Host: You might recognize the voice of today's guest. Paul Quirk is a fellow podcaster in our niche of buying businesses. Paul founded and hosts Buy and Build, which very much like Acquiring Minds, interviews acquisition entrepreneurs and people in and around search. Paul's geographic focus is Europe. He's based in Switzerland, so his pod is a wealth of stories of UK and continental searchers. Well, Paul himself is now an accomplished searcher and that's what we spend most of our time on today. He found a window and door installation business in the uk. We of course, get into what he liked about this particular business, what the acquisition looked like, how he financed it, and how the transition has gone. One interesting wrinkle is that the business is in the UK while Paul's family is in Switzerland and he commutes. So consider this a tutorial on how, if pressed, you might make a remote acquisition work for you. Enjoy this conversation with Paul Quirk, owner of Amber Home Improvements and host and founder of the podcast Buy and Build. Welcome to Acquiring Minds, a podcast about buying businesses. My name is Will Smith. Acquiring an existing business is an awesome opportunity for many entrepreneurs, and on this podcast I talk to the people who do it. You've probably heard me mention SMBash, the conference in Orlando for acquisition entrepreneurs, SMB owners and investors. It was such a valuable event. I met no less than 12 acquiring minds guests there in person, hosts of other podcasts in this space and and if you're on SMB Twitter, it was a who's who of all the biggest accounts. Well, smbash is coming back around this time in Austin in April, and I'll definitely be going back. I'm told by the SM Bash team that this year they're going even deeper on content relevant to search, including a focus on finding investors for your acquisition and inviting a lot of investors to attend as well. For serious searchers or those who've recently acquired, SMBash is really the leading event. There are others associated with universities, but as far as I'm aware, this is the biggest and best indie conference for entrepreneurship through acquisition. Check out smbash.com six letters S M B A S H.com or click the link in the show notes. See you in Austin. Paul Quirk welcome to Acquiring Minds.

Guest: Thanks Will. Thanks for having me. Excited to be here. Join the illustrious guest list that's been on Acquiring Minds and been a fan of the podcast myself for some time. So happy to be on.

Host: Oh that's. That's great to hear, Paul, especially coming from you. You are actually here in Two capacities. So first as an acquisition entrepreneur, a few months ago you bought Amber Home Improvements, a window and door installation business in the uk. But you are also host of the Buy and Build podcast. So as I was just referencing, you're a fellow ETA podcaster. So we will get into that toward the end, podcaster to podcaster. I can't wait to ask you some questions about how that's gone. But let's start off. Paul, with some background on you. You are originally from South Africa, so how did you end up in the uk?

[3:27] Guest: Okay, well I, I guess first, first point is that I am a British citizen, even though I never came to the UK until I was a. About 22. But my mother is, is from here. So that gives me the UK passport and that may not mean much to people listening, but the South African passport doesn't really, isn't really helpful when you're traveling you have to get visas for everywhere and it's difficult to work in different places. So I was lucky. I kind of was a bit of a. Yeah, bit of a lottery, won the lottery there in terms of passports for people coming from South Africa. But I studied there up until graduating university and then I applied for a few internships at some of the major banks, firstly in South Africa, but it was complicated. We have a, not to go into the weeds, but a complicated history. And then when it comes to employment it can be difficult depending on your, on your race. So it was a little bit complicated for me. So I applied overseas to a few banks, somehow locked an internship at J.P. morgan in Geneva. I'd apply. I selected London as my primary location. But at the time my now wife was accepting a job in Geneva and I was thinking, okay, I'll go to London, you go to Geneva, we'll figure it out from there. And then funnily enough landed up in Geneva too. They found a role that they thought I would fit. So as an intern there in Geneva, I just worked really hard and just told everyone that I wanted a job. I'd finished graduating, everyone was going back to do their Masters and somehow they were nice enough to give me a full time job. And I spent about 10 years there at J.P. morgan. I moved around a bit. So I did come to London eventually did a few back and forth to New York and was ultimately reporting up to New York, but spent most of my time in Geneva. And it was actually there where I had heard or I heard about a guy who had left to start a search fund and that's where I've kind of the first time I'd heard about this concept. And he went on to successfully acquire and roll up, I guess, I think tertiary education institutes, I'm not sure. In Mexico. His name is Angel Alvarez. He's one of the managing partners of Elza Capital. He invests in searches based in Barcelona and I think Mexico too. When I heard about it, I was very intrigued. I was still young, I think I was maybe still an intern or an analyst, but it kind of, it just sat there at the back of my mind. And then later on when I decided to do something a little bit entrepreneurial, this was always kind of at the back of my mind and I'd slowly read the Stanford studies and a lot of the literature. I didn't and haven't done an mba. So I was always maybe felt like a bit of an imposter a few years back. Well, can I actually go down this route? But yeah, so that's, I eventually decided I was going to do it and language barrier was something that restricted me. I thought about doing it back home in South Africa, but you know, I touched on kind of the challenges on the hiring side there. It's already, you know, searching and acquiring is already pretty, pretty complex endeavor. So I didn't want to make it extra, extra complex. And then the language barrier dictated I could only rarely focus on the uk. So that's why I decided to focus on searching and acquiring in the uk. And I was doing that while based in kind of Geneva, France, on the border there where I was coming from, and then finally acquired the company based in the uk. So now I'm here during the week, Monday to Friday, fly back most weekends. So it's pretty busy, but enjoying it.

[6:59] Host: Wow. So that's, we'll, we'll get into that. But you know, a remote acquisition, I mean location and proximity to your acquisition is, is of course a big theme, but being doing it across, across country lines is this, this is a first for me. Very, very European of you. Of course, in the States we don't, we don't get a lot of that. So that's, that's fascinating. We'll get into it. But just going back a little bit, Paul, to your, your interest in search. Had you always been entrepreneurial or had you ever been entrepreneurial? What do you think grabbed you about this concept?

Guest: Yeah, yeah, I think so. Yes. With not much success. I had been entrepreneurial, so I couple of startups. One was when I was in South Africa, an internship placement agency. I mean it was really small scale but literally cost nothing cost A website I found out early on from my wife who is French and she had come to South Africa on an internship that often the European schools will pay for the students to come do an internship in South Africa. A lot of people want to come to a place like South Africa because it's beautiful and they get to learn English if it's not their first language. So I basically had the idea to be an agency for that and place them in companies where they could do internships. That was kind of short lived but I guess technically profitable because it cost me very little money. And then later I launched when I was in Switzerland and an organic sports supplement brand. I, I'm a bit of a health and fitness enthusiast if you will and, and it was very difficult to find what I wanted in Switzerland. It's a very beautiful developed country but they're very like they're. You can't order things on Amazon. They don't, they don't have Amazon there. Well, at least they didn't when, when I was there. So it was, you know, you could buy whatever Swiss, but that's limited and there was nothing like this in Swiss. I launched that, that was reasonably successful, probably marginally profitable, but extremely hard like trying to create a brand online kind of E commerce wasn't as popular as I I guess thought I probably should have done more research. But I just assume, you know, Switzerland people are going to buy things online. They have, you know, you know, they have, they have money, they should. But it wasn't really the case. I had to like pivot to brick and mortar stocking in gyms and eventually after like the third manufacturing run, I wound that down. But that was a good learning experience, but just brutal. And I was doing that while still working at JP Morgan which you know, just makes it even more tough. But it was never going to replace my kind of banking salary. So I just kind of threw in the towel really.

[9:26] Host: And then what year was that?

Guest: That was. I'd have to check exactly. Well, but probably around 2016ish, I would say 2015, 16. And, and yeah, like at the back of my mind the search fund thing was always brewing. And then I, I found I found myself a little bit like things weren't really changing too much from in the JP Morgan side. I kept on getting promoted but the role was not really evolving as much as I would have liked. So I started thinking about different options and this kind of came back as an option. I started digging into it more and consuming podcasts a little bit more and kind of Educating myself compared to when I'd first heard about it as an analyst, there was so much more out there. So you can kind of like, educate yourself before you hit the ground running. I listened to your podcast just the other day about the two guys that launched a hedge fund and then found their way into search funds. Yeah, I can only imagine how difficult it must have been for them. I mean, they alluded to that, but it was a little bit easier when I started because there was so much literature out there. However, it's different in the uk, so I soon learned that. But I guess naively thought, okay, there's enough for me to kind of step away and do this and execute on this. And so then I decided to do it.

Host: And going back to replacing your salary with the, with the attempt at the supplements business, you know, you had, as you said, J.P. morgan approaching 10 years at J.P. morgan. You know, I would imagine that long of a tenure in high finance in Geneva at JP Morgan, you know, your salary starts to get pretty interesting at those levels. So, you know, that kind of a golden hand handcuff situation. So stepping out to do something entrepreneurial becomes and feels more and more risky. Did that play into your calculation at all? I mean, I guess in another way to put that is like, you know, the higher your salary, the more successful your search has to be to replace said salary.

Guest: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, it. It definitely did. So there's pros and cons, right? The, like, I have a pretty simple life, so I was able to kind of save and invest along the way to allow me to, to search and then also to hopefully and. And it was the case, I guess, eventually invest in my acquisition too. So that, that was one of the benefits. The cons, like you said, is kind of the opportunity cost, I guess. And I, I think I was in a fortunate situation. So when I was deciding to do it, the offices in Geneva were going kind of going through a restructuring. Some people lost their jobs. Some people were asked to move to either New York or London as they were kind of, you know, downsizing Geneva fuel because it's an expensive place to employ people. And I had, I guess, been offered roles in both of the other locations. And I asked if I turn it down, you know, do I just get the package, like everyone that just basically lost their jobs? And the answer, the short answer was yes. I didn't really allude to why I was asking the question, but, you know, it was, it was an additional lump sum, if you will. So that kind of made the decision not A little bit easier, A lot easier because then it gives you a little bit of Runway. So you're not really eating into the investments, your investment saving from day one. And I, and I. So the risk is then if you fail, you have to go back and kind of market yourself and tell people what you were doing for, I don't know, one, two years, etc. And I spoke to a few people about that and they, they kind of, you know, gave me the confidence that I could, you know, sell myself on kind of the failed search, if you will again, maybe naively. So then I just thought, okay, you know what, I'm gonna, I'm gonna take this option. I've always been kind of fine with risk. That's, that's probably, I don't know if it's a strength or weakness, but it's definitely a quality that I have. And I just thought I'm gonna, I'm gonna take that risk and see how, how it plays out. So yeah, I mean, like you said, pros and cons, but I thought the, the potential upside outweighed the downside. So, so here we are.

