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Unknown
You.

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Unknown
Welcome back to the M&A zing, the podcast for acquisition entrepreneurs Holdco Builders and equity Gap Investors. I'm Gareth Hawkins. I am the CEO and co-founder of Biz Crunch. And today we have a fantastic guest for you with an amazing story. He started with a bag of footballs, a handful of fliers and an office in his bedroom at his parents house.

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Unknown
That was 20 years ago. And fast forward to today. Craig Brennan is chairman of K four Holdings, a portfolio spanning over 300 primary schools through LSC and 11 nursery acquisitions through Nurture Childcare which itself has grown from 0 to 13 million in four years. And now he has achieved every young boy's dream. He owns a football club, with Cheadle Town FC.

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Unknown
So here's what makes Craig Story essential. Listening for anyone considering entrepreneurship through acquisition. He didn't start with a search fund or an NBA playbook. He started by learning how to actually run things, and Craig's rolled up 11 acquisitions into nurture child care since 2021. But that only works because he spent 15 years building AFC from the ground up, understanding operations, hiring, retention, regulatory compliance, and how to make money when you're the one answering all the phones.

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Unknown
So for anyone considering the ETF route, you're going to find a very refreshingly unglamorous story here, with a happy ending, or happy, today, with plenty of years left to run on this. So, let's hope that you take away from this the need to plan your integration, do the hard work, get your research right, and that there are just no shortcuts to understanding how to run a business.

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Unknown
Or how to roll up an industry. So let's dive in with Craig Brennan and find out how he went from bedroom start up to serial acquirer and what he's learned along the way. Craig, welcome to the amazing. Thank you for having me, Gareth. I'm delighted to be on the pod. Well, it's an absolute pleasure to have you.

00:02:11:13 - 00:02:33:05
Unknown
So I know you're an incredibly busy man, with, all these various business interests and, a sizable team, that you're responsible for. So, yeah, we've heard the, the sort of initial kind of origin story, in my potted version, but we'd love to hear it straight from the horse's mouth. Tell us about that journey from the, the bedroom office to to where we are today.

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Unknown
Give us the sort of Reader's Digest version, if you can. Sure. I'll do my best. So the plan for me was never, I suppose, the root, I would say I'm not gone down the academic route and straight out of school at 15 or so. Played a little bit of academy football for Manchester United. It's quite clear I wasn't gonna be a professional footballer, so I kind of fell out of school wondering what was going to do and stumbled across children's football coaching.

00:02:55:24 - 00:03:14:24
Unknown
Didn't it? Never entered my mind, didn't even know that it could be paid to do that as a job, to teach children as a footballer. So I couldn't play football. Teaching was probably the next best thing for me. So I started to teach children and football local to me, started part time and that kind of developed into a full time role with a local company, and I was kind of doing most of the things in that company.

00:03:14:27 - 00:03:31:19
Unknown
By the age of 20, I was, doing the marketing. I was creating fliers on the laptop. I was, delivering sessions myself. I was recruiting stuff. So I was learning a lot of the sort of back office functions at a very, very early age. It was only a small business with so three people when I started, maybe about ten by the time I left a year later.

00:03:31:31 - 00:03:47:40
Unknown
So I was doing a lot of the work and I was getting paid, let's say, peanuts, to be honest. I had a conversation with the owner. He didn't feel like he could pay me as much as I felt the job was worth. So I made the decision to then step aside and started my own business, which is more of a weekend business at the time, and teaching children how to play football.

00:03:47:40 - 00:04:07:41
Unknown
But it was about children under the age of five, and that went from being a part time kind of lifestyle, hobby, business. And over the years from 2006, when I was 21 years old, over the years from from then on, it kind of developed, became more of a full time business. So I did a really good job working the primary schools, providing high quality service and probably trying to professionalize the business.

00:04:07:46 - 00:04:32:56
Unknown
And it grew organically from 2006 to probably about 2015, just kind of plodding along, no real ambition of to what I was or even thought as to where I was going to take it or what the potential was. And it's only when I started to kind of invest in the self-development, it opened my eyes up because I've not been down the academic route, actually open my eyes up to the the possibilities of how to actually scale a business business and how far we can take it so we grow the business.

00:04:32:56 - 00:04:47:47
Unknown
Then I think by 2018 it was still doing around about a million in revenue. And then that I had an opportunity to then acquire a very small provider close to me, more of an asset purchase. Well, it was it was an asset purchase of somebody who was actually my mentor when I was an apprentice in the sector.

00:04:47:47 - 00:05:03:38
Unknown
So I bought his business off him. He came to work for me, and that really opened my eyes. That was kind of one one of the points in my journey where I realize it's a bit of a light bulb moment. This time I'm slowly here to try and grow 5% year on year round up so I can go and buy a business and grow 2,030% overnight.

00:05:03:43 - 00:05:31:10
Unknown
So I really that genuinely added on a quarter of a million did it in revenue. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Overnight, which was you know in grand scheme of things now it's not huge. But from that perspective as a as a young business owner, it really opened my eyes. Not being from the world of M&A. So I then dove into the world of M&A as much as I could at that point, reading books, YouTube video, you know, all the books that everyone's read in regards to and their business acquisition and a really double down.

00:05:31:15 - 00:05:52:04
Unknown
So from 2018 to 2021, I did one more deal. But a lot of the lot of that time was spent on professionalizing the business, growing out the different functions finance, HR, sales and marketing. Ready for that next stage of growth. I did what was called the goal is still is called the Goldman Sachs program as well. I'm not sure if many listeners would've heard of it was quite a hundred small businesses.

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Unknown
That's right. Yeah. So I did that in I think I was cohort three. I was the third national cohort. We ran out of Oxford, Leeds and London and somebody at somewhere else. So a great program. And there was, there was one unit in that which focused on business acquisitions. It was mostly around how to buy a business for a pound, used to stress businesses, which, you know, it's not something I've really gone into, but again opened my eyes into the opportunities.

00:06:14:52 - 00:06:32:28
Unknown
And I gained a lot from that program and, you know, very, very good program and highly recommend it to people who are looking for not from an operator's perspective on how to really professionalize your business. So for an operations perspective, it gave me a lot. Interestingly, they created lots outside knowledge within. They they focused on the 1 pound down the wall.

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Unknown
You know, the. Yeah. That doesn't seem very Goldman Sachs. Not well, exactly. Yeah. I think the guy who was teaching the unit at the time I got called PE pizza, he was he was big on that. And he's, he's done a lot of those deals for clients. I think that were more his forte, as opposed to the general sort of M&A that that most people are familiar with of short some businesses.

00:06:53:07 - 00:07:14:29
Unknown
So I think that's probably why. So yeah, the the second deal in 2021, I bought a business in London, again, was a huge business, probably due to 1.3 in revenue bolted on. So that effectively double in size overnight. We didn't do that much organic growth between sort of 18 and 21. We kind of, stayed pretty similar.

