From Small Acquisition to $30m Industry Leader

Like obviously, you know, you can't have another Christmas in February, but you can have a D2C strategy where Valentine's Day becomes more valuable to you as a business. So that was my first initial hypothesis. So in terms of plot points was like, get the facilities in order.

So I moved the business very quickly, which was like Rick and Rice were like, what are you doing? Like that's just like you don't, you don't move the business within the first year. It's so stupid. And I was like, yeah, I'm stupid.

And I guess I over calculated and made the assumption that it would be easy to renew even just for like a year or two. But instead the landlord was like no, five or nothing. And I was like, I'm not locking in for five in this tiny little space because then I can't grow for five years.

And so essentially my back was against the wall. I had to move the space very. Into a bigger space and take that financial risk very early in my ownership and journey.

And so for those of you who are buying a business, just make sure that you at least have the sellers negotiate options on the leases so that you have more optionality. That was something, a big thing that I missed. So I was really forced to physically move the business within the first year of ownership, which is extremely difficult.

But you know what? Well, looking back, I'm so grateful that I did because there's no, no way we would be where we are if we hadn't moved it. Right? We do more now in an offseason month than the whole business did when I bought it. And you can't do that, you can't do that without the physical space.

Right? And so, and to be honest with you, the more I was so naive when I first bought the business and the less you know, the better. I don't know after a year of operating if I would have had the courage or the balls to risk everything to bet on a new space. I was so green that I did.

And, and then I worked my tail off to make it work. But I think sometimes ignorance can be Bliss or luck along the way.

Excellent. You move the business in the first year, that expands capacity a lot. And so you then I guess embark on this strategy of trying to spread out the seasonality somewhat or, or, or bolster some of these other months. Mother's Day, Valentine's Day.

Yeah. But you can think of it now I've just added more fixed costs of the business. Right. Rick and Rice remind me every day they make the students repeat we hate fixed costs. Like, this is like exactly the model of what not to do, right.

This is like. And so now I've just like, I've put the goalpost even further because now I need even more EBITDA to just, just hit my. But I see the path.