Prairie Capital Advisors

are about to sell and exit the business that they’ve often spent years arduously building from scratch. The company takes care to unearthwhat’s important outside of the financial attributes, things like taking care of their employees or certain people, maintaining independence and ensuring that the legacy and brand continue to live on. It determines the pros and cons of each different type of exit strategy so that clients can pursue their choices with absolute confidence. “Our business is very much about being completely independent, providing a large range of options for our clients, and not having any sort of set agenda… It’s about finding the right solution and limiting seller remorse,” Diehl says. Lastly, it must be reemphasized that Prairie is one of the few ESOP companies who advise ESOP companies, so when it enters into consulting engagements,it does so fromnot onlya professional standpoint but from the standpoint of having practically lived its own advice. possible. Beyond that emphasis on teamwork, the company also outpaces many others in its space through the variety of ownership transition scenarios it can advise its clients on. Typically, when companies within the advisory space service ESOPs, they only provide ESOP advisory services. The same is true for companies that can be considered M&A shops; that’s all they’ll tend to do. This is where Prairie Capital Advisors business model differentiates them from competitors; it does all of the above and then some. “Our job is to educate our clients or potential clients on what all of their alternatives are and to help navigate the ownership transition process,” Diehl explains. Not only does Prairie help its clients understand both the financial repercussions and the tax impact of whatever decision they’re making, but also the softer, psychological impact that starts to arise when clients begin to confront the fact that they 6 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE VOLUME 10, ISSUE 12