Are you searching for sound advice for your business start up ?  If you are starting a business in San Diego or anywhere in California, there are several decisions to be made that will have a profound impact on the success of your venture.

It is important to have access to an experienced  business advisor with the experience and legal skill to guide you through the beginning of this exciting process, as well as a team member who will support your efforts to grow that business well into the future.

The Watkins Firm has more than four decades of experience in business formation and ongoing operations. We are prepared to help by providing insight into the selection and establishment of your business entity, as well as planning for how decisions will be made.  This will require custom-tailored corporate documents such as an LLC operating agreement or a corporate shareholders’ agreement and bylaws.  The Watkins Firm can support you through every process of startup and development, including HR documents such as employee handbooks and policies and procedures, crafting employee agreements, creating business contracts, even assisting in the negotiation your first commercial lease.

The Watkins Firm provides sound advice for your business start up to make sure it has the strongest opportunity to survive and thrive. We will work to protect your personal assets, as well as all of the money, time and sweat you will be investing in your new business.

The Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics reports 20% of new businesses fail in the first year and 50% will fail by their fifth year of business.  The Watkins Firm provides sound advice for your business start up l and helps our clients to avoid the pitfalls which befall other businesses.

Pro-Tip: “If you choose a corporation, not all corporations are the same. If you choose a limited liability company, if you choose a partnership, a limited liability partnership, there’s all types of different variations. And then you can get into the nitty gritty based on your profession and all the regs and all the professional license requirements and all of the, depending on the kind of company, their resale license and permits. There’s all kinds of little things that your old business lawyer knows about <laugh> and can tell you about from the get go. As opposed to you finding out after you’ve made a few mistakes,

You’re giving birth to a living creature that’s been recognized by the United States Supreme Court. And so you have these corporate documents and you have to decide on how much ownership will be and who owns what. Then you decide about what potential types of ownership there might be such as reserve shares, or other ways in which people can own part of it. And then you capitalize it. Either you capitalize it with cash or you capitalize it with goodwill or a combination or a property. But how you capitalize it can determine whether or not it’s a real company or you have all those protections of corporate veil and creditors and you’re personally shielded. So how you start it is very important. And thinking about it, we’ll send you on the right path to avoiding all kinds of pitfalls and trouble.

If you’re going to be doing some big business, you’re going to have big liability or you could personally not have big liability. And also you can have an entity that can be sold. You can have an entity that can be sold in whole or bring in investors. If you do everything right, you get to do all these things. If you get a big opportunity and you didn’t set your company up correctly, then you can’t have a business suiter with several million dollars knock on your door to acquire you. You’ve not taken the time to set things up right in the beginning, and you have to rewrite everything and restructure everything and hope you didn’t make any mistakes. And all of a sudden that opportunity doesn’t look like such a good deal. And that person who’s got the investment money will say, ‘well, this person’s not professional. This person’s not really serious about doing business.’ And you’ll miss it all because you didn’t pay attention in the beginning when you formed a company.” – Dan Watkins, Founding Partner

If you are starting a San Diego or Southern California business we invite you to review our podcast Episode 34 – Business Formation as well as the strong recommendations of our clients and contact the Watkins Firm or call 858-535-1511 for a complimentary consultation today.

We work with you to develop a strategy that is cost effective while meeting and exceeding your objectives.  You’ll receive sound advice for your business start up and a strong foundation of corporate documents and contracts.  The experience and advice we bring to the table will compliment your own business skills and knowledge increasing the likelihood of business success.