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Posted
1 hour ago, LC said:

A few years ago I bought into some local businesses, including a pizzeria/bar. We are finalizing the sale of that to the owner/operator. Not a homerun by any means, with the sale price + net dividends received along the way, will be about a 25-30% return or ~10-12% annual IRR. Not the worst but from a pure capital allocation perspective definitely inferior to the public markets.

 

The good (or bad) news is now I have a reinvestment problem on my hands.

 

Congratulations LC, --- wonderful return and a good problem to have. Do it again!

Posted
On 5/24/2025 at 12:32 PM, LC said:

Thank you both for the kind words!

Why are you selling, if I may ask?  Thank you.  I have always wanted to invest in private businesses, so am curious about this topic.  

Posted (edited)

Sold my GME calls for a double in two months.

 

Did not like the minimalistic BTC purchase... Was hoping they really took advantage when it dropped to 75k but seems like they didn't.

Edited by Paarslaars
Posted
On 5/24/2025 at 12:18 PM, LC said:

A few years ago I bought into some local businesses, including a pizzeria/bar. We are finalizing the sale of that to the owner/operator. Not a homerun by any means, with the sale price + net dividends received along the way, will be about a 25-30% return or ~10-12% annual IRR. Not the worst but from a pure capital allocation perspective definitely inferior to the public markets.

 

The good (or bad) news is now I have a reinvestment problem on my hands.

Congrats. Great return on a small restaurant/bar.  Honestly, the ability to exit at all with a profit is impressive.

Posted
On 5/24/2025 at 1:18 PM, LC said:

A few years ago I bought into some local businesses, including a pizzeria/bar. We are finalizing the sale of that to the owner/operator. Not a homerun by any means, with the sale price + net dividends received along the way, will be about a 25-30% return or ~10-12% annual IRR. Not the worst but from a pure capital allocation perspective definitely inferior to the public markets.

 

The good (or bad) news is now I have a reinvestment problem on my hands.

 

I think you are the first person I've heard of who used to work in (finance?) and has made money investing in a restaurant rather than lost it as a kind of hobby/"tax strategy". 

 

Congrats!!! 

Posted (edited)
On 5/25/2025 at 3:48 PM, Marco Van Basten said:

Why are you selling, if I may ask?  Thank you.  I have always wanted to invest in private businesses, so am curious about this topic.  

 

34 minutes ago, Rainier said:

Congrats. Great return on a small restaurant/bar.  Honestly, the ability to exit at all with a profit is impressive.

 

Part of the reason I sold was the last 2 years we turned around the business, at this point it is at a steady-state.

 

So nothing really more for me to add to the business, and really it was the owner/operator's "dream" to own his own restaurant...given "the economy" and the volatility in the restaurant industry...figured it was as good a time as any to step back.

 

Along the way, there was definitely a lot of work "educating" the operator on how to run a profitable business. Many disagreements along the way...things like, "No we cannot have 4 employees in the shop from 2pm-5pm when we have 4 total customers" kind of thing...

 

part of the reason (IMHO) the restaurant industry has a bad reputation is because it attracts unskilled labor. The business itself is like any other - if you have a "moat", you can do well. But I think a lot of people running restaurants have 100% kitchen skills and 0% business skills.

 

 

@thepupil Thank you...I still work in finance, this was a side project. It was 90% me telling the operator that we can't hire more people, we can't drastically expand the menu, we can't buy new beer coolers for no reason other than "they're nice"...things like that 😄 Definitely an experience.

 

He is probably happy to have me off his back, I am happy to have walked without a loss!

 

Really the only reason this place succeeded is we are 1 of 2 pizzerias in a big ski area, and we had a guaranteed vendor spot (1 of 5 total) at a regional summer concert venue. So the shop had those built-in "moats". From there it was just limiting as many expenses as possible and ensuring the operator ran a tight ship.

Edited by LC
Posted
4 minutes ago, LC said:

 

 

 

 

part of the reason (IMHO) the restaurant industry has a bad reputation is because it attracts unskilled labor. The business itself is like any other - if you have a "moat", you can do well. But I think a lot of people running restaurants have 100% kitchen skills and 0% business skills.

Agreed. Plus no moat and seemingly infinite competition.

Posted

In my work DC pension, sold my position in the S&P500 which I purchased during trump tariff tantrum with a 15% gain. I'll wait for the next dislocation to buy back in.  Patience...

Posted
23 minutes ago, John Hjorth said:

 

Reads like a good and quick puff for you, Greg [ @Gregmal ] 😉.

Buy when they’re scared and whiny and sell when they’re talking about tacos!

 

$50/60s on Novo was too easy 

Posted
1 minute ago, Gregmal said:

Buy when they’re scared and whiny and sell when they’re talking about tacos!

 

$50/60s on Novo was too easy 

 

lol! 😅 - Yeah, totally sentiment driven ...

Posted

Sold 80% of my IMB position, with the CEO leaving and the thesis having played out, i think its time to move on. But will keep a 2% to see if it keeps going and collect the divis. Didn't feel like it but it doubled the S&P500 return over the past 5 years. Last big tobacco position remaining is now BTI.

Posted

Sold Alphawave semi ($AWEVF) due to the Qualcomm acquisition. Had a large position but didn't want to talk about it previously due to very low trading volume and high volatility. 

 

Sale price was well below expectations with only a 70% return but timing luck made the IRR look good. Qualcomm got a steal at that valuation. 

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