00:07:14:29 - 00:07:30:30
Unknown
We'd go about one year, maybe drop a bit the next year. We'd also invested in other regions or tried greenfield sites, kind of putting a manager in the region and growing it from scratch. I bit my toe in the water franchise, and none of them really did it for me or on the other options. Maybe I wasn't great at doing that thing.

00:07:30:30 - 00:07:51:07
Unknown
It wasn't at all. It was really the acquisitions of all the businesses that really sort of let me up inside, and I got a real push from that. So that 2020 was a share purchase, was it right? Yeah. Which is a business in London. So I've actually bought that business. We sort of rebranded it to look at the original company in 2006 called Little Cakes Coaching.

00:07:51:12 - 00:08:10:43
Unknown
In that time we combination just do football more into sports. And then by 2020 we became what we classed as a primary primary school, PTA, primary school, provider of PPE, obviously specialist teachers for primary schools. So those primary schools have general teachers where they teach everything. We come in as a specialist in will teach PE, music, modern foreign language, drama.

00:08:10:48 - 00:08:34:49
Unknown
And then we do like wraparound clubs as well. So breakfast clubs and holiday clubs is like a full on service. So to get away from the word sport we show and little sports coaching to LSC. And that's what we're known as today. So then from 2022 when we did that one, we've done four more acquisitions in that space since, you know, large businesses of 2 to 3 million in revenue, and a couple a bit smaller than that as well.

00:08:35:04 - 00:08:57:07
Unknown
So we're really off to the races with the growth by acquisition. Yeah. You got to that 2021 milestone. What would you think was the big unlock? Was it was it that you had liquidity to really go ahead and do this? And, you know, there were there was more cash to deploy or that you just nailed the model or you understood the best deal structure, like, why, why did you become that serial acquirer specifically?

00:08:57:07 - 00:09:11:49
Unknown
From there, I think I just for me, I saw it as a real I wouldn't say it's not easy, but to me it was the simplest route to scale. And for me it was why run your life? Why start from zero and slog all the way up to ten, when you can start at eight and take it to ten?

00:09:11:54 - 00:09:32:54
Unknown
That's my philosophy on it. Take a business that's good and solid and understand. Believe is where you can create the value, and that's what's important. And I think I'll probably come to that later. And what we see is all you create in. But for me it was I can take a good business and make it better, and I can make some cost efficiencies by stripping out some of the back office functions and the other things that create value when you when you're rolling up.

00:09:32:54 - 00:09:53:25
Unknown
So for us, it was, it was it was unlocking my brand. And that was the fastest and simplest route. We didn't have loads of capital and we'll come to that later, you know, had to be quite creative with how we, finance some of these deals as well. But yeah, if we go back to sort of 2021 at that time as well, I was sort of middle of 2020.

00:09:53:25 - 00:10:12:34
Unknown
So we were in the middle of Covid. I kept getting sent by brokers, Children's Day nurseries, and because part of what we did was Ofsted reg the childcare, I never really went down that route. But then I start to look at that sector and look at the future of the funding, the fund environment and looking at the private equity consolidations that were happening in that sector.

00:10:12:39 - 00:10:47:40
Unknown
But it really started to interest me. So I'd kind of kind of decided to diversify and spin out another business, which I called Nurture Childcare. Again, I'm sure we'll come to it later on. Yeah, we sure will. Because what you've ended up here with is a nicely diversified portfolio. But but in the education space, but to rather scalable areas of it with the wraparound care in the sort of, nonacademic, sports interests and music and drama, teaching that and then and then the, the full daycare, nursery, early years stuff on the, on the other side of it.

00:10:47:40 - 00:11:10:36
Unknown
Really great mix and I'm sure, cash generative. In the round. Yeah, absolutely. And that's obviously that's key for us is that is the quality of earnings. And for both businesses, our customers generally pay us either upfront or at the start of the month. So especially for the donor, actually, you know, a lot of funding is is paid in advance so that the cash the cash cash cycles is quite positive.

00:11:10:40 - 00:11:27:41
Unknown
So in the early days of LSA, that's what enabled us to kind of leverage that cash into an into the next acquisition as well. Although albeit we helped, we start to use some, some debt. But we, we did have to be creative in regards to the sort of, finance stack and how we, how we got those deals done.

00:11:27:41 - 00:11:54:33
Unknown
But yeah, good businesses, solid earnings. Well, let's get into the finances and the financial because you're not from a financial background, as you said. You're an operator. You've come from, you know, hands on sports training and you've learned acquisitions and integrations, as a consequence of having to do them, which is, which is fabulous. Do you think that operational experience has given you the, the the sort of magic secret sauce unlock to be able to create value from these acquisitions?

00:11:54:37 - 00:12:13:39
Unknown
Absolutely. And I think there's been times over the last ten years where I've started to acquire businesses and have thought, why? Why not started this early? Why didn't start this at 25 years old when it was even younger, potentially could have been sold to so much more ahead of the game? I think I would not have been accessible as successful as I am nowadays without that operating experience.

00:12:13:39 - 00:12:30:43
Unknown
I think they've only been successful is because I've had really a real depth in operate in the businesses and like it's quite a soft business to scale because it's human capital, it's relatively low pay. So you've got a lot of staffing issues, staff retention stuff, acquisition and churn and everything that goes with that. So it's a tough business to scale.

00:12:30:43 - 00:12:50:21
Unknown
So I think being able to know where the skeletons are and where where the problems are going to occur in the businesses that were by it just allows me to understand where the risks are much better. I think you could have bought businesses at the age of 25. I highly doubtful would have been able to, sustain the level of revenue and profit, never mind improve them.

00:12:50:25 - 00:13:17:43
Unknown
So absolutely. I think the way I've been an operator, first go in and then move into more of an owner investor is works for me. Might not be for everyone, but it has to me certainly in the SMB space because, you know, going from a corporate background into owning a large business is is now probably relatively similar to going from a corporate background to an SMB, where actually you're the one buying the milk on a Monday morning, going into the office, booking the cleaners, fixing the photocopier, doing the sales and marketing.

00:13:17:43 - 00:13:35:20
Unknown
It's very different. And the team that you've got around you, quite different skills and a different, appetite for for work and for the career progress. So absolutely. I think for me, that's, that's why I've managed to roll up as many as I have, because I've had that experience. And it sounds to me like you've, had that human centric approach.

00:13:35:20 - 00:13:50:42
Unknown
You know, you're a late, relatable person. You've been in the trenches, you've done it yourself, as you say. You know, where the, what's in the cupboards and where to look and where to extract the value. But also, you can relate to the challenges that your team are under. And I'm sure that helps get the best out of them.

00:13:50:47 - 00:14:08:51
Unknown
You know, having done it yourself. Yeah, absolutely. And it's a, it's a help and a hindrance at times because people come to you and I'm a naturally a problem solver. Someone comes with me. We've got this issue of my my first goal, too is let me help you solve it. And over the last five years, as I'm trying to become more of an investor as than an operator, I'm trying to step back from that.

