“We called a couple of manufacturers, said, hey, we're looking to sell your products in wealthy territories. They said, that sounds great. I mean, you don't even pay to become a dealer. We did a quick training with the distributor and truly started buying ads and doing water tests for people, starting to sell equipment. So you can really just call companies and say, hey, I'd like to make you some more money. And they'll generally take that call.”

“Our goal is to go in and treat both the water that goes on homeowners and in homeowners. We’re generally going to be testing the water to start … There’s really two different options. We’ll sell them something filtering or softening water throughout the whole house … Prices there range anywhere from $2,000 up to $7,000 or $8,000 for a whole house system. … Average ticket north of $7,500, but don’t get me wrong—we hit some singles and doubles with like one to two thousand dollar drinking water tickets too.”

“At the same time, though, I think there's a lot of people out there buying businesses for $2 million plus that they could start for $50k and a truck. My partner and I … were confident that we could buy advertising while building partnerships with other people in the market to just go zero to one and not have a SBA note hanging over our head. Is it slower to start? Absolutely. Is there any income right now? Not really. But those are things that we were comfortable with to have the flexibility.”

“When I think about acquiring a business, I think about acquiring a service footprint, if you will. So if we could go find a company that's been around for 20, 30 years, they have 1,000, 2,000 customers that they go and see every six months, that's hyper interesting to us. It would build that stable base of service revenue. … If we again can buy recurring revenue, that's where I would feel comfortable paying some sort of real multiple for it.”

 “The SBA only requires 10% equity injection. So on a $2 million business, that's roughly $200,000. … What we've really tried to position to folks is or to owners is, hey, we want you to actually come along for the ride for us. So let's say we're buying his business for $2 million. We say, we'd like you to maintain a 10% equity stake … The remaining $1.6 million in this example would be coming from the bank. And that's where the platform we've built steps in to help searchers raise that $200,000 or the equity injection that they need for their business.”

“There’s been a lot we’ve learned a lot really quickly. I think one is your model is cute, but it’s not gonna, it’s more like art than science. … What really matters at least going zero to one is all top of funnel. We’re actually okay giving away margin on some jobs just to get more jobs done. … A big learning was just a lot of the stuff that happens below the fold, don’t waste your time. Just get the phone to ring. That’s all that matters in the earliest days.”

“Effectively SMB Invest allows searchers to market their deal to high net worth investors. … Really just trying to play a part and help guys raise the money to get some deals done. … We’re an intermediary really for people wanting to raise money for a deal that they’re gonna buy. So less like business brokerage, more capital connecting, if you will. Almost like a placement agent, but we don’t charge any fees. It’s more just for fun.”