[13:27] Host: And so to be clear, you got something of a severance as on your. As you left. Yeah, well, that was, that was happy kind of happy timing or the way you played that. Okay, and so where are we now? What, what date roughly when I left J.P. morgan. Yeah, yeah. And yes. And officially decided to pursue your search.

Guest: It would have been the end of 2020, I believe. So I searched for the, for basically the whole of 21. The beginning of 22 or like half of 22. Yeah. So there we go. End of 2020. That's right. Yeah.

Host: Okay. Okay. And I believe you started the podcast at the end of 2021. Does that sound right, that you were. Yeah, we were. It was about like a year into your search.

Guest: Yeah. Maybe kind of September.

Host: Ish.

Guest: Well, I can't remember because we, we kind of. At the time I had a co host, David, who's still a friend of mine. We pre pre recorded handful just to see if we liked it, if they were any good, and then we launched. I can't remember exactly when we started recording versus launching, but you're probably about right.

Host: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. All right. And so you are, you're in Geneva, you decide to do a self funded search.

Guest: Yeah, yeah.

Host: Okay. Talk us through that decision process to, to realize you're going to be living in Geneva, searching in the uk, hopefully acquiring in the uk, but, but continuing indefinitely to live and operate the business from Geneva.

Guest: Yeah. Well, I now live in the UK during the week by the way and operate from the uk. But at the time, yeah I was again maybe a little bit naive, but I was just thinking, all right, I'll just look kind of where I am located around Geneva because it is pretty international. I soon found out that all small business owners are basically only want to speak French in the French region and the UK and even South Africa initially. And then very quickly like a month or two into it realized like the UK is going to be the best option from the language standpoint culturally, from kind of business friendly, ecosystem wise. So it probably took me a month to six weeks to really focus in on the UK because I was maybe as everyone does early on in their search weighing options in the U.S. i don't know, maybe you're looking at kind of different states and then you decide on, okay, it's just going to be these two states. If you self funded you kind of have a little more flexibility. So yeah, it was, it was a bit of a learning process for the first few weeks for sure.

[15:52] Host: Okay, so you dialed that in, you realized it was going to be the uk. Give us some more parameters of your search size. I know you ultimately developed a thesis. Talk us through some of these parameters.

Guest: Yeah, so early on I knew I wanted to go self funded and I was, I was flexible enough on size I guess early on before I figured out some of the other parameters like debt and you know, debt equity ratios and things like that, that kind of skew towards a certain size. And I can get into what I mean by that but I was a little bit flexible thinking okay, I can go on like really fragmented industries like fire and security buy small and just kind of roll up quickly and then I don't mind kind of buying a job but then after like maybe acquisition 2 and 3 it becomes less of a job because I had a bit of savings investments to live from and then kind of changed my mindset later on to you know, at least £500,000. So I don't know what that converts this product 650 to $700,000 upwards in any but just was probably about right because the size of debt needed, needed to be a certain level. Otherwise people don't really waste any time on, on giving you that debt financing. And it's a complicated debt market here. And then also multiples aren't three times like you know, you read everywhere. Sometimes they can get a little bit north of four or five times depending on the industry. So I quickly realized I'll have to look a little bit bigger because just from a cash flow standpoint after debt servicing and the multiples you're paying, it doesn't make sense to be too small. So that was also kind of an evolving process. But, but yeah, so I guess that came, you know, maybe months in after I learned these things and probably after I started speaking to people that ultimately became guests on the podcast. Because I quickly learned, you know, it's, there's was a lot of literature around the US markets and then you have kind of the international space, the report that's done by IESE or however you pronounce the business school in Spain. But the UK is different on a lot of aspects and you know, as a result the way you have to search and the types of business you can acquire are, are a little bit different. So as I learned that my kind of strategy in searching evolved.

[18:17] Host: Top of the list for most acquisition entrepreneurs after they close on the business is digital marketing. Is the business doing it properly or at all? Has the website been touched since 2005? In many cases that website is going to need an overhaul. Eversight is a firm that works with searchers to do custom redesigns of their websites for a flat monthly fee. So you don't need to spend down your precious working capital for a custom redesign of the website. That and all ongoing support is baked into their monthly fee. So your website cost is simple and predictable month after month with the assurance of knowing that you can ping the folks at Eversight for any changes you might need and you will talk to a human, call or email your Eversight rep, make a request and expect your changes live in hours, sometimes minutes. There is so much going on when you transition that business you buy. Make the website management easy by putting it in the capable hands of Eversight. Check out Eversight.com searchers E V E R S I T E.com searchers. So for the UK searchers who might be listening, what are two or three of these things that you learned, these idiosyncrasies of the UK market that you learn the hard way that you might just accelerate somebody's knowledge of and awareness of?

Guest: Yeah, so if, I mean the first biggest one is the debt market is completely different. So we don't have anything that looks even remotely similar to the SBA loan. So if you're going down self funded route it's very unlikely you can go to conventional bank. So you have to go to kind of these alternative lenders or private credit funds and almost get what would look like mezzanine debt in the US I would imagine in terms of kind of the, the interest rates you're paying. So it's quite expensive. And then the term of those loans is kind of 5 to 6 years versus 10 years. So you can't really lever up like 89, 90% like self funded searches do in the US. You have to be a lot more conservative on that debt number because you know, like it may sound scary leveraging up 80, 90% but it's really the debt servicing that's, that's the kind of thing you really need to look at. Right. And that's why, you know, it's just the economics are not the exact same and therefore you need a bigger equity check and, or a bit more seller financing to kind of bridge that gap and then that changes kind of okay, well I thought my X amount of equity could get me so far, but actually maybe, maybe there's a little bit of a shortfall there and maybe I have to raise more outside equity than I originally anticipated. So that's, that's the first big one. The second thing I would say is probably around the, the, the broker broker deal. So intermediaries come in all shapes and sizes. I would say in the UK there's one or two really big brokers that, I mean it's, it's very unregulated. I don't know if it's more or less unregulated in the, in the UK and in the US but their business model essentially from what I understand, and one of them is a public company. So I think people have kind of reverse engineered that this is the case, but they're incentivized. It's basically like a retainer model rather than a success fee model. So they promise business owners your business for 10 times. You'll definitely get a million for this or 2 million or 10 million for this. The seller obviously believes that and they've kind of got that in their mind and then you have these conversations and you know, it's just like it's basically a waste of time because you think, you know, you suggest what would be a reasonable price at a reasonable structure and it's way, way, you know, off of their expectations. So that would be, I would say kind of target more corporate finance intermediaries or accounting firms and slightly more professional if you will. Apologies if I'm offending anyone, but intermediaries that are more success based, driven and a lot of the kind of Main street brokers in the uk, the big ones are or don't seem to be based on success fees. So that's another thing. And then maybe combined with that is the multiple discussion because they're promised such high multiples. I don't know if that's the reason why multiples seem to be higher than what I hear in the us but generally they are. Like anything recurring just seems to be like five, six times even for small businesses. It's not like, oh, this is, you know, this is a really small business. You're buying a job, therefore you can easily get three times. No one seems to really want to hear that. It's just so, I mean, not, I mean, I, I, my, my, my, the company I bought was around three times ebitda. So it's not like you can't find them. But I just think, you know, I remember looking at Biz Buy Sell some months back and you, you literally, they, they give you the price on the listing and it's slap bang three times. Like you would never ever see anything like that in the uk. It's all, there's no prices quoted and then like I said, expectations are just crazy, crazy between the buyer and seller.

[23:21] Host: Wow, man. Well, you've really shifted my perspective here, Paul, because here in the US we talk all the time about how difficult it is to find a great business to buy and you've just like layered on three further disadvantages that you have in the uk. I mean, you're making it sound extremely, extremely difficult there.

Guest: Yeah.

Host: It's also a smaller country, a smaller market, so there are fewer targets. So I imagine that the pickings are slimmer. On the other hand, there are probably less searchers running around too. So there's also maybe less competition for deals. How did that feel? I know you don't have anything to compare it to, but did it feel super competitive? Are there a lot of Paul Corks running around competing with you to buy businesses?

[24:01] Guest: Yeah, maybe. If I can just add one more thing onto because it is more challenging I think in the uk. But one thing I mentioned in terms of the structuring was the what I think the US people refer to as seller financing.

Host: Yeah.

Guest: Here it's, you know, there's different phrases for it, but essentially that's typically interest free. And as a percentage of total EV, you'll see that getting at times 20, 30%, 40% sometimes to kind of help with that debt component. So that does help. So like maybe net net from a cash flow standpoint you're still not going to see 10 years on, even on that piece. But from an interest rate standpoint maybe it gets close to what the US is. So I would just. It's not all, it's not all horrible.

Host: That's actually. And let me, Paul, before you answer my question about the competition, let me also ask about bridging the gap because the multiples are higher and things are more expensive. Does that mean are there kind of a handful or more than a handful of SMB acquisition investors here? There are, there are kind of like some, you know, once you get into the world at all and start looking to raise money for your deal, you know, know the short list emerges pretty quickly. It's a small world and people kind of know the names. Is it like that there, Are there some pretty active search investors there in the uk? Is that. Yeah. So are there go tos to bridge that gap, to bridge that equity gap?

