Going Beyond the Deal

If this was useful, the letter goes further: one short insider note each week on what I'm seeing in live deals right now. It's free, it's two minutes, and replies come straight to me. Join at thejmichael.com/letter . What if the most important part of any deal is the one that never makes the headline? Carolyn Vallejo is senior editor at the Association for Corporate Growth and host of its Middle M...

If this was useful, the letter goes further: one short insider note each week on what I'm seeing in live deals right now. It's free, it's two minutes, and replies come straight to me. Join at thejmichael.com/letter . How do you keep a business alive for 100 years without losing what made it great? Josh Sanders is the fourth generation to lead Sea Breeze, the beverage company his great-grandfather...

If this was useful, the letter goes further: one short insider note each week on what I'm seeing in live deals right now. It's free, it's two minutes, and replies come straight to me. Join at thejmichael.com/letter . What if the thing people fall in love with is the first thing to disappear when a business grows? Tom Selementi went from washing dishes at a bagel shop at 16 to scaling brands like L...

If this was useful, the letter goes further: one short insider note each week on what I'm seeing in live deals right now. It's free, it's two minutes, and replies come straight to me. Join at thejmichael.com/letter . What if the biggest number you can announce is not the one you get to keep? Two founders sold their companies the same year, one for $50 million and one for $30 million, and the one w...

If this was useful, the letter goes further: one short insider note each week on what I'm seeing in live deals right now. It's free, it's two minutes, and replies come straight to me. Join at thejmichael.com/letter . What if the fee you never read is quietly draining your profit? J. Michael Fischer Jr. sits down with Eric Cohen, founder and CEO of Merchant Advocate, built to sit on the business ow...

If this was useful, the letter goes further: one short insider note each week on what I'm seeing in live deals right now. It's free, it's two minutes, and replies come straight to me. Join at thejmichael.com/letter . What if the fix for a life-or-death problem was small enough to fit in the tiny pocket of your jeans? Jessica Walsh has a severe allergy, the kind where the wrong exposure becomes an...

If this was useful, the letter goes further: one short insider note each week on what I'm seeing in live deals right now. It's free, it's two minutes, and replies come straight to me. Join at thejmichael.com/letter . What if the biggest financial moment of your life comes down to everything except the number? In this collage episode of Going Beyond the Deal, host J. Michael Fischer Jr., Managing D...

If this was useful, the letter goes further: one short insider note each week on what I'm seeing in live deals right now. It's free, it's two minutes, and replies come straight to me. Join at thejmichael.com/letter. What if the highest offer is the worst thing that could happen to everything you built? There is a moment near the end of almost every deal when the owner goes quiet. The number is goo...

What if the person across the table is telling you a story, and the real story is the one you never checked? J. Michael Fischer Jr. sits down with Cynthia Hetherington, founder and CEO of the Hetherington Group, and the author of the textbook investigators and agencies learn OSINT from. She helped investigate two of the largest Ponzi schemes in American history and trains thousands of professional...

What if the hardest part of selling your business is the Monday morning after the deal closes? The Exit Planning Institute found that 76% of business owners who sell regret it within a year. In this solo episode, J. Michael Fischer Jr., Managing Director at DBD Investment Bank, explains why that regret is almost never about the money. Michael breaks down the gap between a successful transaction an...

What happens to you, not just your business, when AI can do the expert work you built your career on? Ivan Nikolov spent his career in fitness and mindset coaching before co-founding Parallon AI, a company built to hand a business’s most repetitive expert work to machines. In this conversation with J. Michael Fischer Jr., the two go past the usual AI efficiency talk to a harder question: what happ...

What if the smartest business you ever build is the one you never planned to sell? Laurel Whitney has done what most founders only imagine once. She is the co-founder and CFO of Push Beverages, but before that she built and sold the largest independent vending company in New Jersey, and before that she opened and sold a 22,000 square foot children's entertainment facility. In this conversation wit...

What if the hardest-working person in the room is actually the one getting the least done? J. Michael Fischer Jr. sits down with David Crawford, CEO of Anco AI and the chief operating officer behind Fischer’s advisory work, books, speaking, and this podcast. Fischer thought he had no time problem. He was disciplined, guarded his calendar, and outworked the room. Then David asked one question that...

