Business for sale - Media Publishing Company
~ NEGOTIABLE TERMS ~ STAGED PAYMENTS POSSIBLE ~ PRICE IS FOR OUTRIGHT COMPLETE PURCHASE
£35,000 for a business that is well-established and highly profitable. Minimal hours per week to run (less than five) and very easy to run from a small office or even from home. Assets valued at £40,000 and ongoing income from publishing in-house IT manuals in electronic format (on DVD or E-Mailed to customer).
Highlights:
* Unusual and interesting business type. * Been run by the owner as a profitable business for ten years. * Extremely high profit to costs ratio. * Operational business. Orders coming in on the phone and through web site. * Ultra-low running costs. * Fully relocatable. * No actual premises required as a base. * Easy to integrate into an existing business. * A one-person staff is all that's needed. * Very high profit. * Lots of sales potential. * Large database of subscribers. * Huge library of owned-outright IT manuals. * Well-established
Very Flexible Financial operations: • Most sales are processed through PAYPAL. Meaning money can be withdrawn from the business in any country, to any bank, directly on to a credit card or by cheque from PAYPAL. • Each sale of 'courseware files' is on a DVD that costs less than 25p to write and print. • At computer shows and exhibitions you could generate thousands of pounds in cash sales, each time only providing a 25p DVD. This cash can then be paid in to the company bank account and withdrawn through the bank or through PAYPAL. • So...every sale of £50 up to £395 costs only 25p to supply. That means, from 10 sales at £395, you are paying in £3950 to the bank account and incurring production costs of just £2.50.
100% equity and ownership of all assets, and the company - is what is on sale. PROFITABLE, FLEXIBLE, UNUSUAL but VERY EASY TO RUN AND ADMINISTER. An extremely profitable web-based publishing company. The turnover isn’t huge as I do not do any advertising or marketing but the nett profit margin is extremely high (above 70 per cent). So the potential is great. Entirely relocatable without any need for dedicated retail or office premises. Can be run from any small office or part of an existing business operation. Run since its inception by one person (no need for employees). Annual sales figures over the past decade have varied according to the amount of sales work I've put in. When I worked on it as a normal working week and had a commission-only salesman I achieved £70,000 in one year. I no longer do any pro-active sales work (not for the past 3
Updated: 20 October 2009
years). All sales come from the web site subscribers and Google search result clicks. In the past 20 months (to October 2009) I've turned over through the books £43,958.97, of which almost all is profit due to the tiny sales fulfilment costs.
business.
What ships in the package: Domain names. coursewareco.com, coursewareco.co.uk. All web content. Code, files, data, images, etc. Company with its books (all in credit; no liabilities) VAT registration and bank accounts. Databases of almost 3000 IT professionals (IT Training Consultants and IT recruitment professionals.
The business:
www.coursewareco.com The Courseware Company
The person:
David Williams - Writing and publishing IT training manuals for the past eleven years. I have operated my IT courseware publishing operation for 11 years and it has been very lucrative, low pressure work and flexible. As well as carrying low running costs and no need for staffing costs, beyond myself. I started it from nothing, writing a large amount of the courseware myself and buying courses in from other authors. The courseware library became quite large and maintaining updates and adding new releases can be time-consuming. Consequently, in the past four years my courseware library has become a little outdated and in need of courseware rewrites. Due to a lack of time, I have concentrated on Microsoft Office applications courseware. This part of the library of fully up to date and it is the most in-demand courseware in the instructor-led training industry. This is our best seller and my Office 2007 courseware is used successfully daily in classrooms, worldwide, for the delivery of high quality IT training courses. The courseware library is up-to-date but the buyer of this business should budget an amount of money for updating a portion of the courseware titles to newer releases if required by the buyer. Or be prepared to carry out some authoring in-house. I am happy to remain on call or contract as courseware author and can commit to creating the Office 14 updates in the New Year at no extra cost to the business sale price agreed. Three years ago I redesigned my courseware publications web site (COURSEWARECO) to incorporate its sister site - a recruitment/matching service
Updated: 20 October 2009
Publications assets - outright and complete ownership of the IT training manuals library, featured on The Courseware Company web site (coursewareco.com). All customer databases, leads, history and customer intelligence information. International ‘COURSEWARECO’ domain names.
