. T E C H N O L O G Y .

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What's it worth?
Uncover your company's valuationwithout high-priced consultants
"M i
om-and-pop businesses
have the same issues as
. the Fortune 5oo. The dif-
ference is that big companies spend mil-
lions on consultants to help fixthem,"
says Christopher Myers, co-founder and
CEO of web-based financial planning
tool BodeTree. But if Myers and his
partner. Matt Ankrum, have their way,
BodeTree will level the playing field.
Released out of beta in April, Bode-
Tree pulls data from a company's Quick-
Books program to build a thorough
financial profile; prepare reports specific
to investors, banks, attorneys or ac-
countants; and, thanks to a proprietary
algorithm, spit out a company valuation.
It's that last function that makes Bode-
Tree unique. "Fvery owner and CEO needs
to know this number, but I'd say 97 per-
cent don't," Myers says. "Instead, they're
obsessed with revenue and 'growing the
business,' when often what they're really
doing is growing broke. They discover
it when they go to sell the business, go
through a divorce or go bankrupttimes
when they spend thousands of dollars on
consultants to help them figure out what
everything's worth."
Mario Evans was one of those
shocked to find out her company's true
value. "Our business is booming, and
we thought it was worth a lot," says the
co-founder of Houston-based wholesale
artisan bread bakery Slow Dough Bread
Co. "But with our debt load, BodeTree
didn't think so."
The program's optimizer tool quanti-
fies the impact of nearly every decision,
from adding or cutting staff to opening
new locations or taking on debt. To
improve Slow Dough's valuation,
Evans used the tool, which pits
her company's financiis
against a Risk Manage-
ment Association
database of indus-
try competitors, i"' '
46 i Entrepreneur August 201S
to find any overlooked solutions. "We
saw that tightening up collections was
the first thing to do, instead of immedi-
ately cutting costs somewhere," she says.
The idea for BodeTree came to
Myers and Ankrum in 2010, when they
were well-paid corporate strategists at
the Apollo Group. "We realized that
most of what we did was ask a few
questions, plug in readily available infor-
mation, read the reports and make
recommendations," Myers says. "Bode-
Tree walks people through the same
process and involves less work than fill-
ing out a car loan doc."
To get the most out of the subscrip-
tion servicewhich costs $250 per year
or $25 per monthMyers advises users
to have at least three years of Quick-
Books data to upload. Up next: a version
for FreshBooks accounting software.
Grant Davis
"Every owner and CEO
needs to know this number."
Christopher Myers, BodeTree
Home Benefits Demo Why Our Story Pricing
Numbers are boring.
Your business isn't.
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