What if the price you get for your business was mostly decided before you ever called a banker? A founder called J. Michael Fischer Jr. last year, excited, ready to sell the company he had spent almost 20 years building. Michael had to tell him the hard truth. The price he was going to get had already been mostly decided, not by the market or the buyer, but by what he did or failed to do in the 24...

What if the most dangerous thing in a hospital room is the air itself? Gary Kellstrom Jr. spent 17 years in the medical device industry before betting everything on one idea. He is founder and CEO of Geared Power Biotech, the Wayne, New Jersey startup behind BioGuard UVC, a wearable device that inactivates airborne pathogens in exhaled breath before they reach anyone else. With J. Michael Fischer...

What if most restaurants fail for reasons that have almost nothing to do with the food? Half of them close, and last year nearly 10,000 shut down across America. In this episode, J. Michael Fischer Jr. sits down with Michael Balsamo, founder and CEO of The Sage Advisory Group, to unpack why. Michael grew up in his family's Italian restaurant on Long Island, worked every job from the dish pit to th...

What if the numbers you trust most are the ones steering your business into the ground? Jay David has spent his career inside food manufacturing plants, where real decisions carry real consequences. He is a turnaround operator and the author of Turnaround Revelations, and he speaks a language most consultants do not, having lived on both the finance and operations sides of a struggling business. I...

What if the highest offer on the table is the one that leaves you with the least? A founder once turned down an offer, then a month later celebrated a bigger one that put less money in his pocket. In this solo episode, J. Michael Fischer Jr., Managing Director at DBD Investment Bank, explains how that happens and why the number on the front page of a letter of intent is not the deal. Michael break...

What if your greatest setback became your launchpad for impact and growth? In this episode, J. Michael Fischer Jr. sits down with Eric LeGrand, entrepreneur, motivational speaker, and founder of LeGrand Coffee House and Eric LeGrand Bourbon. They dive deep into the raw realities of starting over after unimaginable adversity, challenging common myths about resilience, business, and success. Through...

What if your family business legacy is actually a hidden burden? J. Michael Fischer Jr. dives deep into the emotional and strategic fault lines of succession where legacy, guilt, and honest conversations collide. This episode is for founders, operators, and advisors who care about more than just the numbers. If you've ever wondered what really happens when your children don’t want the business, or...

Do you really understand the hidden link between your mouth and your overall health? In this high-impact episode, J. Michael Fischer Jr. sits down with Dr. Maria Kunstadter, CEO and co-founder of The Teledentist, to reveal why virtual dental care is so much more than a convenience. It’s a lifeline for millions missing out on essential oral health. They unpack the surprising ways virtual consults a...

What if the unseen threat in your daily tech use is more dangerous and more addressable than you think? In this episode, Amy Hedrick, CEO and founder of Cleanbox Technology, shares how a single unnoticed risk ignited a revolution in technology hygiene. Joined by your host, they dive deep into the urgent and overlooked dangers of shared devices, unpacking the surprising business opportunity lurking...

What if the real breakthroughs in longevity are happening behind the scenes, hidden from mainstream health trends? This episode features Brad Younggren, CEO of Circulate Health, who’s quietly transforming how advanced therapies reach people determined to live longer, healthier lives. Together, he and Michael dig deep into the urgent gap between hyped-up longevity ideas and what’s really working, u...

Is your approach to launching or investing in beverage brands holding you back without you knowing it? In this high-impact conversation, J. Michael Fisher Jr. sits down with Bill Petromovich, a proven beverage industry operator and investor, to expose what really drives brand success, what keeps founders from ever breaking through, and why old-school juice could be the next billion-dollar disrupti...

Ever wonder what will separate tomorrow’s winners from the lost in an economy shaken by AI? In this urgent, eye-opening episode, J. Michael Fisher Jr. sits down with Keith Zubchevich, CEO of Conviva, to reveal how AI is fundamentally rewriting the rules for business owners, advisors, and operators. If you think AI is just another technology wave, get ready to have your assumptions shattered. From...