Acquisition & Advisory · Based in Los Angeles, CA · Serving Clients Nationwide
Advice built around you and your business.
Cedarmark is based in California and advises buyers and sellers of small businesses nationwide through acquisition due diligence, operational improvement, and sale preparation, backed by hands-on experience in both financial analysis and business operations.
Services
Where Cedarmark helps
Each service below is available to clients nationwide. Cedarmark's work is organized across three core disciplines, with individual services tailored to each stage of the transaction.
Acquisition Due Diligence
Financial, operational, and market review of a target business before you sign, built to surface what actually moves the deal terms, not a boilerplate checklist.
Business Improvement Consulting
Hands-on operating guidance for owners looking to tighten margins, fix reporting, and build the systems a business needs to run without you in every decision.
Sale Preparation Consulting
Get a business buyer-ready: clean financials, a defensible valuation narrative, and the documentation a serious buyer's diligence process will ask for.
CFA Charterholder · Los Angeles
- Bessemer Trust, Analyst
- Single-family office, VP Investments
- Laundromat roll-up, VP Strategy, Corp Dev
- 15 acquisitions closed · ~$18M deployed
About
An advisor's judgment, an operator's scars
Most small-business advice comes from people who never had to live with the numbers they signed off on. John's background is different. He began his career as an analyst at Bessemer Trust, invested on behalf of a single-family office, and later built the corporate development function for a private equity-backed laundromat platform.
In that operating role, John closed 15 acquisitions, deployed roughly $18 million in capital, and helped scale the platform to 24 locations. His work did not stop at diligence and deal terms; he also helped design the platform's operating and financial systems and saw firsthand how acquisition assumptions translated into real-world results.
Cedarmark is based in Los Angeles and advises clients nationwide.
Cedarmark is built as an advisory practice, not a transaction brokerage. The work is judgment and analysis, not a commission on getting a deal done.
That distinction is central to how Cedarmark works. Engagements are structured around the quality of the advice, not whether a transaction closes, keeping incentives aligned with the client's outcome.
FAQ
Questions people usually ask
Is Cedarmark a business broker?
No. Cedarmark is built as an advisory practice, not a brokerage, so the work is judgment and diligence, not a commission on getting a deal closed.
What size deals does Cedarmark work on?
Most client engagements run around $1 million in total investment, though the same approach scales up or down depending on the deal.
Do you only work with laundromats?
The founder's own track record started there, but Cedarmark's advisory work covers small businesses broadly now, any deal where the diligence and operating questions look similar.
How does an engagement usually start?
With a short call to talk through what you're looking at. From there, engagements are scoped and priced flat-fee or hourly, never a success fee tied to closing.
Does Cedarmark work with clients outside California?
Yes. Cedarmark is based in California but advises buyers, owners, and sellers across the United States.
Where is Cedarmark based?
Los Angeles, California. The firm serves clients nationwide.
Get in touch
Start a conversation
Schedule a call
Book time directly on the calendar for a first conversation about your acquisition, sale, or operating challenge.