Most entrepreneurs pursuing a traditional search fund fit a type freshly minted mba, probably little to no leadership experience, largely unproven. Well, today's guest is the exception. Randy Remp had already run a company at 29 with zero direct reports to his name, he was handed the CEO seat of a struggling insurance business bleeding $2 million a year.
Acquiring Minds
Second-Time CEO Buys a $30m Title Company
Episode
Excerpts · 345 segments · ~1:22:28 long
Short excerpts only — hear the full conversation on the publisher's site.
05:00 Lawyer to CEO at 2911:00 Wanting equity, path to search18:28 Accessing search capital mid-career23:41 Finding and understanding Meridian Title33:40 Title industry cyclicality risk46:59 Deal structure and financing55:15 F reorg saves the deal59:09 Reps and warranties surprise1:05:59 Leadership changes and CFO1:13:04 EOS Lite operating model
Six years later he turned it profitable to the tune of 5 million EBITDA. He just didn't own any of it. No real upside for all that value he'd created.
That rub sent Randy looking for his own deal. So he came to search funds mid career, not out of a top tier MBA program and had to earn investor trust on one thing that most searchers don't have evidence he could already run a business. In 2021, Randy closed on Meridian Title, a $30 million plus acquisition in one of the larger title insurance agencies in the country.
This was not a starter business. It was sized to match what he'd already shown he could handle. Listen for how Randy broke into search fund capital without the standard pedigree, the deal saving f reorg triggered by a Georgia Senate runoff.
Remember that and how Meridian kept growing through the worst home sales downturn in 50 years. Here is Randy Remp, CEO of Meridian Title. Regular listeners of Acquiring Minds will recognize the name Connor Gross.
Connor is the expert at the intersection of franchising and entrepreneurship through acquisition, ETA and In a webinar today, Thursday, Connor will lay out the three paths to franchising for acquisition entrepreneurs. First, conventional searching second, the plant your flag strategy and third, partnership. Each path looks different and which one fits depends on your goals, your strengths and…
Among the topics you'll learn today what the three paths each entail, how acquisition entrepreneurs can pursue each path, the benefits and drawbacks of each, how to determine which one best aligns with your goals, and case studies from entrepreneurs for each of the three. The webinar is the three paths to Franchising for Acquisition Entrepreneurs and it is today, Thursday, August 6th, Wednesday,…
Link to register is right at the top of this episode's show notes or on the Acquiring Minds homepage. Acquiringminds co. 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 know Enzo Technologies as one of the leading IT managed service providers serving the search community. Led by Nick Akers, an Acquiring Minds guest who bought the 35 year old business.
The team at Inzo regularly works with searchers and their acquisitions. And one feature of acquired businesses that Enzo is seeing over and over is the need to implement cyber cybersecurity promptly during the transition. So many acquired small businesses either have glaring vulnerabilities, lack security best practices, or both.
That step one to de risk the deal you just closed should be addressing these issues. INSO is your full service IT MSP for post close stability. They assess your target, surface the biggest risks in plain English and give you a day one through 30 plan to cut exposure, prevent downtime and even find cost takeouts like bloated telecom bills.
Check out inzotechnologies.com I N Z O or email Nick directly at nicknzotechnologies.com Randy Remp welcome to Acquiring Minds.
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