This is a complex story to write—and maybe even more difficult to share. I’ve been thinking a lot about the pros and cons of publishing this story.
But If I’m writing it today, it’s for my children, who might one day face similar situations. It’s also for me, a way to remember what I stand for.
This is the story of how I earned my first token of honor.
I grew up hearing stories of my grandfather’s work ethic, generosity, and repeated betrayals by people he helped. Those stories are still told in my family. These stories shaped my understanding of fairness and honor.
From an early age, I was fortunate enough to realize magic was real. Logging onto my computer, playing MMORPGs, exploring the internet—it felt like opening my very own Hogwarts Acceptance Letter.
In contrast, the family business was nothing but Number Four, Privet Drive. Especially after my grand-father passed away, leaving a mess of inflated egos behind him.
The family business became a place built on inheritance rather than merit, where nepotism overruled all logic. A place where personal growth was always subordinated to someone else’s agenda — ruled by confusion and opacity, where advancement came through personal favor rather than hard work or measurable results.
But still, I often asked myself: was there something for me there?
Even though I spent the last 7 years of my life as a wizard in Hogwarts, aka working in tech, having learned magic tricks, earning internet money, .. a part of me wanted to come back to Number Four, Private Drive and try to work with the Dudley’s of this world.
I learned the answer the hard way.
Choosing between what’s right and what’s easy
A few years ago, during COVID, I decided to start an online business selling artisanal food, manufactured by the family business. Because of the nature of the product, it was highly seasonal — active only two to three months a year — which made it manageable alongside my client work.
For practical reasons, I partnered with one of my cousin to handle logistics, while I’d do all the rest. I knew from the beginning logistics was something I could have externalized to a third party company. But I thought it was important to have full control over the customer experience, and ultimately diminish the cost.
Ironically, I realize now this decision cost me my side-business.
My cousin was working 8AM-4PM for the family business, so it made perfect sense to assign him with work he could be doing over there, where every order was prepared, as he was already on the ground. He was mostly doing the same job during the day and it would only request from him a few hours in the morning and/or a few hours in the evening. For 2-3 months max, every year. He could even start before the season, pre-pack everything and then take care of the orders on the spot. This was an easy job.
For a 50% share in the business, it was a really good deal.
In other words, the deal sounded more than fair for him.
We shook hands on a shared vision I explained him: within three to five seasons, we’d build a strong online brand that could eventually run — and sell — on its own.
The first season, the business made 3k€. Every penny was reinvested into growing.
The second season, the business made 25k€. Every penny was reinvested into growing.
The third season, the business made 55k€. Every penny was reinvested into growing.
But, even though the business was growing, something felt off from the beginning.
The balance was wrong — in risk-taking, effort, ambition, and real dedication.
More than once, I found myself coming down late at night or early in the morning to handle the logistics myself. More than once, we received complains from the customers, who had to wait 10 days to receive their orders. More than once, I had to play the firefighter and give him an helping hand. More than once, I ended up alone, doing his part of job. I know this is part of building a business, but an even bigger part of building a business is having a reliable partner by your side, who you can trust with your life. But no, this was not it at all.
I kept running into excuses, low energy, and broken promises. It was clear that my partner was simply not fully invested, to say it politely.
Later on, I came down to the inevitable realization that this person was simply benefiting from my work and dedication, acting as a bottleneck to the business growth, and to put it simply, he wasn’t giving his best for the company to grow (faster).
I was the only one really focused on growing a tree that would give fruits, season after season.
I was in front of someone unprofessional, and he was my cousin. How was I suppose to deal with that? I accepted excuses, the semi-apologies, and every year, I moved on to the next season, hoping for a better future.
Was it out of malice, bad faith, greed, stupidity or lack of education? I really don’t know for sure. There was definitely something around the lack of self-awareness.
On a side note: I notice there is an entire generation of young people thinking like the mob.
For those people, you only win something by taking it from someone else. To get what they want, they’re ready to cheat, to lie, to beg, to ask for favors, to kiss rings.
Everything is good, but actual work and sacrifices.
Coming from an entrepreneurial background, where you move fast and break things, where you look at data, share feedback, learn on the spot and shoot for the moon, it’s little to say our energies didn’t match.
I carried a fire in me. I was fighting, pushing forward — while he most of the time moved softly, or just didn’t give enough.
I was gambling with my finances and my family’s stability, while he remained safely within the comfort of his routine.
Of course, I could have dealt with the lack of intensivity, but sadly it came along with something else. Something much worse: status seeking.
In public, he spoke the language of winners and had the rhetoric of a self-made man. I think he was buying his own story that he was some kind of a risk-taker entrepreneurial individual. He was building his empire, “taking revenge against life”. Everything in his work involvement was superficial, but he was strutting around, trying to impress others.
