Business buyout frenzy.

• Author: Sommars, Jack
• Position: Includes related articles on mergers - Expectation of growth in Colorado

Dan Haney saw it coming. The market was hot, consolidations everywhere. And his most recent five-year plan told him his 33-year-old family-owned screen printing company was poised for change. He went to Englewood-based Good Decal Co.'s other owners - his brothers and sisters - and laid it out. "We can be consumed or expand," he told them.

Expansion would have put the debt-free company in hock, despite its $10 million annual gross sales. The family voted to sell.

Haney, 47, had run Good Decal for 22 years. But last summer his family sold the company to Wallace Computer Services (NYSE:WCS), a Lisle, Ill., commercial printing supply and services operation, for an undisclosed amount. "That's personal," Haney said.

The "100-percent cash transaction," though, brought Haney about 40 percent more than his initial valuation of his company. This pleasing outcome lets him take a long look at his options after his two-year contract with Wallace has expired.

Two things for sure, he said: He'll never start another business, and "I'll never be in debt again."

Colorado's merger and acquisitions market is moving like a snake in an earthquake. Colorado businesses are on a dizzying, unprecedented buying and selling tear, a frenzy hitting all industries and business sizes. The market has gone way beyond the well-publicized megamergers. Today's acquisition and merger market encompasses big guys, little guys and middle guys. Buyers are instate, out-of-state, public and private.

Big guys circle and select little guys for sale, ensuring fast expansion into new markets. Sellers are naming unprecedented multiples for their hard-built companies, and taking undreamed of amounts to the bank, other investments or a new life.

Sellers select from strategic buyers, those bent on acquiring according to corporate plans, or financial buyers searching for the best investment. In turn, buyers seek small- to medium-range businesses - $1 million to $50 million and up - to expand quickly or reach new but major markets.

"We're experiencing a consolidation frenzy here in Colorado," said the man who handled Haney's deal, Ned Minor of Minor & Brown, a Denver law firm specializing in small- and medium-sized buyouts. "Buyers are paying higher multiples than at any time in history."

"It's the ideal time to cash in and to diversify," said Gary Williams, a partner in Denver-based Business Acquisitions Ltd.

Business owners tie up a good 90 percent of their worth in their companies...