00:14:08:51 - 00:14:24:20
Unknown
And I've got a managing director in one of the businesses. I'll be looking for a CEO in the next year in the next couple of years. So I'm trying to step back completely from day to day. But it's hard when you've been in the business for 20 years, because people will know that you're the best person to ask the question, you know, to get an answer.

00:14:24:25 - 00:14:40:48
Unknown
So that's the hindrance on that. On the flip side of it, again, I can help people. I've done every job in the business from, you know, an apprentice all the way up to, you know, the CEO that I am now, everything in between. So there's nothing and expect stuff to do that I haven't done myself. And there's nothing that I don't know that goes on in the business.

00:14:40:55 - 00:14:57:02
Unknown
What I would say is I have brought in specialists as you a small business, because you're a general operates and as you grow, you start to bring specialists into those departments. So I'm just starting to now bring up let's say now five years, I'll bring in people who are better at finance than me, better at HR than me.

00:14:57:07 - 00:15:17:31
Unknown
And you start to learn by yourself. Can you bring those specialists in to actually increases your skill and knowledge at the same time, which I found, you know, a real benefit. It's a huge unlock. Yeah. And I think to get the best out of those specialists, delegating to and empowering them with some degree of autonomy is often the difficult bridge to to cross for an owner operator who's done everything themselves.

00:15:17:42 - 00:15:37:37
Unknown
That that trust thing is, is I mean, it sounds like you've bought into it, you know, fully. But, building that trust and that willingness to delegate and stand back is, is often a learned skill that, owner operators have to develop. You found that? Absolutely. I went through that journey and probably still, to a degree in some aspects.

00:15:37:42 - 00:15:58:10
Unknown
I think as an owner operator, you think that you know everything and you're the best person to do that job because that's what you've always done. It's only when you bring in an FDA, you know, a chief, a chief people officer, you know, sales, a marketing director. You realize there's there's levels to this. And I think I'm at this level and actually, I'm not I'm right down here and there's people who can operate at a much higher level.

00:15:58:21 - 00:16:14:42
Unknown
I'm a big believer in don't get someone in to do the job. And then tell them how to do it. You bring someone in and you let them do it how they do it. You generally bring someone in who's been at 2 or 3 steps ahead of you, or in a business, it's 2 or 3 steps ahead of you, and they come in and tell you, like you tell me the vision and I'll show you how I get there, and I'll help us get there.

00:16:14:42 - 00:16:29:27
Unknown
And that's what I'm a big believer in. Now, my job as a CEO is to set the vision, get buy in, and then let bring the right people into the team to help us achieve that. Ultimately, it's a beautiful, very enlightened viewpoint there with Craig and wonderfully articulated. I'm sure there's lots of I've still come to bed, as I said.

00:16:29:38 - 00:16:47:54
Unknown
Yeah, well, you did that. The Gandalf moment naming. Yeah, but not quite as salt and peppery as, as as me. So let's go to where we are today. You've got, you know, the serial acquisition engine is is firing on all cylinders, both, having done it on the sports, and the, extracurricular stuff as well.

00:16:47:54 - 00:17:13:32
Unknown
Now, as having done that serially on the day nurseries and built a lovely group there with nurtured, which continues to acquire almost annually maybe, maybe multiple acquisitions annually. Is that the case? Yeah, we did, six acquisitions last year in Nurture Childcare. So we're very acquisitive. We're looking at it. We're back. But we've got that with without North, actors and hopefully going to move to sort of an architect with, so we can move a bit quicker.

00:17:13:37 - 00:17:33:48
Unknown
So yeah, we're, we're very acquisitive in all the businesses in the three businesses that we've got. And the nurseries, I think it's just there's a lot more opportunity out there and a lot more it's a different demographic of seller. You speak more to people who are retiring owners, whereas in the education company, it's people are probably at the ceiling and they want to either have a liquidity event or the movement's moving into a different sector.

00:17:33:48 - 00:17:52:55
Unknown
So there's more opportunity in the nursery sector, there's more private equity, consolidation as well, which kind of is is sort of helping in regards to small group roll ups as well. Oh, I probably won't be long before living bridge is knocking on your door. Because obviously they're out there doing, backing a couple of platforms and, as a, as are others.

00:17:52:55 - 00:18:11:45
Unknown
But, you know, revolting cash flow facility. Sounds interesting that that's a, you know, huge enabler. I should think, that the money's there when you need it. But you're in a hot sector. How are you finding the competition in, in nursery acquisitions? Because, as you say, there's lots of folks that are reaching that vintage, that age where they're looking for their exit.

00:18:11:45 - 00:18:31:24
Unknown
But there's also a steady flow of people that are looking to buy off them. So I imagine you're really the only show in town turning up and offering to buy these businesses. No, I mean, we we've averaged at the very start it was during Covid. So we we kind of had the pick of the bunch. I think a lot of the private equity backed ones, it was shut us down and left behind down the hatches and ride it through.

00:18:31:24 - 00:18:48:15
Unknown
And I was the opposite. I was like, now's a good time to buy. We can potentially get some shoes at a decent price that I know how to improve quite quickly. And we did. And that's what enables us to grow quite quickly. I think in the first three years we did, five acquisitions, with no experience in the sector.

00:18:48:19 - 00:19:04:44
Unknown
That's the landscape is very much change, multiples of increase. Now, we even find that there's deals happening that don't even come to market with brokers, you know, so like I'm speaking to brokers saying, why did I miss that sale? I didn't go to market. So, you know, a lot of the private equity ones obviously got brokers in the pocket to a degree.

00:19:04:58 - 00:19:32:34
Unknown
And the saying that we're we're going to we're going to prefer you because they're for bigger, you know, decent kickback no doubt from that. So that that's frustrating that we missed out on some of the big deals. But I think what previously happened, especially in the nervousness sector, is, a lot of the private equity backed groups would, would kind of target the, that the more, I would say, demographically, preferential areas.

00:19:32:34 - 00:19:52:17
Unknown
So areas such as Knightsbridge, you know, Mayfair where private rates, they can, they can charge a premium for, whereas we kind of the opposite way could I, I knew that there's going to be a change in the funding landscape for that. So I went in less advantaged areas where the revenue was based more around funded or at least split a bit more equally.

00:19:52:17 - 00:20:09:45
Unknown
And that's, you know, locally, London in our advantage because the local authorities and the governments have now massively increased the funding for nurseries. So now that the, the corporates, if we call them corporates, but the private equity groups are now reversing that and going the other way and going to more funded nurseries, because obviously that's where the opportunities for them.

00:20:09:50 - 00:20:25:18
Unknown
So we kind of have an opportunity where we can pick off the ones that we wanted to do. It wasn't much interest. Now we're getting a bit bigger and which looking for bigger groups to compete against. And by maybe small groups of 3 or 4, we are getting outbid on some of the private by some of the private equity ones who can pay high multiple.

