Last week we asked our Advisor community, “In 2013 when the Value Acceleration Methodology was introduced, how many CEPAs where active in the marketplace?” Here are the results:
40% said 50
27% said 120
13% said 215
20% said 275
As business owners there are times where we pause and reflect. This is one of those moments. I think it’s important to tie back into the history of our profession, industry, and organization. We have come quite a long way as a community of professionals who advise business owners in exit planning and value growth.
EPI was founded in 2005 with the first CEPA Program in 2007. My father, Chris Snider, was one of the first 100 CEPAs. He came through the program in the fall of 2008. Little did he know that just a short four years later he would team up with his son to purchase the business in 2012. That fall, Chris and I took over EPI primarily because we believe in helping owners exit successfully.
Chris had a process at the time called BIGS, Buy, Improve, Grow, and Sell. In 2012 he transitioned from this more siloed approach into a flowing process called the Value Acceleration Methodology. We began implementing this process with business owners in the Midwest. But we knew that if we really wanted to make a difference, we would need to stretch much further than that to address the 4.5 million baby boomer owners in transition. In the spring of 2013, we introduced this methodology to the exit planning profession. We began teaching it to professional advisors of all kinds who shared the same purpose and vision: to help owners create more significant and more transferable companies while aligning their personal and financial goals.
When we introduced The Value Acceleration Methodology, we had 120 CEPAs in the EPI community. Now, eight years later, EPI serves 2,500 CEPAs and another 30,000 advisors across the globe through our chapter network and free online education. As we begin to effect more change and drive more significant companies, EPI will grow to over 10,000 CEPAs in the next 3 years.