A27M
Apply

Publications

The thesis, in long form.

White papers and articles from inside the collective. The deepest version of the A27M argument lives here. New writing lands periodically.

Article9 min read

The Squeeze on the Middle

The floor came up, the ceiling came down, and you are standing in between

A solo operator with a subscription now delivers about eighty percent of your work at forty percent of your cost. Meanwhile a platform held us to $10,000 a month for seven months on a contract that auto-renewed, at a point when we were already hurting. Nothing in your business broke. The position it sits in did.

  • trends
  • ai
  • growth
August 3, 2026
Read
Article10 min read

Buying the Agency Across Town Without a Big Check

The math that lets consolidators buy your market works just as well in the other direction.

One advisor in our orbit came in on the exit of a nine-year private equity roll-up, and the whole effort returned about 9% a year. Buying the agency across town is still the cheapest growth you will find, and the structures that let consolidators do it without writing checks work the same in your direction. Just do not confuse it with getting rich quickly.

  • buying
  • growth
  • deal-structure
July 20, 2026
Read
Article9 min read

The Founder-Dependence Discount

If the business needs you daily, a buyer is not purchasing a company

Somewhere in the process a buyer will ask what happens here if you are unavailable for ninety days. On $600,000 of earnings, the honest answer is worth $1.2 million, because the same agency prices at 3x or at 5x depending on how much of it runs without you in the room.

  • growth
  • valuation
  • operations
June 29, 2026
Read
Article8 min read

Recurring Revenue Changes the Math

The same fix that solves January solves your multiple

An agency doing $3M at a 20% margin earns about $600K, and that same $600K sells for anywhere between $1.8M and $3M. Same clients, same crew, $1.2M of difference, decided mostly by whether the revenue arrives on a contract or has to be resold from scratch every thirty days.

  • growth
  • recurring-revenue
  • valuation
June 22, 2026
Read
Article8 min read

What Moves the Multiple

Same earnings, different price. The gap gets built years before anyone names a number.

Two agencies both cleared $600,000 in adjusted EBITDA last year. One sold for $1.8 million. The other sold for $3 million. That $1.2 million gap was decided two or three years before either owner ever took a buyer's call.

  • valuation
  • multiples
  • growth
June 8, 2026
Read
Learn · A27M