3,500 Acquisitions in 55 Years: How NDFC Achieved the Impossible.
Most said it can't be done. NDFC did it. Here's how.
The Scale Question: “How Could Anyone Do 3,500 Deals?”
At first glance, the number seems unbelievable. And for any traditional firm, it would be. But NDFC and Gordon Bizar created a unique system at the right moment in history.
Here’s what made it possible:
- A Massive Funnel – In the 1980s and 1990s, Gordon’s Bizar Financing™ training programs filled rooms with tens of thousands of entrepreneurs. More than 350,000 attended Essentials, and over 30,000 graduated Pro trainings.
- Scaled Marketing – it was the scale of media we used to fill the funnel that drove the process. Through national newspaper ads, spot television, our Getting Rich Your Way infomercial, and hundreds of media appearances, Gordon mass-sold the concept of acquisition. That created a vast network of entrepreneurs who found deals, and we built trained teams to partner with them and get those deals closed.
- Partnership at Scale – Gordon partnered with graduates who found acquisition opportunities but couldn’t close them on their own, multiplying deal capacity nationwide.
- Teams in Every City – His father and local partners built acquisition teams in major metro areas, creating a distributed network of dealmakers.
- Perfect Timing – When Wall Street’s LBO market collapsed under 21% interest rates, Gordon pivoted to small-business acquisitions powered by seller financing — a market few others touched.
This combination — massive deal flow, trained partners, city-based teams, and the right timing — is why 3,500 acquisitions became not only possible, but inevitable.
Brokers Never Saw Us Coming — By Design.
Our message of “How to Buy a Business with No Cash” attracted thousands of buyers, but brokers often misinterpreted it as a red flag — assuming deals wouldn’t close or commissions wouldn’t be paid. They were wrong. Every deal closed through a buyer SPE in the name of our partners, and every broker got their full commission.
Rather than fight broker bias, we let deals flow under the radar. That’s why most in the industry never realized the scale of our machine — and why the truth is this: we’ve put more commission dollars into brokers’ pockets than any other buyer ever.
And if you’ve been around long enough, you may have already earned a commission on one of our buys — without ever knowing it was us.
Today, we’ve evolved. Alongside our unmatched mastery of financial leverage, we now add substantial equity capital from:
- The NDFC Business Acquisition Partner Fund
- Family Offices investing alongside us
- Private investors multiplying our buying capacity
The Track Record
- 33 pioneering deals in the “Go-Go” 1960s–70s.
- 3,000+ transactions in the 1980–1998 Surge Years.
- 570+ deals from 1998–Present, through recessions and pandemics.
Grand Total: Over 3,500 acquisitions completed.
No other M&A firm in history has achieved this scale, resilience, and longevity.
Why It Matters Today
- Certainty for brokers – Work with a buyer who closes.
- Trust for sellers – Structures protect companies, employees, and legacies.
- Opportunity for entrepreneurs – Shared ownership, shared wealth.
- Security for all – Every deal stands alone, insulated from others.