A Searcher’s Second Act: Building a $25m Holdco

Today's guest's journey into buying businesses began 10 years ago. Eric Calderon learned about the concept at Harvard Business School, which he entered with the idea that he would return to a corporate path and become an executive. But he took Rick and Royce's class at HBS and decided that this is what he would do instead.

And he did, buying a business in his native Houston with Rick and Royce as investors. We hear the story of that search and exit, as well as what Eric is doing today, which is building TXE Partners, his holdco that buys small testing, inspection, and calibration tick businesses. Today, TXE has aggregate revenues of $25 million.

So this is a story of an entrepreneur who did a traditional search first and learned in industry, exited, then for his second chapter, set out to build a long-term holdco and is doing it. Now, you'll notice that Eric himself never refers to TXE as a holdco.

That's my word. So it's not like he's been bitten by the holdco trend. No, Eric is building a sector-specific enterprise in TIC. The businesses he acquires complement each other and fill gaps in the enterprise.

you'll hear him say he thinks of them as divisions of the company, as opposed to standalone businesses in a holdco. We cover many themes in Eric's journey and around what he's building with TXE, including shared services in a holdco versus decentralization, raising patient capital from investors committed to a long-term hold, buying a business in the oil and gas industry, which is typically…

The advantage of assembling a holdco of smaller $1 million SDE businesses. And the tension Eric feels around his own identity. Is he an operator or is he an investor?

And here he is, Eric Calderon, owner of TXE Partners. If you haven't checked out Smith List for a while, there are some great opportunities listed there. These are leadership positions within entrepreneurial small businesses, typically search or acquired businesses.

Some open positions on the site right now, GM for a leading pool business with 10 million in revenue. Entrepreneurial GM to help grow an outdoor services platform from one and a half to 10 million. COO of a wood product manufacturer with potential to become president or later owner.

Head to smithlist.com to check out these roles and others for entrepreneurial operators and GMs. And while you're there, sign up for the alerts so that you're notified as we post yet more opportunities from the SMB and ETA ecosystem. smithlist.com smithlist.com

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. Running payroll, paying your bills, closing your books, and producing financials. These are critical tasks every business owner must do or oversee, but spending time on them distracts you from the leadership in growth work you want to do.

So let System 6 do it for you. Owned and led by a former searcher, Chris Williams, System 6 is a leading outsourced finance team for hundreds of SMBs, including over 50 searcher-acquired businesses. Chris, Tim, and the System 6 team understand firsthand the challenges, the opportunities of jumping into a business as its new owner.