Would you marry them and have kids together?

If you’re willing to grab a drink I’ve got a story for you.

Several years ago I was in the process of re-launching my writing and I was pitching some story ideas to a well-known bike magazine.

One of the stories I wanted to write was about one of the very first 29”er only companies.

My editors said they liked the idea so I hired a photographer, went for a ride with one of the founders of the company and later had lunch with the second half of the company.

My first indication that something was wrong was when I contacted the person they said was going to be fabricating some titanium frames for these guys. When I got them on the phone they said they wanted to keep their name out of the story and didn’t want to be associated with this company.

Whoa…

Okay…

The second was when I asked the two partners when we could expect to see some new product and they said they didn’t have anything in the works.

That seemed to be it then so I called my editor and said I was killing the story because there wasn’t a story.

Or so I thought.

A couple of months passed and I got an IM on Facebook from someone I didn’t recognize. As it turned out it was one of the partners I had interviewed a couple of months previously.

He said he wanted to talk over the phone so I blasted him my number and sometime later I got a call.

He wanted to know where the story was and I told him there wasn’t going to be a story because there wasn’t any company.

He got a little hot under the collar and said he was banking on that story to get the company rolling again.

After he cooled down he said he wanted to meet again.

We met, grabbed some coffee, talked a bit and things seemed fine.

As we were wrapping things up he said that he wanted to get to get together again but next time we were going for a ride.

One ride turned into many and many rides turned into many conversations and those conversations eventually lead to him asking me if he wanted to come on board and become a new partner.

I hated my day job and I didn’t have anything else on the horizon so I figured, what the heck. I knew the industry pretty well and we seemed to have complementary skill sets.

Afterward, we rode and rode, and we talked and talked.

During my off time, I did some research concerning angel investors, logistics, business plans, mission statements and, something wacky called a contract. 

Every time I tried to pin him down about those things he became evasive and promised we'd talk about them during our next ride.

So we rode and rode, and talked and talked and talked some more.

I was spending so much time doing this my wife started to worry that nothing was going to come out of this. My wife is uncannily smart and she suggested I talk to my sister-in-law.

I talked to my sister-in-law because she’s been through several business programs and she suggested I call up some of my partner’s acquaintances and ask them about their experience with my partner.

I phoned one of my partner’s former co-workers and asked about my partner and they had some positive things to say about him.

But when I told my partner about the call he got very upset and I had to spend some time talking him down.

That.

Was.

Not.

Normal.

My tilting point came when I went for a ride with my partner and went for our final ride together.

We took off and we were riding along a singletrack I started gabbing away and after a bit, I realized I was alone.

I rode back to the trailhead calling the partner’s name because he could have had a mechanical issue.

He was nowhere to be found.

I rode to the parking lot.

His car was gone.

I loaded my bike onto my truck and drove to his house.

I knocked on his door, rang his bell, and called both his cellphone and landline.

Nothing.

At that point, I was done.

Sure, I had some good rides in but as far as business went, it detonated before it hit the launch pad.

So… Here’s my point. There are plenty of business programs, and how-to books about how to start a business and they almost always say that starting a business is risky and starting one with a partner is even riskier.

If you do want to partner up, do your homework and don’t make the mistakes I did.

Here is what I learned:

1.   Get as much information about your prospective partner as you can.
2.   Do they have a solid financial history?
3.    Have they had multiple divorces?
4.    Do they have a police record?
5.    Can you stand being with each other for days or weeks at a time?
6.    How do they react during a crisis?
7.    Had they been in a partnership before?
8.    What happened?
9.    Do they have a history of success?
10.  Do they have problems with drugs or alcohol?
11.   Would you marry them and have kids together?
12.   Never partner with an asshole.

While I was bummed that the whole venture crashed and burned I’m glad it did before I was deeply in debt and was burdened with inventory I couldn’t unload.

My biggest failing was I was engaged with my ego, and I acted emotionally, not intellectually.

Emotions are great when you’re in the flow during a ride, not so great when if you want to start a business.