CBI+Team has a management team with excellent financial and operational experience, all of whom have started and run their own businesses in addition to assisting more than 700 buyers in locating and acquiring their desired businesses for financial freedom. The combined experience of our team creates a practical and focused approach of business intermediary services on behalf of the firm’s clients:
Carl Grimes, CBI, Chairman of the Board
Before Carl Grimes founded CBI+ Team over 15 years ago, he published an award-winning newspaper, built and operated a state-of-the-art cable television system, real estate firm, retail catalog sales business and an abstract and title company. All of these businesses were successfully sold to strategic and institutional investors and led Carl to the field of business brokerage with a specialization in mid-market mergers and acquisitions. Carl also received the designation of Certified Business Intermediary (CBI) from the International Business Brokers Association and owns CBI+ Team offices in Northwest Arkansas, and Fort Smith, Arkansas.
As a licensed real estate broker in both Arkansas and Missouri, Carl is also the president of the Professional Association of Arkansas Business Brokers. Carl has been involved in the sale of over 600 businesses in his career as a professional business broker. His areas of specialty in business sales include print businesses, motorsports industries, title companies, cable television companies, renewable energy, retail stores, manufacturing, and restaurants.
Born and raised in Clarendon, Arkansas, Carl is proud of being a native “Arkansawyer”. In 1971, Carl married his high school sweetheart, Kathy. In 1984, he started his first business in Northwest Arkansas. Carl and Kathy have two grown sons, Casey and Connor. Casey, the oldest, recently married and Carl is happy to announce Casey’s decision to join the family business of CBI+ Team in Northwest Arkansas. Connor has been involved in the family business for many years, and has recently been appointed as President and principal owner of the Little Rock office of CBI+ Team.
A graduate of the inaugural class of Leadership Fayetteville, a program conducted by the Fayetteville Chamber of Commerce, Carl has served as a city councilman, school board member, and a Chamber of Commerce president. A member of New Heights Church in Fayetteville, Carl has also served as an elder, a deacon, and a Sunday school teacher.
Connor Grimes, Managing Partner- Central Arkansas
Connor Grimes is the managing partner in the CBI office of Central Arkansas. Grimes has a life-time of experience as a business intermediary, helping bring privately-held business Sellers and Buyers together.
Grimes started his business brokerage career in the CBI+Team office in Springfield, Missouri, before moving on to work in the Northwest Arkansas office in Lowell. Grimes went on to work with CBI+Team offices in Kansas City and Charleston, South Carolina. In Charleston, Grimes was the managing intermediary where his responsibilities included recruiting and training new intermediaries as well as running the day-to-day operations of the office. Recently, Grimes was the Executive Broker in The CBI+Team office in Fort Smith, hiring, training and mentoring new intermediaries, ultimately growing that office. Having developed a strong reputation for his knowledge and experience in business brokerage, Grimes spent time traveling the country training other The CBI+Team office owners and intermediaries the method that CBI uses to bring business Sellers and Buyers together.
Grimes has experience in assisting business owners obtain independent, third party valuations of their businesses in order to set a market-driven purchase price for the business, providing the seller with a realistic opportunity to sell the business for the most money possible in the least amount of time. Grimes has also worked extensively with business buyers, training them in the CBI System, a tried and true method of finding the right business at the right price and on the right terms. Grimes has also worked closely with the Franchise Sales and Re-Sales division of The CBI+Team. Grimes states that, “Franchises mean you are in business for yourself but not by yourself. Franchises are perfect for corporate people who have decided that they want to work for themselves but need some reassurance in being the one calling the shots. “That is why franchises are a match for these people, they have management teams in place and a method that has proven itself to work.
Grimes is an avid outdoorsman. He enjoys hunting, fishing, floating and hiking. He is also a fan of college athletics, mainly college football. Grimes was the Arkansas 100 meter state champion before going on to become an All-American sprinter during his college athletic career. He is active in his church and spends time volunteering throughout the community.
Grimes has experience in helping Central Arkansas business Sellers and Buyers as well, having brokered the sale of businesses such as Willy D’s Piano Bar, Sport Clips and others.
