In this episode of the M&A Launchpad Podcast, hosts Feras Moussa and Casey Minshew chat with Houston-based operator and Army veteran Raj Kankaria, owner of Lone Star Attorney Service—the largest process service company in Harris County. Raj breaks down how a career pivot and a tough life moment led him to discover a niche, recurring-revenue business, why he structured the acquisition with heavy seller financing, and how implementing EOS unlocked rapid growth from ~700–800 serves per month to ~1,200 in just a few months. We get into margins, pricing, who pays for service of process, the realities of post-close change management, and how disciplined leadership from the military translates into small-business execution.
In this podcast episode, we discuss:
- Raj’s path: Army → Rice MBA → Investment banking → Acquisition entrepreneur
- How getting served divorce papers revealed a business opportunity
- What a process server actually does and who pays for it in different case types
- Inside Lone Star Attorney Service: pricing transparency, sticky clients, and 25%+ margins
- Deal structure: ~$1M valuation, ~4x forward EBITDA, 60% seller note, 30% seller rollover, 10% buyer equity
- Why seller financing protects both parties and can create better after-tax outcomes
- First-90-days playbook: immediate cultural reset, policy changes, and EOS implementation
- Operational cadence: weekly L10s, issue-solving, and aligning the team to quarterly targets
- Growth unlocks: InfoTrack preferred-vendor status and a tax-protest client adding steady volume
- Technology collaboration with the case-management vendor versus building in-house
- What’s next: organic growth, acquisitions, offshoring, and scaling statewide
Guest Contact Info:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rajkankaria/
Company: Lone Star Attorney Service (Houston, TX)
Email: (shared during the episode)
Additional Resources
M&A Launchpad Conference:
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Sponsored by O’Connell Advisory Group
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Visit: www.oconnelladvisorygroup.com
Contact Casey Minshew and Feras Moussa at info@equity-launchpad.com
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🎧 Podcast on YouTube: https://youtu.be/hHIpxVPvLFk
🎧 Podcast on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/6fm4Xnqj8LEDPIKyqxc6P9?si=guouVAk9SHWdwtlyVHI5kg
🎧 Podcast on Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/from-divorce-papers-to-a-%241m-business-acquisition/id1740382586?i=1000735562704
Transcript
00:00 Hey there, this is Casey with the M&A Launchpad podcast. Put it on your calendar. This is a do not missed
00:07 one-day event. There’s going to be incredible headliners, but really at the end of the day, you’re going to get a
00:12 chance to talk to people that have made acquisitions, learn from some of the challenges that they’ve made because
00:18 this is definitely a challenging process. But more importantly, there’s going to be people there that can help
00:23 you and support you along the way from great vendors, quality of earnings, how to run the due diligence process, and
00:29 how do I get financed, how do I raise capital, how do I structure all of these things. It’s going to be hundreds of
00:35 people that are all focused, like-minded people, and man, everyone that’s come has given us incredible feedback. We
00:41 look forward to seeing you. All right. On today’s episode, we interviewed Raj Kankaria where we talked about leaving the military, going into
00:49 college, going investing in banking, then leaving and really kind of stumbling into just a short-term means
00:55 to make some money and really meeting the business owner and ultimately buying a process server company and what that
01:02 business is about and some of the things to kind of look at, right? And he got a amazing structure with a seller and
01:07 he’s, you know, only a few months into it, but off to the races and really a lot of nuggets in this one. So Casey,
01:12 what were some of your takeaways? Man, first off, what a cool business. I I just didn’t even think about that type of business, you know, and and it’s just
01:19 amazing at how many type of businesses are out there. And it’s one of the things I love about doing this podcast.
