My two guests for this episode are Ryan Lechner and Nico Gimenez who have raised a traditional search fund together as partners called Bonsai Group and are a few months into their search. I’ve had searchers with partners on the podcast before, Sam Rosati being a great example, but I haven’t had them on the podcast before together. What made this episode particularly fun is Ryan and Nico are lifelong friends and it shows. Finding a partner for a search with aligned values can be very difficult and luckily for them they had a very long due diligence period.

In this episode we talk about why they chose to search as partners, how the role is divided now and might be upon close, how their outreach strategy has evolved, and a company with a very niche monopoly in surfing.

For the full episode transcript and more information visit alexbridgeman.com/podcast.

I’m also the founder of The Operator’s Handbook, a print publication where small company operators share their insights and ideas for building more effective and profitable companies. Articles focus on process improvement, sales, hiring and training, managing culture, and all responsibilities within operating a small company. If you run a small business and are looking for new ways to grow and improve, subscribe today and join your peers in the endless pursuit of better at theoperatorshandbook.com.