Think Like an Owner

Ep.242: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Steve Swinney ( @steveswinney ). My guest today is Steve Swinney, founder and CEO of Kodiak Building Partners. The company, which started in 2011 with the acquisition of Barton Supply in Denver, has grown to 45+ acquisitions and $3 billion in sales by 2024. We cover Steve's extensive experience in building product distribution, Kodiak's diversification st...

Ep.241: Alex ( @Aebrigeman ) is joined by Ed Manfre ( @emanfre ). My guest today is Ed Manfre, a business leader, executive coach, and co-author of Lead Through Anything alongside recent guest Dustin Seale. He has two decades of experience helping CEOs and C-Suite leaders align themselves and their companies for success. He's served leadership roles at firms Heidrick & Struggles and Spencer Stuart...

Ep.240: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Sarah Rowell ( @sarahrowell ). This is the first episode in our new series called the Build Series, in partnership with Pacific Lake Partners and Trilogy Search Partners. Over the six Build Series episodes, we will explore how CEOs can accelerate their company's growth trajectory, as well as their own professional growth as leaders. The Build Series conti...

This is my second episode hosting Alex De Pfyffer and Ross Porter, founders of Heritage Holding, on the podcast. A lot has happened since their first episode in late 2022. They've built 7 platforms through 25 acquisitions and recently raised a committed fund for the next five platforms. They've done excellent sourcing, but I also admire their ability to build a strong team at Heritage that allows...

My guest today is Jeff Homer, who's pursued one of the most interesting consolidation theses I've ever heard, music schools and more recently dance studios through his company, Ensemble Performing Arts. And his pace is incredible, acquiring essentially a school per month for five years, totaling 70 acquisitions and integrations. The number of reps he's had is incredible, and has given him a huge a...

My guest today is Justin Watt, co-founder of Switchboard, which helps businesses with automation and AI tools to become more effective and efficient companies. He's the smartest person I know when it comes to automation, and I've been really excited to record this episode with him laying out his philosophy for tools and how to approach streamlining key internal processes. We talk about hype vs rea...

I formed Airframe Group to acquire and build a transformative company in aviation services that is loyal to customers, moves fast, and pursues an ambitious vision for the long-term. I have a life-long passion for aviation and want to my next life chapter creating organizations that give the aviation community their absolute best. My ideal partner is an owner ready for their next chapter of life an...

Episode 235: Alex Bridgeman ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Chris Hoffman ( Chris-Hoffman ). My guest, Chris Hoffmann, is the President and CEO of Hoffmann Brothers, a home services business based in St. Louis. Hoffmann Brothers have scaled from $10 million in 2015 to over $100 million in revenue in 2023. We talk about how that journey happened, their experience building executive teams, investing i...

Ep.234: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Auren Hoffman ( @auren ). In this episode, I sit down with Auren Hoffman, CEO of SafeGraph and partner at Flex Capital. The conversation centers around Auren's experiences in running data companies and his insights into the data as a service market. We discuss the slower-than-expected growth in the buyer's market for data, and what it takes for data compa...

Ep. 232: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Sara Heston ( @sara-heston ). My guest today is Sara Heston. We discuss the latest findings from the 2024 Stanford Search Fund Study, which reviews trends from the past two years. Key topics include rapid growth in the Search Fund industry, changing searcher backgrounds such as 24% of searchers not having an MBA, return trends, drivers of outsized return...

Ep.231: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Rick Ruback and Royce Yudkoff . My guests today are Rick Ruback and Royce Yudkoff, both Harvard professors for entrepreneurship through acquisition and co-authors of the most popular and well-known piece of content in search, the HBR book How to Buy a Small Business which I would consider the bible of the search fund world. It's one of the first resources...

Ep.230: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Anand Sanwal ( @anandsanwal ). My guest today is Anand Sanwal, founder and former CEO of CB Insights, which provides data and intelligence on private markets, companies, and investors. Anand recently hired a new CEO for CB Insights and stepped into a chairman role. Anand ran the company for 14 years and developed a unique perspective on leading that I was...

Ep.228: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Brett Kelly ( @BrettKPG ). My guest on this episode is Brett Kelly, founder and CEO of Kelly Partners, a publicly traded accounting, tax, and advisory firm with global ambitions and a roughly $350m market cap. Since 2006 they have done 80 acquisitions and developed a strong playbook for building best-in-class accounting firms with a focus on high-net-wort...

