Every week, I read a post on LinkedIn about someone starting a business. The leap of faith. The early wins. The hustle.
Slightly less often, someone writes about scaling one. The growing pains, the hiring mistakes, the pivot that saved everything.
But closing a business responsibly? On purpose? While it’s still profitable? Almost nobody writes about that. (At least not that I’ve seen.)
And here’s what I find stranger still: the businesses that talk the most about doing things differently are just as quiet. You know the ones: B Corps, purpose-driven founders, the “better business” crowd.
We’ll happily share our B Corp scores. We’ll publish our impact reports with glee. We’ll talk about governance and stakeholder capitalism and the triple bottom line. But when it comes to the final act of good governance — knowing when to stop and doing it properly — we go silent.
I think that’s a missed opportunity. And I think it matters.
A few weeks ago, I published this LinkedIn post announcing that my business partner and I were closing our B Corp certified agency, avery + brown, after 5.5 years. We were still profitable. We still had work coming in (and still do). But the market had shifted, the model wasn’t working the way it once had and, honestly, it just wasn’t fun anymore.
So we called it. On our own terms. While we still could. We were lucky to be in a position where that was still a choice. I fully acknowledge that not everyone has that same fortune.
The response caught me completely off guard, and I’ll get to that later in the post. But one comment in particular stuck with me. Someone wrote: “There aren’t enough good deaths in business.”
They’re right. And this post is my attempt to change that, by sharing what I learned, what I’d do again, and the principles I think are worth naming for any founder facing the same decision.
Knowing when to stop, and why that’s good governance
In a parallel universe, I’m sure there’s a version of the avery + brown story where we keep going. Where we tighten the belts, take on projects we don’t believe in, agree to the lower prices our prospects were beating us down on, and slowly grind ourselves down until the decision to close is made for us.
The thing is, after working for startups and hanging around entrepreneurs for over 16 years, I’ve heard that version play out plenty of times. I’m sure you have, too. A business that was once exciting becomes a thing the founder is just… managing. They’re not a leader of a business any more; they’re a slave to the one they created. The passion leaves, the quality drops, and eventually the money follows. By the time it ends, there’s nothing left to feel good about.
We didn’t want that.
Closing a business responsibly while it’s still breathing goes against almost every instinct a founder has. We’re trained to push through. To find a way. To treat resilience as a personality trait rather than a strategy. And sometimes that’s right. Sometimes we do need to ride it out. Every founder’s situation is different, and I have no interest in second-guessing anyone else’s timing. But I can speak to what I’ve seen and what I’ve learned from our own experience.
Sometimes the most responsible thing you can do is pay attention to what the market is telling you. (Yikes, I sound like a marketer.)
For me, the signals were clear. The traditional agency model was under pressure. The market had been difficult for over 18 months, the last 7 of which were brutal. The projects coming in were rarely the kind that made us want to get out of bed. And when you’re running a purpose-driven business, that last one matters more than most people realise. If the work isn’t creating the impact you set out to create, what exactly are you holding onto?
One of the comments on my LinkedIn post put it better than I could: “Knowing when it’s time to stop is one of the best leadership and business qualities.”
I’d go further. For any business that calls itself responsible, and any company that says it takes governance seriously, knowing when to stop isn’t just a quality. It’s an obligation.
Good governance doesn’t only apply when things are going well. It applies at the end, too. Arguably, that’s when it matters most.
Your duty of care doesn’t end when the work does
When a business closes badly, the founder isn’t the only one who suffers. Usually, they’re not even the one who suffers most.
Think about it. When a business runs out of cash and goes under overnight, who else is left in the lurch? Employees who find out on a Friday they don’t have a job come Monday. Clients mid-way through a project with either no one else to finish it, or a major headache to onboard a new agency / consultant. Contractors with unpaid invoices they might never see settled. Suppliers who perhaps had extended you credit in good faith.
That’s not just unfortunate. And I don’t think we can keep writing it off as ‘just how business works.’ It points to something deeper; a gap in how we think about responsibility at the end of a business’s life, not just the beginning.
I really don’t say that to be critical. I know that sometimes businesses fail suddenly and there really was no choice. Markets collapse. Clients disappear. A global pandemic arrives. Yes, things can happen that are genuinely out of your control. And I have nothing but genuine empathy for anyone who’s been through that.
But those genuinely uncontrollable circumstances aside, I think we owe it to ourselves to ask a harder question: how many difficult closures could have ended differently if the decision had been made earlier? While there was still time, still money, and still the ability to do right by the people who depended on the business?
When we decided to close avery + brown, the first list we made wasn’t of tasks, but of people. Every person and every business that would be affected by this decision. And we worked through that list carefully.
- Our employees were told first, face to face, with honesty and as much notice as we could give. We helped them prepare for what was next as early on and as well as we could.
- Our clients were also told before any public announcement, along with a clear plan for completing or transitioning every piece of work in progress. Nobody was left mid-project with nowhere to turn.
- Our contractors and suppliers were all paid in full and on time. No outstanding debts. No awkward conversations. No one chasing money they were owed.
