Article Library

SEARCH BY...

SEARCH RESULTS

How To Cut Your Estate Tax By 90 Percent

Published March 30, 1993 Barry Kaye |

As currently structured, the tax system in this country levies an estate tax of up to 55 percent, with minimal deductions, on monies passed down from one generation to the next. There is no plan in si...

Read/Download

Breaking Deadlocks Over Valuation

Published March 30, 1993 John A. Graf |

Most first-generation businesses owe their dynamism to the single-mindedness of the owner and the spirit of entrepreneurship which usually pervades the company. When two or more generations become ac...

Read/Download

Family Business Cooperatives

Published March 30, 1993 John Grossman |

Carpet One is just seven years old but it has 460 stores across the country with combined annual sales of $1.1 billion. What's unusual about this fast-growing organization based in Atlanta is that it...

Read/Download

The 10 Deadly Sins in Estate Planning

Published March 30, 1993 Ross W. Nager |

It's a subject that only lawyers, accountants, and insurance salesmen seem to enjoy discussing. Estate planning requires us to face our mortality. The process seems to imply that we must close the boo...

Read/Download

Passing on Pride of Craft

Published March 30, 1993 James Krohe Jr. |

A fourth generation firm in Chicago, A. Finkl & Sons is a steel mini-mill that melts, forges, heat-treats, and machines customized steel pinion shafts, gear blanks, hammer rams, reamer bodies, an...

Read/Download

Giving Generously to Charity Without Cheating Your Heirs

Published December 30, 1992 William J. Goldberg |

Many owners of family businesses approach retirement with conflicting priorities on thedisposition of their assets. They want to donate as much as possible to charity but worry thatcharitable giving w...

Read/Download

The Phantom Stock Plan: A Carrot Without the Stock

Published November 30, 1992 Mark Fischetti |

Diane Montoya knew she had to sweeten her offer. Aschief executive of States Industries, a plywood maker in Eugene, Oregon, she had found a top candidateto become the firm's new vice president of fin...

Read/Download

How Much Is Your Business Really Worth?

Published November 30, 1992 Daniel D. Bayston |

Over the past several years, shareholders of both publicly held companies and closely heldconcerns have experienced significant swings in the value of their holdings. While shareholders ofpublicly hel...

Read/Download

What's Fair in Love and The Business

Published November 30, 1992 Peter Davis |

Productivity and fairness are central themes in family business life. Productivity because someone has to produce the goods and compete so the business can stay alive. Fairness because without it the ...

Read/Download

Before You Get Hitched to a Hired Gun

Published November 30, 1992 Leon Danco |

When a family business owner hires a key manager, it's alot like tying the marriage knot. More so than in a public company, employment in a family firm shouldbe thought of as “until death do us...

Read/Download

What the Law Says Lenders Can and Cannot Demand

Published November 30, 1992 Steven C. Bahls |

One morning in 1983, Donald Bottrell and his partner, Ed Reeve, met their banker for aroutine review of their loans. Their company, Northern Line Layers, a cable concern based in Montana,had six opera...

Read/Download

Invest in Your Kids Through a Family Bank

Published August 30, 1992 Mike Cohn |

Parents who want to spur entrepreneurialism in future generations should consider setting up afamily bank to fund new ventures by family members. Such a bank can be particularly important insecond- an...

Read/Download

A Model Program for Family Run Dealerships

Published August 30, 1992 Howard Muson |

The spectrum of family businesses includes countless small dealers, franchisees, anddistributors who depend for their livelihoods on contractual arrangements with a large manufacturer. Fast-food outle...

Read/Download

How the Walton Family Partnership Worked

Published August 30, 1992 Sam Walton |

No question about it, a lot of my attitude toward money stems from growing up during a prettyhardscrabble time in our country's history: the Great Depression. And this heartland area we come fromout h...

Read/Download

Hiring a CEO Without Giving Away the Store

Published August 30, 1992 Alec Berkman |

When family businesses seek to recruit an outside, nonfamily CEO to run the company, they usually have to offer a compensation package that promises to build the individual's net worth. In the euphori...

Read/Download

Watch Your Language

Published August 30, 1992 Andrea Grace Mackiewicz for Ernst & Young |

Words can hurt just as surely as sticks and stones—whether those words are true or false,whether they are meant to wound or are simply uttered in haste. Particularly in a family business, thech...

Read/Download

When Old Soldiers Don't Just Fade Away

Published August 30, 1992 Leon Danco |

It's every successor's nightmare. Dad has been calling nearly every day from Palm Springs. He'sheard through the grapevine that sales are down and inventory is piling up. He's been told suppliersare ...

Read/Download

Changing Ways of Inheritance

Published August 30, 1992 John H. Langbein |

If you have frequented the camping grounds or motel strips of Middle America lately, you mayhave noticed graying couples driving station wagons and recreational vehicles festooned with bumperstickers...

Read/Download

A Little Empathy Practice Goes a Long Way

Published August 30, 1992 T. Roger Peay |

Having succession problems? Feel misunderstood by your father or your son or daughter or brother-in-law? Maybe they feel the same way. If only everyone could begin to appreciate the other guy's point ...

Read/Download

Why Families Don't Talk About The 'C Word'

Published August 30, 1992 Peter Davis |

Not long ago I had dinner with a family that ran amanufacturing company. We discussed the future of the family business. "Everything is fine," thefather, who is in his late 40s, said about the busines...

Read/Download