Start in electrical, prove it, then acquire shop after shop — plumbing, HVAC, construction, civil — putting every one on the same modern back office and selling the whole thing at scale. This is the plan, the offer I'm bringing to David, and what the numbers look like.
Great local trade businesses are everywhere — but the owner usually is the business, so they can't step away and can't easily sell. Verified gives them a buyer, a system, and a paycheck — and rolls them into one company that's worth far more than the sum of the shops.
Buy strong owner-operator shops at a fair price (~4× earnings) — crews, trucks, and a book of work from day one.
Put every shop on The Verified System — one AI-powered back office, one way of estimating, dispatching, and running jobs.
Combine them into one bigger, cleaner firm and sell it at a much higher multiple (~8.5×) — or keep it for cash flow.
Skilled-trade owners are retiring with no one to buy their shops. We're the buyer they can't otherwise find.
AI and modern software are pulling ahead of small shops. We bring it to them, built in.
Buy small and cheap, sell big and consolidated. That spread is the engine of the whole thing.
They get a real exit for a business they could never sell, a salary to keep running their crews without the ownership stress, and a system worth $250k+ a year in services they'd otherwise have to build alone. It's the difference between selling out and trading up.
One platform that runs every shop we buy — and the thing we sell owners to get them to join. It's built first, in the opening weeks, then installed into each firm as we acquire it.
David commits up to $10 million — but never as a lump sum. It's called in gated waves as each acquisition proves out, so most of it is never at risk at once. And he's made whole before I earn a dollar of my share.
The capital goes in only as the plan proves itself — a small check to prove the model, then bigger waves as each acquisition works.
9 firms · 57 trucks
~$37M revenue
~$4.5M annual profit
sold at ~8.5× → ~$47M value
The whole design is that adding a division never adds a back office. One central operation runs them all, so the team stays lean as the firm grows.
Runs the platform — the deals, the brand, and personally installs the system into the first firms. Leaves McCully in stages as it grows.
The spine of the company from day one — scheduling, invoicing, customer experience, and watching every job across every division. Grows from running one shop's back office into leading it across the whole portfolio as each trade comes online.
Runs the founding electrical division under his license, with a real ownership stake in the line he runs.
An integration manager makes each acquisition repeatable; an estimator carries the Verified estimation process into every shop.
It starts with one truck and a proven idea. First launch: Monday, October 5, 2026.