Most successful sales: One-off sale to online learning company: £10,000.
for IT training professionals. I had the web site redesigned and improved early in 2007 and the number of subscribers increased. This increase was sustained and sales levels remain good, although I do no active sales and marketing work. Sales come through Google Adwords and from those subscribed to the site. I value the number of subscribers and this aspect may appeal to a potential buyer with a product or service that could be marketed to the subscriber database. I half-own a retail classic scooters shop in Bristol (Fanatic Scooters; see www.fanaticscooters.co.uk) and now wish to spend time and investment on the manufacture of classic scooter spare parts. The IT courseware publishing business was perfect for me before my children were born and when they were pre-school age because it is a business that can be operated at any time of the day in small chunks. Also when I was travelling and living abroad it was the ideal 'no actual business premises' way to keep earning whilst on the move and out of the UK job market. It has always been very low-maintenance and requires no staff. When extra income is required, a mailshot to subscribers or a table at a show or computer fair always produces. I have not explored sale of the manuals in hard copy format, preferring to stick to the soft media option, which is cheaper and easier, as a hands-off business, to run.
Single day at the NEC IT Training Show, Birmingham £8,500 taken in cash sales in the exhibition hall. Production costs and flyers cost less than £50.
Proposed sale procedure: 1. Price, contract of sale and transfer of assets inventory agreed. 2. Contract signed and simultaneous deposit paid/handing over of electronic assets, to show goodwill on both sides. Ten or twenty per cent deposit suggested. Assets handed over at this point courseware publications library, customer and subscriber databases. 3. Balance paid at time of signing over of domain names and (thereby) full control of web sites and calls/orders/sales (ongoing business). 4. Conclusion of sale to involve handing over to buyer of all electronic files, templates, additional web site files and data. 5. Ongoing support or help, as negotiated or agreed.
The company:
Incorporated as Seven Dials Media Distribution Limited Trading as:
THE COURSEWARE COMPANY IT TRAINING TOOLKIT COURSEWARECO
Assets Valuation: £40,000 - £50,000:
The COURSEWARECO web site is valued (by its own cost and the cost of building anything similar) at £15,000 including its own brand and company and product design matter. The courseware library of 242 IT training manuals is valued at £40,000. The COURSEWARECO database of almost 3000 subscribers (IT professionals) has not been externally valued. But it is up-to-date and has not been used to market any products other than IT courseware and COURSEWARECO web services.
Updated: 20 October 2009
Expected frequent questions:
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What are the courseware main strengths and weaknesses? We are nearing the end of the Microsoft Office version cycle. Office courseware is always our best seller, as is Office 2007. The new version (v14) of Office is due out in early 2010. The down side is that sales of office 2007 courseware are now decreasing due to the new version on the horizon. The strength, however, is that this will be a great opportunity to launch courseware for it early on and capitalise on the demand. I will write the Office 14 courseware updates for the new owner of The Courseware Company as part of the sale price. Are the terms negotiable and would you consider staged payments? Yes. I would consider an initial payment to allow transfer of the assets and new-owner trading to commence. Followed by a second (final) payment in 2010, or on my delivery of the Office 14 courseware. Would you be prepared to continue as courseware author (contractor)? Yes. Where do the sales come from? Mostly from subscribers to the site call in and place orders. There are just short of 3000 of them. New subscribers re attracted to the site for recruitment/employment prospects and they are attracted to the courseware element of the site and special offers. I also send newsletters and mailouts to all subscribers occasionally detailing special offers. How could sales be increased? My largest sales volumes always came from exhibitions, shows and computer fairs. These are mostly - cash sales. Computer fairs take place all over the country, on most Sundays. It is easy to make sales at these events. Publication and sales of hard copies is unexplored. Investment of time or money in course updates in the library would increase sales. Development of the franchise concept now advertised on the site.
6. Training will be given but the buyer will be expected to be fully computerliterate. Please ask for details.
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Why are you selling this business now? Because it is in good shape and with some investment of time or money it could significantly increase its turnover, but I don't have that time any more to expand it. I have a half share in a classic scooters business which I now wish to spend more time and money on.
Updated: 20 October 2009
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Would you take any less than the advertised price? I would not consider much less because, at around £20,000 per year profit, with very low maintenance and near zero running costs, I am only 2 years away at any time from profit income of £40,000 and 3 years away from future income of £60,000. With the assets retained. How did you acquire the large number of subscribers in the user databases? From years of shear hard work, advertising my IT recruitment sites, doing mailshots and doing the exhibition rounds. After all this work in the early years and after a decent number were captured as a foundation, word of mouth ensured regular new registrations. I still advertise on Google ADWORDS. Who wrote all the courseware in the courseware library? All the courseware I publish and sell through The Courseware Company was either written by me or purchased by me or my companies over the years. I do not publish or sell any courseware that belongs to others and no royalties are due on any of the materials I publish.
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Contact:
David Williams 58 North Street, Bristol BS3 1HJ Work - 0117 902 8656 | mobile - 07795 423598 | fax - 0870 460 2492 info@coursewareco.com
Updated: 20 October 2009