- And ourselves? We gave ourselves permission to feel proud rather than ashamed. That might sound small, but for any founder who’s been through a closure, you’ll know it isn’t. And if you’re a founder who has ever had to close a business, no matter under what circumstances, I really want you to remember this:
By starting your own business, you’ve already done something most people never will. You turned a daydream into reality. We all have daydreams. Only a tiny percentage of us act on them. If your business was still standing after that first year, you outlasted roughly a fifth of new ventures that never make it that far. And if you were still going after three years, you pushed through the point where many businesses have already closed their doors, putting you in a minority of founders with real staying power. You’ve more than earned the right to be proud of what you built, regardless of how “big” or successful it felt from the inside.
One of our longest-standing suppliers commented on my LinkedIn post and described us as “the first company to carefully and professionally close on me as a customer.” And he’s been in business for 27 years. That sentence has stayed with me. Not because it’s a compliment, but because it shows how rare that experience is.
But it shouldn’t be rare. Especially among businesses that position themselves as responsible.
What 450 comments taught me about closing well
I expected our three LinkedIn posts to get some traction. A few kind words from close friends and former clients. Maybe some commiserations. The usual.
What I didn’t expect was over 450 comments, DMs and emails in the space of a fortnight. And what surprised me most wasn’t the volume; it was the tone.
People weren’t offering sympathy. What came through, again and again, was something closer to relief. As if the post had given people permission to think differently about what a business ending could look like.
Comment after comment said some version of the same thing: “I wish more people did this.” “I wish I’d done this.” And variations of “I didn’t know we were allowed to do this.” Think about that for a second. It’s as if there’s some unwritten rule that closing a business has to be a disaster. As if the only acceptable ending is the one where you’re dragged out kicking and screaming.
Some of the other phrases people used, include:
“Closing something you have built and invested massively into is proper difficult — however I see nothing but integrity in how you have grown the business and how you will retire the business.”
“You’re doing it the right way, being fair to everyone and, more importantly, for one of the most important reasons: it’s not fun anymore.”
“Sorry to read this — but what a powerful story yours is.”
And perhaps my favourite: “It’s amazing how many people drag it on until it becomes painful and unfair on everyone.”
That one cuts to the heart of it. Because dragging it on doesn’t just hurt the founder. It hurts everyone around them. The employees who sense something’s wrong but aren’t being told. The clients who notice the quality slipping. The suppliers who start chasing payments. Dragging it on isn’t resilience. It’s avoidance.
What the response to our post showed me is that there’s a real hunger for honesty about this stuff. Founders want permission to stop. They want to see what closing a business responsibly actually looks like. To close with clarity, dignity and pride.
And they want to know it’s possible to end a chapter and still feel good about what they built.
And it is. I promise.
Seven principles for closing a business responsibly
Don’t worry; I’m not going to pretend this is some sort of definitive framework. Every business is different, every closure has its own context, and I’m wary of turning something deeply personal into a tidy checklist.
But having been through it — and having now heard from dozens of people who’ve been through it too — I do think there are principles worth naming. Not rules. Principles. Things to hold onto when the decision is made and the real work of closing well begins.
1. Close while you still can, not when you have to.
This is the big one. If you wait until the cash is gone and the debts are mounting, you lose the ability to close on your terms. You lose the ability to look after the people who depend on you. Pay attention to the signals early. The market will usually tell you what’s coming if you’re willing to listen.
2. Make a list of people first, not tasks.
Before you think about admin, Companies House filings or winding-down logistics, think about the human beings who will be affected. Employees. Clients. Contractors. Suppliers. Partners. Write their names down. Then work through that list with care and intention. Every single one of those relationships matters.
3. Tell your people first, and tell them honestly.
No corporate euphemisms. No “restructuring” language. Just the truth, delivered with respect and as much notice as you can give. The people closest to you deserve to hear it from you, face to face, before anyone else.
4. Honour every commitment.
Finish the work. Pay the invoices. Deliver on your promises. If you can’t complete something, communicate that early and help find an alternative. The fastest way to undo years of goodwill is to leave people out of pocket or mid-project with nowhere to turn.
5. Own the narrative.
Don’t disappear. Don’t go quiet and hope nobody notices. If you’ve built something you’re proud of, say so. If the market made it untenable, say that too. People respect honesty far more than silence. The way you tell the story of your closure becomes part of your professional reputation going forward.
6. Give yourself permission to be proud.
This might be the hardest one. Founders tend to treat closure as failure, full stop. But if you built something real, employed people, created impact, stayed true to your values and closed with integrity, that is not failure. That is a chapter well lived. Let yourself feel that.
7. Remember: a good ending is good governance.
If your business has spent years talking about responsible leadership, stakeholder care and doing things properly, then the closure is your final exam. It’s where all of that is either proven or exposed. Close the way you operated. With clarity, with care, and with your values intact.
One door closes…
A responsible business doesn’t stop being responsible when things get hard. It doesn’t stop at the B Corp assessment or the impact report or the keynote speech. It goes all the way to the end.
And sometimes the end is the bravest part.
If you’re a founder weighing up whether it’s time to stop, I hope this post has given you something useful. Not a playbook necessarily, but proof that it’s possible to close a business and walk away with your integrity, your relationships and your pride intact.
I did. And I’m still smiling.