In October of this year, The Vethan Law Firm, P.C. (VLF) reached a favorable resolution for our client, a Greek immigrant who, with his two brothers, had built a multi-million dollar business partnership over forty years. However, even as close as the brothers were, when they first began business operations in the late 1960s, time, the pressure put on by their children and grandchildren served as a piercing blow to the partnership.
After forty (40) years, the family that had lived and built the American Dream, quickly were at odds with each other as to the management and business affairs of the partnership. As brothers, they made all their business decisions after hours, seated around a table at one of the restaurants they owned, over beer and Greek food. They never believed they needed a partnership agreement. They were wrong.
The hands of time moved on, building their empire, but introducing family members and other pressures on the business. After the money involved in the business reached a critical mass, factions developed within the family, and the brothers were pitted against each other.
After several months of contentious litigation, VLF’s business attorneys were able to secure a favorable resolution for one of the brothers. The lack or a partnership agreement and the dearth of resolutions and governing documents could have easily thrown the entire enterprise into a free-for-all.
While VLF’s lawyers could save our client’s share of the business for him, and recapture it for his family, the relationship between our client and his brothers may be forever damaged. All this because the terms of their partnership were never properly laid out when they started the business almost half a century ago.
Business people have the choice of learning from others, or insisting on repeating the same mistakes. The business and corporate lawyers at VLF work with our clients to make sure their business and business agreements are prepared early, modified as required, when the business changes, to suit our clients’ needs.