Guest: There certainly are. There's, there's ones that will focus strictly on traditional search funds because they know, you know, it's, it's very structured and they know, they know what, what, what is in front of them. And then the self funded searches, it is also quite structured. From what I found early on in my conversations, they expect kind of some portion of your equity to be vesting over time. Like which, which is neither good nor bad. I just found that it was very like this is how you, this is how we expect investor equity terms to look like and you can't really deviate. And from what I'd learned from kind of maybe, maybe the, the US counterparts from, from people on your podcast and reading, you know, search fund and the likes is you can kind of take a deal and maybe it's negotiable, right, because you've raised the debt, the equity gap kind of is a bit of a moving target, etc. So I, I took that approach and maybe the network from my podcast helped me find investors outside of the search fund ecosystem, if you will. But they're kind of, they're familiar with small business acquisitions, so they definitely are. And I think there are also, like I said, other people that would be comfortable financing these types of deals that aren't kind of part of the NBA communities, if you will, because I feel like a lot of it stems from the MBA programs, like the Ivy League MBA programs. So there's, there's both and I don't think either one is better or worse. It's just, you know, it depends on the deal, depends on the searcher. So it's not too bad. I think it's definitely, they're definitely fewer than the US but like you said it's a smaller market too. So I don't think it's necessarily too complicated. And some people or quite a few investors like I know you had on Alex Glassner on your podcast a while back, he had a handful of US investors on his cap table. A lot of the traditional search funds will have U.S. or international investors on the cap table. So even though self funded skews to more kind of UK based investors, that's not always the case. So people do want some international exposure. So we have a good mix and I don't think that's too complicated on the equity side. I would argue it's more difficult on the dead side.

[27:29] Host: Yeah. Yeah, great. And before we move on I just want to correct myself. I made it sound like in the US we have a small handful of go to investors and in fact there are well known names in the investment community for sure. But that's not to say there's all sorts of sources of capital over here. So for the listeners I just want to kind of correct, correct the record there. It's not to say that there's five or ten places to get capital if you got a good deal. There are a lot of them in the U.S. moving on. Paul, so, so did you butt heads with other searchers as you were looking for your deal? How competitive is the market?

Guest: It's, it's not too competitive I would say. I didn't really butt heads. You hear of people searching in your industry and then may maybe they would become or share less information if you will because maybe they thought it was or they think it's more competitive because it's a smaller market. But I didn't find that to be the case. I mean I think, I think what you do run into a lot is other acquisition because. So maybe I should define things a little bit like a searcher. I, I find someone who's kind of found the literature from one of the MBA programs and kind of takes a more academic approach to it if you will. And then there's kind of broader business buyers that are, there's quite a lot of these types of buyers in the UK that takes these training courses and tribe by businesses with no money down which again neither here nor like it's not a good or a bad thing. But a lot of sellers are a little bit frustrated to hear that message because as you'd expect they want as much money up front as possible. So I found sometimes you get some pushback when you speak to an owner because they think that's the approach that you want to take. But if you kind of educate it or kind of market yourself early up front as to the approach you want to take, that helps the conversation down that route. So that was one of the, that was one of the challenges I found kind of differentiating yourself against other business buyers but in terms of searches maybe because I don't know the split between traditional and self funded. But I would, I would imagine traditional might be more common in the UK and the size would just dictate that we're looking at different types of companies. But it wasn't really something that I ran into a lot. I wouldn't say okay, okay.

Host: And yet it still was difficult to find your deal. So it talk to us about just the mechanics of your search. Were you doing a lot of cold outreach or were you doing just brokered a combination? How did you find Amber?

Guest: Yeah, so I, I, I did both. It's obviously tempting to look at things that are for sale because they're right there in front of you. You just click on a link and ask for a meeting. And I was pretty agnostic early on. Just look trying to look at everything. That seems somewhat interesting to try and educate myself but always, you know, probably wasting a lot of time but figuring like there were nine horrible things. But the one great thing you're like, oh, I can make this work if I just structure it like this way, this way I'll make this thing work. And, and so kicking, I know that

[30:28] Host: temptation, kicking a lot of tires.

Guest: And then I also did the proprietary. So I did it. I tried letters early on because I'd heard that that worked in the UK but it was expensive and it's impossible to track the data and the amount of people that get back to you was basically non existent. So I went to email. That wasn't a ton better but I did have a few interesting conversations. But it's just a very long process because the seller, you end up having to prepare the owner to sell and there's obviously a little bit of conflict there. Whereas if you're going by an intermediary owner, hopefully most of that work is already done up front. So I later started using kind of the more corporate finance type intermediaries to get better quality deals. And that's eventually how I found Amber, through a corporate finance company. I was actually, I reached out to them for a different deal and they mentioned this, this company in this industry if I'd be interested. And I actually had a, had a thesis on this industry. So I, it was, yeah, I'm I'm, I'm very interested. So we had a look at it and then you know, some months down the line we ended up closing on, on that company. But I did both and I, yeah, I, I, I, I read through the, the SIG self funded survey and I probably agree with kind of the broker proprietary split. I mean, skewing to intermediary type deals for a self funded searcher. I, I think probably from the conversation I have, there's more success on that side. But proprietary deals definitely get done. I mean Alex, again, just to go back to Alex, he, he, his was a proprietary deal. And so that's a good example.

Host: Yeah. And so when you were reaching out to intermediaries, to be clear, was it because you were seeing a listing and so you'd reach out to the intermediary with the listing or did you just do kind of, I mean the other kind of blend is cold outreach to intermediaries. So you cultivate relationships with intermediaries, not necessarily because they have a listing at this moment that you want to ask about, but you're just raising your hand and saying, hey, I'm interested in X, Y and Z. I'm real, I'm serious about this. You know, put me on your radar. Did you do some of that or was it mostly driven by like, okay, this intermediary has a listing I want to talk about. And then you'd reach out.

Guest: It was definitely, initially it was definitely just I see a listing and I can see who the intermediary is and then I reach out and then later probably having the podcast helped, then you kind of get on the list of the intermediaries and they're like, okay, he's, he seems somewhat serious. We'll share deals with, with him too. And I think, well, and I think, I know with Amber specifically, I found it on a deal aggregation site called the Business Sale Report and I guess similar to Business Buy Sell in the US which is, aggregates deals across, you know, the UK broadly. And it's, it's a pretty, it's a pretty robust platform to, to scan and I would, you know, pretty much daily scan to see what's new, see what's out there. And I came across it. And then when I met with intermediaries, it was the first time I dealt with this corporate finance company. They're a great bunch of guys. And, and yes, I got a little bit lucky, I would say.

[33:38] Host: Yeah, great, well, so you get lucky, you find Amber. Tell us about, tell us about this business.

Guest: Yeah, so they do window door installation Mainly some kind of extent like what they call living extension. But in the UK you find these conservatories and what they refer to as orangeries but it's like an attachment to the side of your house basically to extend your house into some living space. It's very, very popular in the uk, often with a lot of windows to allow light because the weather in the UK is not great. So these things are really popular. And I, so I, I mean it takes a lot of boxes from like a, from, from the search space but the two boxes it probably doesn't take is the retail N component, I wouldn't say it's exclusively retail and the non recurring revenue component. And I have my thoughts on recurring revenue, I mean as to why it's good and bad. But I wasn't kind of caught up on recurring revenue. Especially when you're going down to smaller business because you typically find there's a lot of concentration. So I was fine with the non recurring revenue. And as I looked into the sector because I'd looked at a few handful of businesses in the sector before I, I quickly learned in the UK it's the oldest housing stock in, in Europe, it's the least energy efficient and what I thought was a very cyclical industry linked to construction. It's actually mostly the replacement market that drives a lot of the revenue. So yes, it's still somewhat of a discretionary spend but if you need to replace a window or a door which is the envelope of a property, you're going to do it, you're not going to kind of delay it. We're not, we're not living in the Bahamas here. So I started to dig into the sector and there's a lot of demand and I thought that kind of mitigated the non recurring revenue nature of the business. And as a result there's essentially no concentration. I mean each Customer is like 2, 3% of total sales. So it's a little bit of a different business. But I was comfortable with that and I think the price paid was very fair and reasonable to kind of mitigate the non recurring revenue aspect of the business. And yeah, I think there's a lot of tailwinds and, and that, that's kind of my thesis and it seems, you know, that the economy is not in the best space now but there still seems to be a ton of demand despite that. So I'm pretty bullish on it and, and you know, keeping my eye out for other, other deals that come up and I guess now deals kind of come to Me, which is a nice change of pace after you make your first acquisition. But, but I think it's a great industry and you know, it's a lot of, for a lot of the reasons that everyone speaks about, you know, you know, how you can kind of the low hanging fruit type things. I'm not going to get into all of them here, but I think people have heard them all before. And then if I talk about Amber itself, it was a good size business. So tick that box. In terms of kind of the valuation discussion, it was in line with what I thought was fair. So kind of early on that that was like, okay, this is worth keeping the conversation going. And as I got further and further into the business, I liked it more. I got on wealthy owners, I get along well with the owners. Two out of three of them, two out of the three had stayed on and kind of, you know, are, are a sounding board for me and kind of they're doing what they were doing beforehand. I've kind of seen myself as a consultant helping like, you know, what can't you do? What do you think's worth doing and that you can't get to? So I split my time between that and kind of learning the business. So that's extremely helpful. And yeah, so for, for, for a lot of reasons I really like the company and, and for the reasons I explained, I like the sector. So yeah, I mean, happy to go deeper and into those. Will.

[37:19] Host: Yeah, yeah, a bunch of follow up questions to that. So because it was through an intermediary, Amber listed through an intermediary, you feel that that intermediary had done their, their proper job at setting expectations in terms of valuation. Just talking earlier about how valuations are totally out of whack, but you got a very, very, you got the, the 3X that we hear about and that's because the intermediate intermediary had done their job, essentially.