00:20:25:22 - 00:20:43:54
Unknown
So at some point we may need to look at you know, we've had lots of approaches in private equity. We may need to look it up. At the moment, we're going to continue to pick off single sites or small groups and just be very picky. I do work hard for, off market deals. So we do a lot deal origination myself and try to find off market stuff, and that's where our success has been.

00:20:43:58 - 00:21:13:15
Unknown
But we do get some brokered deals as well, which is nice. Yeah. I imagine you offer something slightly different to the to the private equity experience as well for the sellers, particularly if they're, if they're staying around. I mean, it's, it's a different sort of employer from that point, isn't it? And from your perspective, yeah. If you were to give up equity in preference shares to, to a, you know, private equity backer, I wonder if you'd have quite as much freedom and agility and, autonomy as you, as you now have agreed.

00:21:13:15 - 00:21:30:10
Unknown
And that's two of us, obviously, one of the key things for me, like, I enjoy what I do. I think one of the key decisions makers, along with my leadership team on the sole owner of the group, I don't report to anyone. I've never read the report at 21 and that would change. You know, we've got an investment director or whatever on your board and things change ultimately.

00:21:30:10 - 00:21:45:07
Unknown
So, you know, for me, it's about what all my life to look like over the next 3 to 5 years. So I'm going to try and continue to go as long as we can. And at some point I might go, you know what, I don't I don't need to. I'm quite happily going at the speed we are and we can take what we, what we get and and be happy with that.

00:21:45:12 - 00:21:59:02
Unknown
But you're right in regards to what we can offer, we're in a bit of a sweet spot now where they don't any potential seller doesn't see us as corporate because we're only a small group of 12. But we've got a lot of firepower funding behind us to make deals happen. And we've got the we've got the credibility.

00:21:59:02 - 00:22:20:28
Unknown
So we're in that nice little sweet spot where we can outbid the small independents, but we're not quite a corporate. And you'd be surprised at the amount of people that don't want to sell to a corporate for whatever reasons they have. Oh, no, that doesn't surprise me. So, what's the geographic spread on nurtured now? Are you still regional or have you, penetrated all corners of the country?

00:22:20:33 - 00:22:43:36
Unknown
No. So mostly north west. So we've got, a cluster in West Yorkshire, a cluster in South Yorkshire, in Sheffield, in that cluster over in Stoke in Staffordshire. So we're really trying to focus at the moment on the north west, the M62 corridor. So Manchester, Leeds, Liverpool really trying to build up some, some critical mass bottlenecks. I had office at Central support offices here in South Manchester where I am, and we don't have an issue within an hour, so we would like to get some round go.

00:22:43:38 - 00:23:07:27
Unknown
So yeah, yeah very sensible. Okay. So if you've got the sort of shared back office or some synergies, you know that regional thing makes a lot of sense then. Yeah absolutely. Yeah. Good man. Well it's really interesting. I'd love to get into some of the deals. Perhaps more on the LSC side. You mentioned you have to be quite inventive, in your structuring that if you're I wouldn't want to invite you to betray any confidence or confidentiality, but there's anything you can speak to about that creativity.

00:23:07:31 - 00:23:27:54
Unknown
Yeah, it's an examples at leat to mine. I'm sure our listeners will find that hugely interesting. Yeah, sure. I mean, I suppose the one that jumps to mind is the one, I quiet down in London and it was during Covid. I remember, this obviously a lot of people out there selling courses on how to buy businesses for no money down and didn't really believe it, but this is probably one of the only times it has happened.

00:23:27:54 - 00:23:46:01
Unknown
And I think there's probably only a couple of reasons why you can't do that. Generally, not a great business underlying business, or it's only worth something to you and not somebody else. I think for me, it was the latter. It was a business that if it stood alone, a business by coming in wouldn't be able to understand how to operate that and probably wouldn't pay any money for it.

00:23:46:01 - 00:24:06:38
Unknown
But for me, there was assets and contracts in that business that would be worth, you know, substantial amounts of the business. It was job online for us ultimately. I mean, I can share some numbers with you. So I think the, the, the EBITDA on that was maybe 200 K at the time. They had about 300 K in cash in the bank.

00:24:06:43 - 00:24:22:30
Unknown
And they were eligible for a balance column which did not yet pulled down. And they had a tax bill which was also in another tax account. So ultimately we didn't have to put any cash into that. We use cash in bank. We used the tax bill, the tax cash that was in that because the tax would need to be paid.

00:24:22:30 - 00:24:50:27
Unknown
It was like nine months down the line that that the banks it for. So we did that. We used the bounce back loan and we paid an amount on initial consideration and the rest deferred over two years. So we got that deal for no cash in. And what they were making EBITDA from, you know, 200 K, I think overnight for they just added maybe, 240 50 K on the EBITDA on our bottom line without us having to do much.

00:24:50:38 - 00:25:07:06
Unknown
And we got rid of the office because they weren't using any staff that were in the office. So us we stripped also the duplicate cost and it was just a great deal for us really to do quite quickly. We're not completely self-financing. Across the sort of two year deferred period is what I imagine. So it was.

00:25:07:06 - 00:25:23:49
Unknown
Yeah. Yeah. And some sort of surplus in there for us as well, which is good. Well so so it grew also did it. Yeah. And you'll tell you that a great story. Well then. Great. So, let's have a talk about what a good acquisition looks like for you. You've obviously got a nose for it. What do you what do you look for?

00:25:23:49 - 00:25:39:12
Unknown
What are the non-negotiables when you're assessing a deal? And what do you like to see? Yeah, obviously it depends on the sector ultimately. But there are a few non-negotiables. And it's probably this. This is you know, it's not rocket science for most people that are looking for businesses these days. But one thing we look for is, you know, quality of earnings.

00:25:39:12 - 00:26:01:33
Unknown
And what how solid are the numbers and concentration of customers? We don't want any concentration of customers. We don't, you know, anything that's generally, government backed and it's only government backed. It might be, you know, a short term contract with the government that's, you know, high level, high percentage chance a bit of it not repeating. The most important one for us is understanding the sector.

00:26:01:33 - 00:26:18:21
Unknown
Have to know the sector. You know, there's some great sexy things out there that happen. I don't understand them, you know, so I'm not going to get into them where whereas, you know, childcare, education and dentistry, it's the the group I'm not spoke about yet. We've not spoke about yet what their sectors are, you know, basic stuff. I do understand the basic business models.

00:26:18:21 - 00:26:37:40
Unknown
And if you can operate one businesses and operate you can generally operate the other ones. And you know which leaves to pull and how to add value. So I need to understand the sector. Solid earnings. Strong management team is obviously non-negotiable. No concentration of customers. And for me, I have to know why I'm buying that business before I'm buying it.

00:26:37:40 - 00:26:51:57
Unknown
So in other words, how can I create value in that business if I don't know how I'm going to create value, I'm not going to buy it. And it could be as simple as multiple arbitrage. I know I can buy history, and if I sell the group in years, in a few years time, six, seven, eight, that's my reason for buying.