Ep.227: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Dustin Seal ( @dustinseale ). My guest today is Dustin Seale, co-author of Lead Through Anything alongside Ed Manfre and managing partner at executive search and leadership firm, Heidrick & Struggles. Dustin has spent his career working with high-performing CEOs from over 70 countries to help transform teams and find the right successors for CEOs and othe...

Ep.226: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by A.J. Wasserstein. My guest on this episode is A.J. Wasserstein. Early in his career, A.J. founded Archives One, a physical records management business he operated as CEO for 17 years before selling to Iron Mountain. He then acquired One Source Water, which was eventually sold to Water Logic in 2016. He then began teaching at Yale School of Management wher...

Ep.225: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Anthony Bramante ( @AnthonyBramante ). My guest today is Anthony Bramante who leads In Control, an automation control systems integrator primarily serving water and wastewater facilities at small and medium-sized towns across the Northern Midwest. Control systems aren't exactly top of mind for me every day, but after chatting with Anthony I'm seeing them...

Ep. 224: Alex (@aebridgeman) is joined by Godard Abel ( @GodardAbel ). My guest is Godard Abel, founder and CEO of G2, an enterprise software marketplace that helps software buyers find the right software for their companies and key problems. G2 is the third company he has led as CEO, the first two being BigMachines, founded in 2000, and SteelBrick, founded in 2014. We talk about lessons learned b...

Ep. 223: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Rick Torres ( @rick-torres ). My guest on this episode is Rick Torres, CEO and co-founder of Applikate Technologies, a digital pathology hardware and software business with a device that can examine tissue many multiples faster than traditional physical slide processes can today. I find this company fascinating given the life science and data element of...

Ep. 222: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Dan Cremons ( @DanCremons ). My guest today is Dan Cremons, author of Winning Moves, 105 Proven Ways to Create Value in Private Equity-Backed Companies, and founder of Accelera Partners where he focuses on helping private equity groups unlock people-powered value creation. Dan started at Alpine Investors for 12 years before leaving in 2021 to found Accel...

Ep.221: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Moises Eilemberg ( @Meilemberg ). My guest is Moises Eilemberg, CEO of XiltriX, a 24-7 life science asset monitoring business that started 5 years ago with 36 employees today and growing swiftly. Moises is unique in that this is his second time as a CEO, his first being back in 2006 when he acquired a healthcare revenue cycle management company Avadyne, w...

My guest today is Tom Klein, former Morningside Co-CEO alongside recent podcast guest Roland Lessard. This episode with Tom acts as a part two pairing with our February episode with Roland where we talked about M&A value creation after close. Tom and I today discuss M&A value creation largely pre-close of add-ons, talking through industry selection, sourcing methodologies, industry knowledge snowb...

The intersection of media and data has been the top idea on my mind for quite some time now. And my guest today, Craig Fuller, runs one of the best modern examples of this concept in action. FreightWaves, founded in 2016, is a media and data company focused on trucking, freight, supply chains, and all things logistics. To date, they have raised $91 million, will hit $42 million in revenue this yea...

Ep. 218: Alex (@aebridgeman) is joined by Henry Schuck ( @HenryLSchuck ). My guest today is Henry Schuck, founder and CEO at ZoomInfo, one of the most successful data businesses in recent times with a market cap today around $12B. I've been looking forward to this podcast for a long time because Henry has proven to be an effective founder, acquirer, and public CEO capital allocator, which is a rar...

Ep.217: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Mike Stone ( @michael-stone ). My guest today is Mike Stone, CEO of CertaPro Painters, the largest painting company in North America structured as a franchise with 370 owners across 500 territories and over $700m in revenue. Their goal is to become a $1B company shortly and a $2.5B revenue company by 2032. The painting industry is a $60B industry growing...

Ep.215: Alex ( @aebridgeman ) is joined by Ayman Al-Abdullah ( @aymanalabdul ). My guest today is Ayman Al-Abdullah, former CEO of Appsumo and now executive coach to other ambitious CEOs looking to scale 7 and 8-figure businesses past $100m, Ayman's specialty. I love learning from CEOs who've made that journey and can share key lessons and takeaways, and Ayman fits that to a "T." He's also a Durha...