Guest: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And over and above the valuation and structure, like there's inevitably big, inevitably going to be things that pop up in due diligence and then having that professional intermediary rarely helps that process. Even though that intermediary was helping or advising the seller. Right. They still want the deal to get done in a fair and reasonable way. So I think that's absolutely critical for getting the deals done. And it sounds obvious, but that's kind of from what I had experienced, hard to find in the UK kind of small business acquisition ecosystem.

Host: Mm. And the. So two of the three owners are staying on in the business, but not as owners or do they still. Did they retain some equity?

Guest: No, they didn't. It was discussed. It was discussed, but I think I, I think they just wanted like a clean break because three of them had slightly different or have slightly different goals. But it was hard to kind of capture all of that and kind of balance all three of their goals. So this was just the cleanest way to do it. And so they don't. But, you know, I think, I think I feel that they're kind of got new energy when they see me there and kind of some young energy, young blood and it really is their baby and seeing someone else like adding value. Hopefully I'm adding value, but at least enthusiastic and trying to add value. I think it re. Energizes them a little bit and feel like the energy is really good between the three of us and we're all kind of looking to the future for Amber because I do think they want to see it successful. Obviously I do too. So it's been a really good partnership.

[39:28] Host: And so these are not reti. People who are retiring or retiring imminently then.

Guest: Well, I think they will do in the, in the next couple years. I mean, they are. The two that I've stayed on are the ones 55 and the 160. So they're not, you know, I don't think they want to stay in the business forever, but I do still think they have energy to run the business, you know, for, for the next, I mean, they will be with me for the first 12 months. That's kind of agreed upon. But I, I think they'd be open to staying longer and I would be open to that too because we, you know, we're working together well. But ultimately, I guess I don't know their motivations. After 12 months we'll see, we can have that discussion. But so that's, that's, I guess specifically in pen and paper how it is. But we'll see how it evolves after 12 months. Great.

Host: And some, some more on the business. So can you share any of the numbers?

Guest: Yeah, I can. So top line is about four and a half million pounds. So I don't know what that is in dollars. Maybe 6 million, give or take, and then 670,000 in EBITDA. So maybe, I don't know, 900,000 EBITDA dollars. So a decent sized business. Yeah, margins are re. I mean, it's not like 30% profit margins like some of the industries, but I think for this industry, the margins of this business is very, very good. And digging into that and looking at Other acquisitions down the line. It's interesting to see where you can pull levers on. Other businesses have less attractive margin. So it's really, it's really good that the business is quite well run and employee count around 30 now. I've made a couple of hires since joining and yeah, I mean, happy to go into other numbers that you think are useful.

Host: 30, you said three. Zero.

Guest: Yeah, yeah.

Host: Okay. And it's. And you mentioned the retail component, so is it primarily a retail operation?

Guest: Yeah, the majority of it is private homeowners. So that may come like we have a very premium showroom, which sounds obvious, but it's actually quite unique for the industry. The industry in the UK has a bit of a bad reputation, if you will. I don't know if you've ever watched the show White Gold on Netflix, but if anyone is curious, it's a very funny show about the industry in the 70s and 80s, I think. And, and apparently that's what it was like back then, but it isn't really like that anymore. But showrooms kind of got out of favor. But this business and a handful of other ones have really pushed towards having premium showrooms where people can come and almost have an Ikea like feel and touch and feel and see what the end product would look. Look like. Ours is kind of interior designed and it's like you step into this, you know, extension that's equipped with the windows and doors, all the furniture's there and mean, it's really impressive. So we've taken that approach. There is that retail component to it. But then we also are looking to make a push on, on kind of the more commercial side. We've done a lot of work with, with kind of private schools in the area, some private companies, and we're looking to push more on partnering with local architects for like, conversion work. There's a lot of historic properties that are being kind of converted into more modern buildings or residences. So there is an aspect to that, but we're trying to diversify that. But that being said, there's a lot of there, like, for the reasons I alluded to earlier, there's just a lot of demand in the, in the private or from private house homeowners.

[43:06] Host: And part of this, that demand also in your thesis is just the greening of real estate in property. Right. So a lot of. I think you said that there's, to the extent that a house hasn't already been, been kind of renovated or that its windows and doors haven't been renovated, there is a need to make them more energy efficient. So it's not right, it's not merely, you know, old properties need to be remodeled every X number of years. It's also there's this incentive, incentives out there now to make everything more energy efficient. So there's, that's kind of like a double tailwind. Not just natural cycles of replacing your windows, but this additional, this, this additional incentive to make your home more energy efficient.

Guest: Yeah, that's exactly right. And that's, and now you see if, if you, if you want to rent properties, they need to meet a certain kind of. We have like a sliding scale. A is, you know, optimal energy efficiency, B, C, D, et cetera. Everything needs to be kind of, I believe it's C and above. And very few properties, I think 67, when I was doing kind of work into the like building my thesis, 67 of properties in the UK do not meet that requirement. So you know, in order to hit those targets, the government would like. There's a lot, I mean there's, there's millions of, of homes that need to be upgraded and yeah, I think there's, there's, there's spin offs to that, but I think that's probably the core aspect that'll be driving demand in the sector.

Host: Yeah, phenomenal. You. I want to just get a little bit more into the acquisition before we hear about the transition, which I'm really also eager to dive into. You had mentioned to me offline that the deal almost died, as deals do, due to like a financing issue. Can you, can you talk about whatever that was and how it was resolved?

Guest: Yeah, yeah. So like I mentioned upfront the debt market was challenged or is challenging in the uk and I'd gotten a bunch of indicative terms from kind of the classic lenders you would go to for an acquisition like us in the uk. And I've still got good relationships with them and I built strong relationships with them, but I think just because it was on the smaller end of what they were looking for, their, their argument up front was I like you, Paul, I like the deal. But you know, it's just, it's a lot of work for us to do for pretty much, you know, the bottom end of what we're going to make on, on kind of financing a deal. So they were on the fence. And then around that time you saw like inflation start picking up, the war broke out, all these things happened. So indicative terms went to no longer issuing the loan for this acquisition. So it kind of let me and it left me in a bit of a tough spot. So it was the first time it almost fell over. I kind of kept that a little bit to myself. I didn't really tell anyone. I'm okay, back to the drawing board. I can, I can, I can solve this. And I went back to a few other lenders that were kind of on the smaller side, so slightly smaller than I was looking for, but this would be on their upper limit. So I thought, okay, they're probably going to be very interested in giving me this loan because they make the most money out of it. And that was the case. So I eventually got. So you get like indicative terms and then eventually get credit back terms, which is, from how I understood it, signed, sealed, delivered, you know, the loan is yours. You just need to basically wait for the drawdown. So it's about a week before acquisition is to be closed and I dealt with a peer to peer lender. So a lot of private credit funds or alternative lenders in the UK are essentially kind of family offices or high net worth individuals basically issuing private credit in a fund capacity. And this alternative lender basically does the due diligence, the credit background and then finance these deals. So it's essentially coming from individuals. So probably naively I was thinking, okay, peer to peer. Yeah, okay. It's always, that's always the case. But what it really was was this company basically only after credit backed terms have been issued, then it goes out to investor base to raise the money. So there's no guarantee and they take no balance sheet risk. And I wasn't completely aware of that. I probably should have, I certainly should have been, but it was an oversight probably on my part. And kind of a week before the deal was about to close, they contacted me to say, look, we're a little bit short on the loan. And I'm like, okay, so when are you going to get it? Speak to whoever you need to speak to. They're like, well, it looks like it's probably not going to meet your timelines. And at this point the deal had kind of been dragging on a little bit because of the first kind of debt situation. I was kind of quietly kicking the can down the road and kind of everyone was getting a little bit anxious. So I just said, you know, look, this, this can't be delayed any further, it needs to get done. And they basically said, well, we're not going to kind of find that gap. And it wasn't a huge gap, but you know, it was significant enough that you know, the deal would not get done. I couldn't raise that equity gap. In such a short time. So I had to go back to the owners and explain to them. And yeah, I was just really honest and upfront and I explained to them exactly what had happened. And I said this is the situation. It's obviously a tough credit market out there, but this is what they've come back with. And if we all want to get the deal done in kind of the next five days as had planned, we're gonna have to just be a little more flexible on how the deal's structured and then we can look to kind of refinance or kind of restructure things post acquisition. So essentially they were really kind enough to kind of increase the percentage of seller financing, whatever you want to call it, to absorb that gap so the equity component didn't have to change. And that, that was also important to me because you go back to the opportunity cost of, of, of, of, you know, not working. I, I couldn't really afford to raise any more equity or I could have, but then it just, my terms didn't look as attractive and the deal looked less attractive for me, like the risk, reward, trade off. So that was really appreciated from my part and I, I think that goes back to building good rapport with the owners I think that you hear so much about. But thankfully it was resolved and we got the deal done. But I mean it was an emotional roller coaster to say the least. I think my wife probably almost killed me about 10 times in those last weeks. But we got through it and we got the deal done.

[49:24] Host: Well, congratulations. That sounds like a nail biter for sure. Okay, Paul, well, you're in the business. Let's talk a little bit about the transition and opportunities in the business first. Those opportunities in the business. You, you've already said that it's well run, that it has good margins for its industry, that the showroom looks great and is kind of cutting edge for its industry. I was poking around the website, the website looks beautiful like, like a modern, you know, marketing optimized website. So on the other hand, you, you, you did also say that there, there, there is some low hanging fruit somewhere. So yeah, just kind of flesh that out a little bit. Like was this, was this your classic search target in the sense that like there were some, there's some really obvious things to go in there and improve because I'm just hearing that the, it's, it's, it's already a really efficient optimized business.

