Harlow furniture

Brief

The original agreement gave each founder an equal veto and said nothing about family members joining. As the children took on management roles, routine decisions stalled and a wholesale expansion sat unsigned for most of a year.

• Five owners with different roles
• An equal veto that stalled decisions
• A wholesale deal waiting on signatures

The founders wanted each child to have a real voice without turning every purchase order into a family vote, and they wanted the new rules in place before the busy spring season. This matter is one of four illustrative examples written for a design sample, each with a different kind of owner. Browse the other three.

Approach

We interviewed each owner separately, then brought the family together around a single decision map that showed who decides what and at what dollar threshold. The drafting followed that map line by line.

Drafting ran in three short rounds, each ending with a family meeting where every owner could mark up the draft in the room.

The map came first. The document only wrote down what the family had already agreed.

Between rounds, one attorney kept a running list of open points so that no question had to be raised twice. When the family disagreed, we wrote both positions side by side and let the owners choose.

Client

Harlow makes solid-wood furniture for homes and restaurants from a workshop outside Denver. Two founders still run the workshop floor, while the next generation handles sales, wholesale accounts and the showroom.

Results

The family signed a new operating agreement with tiered approval thresholds, a buy-sell clause funded by insurance and a clear path for the next generation to take on ownership.

The stalled wholesale agreement was signed within three weeks of the new governance taking effect.

A year on, the family used the new buy-sell clause to plan a gradual retirement for one founder without a single dispute.