How do I prepare my convenience store for the handover to a buyer?

The buyer of a convenience store is buying a routine as much as a building. Much of that routine lives in your head: which driver comes on which morning, how the till is closed, which customer takes the same paper every day. A good handover moves it out of your head and onto paper before closing, while you are still there to answer questions.

Write the daily routines

Put the open, close and till routines in a binder: alarm steps, float counts, cooler checks, deposits, refunds. Keep each to a page. A new owner or a new employee should be able to follow it without calling you. Ask a staff member to test it by following it and marking where it fails.

Build a supplier contact sheet

List each supplier with a contact, the delivery day, the order cut-off and how ordering works. Sorting by delivery day is more useful than sorting by name. The ordering routine page shows what a buyer will want to learn, and your own sheet answers most of it.

Start the service counters early

Post outlet, ATM, bill payment and lottery counters each belong to a provider, and each has its own steps for approving a new operator. Contact each provider early to learn what it needs, because these approvals can take longer than the rest of the sale. The ATM and bill payment page lists what a buyer checks.

Introduce the buyer and agree the training

Introduce the buyer to staff and to the regulars, once your lawyer agrees the timing, and agree training shifts at the counter in writing, with dates and hours. Pull together the camera footage and records using the cameras and records page.