Guest: Yeah, I think in terms of, like, in terms of things to, to make it more profitable percentage wise, there There weren't. I mean maybe in the long run these things will turn out to be drive increase in profit margins, but it was more kind of on the operational side and adding an extra set of hands and maybe someone with a slightly different perspective. Some simple things like moving to digital contracts versus kind of pen and paper where you send it in the post, wait for the customer to sign it and send it back and then they, so you know, just that kind of adds or reduces turnaround times on sales by you know, up to a week. We've implemented with one of the old owners as one of the driving forces behind it, this kind of end to end ERP if you will, that's industry specific. But essentially you can kind of track the whole process from sale to completion of installation and set your timeframes as to how long each phase should take. And then if there's any bottlenecks, it kind of flags the person who's responsible that stage and be like, hey, this is supposed to be done within this five days. It's not what's going on. And I can kind of look at it from the top looking down and be like, okay, the bottlenecks are here, here and here, what's going on? So it really allows you to kind of, you know, really optimize and stay on track of things. Whereas if everyone's kind of just in their day to day, it's hard to, to, to, to know where it is until like you look at the numbers at the end of the month or quarter and be like okay, why is that? And then that's a little bit, that's a little bit unfortunate. Why didn't we resolve that? But now you can kind of get a more I guess live and updated stance of where the business is. So then there was a few, a few hires that, that I was able to spend some time on getting like basically change the entire finance team. Not that the finance team before was bad, but I guess they were kind of limited. They were, the skill was up to like bookkeeping perhaps. Anything else was outsourced to a, an accounting firm. Whereas now we have the in house expertise up to like a financial controller or director as you would, I don't know how you would call it, but basically you know, full on management accounts, some reporting like ad hoc analysis. The, the guy that I onboarded is able to do these things and he's a really young and hungry guy and I think he'll be a huge benefit to the business. So you know, spending some time and hiring a few key roles Whereas, you know, the owners maybe didn't have that bandwidth at the time and I think just spending some time on how we're going to expand the business. The business. I, like I said, I gave you the numbers kind of trailing 12 months if you will. But what I didn't mention is they'd kind of been like that for the last three years. And mainly like, like similar to what you would have heard a lot of times the owners were taking a good salary plus dividends from the business. You know, it was more than sufficient to sustain their lifestyle that, you know, they've done very well for themselves. So at their age they were just thinking, you know, I can go and open up in kind of the adjacent county, I can do all these things. But it's a lot of effort and I'm already, you know, doing very, very well for myself. Where I, I'm sitting I'm like, well that's not good enough. I mean, I understand that but I'm not going to sit and do nothing. I want to, I want to execute on these things. So having their brain to pick on, being able to pick, pick their brain on these things and then spending time thinking about how to do that has also been, you know, I think that's not really a low hanging fruit but it's, it's just the extra bandwidth now to focus on those things. There's probably more things I'm not, I'm not thinking of and, and I probably did the business a bit of a disservice by saying lots of laying fruit because to your point, on margins and things like that is a very well run business. I think, I think like some marketing strategies that, you know, just email campaigns, things like that that I think we could do a little differently but no one really knows how to do it internally. Again a lot of that is outsourced so just, just bringing a few things in house. So yeah, I think classic things I would say.

[54:24] Host: Yeah, I would say Paul, in some, in some ways this feels like the classic search situation where that you hope for. So it's a solid, the bones of the business are very, very solid. But the owners just were kind of resting on their laurels. Just had different priorities in life, different stage of life, but tons of opportunity there for somebody who's a little bit younger, a little bit hungrier to come in and, and just, you know, turn all these things on. I love it. It's very exciting. So when did you close? 15th of September, four months ago. Yeah, so it doesn't sound like I want to just ask about the transition and the philosophy of, you know, don't touch anything for three months or six months or, oh, no, do touch any, do touch things, you know, know, make your impression felt like, you know, there's a new owner here and yes, there is going to be change. It sounds like your approach has been to not be shy about making some changes and making your presence felt, respond to that.

Guest: Probably a bit of a balance. I mean, not, not in the sense that, I mean, I would disagree with that comment in the sense that I, I, I'm coming in every day and, and telling people what to do. I think I'm definitely the person in the business that knows the least about the industry, so I rely heavily on everyone else and that's pretty clear. So I always, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm not ashamed to be like the dumbest person in the room and ask all the dumb questions. But if I think that something is worth executing on, I, I think we should do it. And I, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, you know, speak to the owners, the, the former owners about that and get their thoughts on it. And sometimes, most part, for the most part, we agree and if we don't, I listen and I take the advice on why it may be a bad idea. So I don't think I would say I'm more on the side of not changing anything. And I kind of think about things I can, you know, on a, like, like I said earlier, like a consultancy almost, you know, what do you guys think is important that you guys just haven't been able to tackle yet. Let me, let me take a shot at that. I think I can, I think I can resolve this and then having some of my own ideas, but very much relying on everyone else. So I think that's the kind of approach I've been taking. Like, I don't think there's any decision, key decision that I've taken that I would not run by the two former owners that are still on board. I mean, their experience, they're incredibly smart in the industry and business wise, I mean, like, they probably wouldn't say that if you ask them, but I can tell you, like, you know, just, just running a business, there's like pattern recognition and things that their gut tells them is the right decision. And then I'll go and spend hours on an Excel. I'm like, oh, you're right. Fancy that. You're actually right. So I trust they've got a lot and I rely on them quite heavily. Yeah.

[57:01] Host: Yeah, well, but making a hire or two, those are big decisions.

Guest: Yeah, they. They are. And it was somewhat necessary. So probably what I should have said is the. The. The former finance manager, if you will, that was kind of the bookkeeper. That was the owner that left. That was his wife. So she was always gonna leave at some point that probably. I probably accelerated that a little bit with. With, you know, no, no bad intentions. I just felt comfortable enough to do it earlier than I anticipated. And she knew that that was going to be the case. She said, you know, she would stay on as long as I needed. And I felt that we could. We could hire. But I think. I think a robust finance team is really important if you want to scale these small businesses. Often I think that's probably the weaker team within these small businesses, because technically, like, if you've read e myth in these businesses, they're a technician. They decide, I'm going to start my own business. So they're very good at knowing, like. Like the 1x owner is the sales guy. The other one is kind of the ops guy. And they know that very well. And they're like, oh, well, just his wife can be our bookkeeper. That's fine.

Host: Yeah.

Guest: And then she kind of learns the role, and that's kind of. It kind of caps the finance team. And I think, you know, if you're looking at doing further acquisitions or really want to do some. Some. Some reporting, you can outsource it. But I think it's valuable to have someone in house. So I thought that was important, and I think that is important. So that was important for me. And then there were a few other people that we replaced. One guy retired, so there were a few other hires that were not. Not a result of kind of anyone being fired or leaving because of anything bad that happened. It was just kind of natural. Natural kind of churn within the. Within the business.

Host: Sure. Okay. And are there any. Any kind of things that you think you've done right in your transition? Well, aside from what we've already talked about. For example, your day one speech. You know, how did that go? Have you gone around and proactively interviewed everyone or, you know, the top 10 people in the organization or anything like that? Any. Any techniques that you learned from your. Your own many interviews that you, you know, have become part of Paul's playbook?

Guest: Yeah. So there was no day one speech. I actually was, like, really stressed about what that would look like. And then speaking to the owner, they just. They just said, like, look, that is not going to go down well in this kind of a business. I think it's important if. If we kind of. Not that it wouldn't go down well, but I think it was important for. Because nobody knew about it before the acquisition and just like, land them with a speech like, okay, this is your new owner, and I'm, you know, I'm younger than the existing owners. It probably would have ruffled some feathers. So we decided that we would approach it by going all together, like myself and the other owners. Not one by one, but you kind of had. We have our showroom, which is kind of the sales staff. We have our head office, which is kind of the ops and where we. Where the warehouses, and then we have the fitters and stalls that are on the road. So we kind of just did it like that, kind of. So it wasn't really a speech rather than just introducing me to the team, just informal chats, letting them get to know who I am. Just kind of, you know, almost as if you're at a networking event, if you will. Yeah, I guess it's. It's. It's a little bit different. And like, you know, this. There's probably thinking in the back of mine, this is my.

[1:00:28] Host: My.

Guest: My new boss. But it was very important for me to. To kind of communicate that, like, you know, I don't plan to change anything. Like, Paul, who has got the same name as me, he's the sales director that is the former owner. It's, you know, in. In my eyes, he's still the boss of, like, the showroom, and everyone there kind of still reports to him. And, you know, yeah, I have no. I have no ego in the game. That's completely fine. And I think that was important for everyone to. To know that not. Not much is really changing. I'm really here to. To help with a kind of longer transition of the guys going out to retirement. But. But it's not like, okay, I'm the new guy. This is all going to change. So it was important. We kind of communicated that. And I think by the time we got out to the people that are out in the field, kind of, they knew what was going on. So they had already kind of like, phoned the ops owner to old owner to see what was going on. He reassured them. And then by the time I met them, I kind of kept that consistent messaging which, you know, which was sincere. It's not like what I wanted them to hear. It's, you know, I think it's the truth. And they were okay with that, so that was the approach that we took and we kind of brainstormed that before, so it wasn't just like winging it. We just thought that was the best approach. And I think it worked quite well. I think it would have. Now that I know the people much better. I think it would have been very strange for me to give, for me to stand up and give a speech. So I'm quite glad I didn't have to do that.

Host: Yeah, no, I mean, I like to ask that question just because it seems like such a nerve wracking exercise to do. And I'll also say that now that I'm listening to you talk in the way you did it, it seems like to do a big day, one speech, like an introduction speech. Hey, I'm the new owner. It does seem to contradict a little bit what the contents of that speech often is, which is no big changes, life's not going to change. And you know, but it's like the audience is probably like, yeah, but you've convened us all into this room, you're making this big purchase announcement and so, so you've got us all ginned up and. But you're telling us like it's no big deal. So which is it? You know what I mean? So, yeah, it's kind of, it's kind of interesting.

