Local Businesses.
Permanent Community Assets.Local Businesses. Permanent Community Assets.
AllHold helps owners sell to a trust that keeps the business,
the building, and the jobs in the neighborhood, for everyone.AllHold helps owners sell to a trust that keeps the business, the building, and the jobs in the neighborhood, for everyone.
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AllHold Capital transforms business succession into a strategy for long‑term stability—keeping enterprises rooted, workers protected, and wealth circulating locally.AllHold Capital transforms business succession into a strategy for long‑term stability— keeping enterprises rooted, workers protected, and wealth circulating locally.
Now is the moment.
Millions of profitable, community‑anchoring businesses are approaching owner retirement—with no viable succession plan. The result is predictable: closures, job loss, displacement (longtime businesses and residents being pushed out), and extracted wealth (money that leaves the neighborhood instead of staying in it).
Closure isn't a personal failure. It's structural.
Succession Is the Next Major Displacement Event.
Baby boomers own nearly a quarter of all small businesses, and fewer than one in three small-business owners has a documented exit plan.1
As owners retire:
- •Businesses close
- •Jobs are lost
- •Commercial real estate is sold or extracted
- •Local economies destabilize
Traditional exit options force owners to choose between liquidity (cash in hand) and legacy (what they built lasting after them).
Most succession pathways:
- •Separate the business from its real estate
- •Require capital workers don't have
- •Prioritize extraction or short‑term exit
The result: profitable, essential businesses disappear—not because they failed, but because transition was treated as a financial transaction instead of economic infrastructure (the basic systems a community's economy depends on, like roads or utilities).
A Unified, Place‑Based Ownership Model.
Place-based means rooted in a specific neighborhood.
AllHold's core innovation is simple—and structural.
One perpetual Employee Ownership Trust (EOT) holds both:
- •The operating business
- •The business‑occupied real estate
Employees are the sole beneficiaries (the people the trust exists to benefit: the employees).
By keeping the enterprise and the building together in perpetuity (forever), AllHold stabilizes the business, the commercial corridor (a neighborhood's main business street), and the surrounding community—permanently.
This is succession as stewardship, not extraction.
AllHold works because ownership transition is not treated as a one‑time deal—but as an operating system (a repeatable process that runs every deal the same way).
AllHold offers a different path.
We transition locally rooted businesses—and the buildings they occupy—into permanent, worker‑centered ownership, using patient capital (loans that are paid back slowly, on the business's timeline) and embedded transition infrastructure (the hands-on support that carries a business through the change in ownership) to stabilize communities at the moment they're most vulnerable.
Capital + Structure + Transition Infrastructure
Catalytic Capital
Catalytic capital is money that takes on more risk, waits longer, or accepts lower returns than typical investors, so deals happen that otherwise wouldn't. We deploy blended capital (a mix of loans, grants, and investment from different sources) that is patient (paid back slowly, on the business's timeline) to:
- •Acquire the business and real estate at fair‑market value (the price a typical buyer would pay)
- •Fund the full transition process
- •Align repayment with business performance—not liquidation
Purpose‑Locked Structure
Purpose-locked means the trust's rules keep it serving employees and the community, and can't be changed to sell it off.
- •A single Employee Ownership Trust holds both assets
- •Workers become beneficiaries without personal buy‑in or debt
- •Ownership is locked for long‑term community benefit
Transition Infrastructure
Embedded support that begins before closing and continues through stabilization.
- •Education
- •Diligence (checking the business's finances, legal records, and building before the sale)
- •Governance (how decisions get made, and who makes them)
Transition infrastructure is the catalyst that makes employee ownership durable.
You shouldn't have to choose between getting paid and protecting what you built.
Close the doors
You get paid: Only what you can sell off
Your employees: Lose their jobs
Your building: Sold or left empty
Your name and legacy: Gone
After the sale: Nothing left to stay involved in
Sell to a competitor or investor
You get paid: Yes, if you can find a buyer
Your employees: May be let go or relocated
Your building: Often sold off separately
Your name and legacy: Up to the new owner
After the sale: Decided by the buyer
A DIFFERENT PATH
Sell to an Employee Ownership Trust with AllHold
You get paid: Yes, a fair price, part at closing and part over time
Your employees: Keep their jobs and share in the profits
Your building: Stays with the business, permanently
Your name and legacy: Protected
After the sale: Your choice: step back or stay involved
IN PLAIN ENGLISH
What is an Employee Ownership Trust?
Think of it as selling your business to a trust that holds it for the people who work there, for good.
Your employees don't buy anything, borrow anything, or put up any money. They share in the profits and get a real voice in how the business is run.
It's not a co-op, and there are no shares to buy or sell. With AllHold, the trust owns your building too, so the business can never be priced out of its home.
Purpose: work that pays fairly and treats people well.
Place: real estate that stays in community hands, not sold off to the next investor.
Prosperity: a business strong enough to keep providing both.
IN PLAIN ENGLISH
What is an Employee Ownership Trust?
Think of it as selling your business to a trust that holds it for the people who work there, for good.
Your employees don't buy anything, borrow anything, or put up any money. They share in the profits and get a real voice in how the business is run.
It's not a co-op, and there are no shares to buy or sell. With AllHold, the trust owns your building too, so the business can never be priced out of its home.
Purpose: work that pays fairly and treats people well.
Place: real estate that stays in community hands, not sold off to the next investor.
Prosperity: a business strong enough to keep providing both.
How it works
We talk
A confidential, no-obligation conversation about your business and your goals. We're glad to sign an NDA before you share anything.
We agree on a fair price
We value your business fairly, including what it means to the neighborhood, and build a plan the business can actually afford.
The trust buys the business, and the building
You're paid, your team stays, and the building stays with the business for good.
We stay with your team
Up to three years of hands-on training in governance, finances, and leadership, so your employees are set up to succeed.
Is this right for your business?
We're starting in Philadelphia, but AllHold is built as a national model, designed to be replicated in communities across the country.
Not sure? Tell us about your business and we'll figure it out together.
Tell us about your business
WHO YOU'LL TALK TO
Hi, I'm Maura Shenker.
I've spent close to twenty years in Philadelphia's small business world, including leading Temple University's Small Business Development Center, working inside a CDFI, and working at the U.S. Small Business Administration. I've also run my own small business, so I know what it's like on your side of the table.
More about AllHoldFor employees
Heard your owner is thinking about retiring? Employee ownership could keep your job, and give you a share of the profits and a voice in the business. No buy-in, no debt, no personal risk.
Learn what it means for youFor funders & partners
AllHold's capital is lent, not granted, and every dollar that comes back funds the next transition.
Explore the capital modelSOURCES
- Yearwood, K., Stewart, S., III, Marks, N., & Noel, N. (2026, February 26). The Great Ownership Transfer: A new era of business stewardship. McKinsey Institute for Economic Mobility. https://www.mckinsey.com/institute-for-economic-mobility/our-insights/the-great-ownership-transfer-a-new-era-of-business-stewardship
- Rothwell, J. (2025, March 24). Most small-business owners lack a succession plan. Gallup. https://news.gallup.com/poll/657362/small-business-owners-lack-succession-plan.aspx
Let's talk about what comes next.
Every conversation is confidential, and there's no cost or obligation to start.