The motorcade brought us to the flight with plenty of time to spare. The 200 lb. box was safely stowed and Max and I were drinking champagne in first class. First row. Lots of leg room. Our very own flight attendant. Pretzels. Smelly blue pillow.
By the way, that box was a pain in the ass -- on one flight it damaged the cargo hold, and the plane was delayed while they repaired the cargo room floor. But not today. Everything was going quite smoothly.
Oh wait, I'll get back this story in just a bit....
Have you ever listened to "Whole Lotta Love" -- the Zeppelin song? You know that part where everything just goes kinda crazy in the middle? Lots of screaming and random sounds of insanity? You know that part? Well, try to imagine those sounds as the soundtrack to this story.
And now back to the story.
We were on our way back from Feebix -- an awesome company with 80 people located just outside of Denver. This wasn't our only first-class trip to Feebix. There were others. There were lots of great restaurants too. In fact, the first time I met the CEO of Feebix was at one of those fancy restaurants.
Maybe I should start there instead.
I met Dick and his entourage at a restaurant in Woodside. I didn't know who he was at the time. I didn't know what he wanted. To tell you the truth, I'm not sure it was really Woodside. All I knew is that I was running out of money, and you don't pass up free dinner in a Woodside-looking-place if you're running out of money.
Dick was the REAL DEAL. He was a man with depth and integrity. He was like a high-tech version of Marcus Welby - a man you could trust for sure. He was surrounded by 3 of his obviously highly-esteemed colleagues. I had driven to the dinner in a rented Toytota pickup. My wife had the car -- and at the time we couldn't afford another. I had been working in the garage since early that morning. I'm not sure if I shaved that day or not.
Dick didn't say much during the first hour or so. I spent the time chit-chatting with one of the colleagues; Wendy. Dick listened in and seemed somewhat agitated; like a volcano that was about to blow. I was sure he regretted setting up the meeting in the first place and was just waiting for it to end.
The chit-chat stopped when Dick put down his fork. He stopped eating. He politely wiped his mouth. Everyone waited to hear what he was going to say. He looked at me, adjusted his posture a little bit and said, "Please Barry, I want to buy your company. Tell me you haven't sold it". Do you remember Marcus Welby's "concerned look"? Like when he was the reading lab results about the kid-who-fell-off-the-horse? Well, MY Marcus Welby had that same look.
But I had the lab results he had been looking for. No, I hadn't sold the company. Little Cindy was going to be just fine! We wrapped up dinner with a promise of getting back together again to discuss the terms. Yeah, like that was going to happen!
Back then, I still had some common sense. And, I was pretty skeptical and cynical about the whole deal. Nobody does business like that. Nobody. Not even Marcus Welby.
A few days pass. Nothing. Then, a phone call. Dick wants to meet. Can we fly to Denver and give them a demo? He wanted a few more of his partners to see what we were doing.
So my good friend Max and I packed up the demo -- which included a giant plasma display -- into a mega-huge trade-show case and drove the airport. This was our first first-class trip. Feebix arranged the whole thing.
We were met in Denver by a few of the Feebix people, and they drove us to the company's headquarters. We rode in a giant black Ford Expedition. It was pretty impressive. I had never heard of Feebix before, but sure enough, there was a brand-new glistening office building next to the highway that was capped with those beautiful red letters; F-E-E-B-I-X. This company was definitely FOR REAL. I started to believe.... just a little bit.
Everyone loved the demo. Dick told me that he'd get back to me real soon, and let me know how they'd like to proceed. We flew back to California.
I waited. Then, we were summoned to Denver again. Same deal. Big case, first class, Ford Expedition, Big Red Letters. Another demo for different people.
After this demo I was alone with Dick in his boardroom. It was time to talk business. He said, "how much do you want?" I already knew the answer. I said, "I want 6 million dollars". To which he replied, "Barry, I wasn't prepared to pay that much. But I see your point. Tell you what -- I'll have our chief council draft the papers. You got yourself a deal".
