Chris Edwards·February 10, 2025

Buy, Grow, Exit for a 24x Return in 3.5 Years | Chris Edwards Interview

Chris Edwards, a former consultant who left corporate life in late 2020, bought Affordable Flooring Warehouse in Steamboat Springs, Colorado in February 2021 for $1.7 million with roughly $200k of his own equity. The business was a retail showroom serving residential remodel customers plus a significant cash-and-carry supply business for local contractors — the only such supplier in the remote mountain town. Over 3.5 years, Chris grew revenue from ~$3m to ~$4.5m and more than doubled SDE from ~$500k to $1.1m, taking ~$1.7m in distributions along the way before selling the business in October 2024 for $4 million — a roughly 24x MOIC on his equity. Key growth levers were systematizing lead generation and conversion, installing operational documentation, and taking full control after firing a problematic key employee who had been blocking process improvements. The episode covers the full arc from acquisition through exit, including why he chose not to hold and install an operator (geographic isolation, talent constraints, his own need to focus), his hard-won lessons about the intensity of SMB ownership, and his emerging interest in building a new business from scratch now that he has capital and operational experience.

Deal facts

purchase price: $1.7m
sde ebitda: SDE ~$500k at acquisition; grew to $1.1m
revenue: $3m+ at acquisition; grew to ~$4.5m
financing structure: SBA loan + ~$200k equity; ~$1.2m SBA balance remaining at sale
notes: Sold for $4m in October 2024. ~$1.7m in distributions taken over 3.5 years. Net proceeds ~$2.8m after debt payoff plus distributions = ~$4.65m total value returned on ~$200k equity. 24x MOIC.

Why this business

I liked the economics of the deal, I thought the purchase price was fair, I liked the tailwinds that would ultimately play out for the business, I liked the location, and I thought it was an industry and a business that I could learn. Flooring was one of those industries where I was like okay I think I can do this, it's not exactly rocket science.

What's working

Geographic moat: located in Steamboat Springs, CO (pop. ~10,000), no big-box flooring retailers nearby, making the store the supply house for contractor cash-and-carry in the region
Revenue grew from ~$3m to ~$4.5m and SDE more than doubled from ~$500k to $1.1m over 3.5 years
Installed operational systems and documentation that put the business in the top tier of operational sophistication for a flooring store
Lead generation, lead conversion, and sales systems: systematizing what most contractors leave to chance (phone rings, maybe pick up, maybe follow up)
Firing a key employee who was blocking process improvement turned out to be a huge blessing in disguise — best year followed immediately after
Strong unit economics and gross margins on project-based installation tickets
Business sold successfully for $4m after ~3.5 years, achieving a ~24x MOIC on equity invested

What's hard

Partnered with a key employee to start an adjacent countertop business; the partnership fell apart, the employee was fired and started a competing flooring business, taking key accounts — created intense near-despair moments
Geographic constraint: Steamboat's small population (~10,000) and isolation cap growth; what made it attractive (geographic moat) also capped scale
Difficulty finding talent in a small mountain town; limited pool of career-driven people willing to live and work in Steamboat Springs
Intensity of owner-operator life was relentless — becoming callous, grumpy with customers, missing family moments; working on Christmas Eve
Project-based model means no recurring revenue; constant lead generation required and errors in someone's home create intense customer situations
Could not find an operator capable of maintaining the $1.1m SDE performance, making a hold-and-install-operator strategy impractical

Notable quotes

There's an intensity to this life that I had never experienced before and coming out the other side it feels good to have gone through it all the sleepless nights all the challenging moments and come out the other side.

No one's going to grind as hard as I did to make it a $1.1 million SDE business.

What was appealing about it ended up being a restrictor to growth. What made it attractive is what held it back.

No matter what business you're in you are in the sales and get more sales business, you're in the lead generation business, you are in the marketing business, you are in the lead conversion business.