00:26:51:57 - 00:27:09:46
Unknown
It may be more than that, but they're not doing any marketing. They've not got a website or they're relevant. They've got overlooked in management, you know. So for me it's understanding the reasons for buying it. And so do you model that. Do you attach some values and try and work out what your ROI or IRR might be in in these acquisitions?

00:27:09:53 - 00:27:25:08
Unknown
Are you doing that early going in when you're assessing the deals, or is it more operational that you're thinking actually there's a there's an upside here. I just can't quite quantify it. A bit of both. I mean, in the early days we didn't do that. We didn't model them out. But now obviously we've got a substantial finance team.

00:27:25:09 - 00:27:40:28
Unknown
And our role is is financial modeling. And essentially if we look at the nurseries, that's what the lenders are going to want. They're going to want to see what's the effects of this being plugged into our operation. So yes, of course we do that. I've always I've always looked at the operational efficiencies. So, you know, we don't need two offices in the same city.

00:27:40:28 - 00:28:09:18
Unknown
We don't need two managers managing, you know, six people each. We need one manager managing 12 of your staff. That kind of stuff is that's that's non-negotiable. And we do that. But I think he's also understanding which we've got better is the impact of those decisions. It's very, very easy to create value on a spreadsheet. Actually, in the real life when you are moving staff around who have been in there for a long time and changing roles and, you know, changing uniform, it seems like basic stuff, but it does have an impact on people.

00:28:09:18 - 00:28:30:25
Unknown
And it's I suppose it's trying to understand what the impact of that change is. And that's something that we're we know we're really leading into, you know. Yeah. Being sensitive to those things. So let's talk about integrations because obviously you mentioned there about getting some operational efficiencies. I'm assuming that, you know, you don't leave these to run independently and just share some stuff behind the scenes.

00:28:30:37 - 00:28:49:51
Unknown
Obviously, your website suggests that everything gets, nurtured, branded. Is that the case? Tell me about your approach to integration. Yeah. So we generally take a, I approach based on the individual business. In the nurseries, we, we do rebrand them all. We try to build a brand and we feel good to be value in that brand.

00:28:49:51 - 00:29:08:24
Unknown
So we do reskin them. And how how could we do that is again is individual to that side. So we'll buy some sites and we'll feel like maybe it's not got the best repute. We'd never buy a distressed one, but maybe our brand in that area would have more value than keeping the core brand. So for example, in scope, we've got a really good a brand reputation.

00:29:08:29 - 00:29:24:37
Unknown
So keeping that brand as the old brand has no benefit rebranding it to nurture child care very quickly will have ultimate benefit because we've got a that's a nurtured site. I know my friend who lives in North Stoke and they've got one and they talk about it all the time. I'm glad we've got one in South Stoke. So it's not not, not for us works.

00:29:24:50 - 00:29:44:24
Unknown
But as an say we've, we've all business again in Stoke called Be Active. And they've got such huge brand reputation in the area. And LSC isn't known in that area. So we've not brand, we've not rebranded that. Yeah. It would purely be based on the, the reputation and the benefit of rebranding ultimately comes down to what's the reason for rebranding it.

00:29:44:29 - 00:30:00:45
Unknown
And Charles Be Active have got such good brand value in the area to rush into a rebrand, which purely for egocentric reasons as opposed to anything else. So that's just been left as it is to run. We start to drip things in, like on social media, on LinkedIn it will say be active and then part of our same bracket.

00:30:00:45 - 00:30:25:05
Unknown
So we start to slowly drip stuff in. So that the customers, the school, the staff start to get to know what was. And then if we do have a rebrand in the future, it's not completely alien to them. Got it. How does that apply to standards, for example? Because obviously you're in you're in education and child daycare, the Ofsted driven Ofsted overseen, high, high level of compliance.

00:30:25:10 - 00:30:48:54
Unknown
How do you make sure that you're, you're maintaining standards? You're also keeping the operations growing, and able to sort of pursue growth but not lose sight of the, the ongoing levels of quality. Yeah. So it's obviously one of the key things for us compliance and safety, safeguarding of the children in our care is is of utmost importance to us.

00:30:48:54 - 00:31:14:09
Unknown
If we don't have that, we have nothing starts with the due diligence for acquiring a business. Obviously we look at the safeguarding processes, the policies, we look at staff knowledge and understanding of that as well. And we look at previous Ofsted reports to see if there's been any, cases that we need to be there of or any referrals that may potentially worry, Oreo's and then obviously also bring them into the group with any changes we may.

00:31:14:09 - 00:31:39:27
Unknown
We're always think, go to it's like, how is this going to affect the end user? What's the end user looking at and feeling when we make this change? Most of the back office changes don't reach the end user. So for stuff like safeguarding and quality and compliance, it's purely about showing, presenting the team who we've acquired for want of a better phrase, their process, showing them that often will take parts of what they do, and we'll build it into our process.

00:31:39:27 - 00:31:55:40
Unknown
We will always take the best bits of what we do, we build into our process. We take them on that journey with us. When we got to day to day, we have, you know, very robust protocols in place. So we have quality assurance teams in both businesses whose sole job is to do mocks that inspections. We do like to attend Ofsted inspection.

00:31:55:55 - 00:32:13:07
Unknown
We do quality assurance visits where we observe the staff, give feedback. We have obviously we have the real Ofsted coming until actual Ofsted coming out to to observe us. And we've got one of our sites today actually over in Sheffield. So we've got lots in place and shows. The key thing is, are the basics in place.

00:32:13:07 - 00:32:29:55
Unknown
And then on top of that, what can we overlay to enhance the quality of what we're doing? Well, quality compliance are always top of mind for everything that we do. And it's always back. It's always top of mind when we're scaling as well. We're scaling fine or it's about scaling and not affecting the quality of not just playing spots, but the quality of service at the same time.

00:32:30:00 - 00:32:52:35
Unknown
So we're we're conscious that we don't want to grow too fast with it impacting the quality of service and the safety of the customers and the end users. And I guess that translates through to the sort of targets that you you set for these kind of organizations. I mean, you're somewhat constricted by capacity at a site, right? So it's not it's not easy just to double overnight because you've only got a certain amount of child capacity in a day nursery.

00:32:52:48 - 00:33:15:45
Unknown
That's right. Yeah. Great stuff. So on on that topic with, with people, obviously talent is is scarce in lots of industries and you're, you're working in people, heavy sectors. How is your talent acquisition? How are you managing to stay ahead of that as you, as you're scaling? Because I guess it's a big unlock. What's, what's talent acquisition looking like for SK for.

00:33:15:50 - 00:33:35:36
Unknown
Yeah, I mean for both in both the childcare education businesses, it's our biggest challenge. People are the biggest challenge. And I'm sure a lot of people out there are feeling it who are offering businesses. There's a real, lack of talent, you know, for everybody to be operating a high level. So that is definitely our biggest challenge. With the there's a few things that we've done.

