Acquiring Minds

Alex Michael was seeking to acquire not just a business, but freedom. One year later, he reports back on how it's going. 

Topics in Alex’s interview:

• Top line growth in the last year
• How he diligenced Wallaroo Wallets
• How he uses Amazon PPC ads
• The limitations of an Amazon FBA business
• An expensive lesson about traffic diversification
• Launching new products
• Having his family involved in his business
• Living life on his own terms
• His unconventional thoughts on productivity
• The topics he writes on

Links and how to contact Alex:

• LinkedIn
• QuietLight
• Alex’s Substack
• Wallaroo Wallets

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

• The Acquisition Lab

Connect with A-players who can run your business remotely:

• More Staffing

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

• See past + future interviews on the YouTube channel
• Connect with host Will Smith on LinkedIn
• Follow Will on Twitter

How Austin Smoak raised money from investors to buy a very profitable roofing business that he found on BizBuySell. 

Topics in Austin's interview:

• How Goldman Sachs prepared him for business ownership
• Passively owning franchises
• Why he recommends local brokers over proprietary search
• Finding “business-buyer fit”
• His plan to scale via roll-up
• His philosophy on change management
• Pros and cons of being funded by a family office
• The scope of his residential roofing business
• The roofing industry in Florida
• How he uses digital marketing

Links and how to contact Austin:

• LinkedIn
• Grove Oaks Capital
• Axial
• Why Should White Guys Have All the Fun?: How Reginald Lewis Created a Billion-Dollar Business Empire by Reginald Lewis and Blair S. Walker

Get a complementary pre-acquisition HR & PEO review for your target business:

• Contact [email protected] or visit Aspen HR

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

• Oberle Risk Strategies - Search Fund Team

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

• See past + future interviews on the YouTube channel 
• Connect with host Will Smith on LinkedIn 
• Follow Will on Twitter

Jérôme Bouillon bought a home care agency doing $500k/yr in 2018. Today it exceeds $1m and he's added a second location. 

Topics in Jerome’s interview:

• His cold calling strategy
• Buying a Visiting Angels franchise
• Seeing his employees as his customers
• The changes he made immediately to employee benefits
• Why he stopped penny-pinching in the business
• Why it’s important to know how to work in the business
• Margins in home care
• Home care vs. home healthcare
• How to scale up in this industry
• The benefits of a franchise

Links and how to contact Jérôme:

• LinkedIn
• Twitter
• Traction by Gino Wickman
• Visiting Angels

Get a complementary pre-acquisition HR & PEO review for your target business:

• Contact [email protected] or visit Aspen HR

 Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

• Oberle Risk Strategies - Search Fund Team

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

• See past + future interviews on the YouTube channel
• Connect with host Will Smith on LinkedIn
• Follow Will on Twitter

Heather Shattuck-Heidorn was a tenure-tracked professor, but wanted out. Buying a business offered freedom & security. 

Topics in Heather’s interview:

1. What she loved about academia
2. Why she initially resisted franchises
3. How she found a custom closet franchise
4. Being her husband’s employer
5. Her thoughts on capitalism
6. How small business ownership differs from academia
7. What she likes about owning a franchise
8. How she grows her business organically
9. Learning to communicate with her employees
10. Her fetal position moment

Links and how to contact Heather:

• [email protected]
• HBR Guide to Buying a Small Business by Richard S. Ruback
• The Power of Flexing by Susan Ashford
• Buy Then Build by Walker Deibel
• Home Franchise Concepts

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

• The Acquisition Lab

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

• Oberle Risk Strategies - Search Fund Team

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

• See past + future interviews on the YouTube channel
• Connect with host Will Smith on LinkedIn
• Follow Will on Twitter

Having only ever managed a few people when he bought his business, Alex Glasner shares how the trial by fire is going. 

Topics in Alex's interview:

• The difference between searching and operating
• The challenge of improving processes
• How rapid growth affected the company
• Running the business with a partner
• How the economy impacts his industry
• Having the British government as his sole customer
• Idealism and disillusionment in helping professions
• Why he hasn’t acquired a second business
• Why the first 2 years are hard
• How he has improved as a manager

Links and how to contact Alex:

• [email protected]
• LinkedIn
• Workpays
• Alex’s first appearance on Acquiring Minds

Connect with A-players who can run your business remotely:

• More Staffing

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

• Oberle Risk Strategies - Search Fund Team

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

• See past + future interviews on the YouTube channel
• Connect with host Will Smith on LinkedIn
• Follow Will on Twitter

Ben Bortner couch-surfed, drove Uber, and racked up credit card debt while finding a pool business to buy. It went well. 

