The initial meeting is the most important and often most over looked step in starting a Colorado LLC.  Here’s why.  In our practice, we often meet with founders after they’ve made the decision to start a business.  Whether alone or with a few business partners, properly forming a Colorado Limited Liability Company is critical to the founders and the company itself.  The most overlooked and most often skipped part of the LLC formation process is an initial meeting.  What do I mean by “initial meeting”?  Well, simply, sitting down with your partners (or by yourself) and sometimes an attorney to understand what you are trying to accomplish by forming a Colorado LLC and how you are going to do so.  Here are three areas we see post LLC formation that could have (should have) been avoided with an initial meeting.

Capitalization.  How will the Colorado LLC be funded?  Cash?  Loans?  Sweat Equity?  Outside Investment?  Surprisingly, many LLC founders don’t know the answer to this question.  

Asset Protection.  What assets are being protected by the formation of the LLC?  The members’? The company’s?  Who actually owns the assets being protected?  Is the LLC being formed to protect the company’s assets – such as client lists, trademarks, patents, etc.?  

Name.  Ah, the Name.  This is every founder’s baby.  No matter what they tell you, don’t believe the founder who says of their proposed name: “Oh, I just came with that on the way over… it doesn’t mean that much to me.”  FALSE. It means a lot to them.  And they spent hours agonizing over it, saying it out loud, visualizing it on the business card they’re going to pretend to have only one of when you ask and it’s the name of the domain they bought on GoDaddy.com.  So, what’s the issue?  You may not be able to use the name.

You can read a more detailed post from our Colorado LLC Lawyers about why its important that your LLC have an initial meeting by clicking HERE.