Guest: Yeah, exactly. I, I couldn't agree more. I think it depends on the business. Like coming from JP Morgan, we have these kind of town halls every month and things like that. People wouldn't be too suspicious if they're getting gathered for kind of, you know, a speech or, or something. But like in, in a small business, people like, huh, we all need to gather for speech. What, what, what's going on already? The anxiety would, you know, start bubbling.

Host: Yeah, exactly.

Guest: Yeah. I think, I think the approach we did specifically for, for, for my business was good, but, you know, I think any way can work. I think it's, you know, case by case.

[1:03:00] Host: Paul, I know you're living in the UK during the week, but, you know, you still have a weekend home where your family is, where your wife is. So I want to talk about that for a second and I also, of course, want to talk about the podcast. So let's talk about the, the Geneva to. Where is the business, by the way? It's not in London. I know that much. It's in. Where is it?

Guest: Yeah, so it's up in Norwich, which is about two hours by train northeast of London. It's a very, very nice town, I guess you could say. It's, it's, it's a wealthy ish area. I mean not like London but I mean there's, there is, there is money here. So it's a nice upmarket place, very beautiful countryside. The city is kind of medieval. I'd never been here before. I came to do like the first due diligence meeting last year sometime. But I really, really like it. And yeah, it's not, it's not too far to get, get to London if you need to. I mean I have family there so I do go there sometimes, but most of the time I'm going back to

Host: France like you said, France, Geneva and, and, and flights. There's a, there's an airport where you can get direct flights from Geneva. Or do you have to pass through Heathrow or fly into Heathrow, take the train or what?

Guest: Yeah, so I originally I was going via London. Sometimes he through Heathrow or some of the other smaller airlines that have the low cost airlines flying through them. But it's a little bit more complicated. Then you've got to get into the city center, then you've got to take the train. And once I'd landed here or once I arrived here, I learned that I could fly. And this is going to sound way more complicated than it is, but I'll explain why it's easy. From Norwich directly to Amsterdam, which is like a 25 minute flight, and then from Amsterdam to Geneva and Amsterdam and Geneva are both small airports and I live 10 minutes from each of them and I just travel with a backpack. So I literally just arrived 10 minutes before, kind of walk onto the plane, do that. If I'm in Amsterdam and the layover is like an hour or so, it's a nice airport with lots of nice places to sit and work. So I kind of catch up on a few things there and then walk to my gate and catch the next flight. So it's really, it's quite a breeze to be honest. And I've done a lot of traveling, you know, since I joined J.P. morgan. So it's quite a lot of people here, they're like, oh my goodness, that must be a nightmare. To be honest, it isn't really for me personally, it's not that complicated. So that's how I do it now. And I think door to door it's quicker than going via London, given all the kind of different modes of transport you have to eventually take. Going via London, which seems counterintuitive, but it's relatively straightforward. So I'm doing it most weekends or almost every Weekend. We've done it. Well, I've done it. And then, yeah, like, like I said, during the week here in Norwich and,

Host: And door to door. What is it? What is the time travel?

Guest: So depending on the layover in Amsterdam, which is kind of normally, I normally make it about an hour and a half just in case there's delays. It's probably about three hours, maybe three hours 15, depending, because the hour. So it's the first flight's 25 minutes from Norwich to Amsterdam. Amsterdam, Geneva is about an hour 10. And then include the time in Amsterdam and kind of the 10 minutes to and from the airport. It's about that. And it's. It's mostly on schedule, so I can, I can almost time it perfectly when I'm gonna arrive home and, and arrive here, because I. Yeah, the schedules are the same every week. I know I take the same Friday flight and the same Sunday flight back home. So it's kind of like ingrained. The routine's ingrained now.

[1:06:18] Host: Sure, sure. Well, and, and so how is that going? So, so the flight itself to and from isn't that bad. Three hours door to door, Three and a half hours door to door. It's not that bad at all. Of course. Of course, you are kind of living out of a bachelor pad, I assume, during the week. And. And. Oh, is this, Is that it behind you? Okay, yeah, that might be the office. And. And you know, your wife is three, three and a half hours by flight away. So anyway, yeah, how's that going? And just kind of emotionally, personally. But also, do you have any thoughts about what you might tell other searchers who might consider something like that? Share what you can.

Guest: Yeah, sure. So I think before I go into the kind of personal, emotional side, I. I thought before acquiring it that, that I could probably be home as in kind of France, Geneva area, more than I have been. And technically I could be. But I think as all the. The owner operators will tell you, it's different when you're on site speaking to people face to face in order to get things done, resolve problems. You know, like, people are comfortable doing things over video and calling, but it really, there really is a difference and you can feel and see that. So I quickly realized I can't really just kind of work from home in France because when problems come up, it's a little bit unfair if I'm kind of like trying to resolve it via, you know, a mobile call where everyone's kind of like scattering around looking for answers and things like that. So I am here pretty Much all the time during the work week. And that's okay. So that's the first point. So I think thinking you're able to do it remotely, I think you really have to have a different approach to it. Like, you know, you have to have the mindset that you're not going to be an operator almost and be kind of be like a capital allocator doing maybe multiple acquisitions or building a portfolio approach which maybe potentially that, that will be something I work towards. But as the first one, it's a decent sized business. I can't just kind of like, you know, let it, let it run remotely. I think I need to be a little more hands on, especially because the current owners are working as hard as they did beforehand. And it seems unfair and unreasonable for me to kind of just be like working from France when they've essentially sold the business to me, but yet are working just as hard as ever. So I feel like I need to work at least as hard as them for, for it to be fair. And so that, that was, you know, a change in my thinking early on and, and, and they were open, they said I could work remotely. You know, they said I can have the flexibility. Like I am able to do it. Not that they were giving me permission, but they said like from a tech standpoint you can, you can easily do it. But I quickly learned it's not optimal. And then on the, on the, you know, emotional, personal side, I think it is difficult but even searching can be very emotionally challenging. So this almost seems way easier than kind of the challenges of searching. But my wife and I, we, we've, we've kind of traveled a lot for our respective jobs. She, she used to work for Ralph Lauren for many years. So she, which was also a US based company, their European headquarters was in Geneva too. So we've kind of, you know, always had these periods where like I'm on a, on, on like a work project here and there and that's always fine. Like we always come and go and, and it seems to work fine. And more than fine, I think we both actually find it quite exciting to take on these new, new challenges. And eventually when the end of the school year is up, my wife and daughter will be joining me and we'll be here, we'll be based here in, you know, permanently. I don't know if it'll be forever, but definitely based here permanently. So it's only a short, you know, short term thing that I'm going back and forth every weekend. It's more challenging with my Daughter. Because I. I miss her a lot.

[1:10:08] Host: Yeah.

Guest: And, you know, at her age being three and a half years every week, like, she has these, like, monumental kind of growth or, like, growth and like, things she learns or things she, you know, and, like, you miss these things and it's.

Host: And it's.

Guest: And that's quite tough, but.

Host: Yeah, sure.

Guest: But, you know, I think. I think I'm doing it for the right reasons, and hopefully, I don't really think she understands what's going on, but if she did, I think she would understand that I'm doing it for the right reasons. But, yeah, it's not easy, but I think having a supportive wife and having someone on kind of the same page as you is very helpful because it's definitely not without its challenges. But as long as you kind of know what the end goal is and you're kind of on the same page, that makes it massively helpful. So, yeah, I think for the most part, it's going really well. I think it's not as comp. Almost everyone can't believe that I'm doing what I'm doing, that we're doing what we're doing. But honestly, we don't really. Like before, I know it's Friday and I'm flying back home and it's like it goes by so quickly and then. Yeah. And also it's been three months of this, so maybe. Maybe in a year's time, if this was still happening, it would start to get exhausting, but three, four months with a couple weeks over Christmas altogether. So, you know, it's manageable.

Host: Well, you know, it's funny because it actually probably means that you're more intense and more visible in the business than if you were living locally, because while you're there Monday to Friday, you're pro. I mean, you got nothing else to do but just think, think, think, be in the business, be leading this new business. It's just like you got no other distractions because you can't go home to the family because they're not there. So. So in some ways, like, it's probably had, like, an effect of. Of getting you even more entrenched and ensconced in the business than. Than less than somebody who, you know, is. Lives down the. You know, lives 20 minutes away.

[1:12:03] Guest: So, yeah, I think so. I mean, other than going to the gym, I pretty much. That's. My life is much the gym.

Host: Right.

Guest: And. And working while I'm here in Norwich. I mean, I'll go to some good restaurants and stuff, because it is A nice city, but, you know, I find myself just kind of working at night because, you know, there's, I'm like, well, you know, I'm. Nothing else that I can do. I'm just gonna like this. Those emails, I didn't get to. Let me just tackle those tonight and then the next night something similar. So it does, it does lead you to be a little more. Efficient is definitely not the word, but I guess busy during the week and you can get more done, I would say. But whether that's optimal or not, I don't know. But yeah, I do agree with your comment that I'm kind of like just working the whole time I'm here, basically.

Host: Yeah, yeah, yeah. It'll be, it'll be really interesting to see how it evolves over the next 612 months. Paul, one more question on the acquisition, then let's get to the pod. Aside from the family stuff and the remote, the Geneva to Norwich. Is this pronounced Norwich? Norwich, yeah, Norwich.

Guest: You kind of, you kind of. It's a silent. The W. Norwich.

Host: Okay. Okay. Norwich. How do you feel being an operator? So you've never been an operator before. That's obviously in your, in some ways you, you kind of have the common pattern of kind of from high finance to SMB operator. Very, very different worlds. Even though this is a common pattern. How have you found that transition? How have you found becoming an operator?

