When the time comes, do you want to sell your business externally, or internally to your employees or family members?

Once you decide, a little piece of you may always wonder how the other option would have played out. That’s why the story of Barry Wood is such an interesting case study. Wood is a door guy, who started M&I Door Systems in 1995, sold M&I in 1998, and then started another – virtually identical – door business in 2003, only to sell it in 2013.

Wood sold his first door business externally and his second internally, so his two exits allow us to see clearly the differences between these two types of sale with an as close to apples-to-apples comparison as possible. The pros and cons of selling externally rather than internally may surprise you.