Topics in Ben’s interview:

• Buying a pool service business, putting in only $100 of his own money for equity
• Changes he made to employee compensation (and why)
• Acquiring a second pool business
• Why Ben became certified to do pool maintenance himself
• How Ben improved company culture
• Why he didn’t want to hire a GM
• Selling his company to Pool Troopers
• Launching a fund for self-funded searchers
• The type of searcher he wants to fund
• What a self-funded deal looks like

Links and how to contact Ben:

• [email protected]
• LinkedIn
• Slack Water Capital

Get a complementary pre-acquisition HR & PEO review for your target business:

• Contact [email protected] or visit Aspen HR

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

• The Acquisition Lab

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

• See past + future interviews on the YouTube channel
• Connect with host Will Smith on LinkedIn
• Follow Will on Twitter

9 months after Jesse Safir bought a printing biz, Covid cratered it. 3 years later, sales are nearing pre-Covid levels. 

Topics in Jesse’s interview:

• Finding ABG Printing by sending direct mail
• The value of having a “forgettable” business
• Renegotiating his deal before acquisition
• The changes he made in the first 9 months
• Cutting 80% of his staff during COVID
• Managing cash flow after revenue plunged 95%
• Staffing post-COVID
• How their printing projects have diversified
• The landscape of the printing industry
• Jesse’s vision for a holdco

Links and how to contact Jesse:

• LinkedIn
• [email protected]
• abgprint
• The Dip by Seth Godin
• Jesse on Let’s Buy a Business

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

• Oberle Risk Strategies - Search Fund Team

Get a complementary pre-acquisition HR & PEO review for your target business:

• Contact [email protected] or visit Aspen HR

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

• See past + future interviews on the YouTube channel
• Connect with host Will Smith on LinkedIn
• Follow Will on Twitter

2 searchers, Kaustubh Deo & Kevin Bibelhausen, share how they found investors to provide money to buy their businesses. 

Topics in Kevin and Kaustubh’s interview:

• How Twitter helps searchers learn and network
• How Kevin found investors after his funding fell through
• How they selected investors
• What a good pitch meeting looks like
• How they communicate with investors post-acquisition
• The power of superconnectors when raising funds
• The size of their cap tables
• How they organized their contacts while pitching investors
• How to get the most equity in your business
• The most gratifying and stressful parts of running their businesses

Links and how to contact Kevin and Kaustubh:

• Kaustubh’s LinkedIn
• Kevin’s LinkedIn
• Kevin’s Twitter
• Investor List
• HBR Guide to Buying a Small Business
• Sam Rosati
• Tony Cappaert
• Lisa Forrest
• Mike Botkin

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

• The Acquisition Lab

 Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

• Oberle Risk Strategies - Search Fund Team

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

• See past + future interviews on the YouTube channel
• Connect with host Will Smith on LinkedIn
• Follow Will on Twitter

Burned by 2 acquisitions he did with partners, Jeff Evenson insists on these protections when partnering-up to buy a biz. 

Topics in Jeff Evenson’s interview:

Links and how to contact Jeff:

Get a complementary pre-acquisition HR & PEO review for your target business:

• Contact [email protected] or visit Aspen HR

Get complimentary due diligence on your acquisition's insurance & benefits program:

• Oberle Risk Strategies - Search Fund Team

Connect with Acquiring Minds:

It CAN be done: Matthew Saskin recently acquired a big towing business, hiring an operator to run it from day 1. 

Topics in Matthew Saskin’s interview:

• Why he chose a towing company
• Putting in an operator from day one
• Improvements he made right away
• Why he kept his day job (and how he manages it)
• His COO’s compensation package
• What is phantom equity (and how it’s different from true equity)
• How real estate investment is different from SMB ownership
• The landscape of the towing industry
• Revenue streams for towing companies
• How they recruit drivers

Links and how to contact Matthew:

• Matt's business plan. We decided not to link to it directly. Email Matt to request a copy, and he'll share it with you directly 👇👇
• [email protected]
• LinkedIn
• Twitter
• East Coast Towing

Learn more about Walker Deibel's done-with-you buy-side advisory:

• The Acquisition Lab

Connect with A-players who can run your business remotely:

• More Staffing

Connect with Acquiring Minds: 

• See past + future interviews on the YouTube channel 
• Connect with host Will Smith on LinkedIn 
• Follow Will on Twitter