The Counter Offer

After a long and arduous task of crunching numbers, we decided to meet the owner half way. I was extremely nervous going to meet him to present my offer. I knew I had to be confident about all aspects of the offer, be tough, and not talk too much.

On the way, I noticed a very interesting thing about myself. When I am scared, I just want to curl up and take a nap. I am pretty sure I'm not the only person who does this, but I had never quite realized this in my own behavior. It's this weird feeling, pulling me back home. There was a lot of traffic on the way, which didn't help. I just wanted to be home with the kitties and the puppy. But as soon as I walked into the shop and saw the owner standing there, the feeling went away.

The shop owner actually handled the over-talking for me, which made it easier for me to clear my head. I actually had to steer the conversation to the actual offer while he tried to clutter my mind with information about his business that was so obvious. He said more than three times that he would take only his personal effects from the business, and everything else would stay. As if I would want him to leave his comb! I was strong. I was confident. I was very sure of myself. What a rush! I presented my offer, which I knew I would have to sell because it was lower than he wanted. But I did not waiver. I made all my points supporting my offer, and made a solid attempt to convince him to accept it. (This was, of course, in between all of his babbling and triple explaining of every aspect of the business.) It was clear that I was in the driver's seat, and that actually felt good, which was a surprise because I thought I only liked the pastry making part of the business. We negotiated and negotiated. We talked about when rent would begin; he of course wanting me to start paying rent in March (only two weeks away), and me wanting to start in May (but conceding to start in April). It came down to about $5,000 we were grappling...not much in the scheme of opening a bakery, but in my mind not something to easily cast away. In our counter offer, we went almost $12,000 over what we thought were the useful assets of the business. But that was alright in a way because we were getting rent for about $1,000 less than comparable places in the area. But we still felt we were throwing $12,000 "away" in a sense, so adding $5,000 to that seems hard. We want to win, but we also don't want to lose. We can win by being right (and not paying the $5k), or we can win by being "wrong" (and paying the 5k). We can also lose by not paying the $5k, and run the risk of not having a shop for another full year since there's very few spaces opening up. It's a tough call.