Guest: Yeah, better than I expected. Will, to be honest. I think I was, that, that was probably the thing I was most anxious about. Like would I be good? And I don't know if I'll be good yet. And then will I enjoy it? Which I also didn't know, but I can say, well, at least four months in that I really am enjoying it. Like I, I think that there's like a never ending to do list, constant challenges all the time. But it's exciting things to tackle and it's things I don't think I can't solve. It's just almost a matter of time. Like time is the limiting factor and it's really, it's really interesting to be able to think, okay, what's important, what's not. Let's tackle this and drive value. Like each decision you make is, is making an impact for better or worse on the business. Whereas I mean, like I loved my time at JP Morgan, don't get me wrong. But you know, your, your, your, your decision making ability is very diluted after, you know, it goes up certain layers of management. It's like, okay, interesting idea, Paul, but. No, but you know, but we're not going to go with it, which, which, which, I mean it is what it is. So I'm really enjoying the operating side of it, I must admit. I think it helps to have a business that's kind of, you know, not, not, not a turnaround, if you will, like something that's kind of stable and profitable, although obviously the economy is not what it was, but it's still a good, sound business. And then also having good people in the business that you know, make your day to day pleasurable, all of those things help. And I think I'm, I was lucky to, to found a business that's like that. But yeah, I must admit, like coming from a capital allocation background, I was a little bit anxious and I, I still would like to kind of go that route eventually and maybe build a portfolio or make further acquisitions, but as an operator in isolation, I think I'm really, really enjoying it.

[1:15:16] Host: Yeah, well, if you can learn to be a good operator, becoming a capital allocator later, you'll just be that much better positioned to, to know and understand it absolutely down the path. So it's great.

Guest: Couldn't agree more. I think I honestly could even, I mean I have my own kind of personal portfolio, but just getting into the intricacies of a small business and wrapping your head around unit economics, even though conceptually I knew what all those things were, at least my personal investment was like, oh, this business is interesting, it does interesting things. Let me just, you know, invest a little bit. But now it's really like, I want to know, like what are the margins business? Like I really get into the weeds on every stock I would purchase in my portfolio. And I do think it makes you a better investor kind of knowing how businesses are run rather than, yeah, just kind of like looking at what's the hot stock of the day kind of thing, you know, which is very easy to do. You can always kind of back into a thesis because it's doing X, Y and Z. But being able to know the intricacies and the economics of the business, I think it does make you a better investor. And then when you want to execute on that at some point, you know, having that experience I think will be invaluable.

Host: Yeah, yeah. Well, that's a perfect segue to talk about the podcast, Paul, because you're reminding me the way what you just kind of encapsulated there of me and my relationship to search. So I have all these conversations about it. You know, I, I, I like to think I have some Pretty deep knowledge about it. But I have never been a practitioner. I've never, I, you know, I've, I'm kind of flirting with my way through a very light part time search which I, which I'm not even sure I would consider a true search yet. And I certainly haven't, you know, operated that business that I bought. So. And yet I talk about these concepts, you know, all week long. So let's talk about the podcast first from the perspective of, you know, why did you do it?

Guest: Yeah, so at the time I, we launched the podcast with, I launched it with a friend and co host at the time, David, and we were, I think I found him originally on Search Funder. Like I, I put a post up on Search Fund, he responded and I kind of added him on LinkedIn. I looked at his background and we had a, we had a chat privately and we were kind of on the same page and we also both found it difficult to get information or advice or feedback from other people in the UK search community. It was challenging and we were both having similar conversations with, you know, whether it be people around due diligence or interesting topics that we would share between the two of us. And we thought, well, why don't we just start recording these conversations and then maybe other people will find it helpful too. We can also kind of chronicle our journey if we kind of, kind of come up with or find challenges, you know, just, just talk about them and hopefully just be helpful and just to see what comes of it, to be honest. So that's how it started and it kind of slowly progressed and you know, the community around it now it's, it's very UK and European focused. Yeah, we've had on guests from the US and Canada and other places because they're doing interesting things and it's always interesting to hear how other people think about this kind of ETA ecosystem. But it is biased towards UK and Europe. And yeah, then I later realized it's almost a bit of a cheat code to speak to people that you, probably not that you would never be able to speak to, but you know, you wouldn't be able to get them on your calendar like in two weeks notice to discuss a topic that you know, you really needed to know the answer about X, Y and Z. But all right, well I have a podcast so do you want to come and chat about it? And then they end up, you know, reach out and then, then off the back of that friendships and kind of relationships would, would kind of, you know, almost every single time be spin off from that. So that's been great. And the community has been building. I think it probably helped me kind of on the investor kind of building non traditional search fund investor group, if you will. I touched on that earlier. I think the podcast was definitely a driver of that. Also just relationships with other service providers and just building a bit of an ecosystem around it was another thing I saw developing that I really liked. And that's part of the reason why I want to keep it going post acquisition because even though I'm no longer searching, there's been some topics around operational side and maybe it'll be a bit of a mix but I still want to keep it kind of search focused because I think it is a really cool ecosystem and the more people we can help, the better. So that's it at a high level, I guess. And I don't know about you, Will. I mean I think, by the way, I think I've told you this online, but I think you do a great job and I think you're a great interviewer and I don't know if you found it challenging in the beginning, but it was quite a good learning experience. I've always liked to kind of push myself and feel like a bit of an imposter and kind of push my boundaries to see if I can grow. And it was quite challenging to hear my own voice and you hear all the ticks you say when you speak to people. And I was a little bit anxious to release the first episodes but when I did, the feedback was decent enough that I thought, okay, I can keep going with this and then just improve and get better. And I think it's just, you know, I've had other benefits personally from it that I didn't really anticipate which were. I don't know how you feel about that, but that was quite interesting. A little bit of a personal development moment from the podcast and yeah, I think, I think, yeah, it's mainly just the community behind it like and the people I get to meet, meet and speak to. I mean we've, we've had a few sponsors so we haven't really figured out how to, or not figured out. We haven't really focused on monetizing or anything. I mean it costs me money. It doesn't like overall for sure, it's, it's, it's, you know, it's been like a loss making process financially. But in terms of kind of the spin offs and the network and the investors and all of these things that I found, I think it's been a Huge, huge benefit. So, yeah, I mean, I really, really enjoy it.

[1:21:20] Host: Yeah. Yeah, that's great. Thank you for sharing all that, Paul. I, I, I second, I think everything you said just on the, on the anxiety of, of releasing those first few episodes into the world, this is going to sound cocky, but it's not meant to. For some reason I didn't have that anxiety and that's not because I'm super confident in my own voice or in my interviewing skills at all. I, and frankly, you know, in certain social situations, like in a room full of people, I'm, I'm quite introverted. I'm not, I'm, I'm not an extrovert by any stretch or somebody who calls attention to themselves. So in some ways it was, it's counterintuitive that I wouldn't feel discomfort releasing this into the world, but I, what I have whatever kind of natural inclination I have to this is one on one conversations I've always enjoyed kind of deep and this is kind of classic introvert stuff is like one, an introvert's preference of connection with other human beings is kind of, kind of deep one on one conversations. And that's what podcasting is. So from that respect I kind of, I did have that kind of natural, natural inclination to it. But yeah, putting yourself out into the world, that doesn't come naturally to me. But for whatever reason it just, maybe just because it felt so, you know, there's so much technology between you and the listeners. You're just like basically pressing a button, like upload this mp3 and like that's all it really is. It feels anticlimactic to put it out into the world. I will say as it's grown I'm becoming more self conscious, not less because you know, there's obviously there's more people listening now, so there's more pressure. But I think that comes with sort of any, any, any trajectory where you're having some growth, some success. You know, you start to feel a little bit of, a little bit of pressure to perform. Whereas before it was like easy breezy, no big deal.

Guest: Yeah.

Host: So all very interesting. The for, for folks who haven't yet listened to buy then build what, what are, what's an episode or two that you might, might call out that would be a good entree into your, your podcast.

Guest: Yeah, I think the latest one may be interesting with Simon Webster. So he raised the first search fund in the UK in the 90s and it was successful and he's now lectured at the business, all the business schools Kind of teaching it and leading it in these European markets. And he's a really interesting guy. We, we just, we're about to do like a little miniseries on the different European regions and we started off with the UK and we've got a few more about to come up. I think that's a really interesting conversation. Yeah, well, I, I brought on a new co host who's kind of a traditional searcher at the beginning of his journey, just to kind of balance the conversation rather than me skewing too much on operational topics. And it was his idea, so credit to him. Thank you, Graham. And so that one's. That'll be an interesting one, the most popular one, which I also really enjoyed. And it was funny because the guy, Brad Nathan, excellent, fantastic guy. He's Canadian. He was on holiday in Greece having lunch, I think, in Mykonos. And you can kind of hear nice music in the background. I can see everything happening in the background. And like, I love that episode. I love that episode. He's apologizing now and then for like the music.

[1:24:27] Host: Yeah.

