Andrew Hitchens Tripled a $250K SDE Home Services Business in Under Three Years

The Setup Andrew Hitchens spent six years at McKinsey after leading tank units in the Army. His wife, Marcella, had started one of Mexico's most successful cideries before attending Stanford GSB and joining McKinsey herself. After a seven-month motorcycle honeymoon through Europe and Africa, the couple returned to the U.S. with zero interest in working for anyone else again. A business school friend, Greg, had acquired a window washing company in Dallas and exited successfully. His pitch was simple: people will invest in you to run a business. Andrew read the books, called Jim Sharp, talked to Trish Higgins at Chenmark. The couple relocated to Colorado (the last place they could stay for free) and started a self-funded search in the Denver metro area in winter 2019. The Deal Two months later, they were under contract to buy Colorado Home Cooling, an 18-year-old business that installed whole house fans and attic ventilation systems. The company had one employee beyond the owner and had produced a steady $250K in SDE for a decade. They paid 2.6x, roughly $650K. Several factors drove the decision. The broker had recorded a raw, unedited 30-minute video interview with the seller. No polished SIM, no exaggerated forecasts. Just a genuine, tired owner who had been the lead technician for nearly 20 years and was ready to step away. The broker then connected buyer and seller directly and stepped aside, giving full transparency into the books from day one. The business was tiny, and the trio knew they were buying a job. But the product served a growing green-energy niche (whole house fans use a tenth the energy of air conditioning and are now required by law in California new construction), and COVID was creating sudden demand for anything that freshened indoor air. The seller agreed to stay four months through peak season, and the parties negotiated a retention bonus for the key employee funded from the purchase price. Andrew figured he could learn to install the product himself in a few weeks if he had to. They closed in April 2020. Operating Moves The first problem was seasonality. The previous owner had hired technicians each spring and let them go by September. He could never retain enough people to break through. Andrew and Marcella attacked this on three fronts. First, they added counter-seasonal products. Skylights and sun tunnels kept crews working in cooler months. Second, they hired licensed electricians rather than more handymen. A master electrician is expensive, but the license opened municipal contracts, solar subcontracting, general contractor relationships, and EV charger installations. The barrier to entry became a moat. Third, they repurposed their sales team during the off-season into business development. Instead of laying people off, they sent them out to find new customer segments. After a couple of winters refining this approach, Q1 revenue (with snow on the ground) now exceeds what the previous owner generated in an entire year. Max Williams, a chemical engineer from UT who had spent three years at McKinsey,...