00:33:35:36 - 00:33:57:31
Unknown
So in the nursery sector, we're looking now to be able to pay, what is the the real living wage? Most nursery operators are generally paid at or slightly above the national minimum wage. We're now looking to pay above, you know, not a huge amount, but slightly above the real living wage. We pay paid breaks, which, you know, sounds like basic and obvious, but a lot of providers don't pay breaks on lunches.

00:33:57:36 - 00:34:22:41
Unknown
So we do that. We pay additional leave. We've got, you know, all the benefits, bonus incentives and things on top. So we're doing that piece around the package, what that looks like. So that's great for attraction and attached retention. But it's not about money for everyone writes about the culture and the environment. And I think because we're not backed by private equity, like the way we operate the business, it's not it's not, you know, we don't manage by spreadsheets, like we're very big on culture.

00:34:22:41 - 00:34:45:02
Unknown
And we feel like if someone's going to leave the business, it's generally because they're not happy with the manager or the culture pay. You know, the difference between a few pence, an hour might make some money, but what we found with people who leave for a few pence in our difference, they often come back and the habit is come back to the ways that they weren't, because actually they realized the culture, the environment, how they feel at work is, is much more important.

00:34:45:03 - 00:35:08:24
Unknown
So we're working hard on that piece. I think the fact that we're growing, giving people opportunity to progress is very, very important. Because we a lot of our, our at one of our managers now started as an assistant manager site and she became manager, got an outstanding boss that became an area manager. And you know she's she's growing not just one of, you know, several stories I could tell if people have come into the business and grown with it, which is great.

00:35:08:29 - 00:35:22:33
Unknown
So I think that, and having an employee brand with, you know, our marketing team and our working hard is one of their rocks for this year is to really grow our employee brand, the line so that people are excited when they see our brand. Why would you not want to come and work for nurture, childcare or for anyone else?

00:35:22:44 - 00:35:43:01
Unknown
That's the same unless they were trying to do exactly the same over there. So it's a bigger challenge. But we've got things in place to try and try and counter that. Love that lovely, employer brand, destination, employer piece. That's that's great. And the progression story is wonderful to hear. The people are able to go from you know, early, early in their career, to to a senior role within one employer is fantastic.

00:35:43:06 - 00:36:04:09
Unknown
Just on that real living wage and the paid breaks and those kind of financially implicated, remuneration things. Are you able to get that back on the pricing on, you know, is that coming through in the better quality of the care? And are parents willing to pay more or, or are you pegged? And this is a margin calculation that you've or margin sacrifice that you've chosen to make for the retention.

00:36:04:13 - 00:36:27:16
Unknown
Now it's certainly not margin sacrifice. So we generally you know, the increase in statutory increases will go up in April. Then we'll do some performance ones based in September which to start, we were we were an academic year. So September to August we'll do performance based ones that when we're modeling in our which we're actually in the process of doing at the moment is we'll look at what the statutory increases or performance increases if it will be to build in, and that'll help have as surplus the amount that we need to cover.

00:36:27:25 - 00:36:46:21
Unknown
We generally then look to put our private fees up by a certain percentage to cover the majority of that, and then the local authority fees will increase again. But we're led by the local authorities on that. We don't get to dictate that. So we only generally increase our prices by enough to just cover the salaries and maybe a little bit of surplus for additional growth of costs that are in the business, 3%.

00:36:46:26 - 00:37:14:31
Unknown
And and that we build that into our model every year. So we generally are not the margins are safe because of the way we can increase. It's a it's a it's a service that is required if something's got to be drastically wrong for someone to pull that child out of nursery when not happy. So, you know, there are some, there's some flexibility there to be able to increase prices and also a lot of those increases now because of the funding, the hours a week funded by the, by the council, a lot of those increases have been subsidized by the council.

00:37:14:31 - 00:37:40:18
Unknown
So it's, you know, it's a it's a good set. It's been. Yeah, it sounds like it. Although margin expansion is a challenge. It feels like it's a scale game, and you mentioned about multiple expansion, multiple arbitrage earlier. I guess that's that's the bigger win here, right? Is is that you you get to put a group together that gains a larger multiple as a consequence of its scale, whereas at the margins at each individual site might be constrained.

00:37:40:22 - 00:38:03:00
Unknown
Absolutely. And we're not really we're not really interested. Obviously these operational margins want to increase, and we're very hard on managing our staff cost because that is the biggest cost to the business. So, you know, we know our gross margins need to pay and we try and stick to that religiously, but we're not massively interested in growing the margin in regards to organic growth, although driving occupiers is important, but we don't really hammer home that.

00:38:03:00 - 00:38:22:41
Unknown
That's a target for us. The value creation as a group comes from buying a three and selling a, you know, that's that's where we look for the value creation. Yeah. Great. Well look at Craigie really into the detail and that's lovely to hear. And I'd love to get on to, you know, the fact that it probably wasn't always, as as much as sort of sunshine and rainbows as it might sound like it is today.

00:38:22:46 - 00:38:45:25
Unknown
What was the the sort of most challenging or hardest, toughest part along the journey, would you say? There's been a few. Obviously, people always talk about Covid being one, but I think for me that was actually an opportunity to sit back and reflect as opposed to, oh my God, what's going to happen? I'm not gonna be able to pay everyone, because yes, I had those thoughts, but they were only short lived until furlough came in.

00:38:45:25 - 00:39:03:10
Unknown
And then it was like, right, okay, I've got a bit of breathing space here. So that gave me a bit of opportunity to breathe. I think, if something sticks out, I'd say that. Growth hurts. And one of the things that you have to learn is that not everyone's going to be on that journey with you, and you are not you personally.

00:39:03:10 - 00:39:27:14
Unknown
But the company often outgrows people and people who are your right hand man or woman or your number two in the early days aren't going to be there forever. And that's tough. I think how you manage to handle those conversations and addressing them early is important. So that's one of the lessons, I'd say, unless I've done that. But it's been a couple of times where maybe I've let my heart room ahead and I've let it go long gone too long and it's affected relationships.

00:39:27:14 - 00:39:44:04
Unknown
So to me, that's probably one lesson. And just understanding that as a business, I wouldn't class it as a family, a class as it. I would say it's more like a sports team where you get promoted into the leagues, you play at level, you know, that's a level of players and you need to transfer it. Go on the transfer market, get someone out, bring someone else in at a high level.

00:39:44:04 - 00:40:11:29
Unknown
And that's where I've always operated it. I love that analogy, by the way, Craig. I mean, it's difficult not to over emotionally invest, but also to not to completely emotionally detach. Yeah. So looking at it kind of a bit more transactionally like a sports team analogy is really great because everybody's they're pulling together for the same common mission, but actually as the as the club, as the team improves, you need to bring in that additional kind of level or stage of, of skill.

