Exit Strategies for Creatives: Beyond IPOs and Acquisitions

By The Agora Fund

For decades, startup success has been measured by two words: IPO or acquisition. That binary—the billion-dollar bell-ringer or the billion-dollar buyout—has shaped the entire psychology of venture capital.

But creatives don’t build like tech founders. They build for legacy, not liquidation. For identity, not just income. For cultural permanence, not just exponential growth.

And so we ask:

Why do we force creative businesses into exit frameworks that were never designed for them?

At The Agora Fund, we believe it’s time to expand the vocabulary around exits.
To create financial models that match the cadence of art, the autonomy of design, and the compounding value of cultural IP.
To honor the fact that creatives don’t just want to exit—they want to evolve.

The Exit Myth, Debunked

The startup world has long been obsessed with a very specific kind of narrative arc:

• Build fast

• Scale faster

• Sell high

• Vanish

But creative businesses aren’t built for speed alone. They’re built for resonance. A fashion house might take ten years to break even—but influence a generation. A film studio may produce a single cult-classic—and shape an entire aesthetic movement.

So when we ask a designer or director what their “exit plan” is, the answer is often:

I don’t want to sell—I want to stay in it.
I want to license it, archive it, pass it on, or turn it into a school.

And that is not a weakness of the model.
That is the strength of cultural business.

Because while tech chases unicorns, creatives are building cathedrals—structures that last.

Why Traditional Exits Don’t Fit

Let’s look at what IPOs and acquisitions actually require:

• Institutional scale

• Predictable financials

• Corporate-level compliance

• A “founder step-back” narrative

• A large, often impersonal buyer

That framework may work for apps or platforms.
But for a creative brand rooted in identity, authorship, or visual language, the idea of “exiting” in this way can feel more like erasure.

For a fashion founder, being acquired by a global conglomerate might mean losing control of their aesthetic.
For a filmmaker, being absorbed into a studio system might silence the very voice that made them fundable in the first place.

This isn’t an anti-capitalist argument.
It’s an argument for alternative liquidity models—ones that preserve the creator’s voice while still delivering wealth.

Rethinking Exit: A New Menu for Creatives

Here are the models The Agora Fund encourages creative founders to consider:

1. Licensing Intellectual Property

Rather than sell the entire brand or business, license parts of it: prints, soundtracks, garments, characters, brand assets. This allows the creative to retain control while generating consistent, compounding revenue.

Example: A visual artist licenses textile prints to fashion houses globally, generating income while staying rooted in fine art.

2. Royalty Structures

Partner with platforms, publishers, or manufacturers in revenue-share models. This creates recurring income tied to performance, not ownership dilution.

Example: A fashion label collaborates with a retailer to co-produce collections, retaining creative direction and equity.

3. Employee Ownership or Stewardship Trusts

Exit doesn’t always mean external sale. Founders can pass the company on to their team via ESOPs or community ownership models.

Example: A creative agency builds a 10-year transition plan into a worker cooperative, sustaining the culture while cashing out the founder.

4. Collector Equity + Cultural Syndicates

For design houses and artist-led brands, equity can be sold to cultural patrons—a select group of aligned investors who become long-term custodians rather than extractive stakeholders.

Example: A filmmaker invites 10 backers to invest in a film studio in exchange for a share of all future IP, similar to an angel syndicate for art.

5. Evergreen Investment Structures

Some creative founders never want to exit. Instead, they want to reinvest profits, stay lean, and scale deliberately. These founders may consider holding companies, family offices, or evergreen funds that support long-term stewardship over short-term gain.

Example: A multidisciplinary artist builds a vertically integrated brand that funds its own expansion through cash flow and strategic reinvestment.

Cultural Capital Is Liquid—Just Differently

Creative companies do generate value. They just don’t follow the valuation curves that VCs are trained to recognize.

A painting might sit unsold for five years and then skyrocket. A fashion archive might gain value as a reference for future collections. A short film might become the cornerstone of a licensing deal, media franchise, or streaming brand.

Cultural IP appreciates over time—especially when properly protected, monetized, and preserved.

Our job as investors isn’t to force creative companies into traditional exits.
It’s to help them build exit-optional business models—ones where liquidity is available, but not required for success.

Founders Don’t Want an Exit—They Want an Afterlife

This is the truth behind most creative entrepreneurs:

They didn’t start their company just to sell it. They started it to say something.

They want their work to live beyond the moment. To be collected, cited, archived, emulated, and remembered.

At The Agora Fund, we fund businesses that want to create legacy—not just liquidity.
We work with founders who are building cultural institutions in disguise—brands that may look like fashion labels or indie studios now, but will someday be referenced in textbooks, museums, and oral histories.

Their exit isn’t a number.
It’s a narrative arc.

Conclusion: Exit, Evolved

We’re not against exits.
We’re against flattened definitions of what an exit can look like.

We believe in creative autonomy, financial fluency, and architecting pathways that align with how artists and designers actually build.

If the industry wants to support the next wave of cultural entrepreneurs, we need to expand our imagination of what success—and succession—looks like.

Because not every visionary wants to disappear after the payout.
Some want to stay.
To evolve.
To teach.
To build the next Agora.

And that’s the kind of future we’re investing in.

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Written by The Agora Fund’s Nina Orm, Founding Partner