First, I know nothing about 360Coralz. Nothing about their location, revenue, lease, reputation, etc, but I have bought and sold more than a couple of businesses along the way, and franchised my own. That figure of a business valuation based on revenues alone is pretty rudimentary and in this case not applicable because of the type of business. You also need to look at inventory, value of assets, liabilities, and P/E among other factors, and then toss most of that out the window because the success of a business of this type is nearly 100% dependent on the ownership. We've seen good shops, and bad shops, and knowing that most play in the the same ballpark of vendors, MAP pricing, etc there is one key difference and that's the owner. How smart are they, how business savvy, and how good are they at retail.
I can't imagine buying an existing shop over some minimal percentage of value they have in inventory and assets. The clientele (except in a few cases like Neptune's) isn't a particularly loyal clientele. LFS's are destination oriented businesses, and their clientele aren't particularly loyal and will most often shop wherever is convenient with the best deals. Building clientele is the easiest part of this business if the owner is solid. I am certain I can always negotiate a bettrr lease than most others that are already set, and most LFS's have fairly poorly planned locations anyway simply because owners are usually underfinanced when they begin.
As noted the playing field is level in this industry which is actually a huge issue to me. MAP pricing and no exclusivity means all shops have equal opportunities, but those are mostly really, really bad opportunities. Profit margins in this business are ridiculously low, and cost of inventory is ridiculously high and soft goods are fraught with delivery issues and availability.
This damn well better be a labor of love alone for an owner, because I'm pretty sure I've never met a rich LFS shop owner. A very few make a living and do all right (most don't even do that) , but it's a long, tough road, and I can think of dozens of businesses with better investment opportunities.