It was looking like those months of sitting in the garage with a not-so-fresh-feeling were about to pay off. Feebix was a publicly traded company, and this was a CASH offer. Whoo-ee!
For me, it was pretty exciting. For Dick though, I could see that my "tough negotiation tactics" had taken their toll. Little Cindy was out of intensive care, but it was going to be a long recovery. The room was a little silent, and believe it or not, I was still skeptical. I was going to continue with my skepticism until I saw the paperwork.
Then from out of the blue, Dick said something amazing. He said, "Barry - do you need money?". Knowing I couldn't make payroll, I asked him what he meant. He said, "Do you want a check?". Of course I wanted a check. He snapped his fingers and his assistant brought him the checkbook. This time he didn't ask how much I wanted. He gave me a check for $50,000. I used the money to keep the company in business for another few weeks.
When time passed and I still hadn't seen any paperwork, I grew concerned again. Without giving any advance notice, and without even asking, another check for $50K arrived just in time to make payroll. Again.
Apparently we were on a drip-feed, waiting for the deal to close.
This is where the story gets interesting. You might want to turn up the Zepplin sound track.
Dick calls. "Our board of directors is going to meet, and we want you to come out and give them a demo". I had heard many stories about their board. They had a CEO from a Fortune 500, and the US Ambassador to Yabbadabbador (not the real country, btw). This was going to be cool. But at the same time, none of this really made any sense.
No one did any due diligence. No one talked about future plans for the company. No one looked at the software. There were no lawyers, written terms or anything tangible.
Then, one day, I got a clue. I was looking at Feebix's website. A very nice looking website. It turns out that Feebix's stockholder meeting was scheduled for the same day as the board meeting. This seemed strange -- so I called Dick. I just wanted to make sure that he didn't expect me to do a demo during the stockholder meeting too. After all, we haven't closed the deal yet. He told me not to worry. I didn't have to demo during the stockholder meeting.
The morning of the board meeting we flew out to Denver.
When we arrived at the office, Dick was visibly flustered. Something was terribly wrong. Had little Cindy taken a turn for the worse? She sure had!
It turned out that the ambassador was going to be late for the board meeting. The only way he would be able to see the demo is if we gave the demo at the stockholder meeting. "That won't be a problem, will it Barry?"
This is where everything started to get really strange. Despite the fact that my words were "no", everything was proceeding as if I was saying "yes". In fact I found myself going to the stockholder meeting with Dick, all the time telling him that I wasn't going to do it.
Dick's personality changed. No longer was he Marcus Welby. Now he was Tony Soprano. He was just-this-side of making threats. Not only that, but his entourage changed too. I was actually scared. I was cornered by Paulie, Christopher and Silvio, while they attempted to coerse me into giving the demo.
So what could I do? I called my lawyer on my cellphone and asked him if he could speak on my behalf My lawyer at the time was awesome. It was a great solution. I delegated to someone outside of striking range. Clearly, I'm an awesome manager.
At some point Dick relented. There was nothing he could do. Little Cindy was dead. I killed her.
EPILOGUE
it turns out they were acquiring not just my company, but 6 others.
Feebix invited all 7 companies to the stockholder meeting. 6 of them gave presentations. I was the only one who didn't. If you attended the stockholder meeting and didn't know better, you never would never have known that the technologies presented WEREN'T owned by Feebix at the time.
I would broadly and yet delicately classify the stockholder meeting attendees as folks who were on day-trips from retirement homes.
The Office Building? They rented a portion of the top floor, and paid to have their name put on the outside. I was told they had 80 employees. This included 75 or so who were in the companies that they were going to acquire.
Reality Fusion was never acquired, and to my knowledge, none of the other companies were either.
Feebix eventually asked for their $100K back, but I had already spent it.
Feebix is still in business today.
The head of little Cindy's horse, Penelope, was never found.
<The name Feebix is fictional, names of people have been changed. Aside from that though, the story is true, well except for the part about Cindy and her horse>
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