00:40:11:34 - 00:40:28:26
Unknown
So I agree, I agree, and I think we, we run on iOS, which I'm sure you familiar with and all the businesses in my group, I've implemented iOS three myself or virtual implements. And, you know, they're all engaged in it and we, you know, track people. Right? So this is one the analogies on with the analogy of it being a bus.

00:40:28:26 - 00:40:44:48
Unknown
Right. And we talked about that a lot when, when there's a problem in the boardroom or in the management meeting. And it's generally always come down to a person rather than a process, it's a person generally. And in this case, that ingrained now in those people that have worked for me for 10 or 15 years and had someone hand the notes in for Christmas.

00:40:44:49 - 00:41:05:13
Unknown
In other words, what I think it's time for me to get off the bus. So she'd already identified that the business was growing at a quicker rate than she was comfortable with, and also she was a senior person that she really did. She want that stress and pressure on her at in those late stages of life. So it's good that people start to identify that for themselves before having to have that conversation with them.

00:41:05:13 - 00:41:32:06
Unknown
And that's because we have those honest conversations with each other in the room with other people, and we use the right terminology, right people, right seats, and you're out run the bus or you're off the bus. People start to look at themselves and make that decision before you actually own. My biggest challenge, really material culture. By the sounds of it, if you've got that degree of ownership and, self-awareness in the business, given that opportunity to, to reflect, collectively is quite strong.

00:41:32:11 - 00:41:52:29
Unknown
Yeah. And it's, you know, it's across the board. Most of that does happen. And I think the iOS has been it's been huge for that because, you know, one of the big things, again, in iOS is about accountability. And it's like there's nowhere to hide the governance accountability. Everybody knows what they're accountable for in the business area of the business failing or the cracks appear and everyone knows where that's happening.

00:41:52:30 - 00:42:13:10
Unknown
Who's responsible? Some people, you know, people don't come to work on purpose to do a bad job. It's just either about overcapacity or the lack of competencies they need to be for that role. And, you know, people are generally honest with themselves rather than you having to do it. It's been the whole time we have to have conversations with people, don't get me wrong, but I think iOS has allowed us to to operate that way.

00:42:13:15 - 00:42:35:31
Unknown
Yeah, it's a great enabler. Definitely a great framework. Is there anything, on the acquisition journey that you wish you could go back and do again? You know, you do it differently the second time around or I don't, you know, I don't think there is because I think I've learned more from the mistakes I made than I have from what, what what went well, I know a lot of people say nice, but obviously a bit of a cliche, but it's genuinely true.

00:42:35:31 - 00:42:52:10
Unknown
I think none of the mistakes I've made have been catastrophic. You know, we've not had to make a load of redundancies, you know, not to close anything down or anything like that. It's all just generally been, really positive. I think it's been some businesses. Where am I a slightly overpaid for them, as we know, the ones where we've got to steal.

00:42:52:10 - 00:43:10:57
Unknown
So I think it balances out over time. I've definitely learned, you know, which businesses we need to keep people in longer. You know, we made some mistakes early on where I let business owners leave the business clock quite soon after the sale. And, you know, you realize that actually they did a hell of a lot more than they still are on, and they have more relationships with customers than they let on.

00:43:10:57 - 00:43:27:54
Unknown
And that's an issue. But, you know, we turn those around and there's no issues there. But we learned a lot. And it always it just gives you an understanding of what to look out for more next time and what to apply in the in the deal next time. So I think if the not gone through then I would have made the mistake on a bigger deal down the line.

00:43:27:59 - 00:43:52:08
Unknown
So I don't think I change anything if I'm honest on that, owner dependency piece. There, there is, there is a cautionary tale that, you know, until you've really been through it and acquired the business. And then seeing just how much the owner was still involved, you, you're willing to take them at face value until, you know, you've seen it once or twice and then you go, oh my goodness, which which businesses at this size really have unbundled their, their sellers?

00:43:52:19 - 00:44:07:15
Unknown
I mean, very few in all honesty, they've even if they say, oh, I don't come in day to day, they're still pulling the strings, quite often and have the relationships and all that sort of stuff that is difficult to replace. So you've learned to give them a retention period. Have you or, or structure in the deal with them?

00:44:07:15 - 00:44:26:48
Unknown
Yeah. So there's generally like a consultancy period. Not an urn out, but a consultancy period at the time too. We've only done one in out. That was, you know, over the course of two years and, you know, he was the CEO and he runs on these benefits because that's allowed us to scale quite quickly without having to integrate everything straightaway.

00:44:26:52 - 00:44:45:05
Unknown
Because, you know, that business is running independently and the business owner is very nervous about making any changes because that's going to affect his earnout. Right. And that's the way he sees it, whether it's beneficial to them or not, so that there's pros and cons, but because we've done quite a few deals, we don't need to rush the integration just yet because we call the integrations that we can focus on.

00:44:45:05 - 00:45:03:25
Unknown
So it has been by design as opposed to just by. That's what the seller once said. But I think locking the seller in for a sustained period of handover is definitely for us, has been the way forward, and then it's not set in the nursery group. It's been very different. None of the sellers have stayed anywhere until the past three months.

00:45:03:30 - 00:45:18:47
Unknown
Because we, the managers generally in day to day and that we take the back office function and bring that centrally. So that's worked really well. Nice. So it's been it's been easier to sort of, stamp a model, if you will, on the nursery side than it has been on this on the sports and education. Yeah.

00:45:19:01 - 00:45:40:23
Unknown
Yeah. Absolutely. Okay. Nice. It's it's really interesting. I'd love to get just as we get towards wrapping up, into some sort of advice for aspiring acquirers. Yeah. You've said in the, in the sort of pre conversation, about how it's important to focus on fewer, more impactful things and cut out the noise, focus on the signal.

00:45:40:28 - 00:46:00:52
Unknown
I'd love you to sort of unpack that, really, if that is part of the secret sauce, if you will, of your success. Could you could you just, you know, elaborate? Yeah. So in the early days, especially as an operator, we tried you would probably have 15 to 20 revenue lines, you know, children's parties, 1 to 1 events.

00:46:00:57 - 00:46:20:33
Unknown
Junior football teams got loads of things going on. And looking back now, it's not because we have myself didn't have a marketing team. So at 20 different marketing strategies, 20 different things, you have to train the staff on 20 different cost of, of inquiries that would come in not to go in the cost like the playbook. And so everything you do as a business is it's times 20 because you've got 20 service lines.

00:46:20:33 - 00:46:52:30
Unknown
So we realized quite quickly that if we wanted to be really good at PPA, we needed to call out the rest of the noise. So we kind of just double down on some really simple services. And that's what allowed us to scale, because it just became the business became a lot simpler. And I think for me that that's the same what I've applied to to, to, to the, to the businesses that I've bought is just trying to simplify simplify them as well and systemize them at the same time by making sure that actually, if we're going to scale, it's these you need to be able to scale a simple business model as opposed to

00:46:52:30 - 00:47:09:42
Unknown
something that's a lot more difficult and to understand at the same time. So when we buy a business now, we'll value it based on the simplified business model. Well, we'll get rid of any of the, the noise or the, the additional service lines that don't really look good on the top line don't actually generate a lot of profit.

