Chris Hoffmann - Building Scale in Home Services - Ep.167

Episode 167: Alex Bridgeman (@aebridgeman) is joined by Chris Hoffman (Chris-Hoffman). My guest, Chris Hoffmann, is the President and CEO of Hoffmann Brothers, a home services business based in St. Louis. Hoffmann Brothers have scaled from $10 million in 2015 to over $100 million in revenue in 2023. We talk about how that journey happened, their experience building executive teams, investing in people through a training university they started for ongoing training, and investing activity for home services today. We also talk about what perpetual non-private equity ownership enables them to do, including their unique strategy for managing cash investments and liquidity as a growing family office. This was a ton of fun for me and I hope you enjoy this conversation as well. Listen weekly and follow the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Breaker, and TuneIn.  Learn more about Alex and Think Like an Owner at www.AlexBridgeman.com Links: Chris on LinkedIn Hoffmann Brothers NexStar Network Chapters: (00:03:38) - Hoffman Training University & NexStar (00:08:26) - Enabling scale and revenue growth (00:10:55) - Differences in PE-backed company structures (00:14:25) - Retention and morale-boosting tactics (00:17:59) - Leadership team composition (00:21:17)- Surfacing high-performers & evaluating management teams (0:28:53) - Using Search Firms to find talent (00:30:25) - Choosing an Executive Search firm (00:33:30) - Financial sponsor interest in the HVAC and Home Services market (00:36:15) - Reasons Consolidators are failing (00:38:41) - Debt, Public Equity Strategies & Fund Investing (00:48:00) - Goals for the family office (00:49:47) - Building new locations from scratch vs. acquiring existing companies (00:55:37) - Acquiring a school (00:58:53) - Changing strongly held beliefs (00:59:54) - Chris’ favorite business