Guest: And that was by far and away the most popular episode. And, and he's got a really interesting approach. So he's acquiring businesses in Canada, North America, Europe or like UK Nordics. And it's all. He's done about 60 acquisitions, I believe his portfolio is doing about 600 million in revenue and 60 million in EBITDA. So kind of, you know, 10 million per acquisition, 1 million EBITDA kind of. And he doesn't really fall, it's somewhat. A little bit above, some, a little bit below, but he just really has this approach and he doesn't want to kind of go any bigger because then it puts the risk of the portfolio like it becomes an outsized position. So he just has this really interesting approach and he's doing it at such scale and such speed. Speed. And he goes into also how honestly has not been easy. And he has some good advice and some really good insights and just what he's doing is. Is really unique. I kind of like, maybe, maybe I think about Chen Mark. I don't really know the size of their portfolios, but maybe they're kind of early on in a similar journey. But, but I just found it unique that he's kind of done 60 now and they're all kind of like similar financial size and he, he's kind of like, this works for me. I'm just going to execute this relentlessly. And he's doing like a really good job. So that's a really good episode and he's a great guy. And then maybe one more that stands out to me, it's a little bit, not kind of Searcher specific, but there's a guy in the UK called Joel Ratner and he took over his father's business, which was a very reasonably big retailer here in the uk, Jewelry retailer. And he went on this acquisition spree. It was eventually listed publicly and he was raising tons of money and he had a bit of a, a Persona about him in the media and he was like, they love to hate him, if you will. And he, you know, he, he grew this business exceptionally well. He started acquiring a few of the big J jewelry retailers, retailers in the US and then he made this speech and he had a, you know, he made this comment comparing his products to pr. A prawn cocktail or something and, and, and that it probably lasts longer and cost the same to buy it or something like that. And, and speaking to him and getting to know him, he's actually a very, very down to earth and, and sensible guy. And he'd made that jokes many times, but the media kind of spun this and literally overnight the stock price plummeted and he went from having kind of multiple houses all over the world, flying everywhere by private jet, to, to, to almost bankrupt. And then he pivoted and kind of came back from the dead after, after a few years of depression. And it's really a fascinating story story. There's actually a book about him and that was just an interesting perspective and an interesting episode from someone who was doing acquisitions. So kind of an acquisition entrepreneur, if you all. But just doing it at a very different scale and just living a completely different life. To kind of the searcher who's maybe a little bit more humble and kind of takes a very different approach to what he did. Not to say that he did anything, not to say that he's is any better or worse, but it was such a fascinating conversation. So those are three good ones, but that stand out to me as, you know, interviewing them. They kind of resonated to me as guests, but I get feedback from different topics. Like even if it's one about tax, which can sound really boring, but it's specific to the uk People love that one. So, you know, those are three that I liked.

[1:27:48] Host: That's great, Paul, Those are great recommendations. Thank you for that last question on all of this. Um, so you want to continue with it? The. So I want to continue with acquiring minds indefinitely. No matter what comes, comes next. I'm. I'm predicting a search and an acquisition. But obviously podcasts take a lot of time. I assume you bringing in kind of a, kind of a co host is, is part of you offloading some of the work on the podcast. Is it naive to think that could, like, could you continue doing the podcast by yourself as you operate your new acquisition, or is it naive to think that you can both host a podcast and, you know, be a good operator in your new business at the same time?

Guest: It is tough, I think, I think if I could, if I had to turn the podcast more into, like, a blog about my journey. Like, I think of guesswork, investing, and these people that are chronicling their journey and yeah, very, very. Like, for anyone listening, that's a great read.

Host: Yes.

Guest: And so if I pivoted the podcast to something like that, it would be easier because, you know, I could just turn on the mic and not to say that what he's doing is because he's writing. I think that's way more complicated. It's easy just to turn on a mic and hit record and then kind of just like, you know, speak about your thoughts. Yeah, so that would be easier, but I, I, I don't think I'm that interesting, so I don't know if anyone would listen. And I like speaking to interesting people. So for me, the challenging part is finding the time and coordinating with the guests, and that takes up a lot of time. So I don't do a ton of preparation. I'll do a little bit because I want to be somewhat prepared, but I prefer just to have, like, a bit of a conversation. So I want to know what they've done and what they're up to, but then I want to explore that a little bit more during the episode. So similar to how the guest is listening to this conversation for the first time, it's also my first time having the conversation. And then, and then, you know, so it's mainly about scheduling and finding the guests and coordinating the diary and now find. Because before I was very flexible on timing, whereas now it's more difficult to find time for the guest and for me. So it's just getting even more complicated. On the scheduling side, I've thought about, like, maybe taking off one day in a month and doing like, four in a day, but I'd probably die. And then kind of, you have a month's Runway or some way to get around that. So, so we can, we can brainstorm about that offline. Well, but, but, but I definitely want to keep it going, but it is, it is not easy in terms of the calendar and finding the time and

[1:30:20] Host: in terms of topics that interest you. So now that you've done a search, it sounds like search is still something that interests you, although it also sounds like you just really like the ecosystem, like the people, and want to continue to provide this service to the community. But in terms of your own selfish interest in the topics that interest you, are you now kind of listening to SMB Operations Podcast? Is. Does one. Is there one out there that you like? Like, does your mind shift where it's like you're not thinking about search anymore now? Like you're all, you're thinking all about operations and that's where your, you know, your content interests lie?

Guest: Yes, I think so. So. And there's not. So operations. Also sales. I've been listening to podcasts and audiobooks a lot on sales and kind of persuasion and there's a lot of classics that, that people speak about because there is a heavy sales aspect to our business. And I mean, in general, it's obviously an important skill set, but a lot of that and a lot, yeah, a lot of operational stuff and effective kind of management, leadership, time management. These are the things that I'm finding I'm struggling a lot with, like the leadership side. I don't know if I'm that good, but I feel like I'm not bad and it kind of come naturally. Maybe that's kind of my sport background, but I, I get overwhelmed with the time. Like, I feel like my to do list is just unmanageable and, and kind of I end up forgetting about things and if people don't remind me, it's like, oh, I got to do that. I'm sorry, I don't mean to swear. And it kind of gets a little bit overwhelming. So I've been trying to study that. So things that come to mind, I mean, most, most of them are audiobooks now. Well, to be honest, I think the only other, the only podcast I listen to, and I just found it recently, but I've been kind of binging on it and then I bought his book was this guy, Alex Horosi. I feel like he's very popular in the US But I only just stumbled upon him. But, but he's incredibly smart. I mean, and like, I mean, I mean, obviously a very like, muscular looking guy. But like, at first glance I was like, I was, I was a little bit like, taken aback, but I was intrigued. But I mean, he's incredibly smart and his clarity of thought is really good. So I quite enjoy his content and his book I listened to, the audiobook was, was really good. And then there's a few other classic sales and kind of leadership books that, that I've been listening to. But I don't know if you have any recommendations on the ops side for podcasts, but nothing that I've come across but happy. If you have any good ones, I'm happy to.

Host: You know, there are certainly a couple in the states. What's interesting is that there don't seem to be any. Like there's a handful of ETA podcasts that are kind of now well known and kind of like the go tos. And I don't feel like the same thing exists on the operations side, which is, which is a bit of a head scratcher for me because there's actually, I assume, kind of a lot more to say about operations. I mean, for one thing it doesn't stop unlike search, you know, you buy your business and then kind of that's the end of that cycle. Operations is this perpetual improvement cycle and there's so many facets to it, like you said. I mean there's sales and there's marketing and there's people and there's capital allocation and there's finance. I mean, and on and on and on. But, but, but a couple of names. I mean, Alex Bridgman's Think like an Owner podcast. He has, he, he gets much more into operations than some of the other ETA podcasts. Josh Schultz, I know has a, has a semi, I think semi regular podcast. Where will he, where he will do a deep dive into like a particular type of business, be it a plumbing business, a garage door repair business.

[1:33:48] Guest: Okay.

Host: John, John Wilson had owned and operated, but I don't know.

Guest: Is that still going?

Host: I don't think that that's. I don't think so. So I, I've never connected with John, but I, so, but it hasn't published since June, so I guess, I guess it's not. Or it's on hiatus. So anyway, there, those are the three that come to mind. But none of those are like, you know, except of course Alex is very regular, but his isn't, isn't explicitly operations, although he does do more and more about operations and it's interesting to me. It' why isn't there more out there about operations? Do you, do you have any thoughts about why that might be? Is it not as easy a topic? It's not as kind of like contained as search maybe?

Guest: I, I honestly think.

Host: Or are operators too busy to listen to podcasts sort of thing?

Guest: I think it's that, honestly. And that's why when you said John Wilson's one own and operated, I, what, what was. I'd be curious to know why he stopped that or why it's on hiatus, because I felt like he initially had some guests on, but then it was more about his own journey, which, like I said, seems easy to talk about. And, yeah, and, and I found his quite interesting. It's, it was a bit US centric, so, you know, there were bits of it that were not relevant for me, but I think he was quite entertaining, to be honest. And, and his story was quite, quite cool to follow. So I think, I think if people did it that way, it would be easier. But yeah, just finding the time to do deep dives and schedule guests, that's probably harder to do. Unless, unless, you know, you, you've been, always been doing that. But if you're just kind of doing like a blog version of a podcast, I think that would be possible. I mean, yeah, I think so. So it would be good. I mean, I mean, like I said, I'm not interesting enough to do it myself, but, but someone should.

Host: Well, maybe you're underestimating yourself. I mean, you have one successful podcast here I am interviewing you about what you're doing, so I find what you're doing interesting, and I bet a lot of other people would too. So maybe you're the guy to do the, to, to, to launch a podcast around what he's doing as an operator. So don't be, don't be too humble there, Paul. Well, this has been great, sir. Loved hearing about your acquisition. Of course, loved hearing about your podcast as well. And thanks for, thanks for giving me so much of your time. Thanks for coming on and thanks for, for Buy and Build. I mean, it's a, it's, it's been a wonderful addition to the ETA ecosystem.

[1:36:08] Guest: Thanks. Thanks, Will. Thanks. And yeah, like I said up front, I'm a huge fan of your, your, your podcast. I think up until the day I acquired, I had listened to every single episode. I'm catching up now. Like I said, I just listened to the, the one with the two guys who had the hedge fund. Great, great episode. And thanks for having me on. I mean, I'm, I'm, I'm happy that we kind of talk offline, the two of us, and I'm curious to see how your journey goes, spurring you on to make an acquisition and I know, yeah, I know, I, I, I, I feel like you're underestimating yourself too on that side. I'm pretty sure you could execute on that. Now. You're well versed on the ETA ecosystem, but.

Host: Yeah.

Guest: I really do appreciate you having me on and look forward to keeping in touch.

Host: Great. Paul, we'll get you back on here maybe a little later part of this year to see how things have gone since, so. Until then. Cool.

Guest: Cheers. Will. Sam.