00:47:09:46 - 00:47:33:15
Unknown
So we get rid of that. So that'll be one piece of advice for me will be to really keep it simple. Focus on on the core competency of the business and, and reallocate some resources so that, you know, you're not actually stretched too thinly. Absolutely. And you'll find these opportunities that, you know, potentially reduce headcount because you don't need X amount of people to finance our X amount of people in the, in your because you've got less people or less service lines.

00:47:33:18 - 00:47:53:58
Unknown
Often it's it's noise. And we realized by by taking away it gave us really clear focus and that's what helped great stuff. Do you you do a fair bit of giving back to the acquisition community. I know, you know, you, quite the quite the mentor yourself. Now, I understand, what's one mistake that you see?

00:47:53:58 - 00:48:22:03
Unknown
You know, new aspiring acquirers making, on their journey that you might caution them against. Good question. I think I probably got 3 or 4. I said, one is underestimating the required cash flow you can never add, like, whatever you think you're going to need, you probably need double because something's going to happen. So I think underestimate as entrepreneurs, we always assume the best thought we will cut glass is always half full, not half.

00:48:22:03 - 00:48:40:54
Unknown
Yeah. And with me generally I know people may be quick to finance background a little bit more risk averse because they're used to looking for risk. Me personally, I've always been, you know, I'll be okay now. I'm always it best case scenario person. So I think underestimating required cash flow will be one and therefore not overleveraged. I mean, not pushing it right to the wire.

00:48:40:58 - 00:48:56:34
Unknown
Yeah, absolutely. And then I think on the other side is overestimating growth. There is say we'll get 10% growth year on year. Well that's yeah. Well you know what? The guy that's been running that business for ten years couldn't achieve that. Why do you think that you can come in in year one and do it straight away when you've never operated this business, right.

00:48:56:49 - 00:49:16:30
Unknown
So that would be the second one. I think, going back to what we said before underestimating how much there was a reliance on the left either, well, how much they did or how many relationships they actually held separate the three I think I'll go with. Yeah, great. And really, really useful, pointers. I think they're great kids.

00:49:16:35 - 00:49:39:51
Unknown
Any one of them could save somebody a lot of heartache. So my understanding is the SK four group is is on track to have group revenue exceed 32 million. Is that right? Right. Yeah. My goodness. With some pretty impressive EBITDA margins. What what is with that sort of, you know, set of resources behind you now what is the next phase of growth look like for you?

00:49:39:55 - 00:49:55:54
Unknown
Very much continuing on on the acquisition journey, we've not really touched on the dental group. We, acquired a dental group quite recently as well. So kind of got into that space and that was well, I'd like to say it was strategic, but it wasn't. It was more opportunistic where my dentists, approached me. See what I've been doing it.

00:49:56:02 - 00:50:18:55
Unknown
You wanted to. He's got a really successful dental practice in South Manchester, and he wanted to open some more sites. I managed to talk him round to buy an existing site rather than starting from scratch, then introduced him to the world of, of M&A and, you know, introduced into a couple of brokers. And then it was alarming to me, the multiples, the exchange and the actual the finance available.

00:50:18:55 - 00:50:38:51
Unknown
If you're a dentist, you know, some of the the opportunities to finance properties, businesses is night and day compared to the nursery sector. So then he actually asked if I'd like to partner with him on that business. We partner 5050 and just recently bought a group of four dental practices. So again, not operational, any old businesses, but I think the next year, if you think about the next 12 months alone, it's going to be for the nurseries.

00:50:38:51 - 00:50:59:33
Unknown
We'll look at it. Small groups want to get to 20, nurses by the end of this year rather. See, we've got one more acquisition and then we'll pause acquisitions to consolidate. And, the nurses are probably gonna do one more acquisition on the nurseries this year. But by the end of this year, I'd like to have an MD or CEO in each of the businesses, and I'll focus my time purely on M&A.

00:50:59:38 - 00:51:15:03
Unknown
Fabulous. So we should expect to see plenty more deals from you then over the coming years. I'd like to hope so. Yeah. I mean, I was lucky enough to win, several acquire the year this year. The share was. But I don't think I'll be up for it this year not to have not done any yet in this in this academic year and from start September.

00:51:15:03 - 00:51:33:07
Unknown
So, slowing down compared to last year. But they'll definitely be some deals happening for sure. Yeah. Sounds like it. Is there a one particular milestone that maybe in the next 12 months you want to have nailed? Have you got one particular metric like the, North Star metric in mind? I think it's probably those two.

00:51:33:07 - 00:51:50:58
Unknown
It's probably the number of acquisitions we do in each individual vertical. And having a pure business leader in each of the businesses. So what you can roll out into one up, we'll go with that. Great. Okay. Sounds good. So, how do, our listeners, follow your journey? Are you on are you on the socials? And I see you occasionally on LinkedIn, but.

00:51:50:58 - 00:52:08:04
Unknown
Yeah, I'm I'm going to more than anything. I've came off Instagram so far myself, just doomscrolling, as usual. Time for getting on with work. So come off that. So yeah, LinkedIn is where I spend most of the time. I'm not massively out of it. I can really peaks and troughs to be a couple months to have on it, and then a couple months where I'm really busy with integrations or acquisitions, so it'll go quiet.

00:52:08:04 - 00:52:25:17
Unknown
I'm sure it's like most people, but yeah, if any wants to reach out, say hello or connect, please do. I'm on LinkedIn magic. I will make sure we put your, details in the show notes, if you don't mind. And link people to the various websites for s, k for and for LSC, for nurtured. I'm really super interested in the dentistry thing, too.

00:52:25:17 - 00:52:53:04
Unknown
I mean, I always like a new endeavor, that you've you've saved the guy an awful lot of, money, time and effort by getting him to acquire his way to growth rather than, I think the novo de novo. He could have been very busy. Yeah, I agree, one day, hopefully. Good stuff. Well, Craig, thank you so much for being so generous with your time and for sharing the realities of building operational expertise before scaling through acquisition and what that feels like going from operator to asset owner and serial acquirer.

00:52:53:09 - 00:53:08:49
Unknown
I think this has been a massively inspiring account for our listeners and our viewers. So thank you so much. This tale from the trenches, I think it's, it's been quite enlightening. So, I'm sure you'll get lots of, of outreach from folks that want to know what it is that, has got you this far.

00:53:08:49 - 00:53:33:15
Unknown
But you've been really candid. Thank you so much, Craig. And we wish you the absolute best with the continued success of ask For Group. Thanks for having me on, Gareth. Really enjoyed it. It's been my absolute pleasure. Folks, tune in next time for some more interviews. And, until then, keep on crunching.

00:53:33:19 - 00:53:33:49
Unknown
You.