You see, in those three years, I’ve heard words so disturbing they could make even the deaf bleed from the ears.
In contrast, I mostly remained quite and discreet about the business itself. Until today, of course.
Season after season — one, two, three — the tension kept building until the clash came. He acted surprised, playing the “But aren’t we a family?!” card all over again, trying to fool me with arguments that didn’t stand. I was hard, but I was right.
Out of disgust of all this mess, and because I wasn’t truly passionate about the product or industry, I gave him the opportunity to take full control of the company.
I proposed to sell my shares, even though, in my mind, I had carried most of the weight that brought the business to where it was.
I waited for him to make a non-ambiguous move, for once, and the clock was ticking.
6 months passed, nothing came in, not even the beginning of a proposal.
It felt like, on top of everything else, I was now wasting my time waiting.
Finally, instead of waiting indefinetely, I came up with 3 offers, all pre-signed by me in advance. I dropped them on his desk.
Those offers were designed to give a clear and cut way out for both of us.
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The buyout of my shares for 10,000€
10,000€ is not a lot to buy out someone from a business making around 50k€. It was a way for me to say: “Hey, you did wrong all the way. You can buy me out, and get a quiet mind” Without going into too much details, I can tell that he’d have been whole within one season, after taxes: that’s unheard of. An honest man who can do basic math, who isn’t afraid of working, who’s confident in his ability to create value, would understand within ten minutes that this proposal was fair and very reasonable.
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The dissolution of the company
When you partner with someone, if you can’t find a win–win solution when it’s time to part ways, you can at least have the courage to end it together. It’s clean, it’s dignified, it shows mutual respect. Like grown men, you shake hands and each go your separate ways to start something new.
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The buyout of my shares for €0.01
The 1 cent proposal: earning my first token of honor
Who in is right mind would even propose such a deal?
I’m not naive. I know how most people would fight tooth and nail for their rights.
But I saw things differently. Let me explain myself:
Money is the material expression of a principle: that when people want to do business together, they must give and receive fair value.
If you don’t respect this principle, I believe you’re doomed to fail, one day or another.
Only a sick-society, rewarding weakness over courage and theft over work, can tolerate infringement on this principle.
Money is not for freeloaders who demand it through tears, nor for thieves who take it by force.
Long before freeloaders freeload and thieves steal, money has always been born from the mind and effort of an honest person.
True wealth must be created — you must “make money”.
True wealth can’t be seized, begged for, inherited, shared, stolen, or received as a favor.
I believed, and I still believe, that the money I was leaving on the table by not being paid my fair share would never again generate anything productive. Nothing good can come out of this.
Everything bought with unearned money isn’t a tribute to work, but a reproach — not an achievement, but a shame.
This money can’t bring happiness. Maybe even the contrary.
Who would want this cursed money?
To my kids: Never take part in an unfair deal, or you’ll regret it. Never forget that your honor and integrity will always be worth much more than all the gold in the world. Don’t be rats, don’t snake your way into life.
Always choose what’s right over what’s easy.
I wasn’t surprised when, out of idea, he sent a new last minute offer, sensibly inferior to what I estimated was right. It was a gesture meant to look fair, but it only gave the illusion of integrity.
Why would I accept something that would give a fake peace of mind to someone I don’t respect?
You either do it right, or you don’t.
This offer reminded me of dinners where the bill reveals everyone’s true nature: some pay fully, some never pay, and some pretend to — slipping in a small note just to ease their conscience. This was the same kind of pretense, so I dismissed it.
You can probably guess how it ended: of course, we finally settled for 0.01€.
To my kids: Always pay the bill, in full, and always be the first to pay. Never split the difference. You’ll see a lot of people eating at your table, taking advantage of your generosity. This is part of life, but you have to make a choice. So few of us have made the conscious choice of living like Lords, instead of pigs. Don’t be fooled: you don’t have to be rich to live like a Lord. You just have to be brutally fair, and resist the corruption of the pigs.
So from all the options, he went with the easiest one.
Closing the company and starting again from scratch on his own? Naaaah, too hard.
Valuing my work “fairly”? Naaaah, too expensive.
Drafting a contract that explicitly transfers every single asset I built solo — brand, trademarks, website, customer list, B2B clients, social media accounts, content, treasury, bank account, you name it — for €0.01? Hell yeah!
I signed. I immediately felt relieved.
I’m one of the last Lords, I’m confident in my ability to start over again and again and again until it works.
My place was never at Number Four, Private Drive.
Our common grandfather was venerated by two generations for having built his business on generosity and integrity, spoiling everyone around him.
Like my grandfather, I was looted — not only of money, but of fairness.
Yet what will always remains is what probably mattered most to him, and now to me: the dignity of having done the right thing.
This is the story of how I earned my first token of honor, the most valuable thing a man can earn.
Edmond Dantès