Salty Dawg Pet Grooming & Bakery. Price: $200K. Seller financing of $100K.

Salty Dawg is a relatively new franchise concept owned by some pretty big names: Winn Claybaugh, Gary Ratner, John Hewitt. This store is well-staffed and newly remodeled. Sales are averaging $10K+/wk. 90-day comp sales of +23%. But in no uncertain terms, this store is not yet at breakeven. We’re heading in the right direction, but we still need either more in sales or less in payroll. To build a new Salty Dawg would cost about $300K, plus another $50K in staffing and grand opening expenses, plus a full year’s time to build and open. That’s why buying an existing store with $500K/yr in base sales might be a better option.

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I bought this Salty Dawg franchise store for my kids (26 and 27 years old). I felt so strongly about the brand that I bought the Atlanta Area Development rights for myself. Although well intentioned, it soon became clear that my kids had zero interest in owning a business, much less running it. Stated differently, my kids had no passion for the business, and they decided to pursue other careers. While I love the dog grooming business, with 70+ Great Clips hair salons, having one lone store in a completely different brand makes no sense. It’s more of a distraction than anything else, so I’m looking to sell, preferably to an owner/operator.

Salty Dawg is a great concept, but the store very much needs a franchisee who’s involved in the day-to-day operations and passionate about building the business. Properly run, this store should do about $20K/wk ($1M/yr). It has the capacity to do about $30K/wk ($1.5M/yr), plus you could add mobile grooming (which adds another $5K/wk ($0.25M/yr) per truck. Some might say that offering 50% in seller financing means that I’d essentially be a 50-50 partner. From an equity standpoint, that’s sort of true, but only until the note is paid off. The real benefit is that if the seller has money on the table, they’ll do everything they can to help mentor, coach, support your success.

Salty Dawg is a franchise. So, any potential buyer would have to get pre-approved by the franchisor (Loyalty Brands) and also have good enough credit to satisfy the landlord (for the lease assignment). In terms of the capital, I’m willing to hold the paper on $100K. The buyer would have to have the means to come up with the other $100K. Whether that be from cash, savings, or a HELOC is up to you, but just realize that a $100K loan is often too small for the SBA to dabble with. And just a tip…when buying a business, make sure you have at least an additional 10-20% set aside for working capital.

I do expect my post to get quite a few views/responses, which is great. But regardless of the demand, this won’t become a bidding war. I’m NOT interested in selling for a penny over my asking price. Rather, I’m going to sell to the person who I believe is the best qualified to grow sales and profits. Why? Because a franchisee running a successful and profitable store makes it much easier to scale, to open more stores. Being that I’m the Area Developer, that’s a win/win.