01:24 Um, but one of the things that Raj says in the meeting that is is just it goes
01:29 across the board. Doesn’t matter what you’re trying to do in your life, but you know, when you have a really terrible moment and instead of looking
01:35 at it as, man, I’m it’s just it’s all over. It’s like, hey, where’s that opportunity? And if he wouldn’t have had
01:42 that mindset and if he wouldn’t have done that, he would have never stumbled into the industry, he would have never ever ended up with this company. And so
01:48 having that mindset as an entrepreneur that hey, things are going to go wrong. It’s going to happen. Okay. So how do
01:55 you make you know how do you make you eliminate other women’s right? It’s that mindset. And that was a big takeaway for
02:02 me with Raj today. Agreed. You know, and again, it’s just always fun to learn about new businesses. And I always assumed process
02:08 servers were hired by the courts. Didn’t realize there’s actually like an intermediary there. So again, really
02:14 cool space and lots of good nuggets for someone that’s looking to buy a business that is kind of, you know, something
02:20 that they may not be aware of but really step in and operate it. So [Music]
02:28 all right guys, just take one second here real quick. When you’re buying a business, ensuring the financial health of the company is critical. And that’s
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02:41 to protect your investment and ensure that you’re stepping into a profitable business on day one. Patrick of Okonnell
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02:59 buyers like yourself successfully purchase and operate enduring, profitable businesses. In fact,
03:04 Patrick’s helped some listeners of this show. So, if you’re buying, looking for help with the quality of earnings,
03:09 financial due diligence, network capital, and more, head to Okonnelladvisor.com, or just click the link in the show
03:15 notes. Hey Raj, welcome to the show. Hey, Casey. Hey, Faz. Great to great to be here. Thanks for having me on.
03:21 Yeah, I’m a local Houstonian. We’re looking forward to the only Houstononian we’ve interviewed on the podcast I can
03:26 think of. So, that worked out well. So, so far. Yeah. Yeah. So, Ros, for the listeners, you want to share a little bit about your
03:32 background and what you currently doing? Yeah, sure. Um, I’m originally from Houston, Texas. After I graduated from
03:38 high school, I went to the military academy. Served for five years in the US Army. Went to a lot of cool places like
03:44 Fort Hood, Korea, uh, Missouri. Uh, decided to come back to Houston. Got my
03:50 MBA at Rice. Worked as an investment banker for several years. Worked in corporate finance at an LG company.
03:57 got laid off, went through a divorce, and found myself uh wrapped up in acquisition of this
04:03 company called Lonear Attorney Service, and now I own and operate the largest process service company in Harris
04:09 County. All right, so that was definitely the most concise intro we’ve had. So, let’s talk military. You got that military
04:16 right to the point. We love it. Yeah. So, let’s unpack that a little bit, right? So, you went, you know, you
04:22 you finished up the military, came back, decided to go get a degree, right? went into investment banking and was that
04:28 kind of always the plan? Did you grow up planning for that or did you just kind of stumble into that? And then the real question I think for listeners is how
04:34 did you what made you make that transition right decide you know what I’m going to go and buy something? Yeah. So I’ll start with the investment
04:40 banking question. Um I was able to connect with a lot of good mentors coming out of the army. One of them was
04:46 a guy named Matt Kucka. He had been a student at Rice. He was going to investment banking. He presented all the
04:51 parallels to me of what uh investment banking job would be like compared to what the army job was like. So he
04:58 presented to me the idea of working in a hierarchy, working in intense work environment. So I came back to Houston
05:04 with the intent of going to business school to become a oil and gas investment banker.
05:10 After I finished a few years there, I did a few transactions in the LG space. got a amazing, highly lucrative, very
05:18 shiny ball job offer from an LG project. Little did I know that the risks
05:23 involved in that project, it shut down. Uh I found myself without a job. So I
05:29 explored a number of options. Um I applied to become a police officer. I tried to get a pilot’s license. I just
05:34 wanted to do something that was a little bit I found that entrepreneurs have this uh need for constant stimulation. And I,
05:42 you know, it’s always been kind of the theme of my life. And so I wanted to do something that was different. One of the
05:47 things that I was looking at was acquiring a business. I knew that I didn’t want to go back to a corporate job. Wanted to do something different, thrilling, something that would satisfy
05:53 that itch for me. And the option that I liked the most was buying and acquiring
05:59 a business. And the story behind that is also pretty interesting. Um, if you want to get into detail about that, I think
06:04 that that is kind of the highlight of my acquisition journey. Um, but I I got
06:10 laid off from from the LG company. At the same time, I had an angry wife that
06:15 wanted to to leave. So, she sent me divorce papers. There’s a guy that showed up at my door
06:22 and he served me the divorce papers. And I asked him how much it cost him to to
06:28 serve me. And after getting laid off, I needed I had a lot of bills to pay. I’d gotten used to living life of an
06:33 investment banker. And I was like, man, I I can do about 10 of these a day. He
06:39 told me it was a price close to um a little over a hundred bucks. So, I was like, I could do 10 of these a day. This
06:44 is a business right here while I get to my next, you know, figure out what I was going to do next. Um, so I got a process
06:51 servers license, started serving papers, got really close with the owner of Lonear. Um, he would ask me for business
06:57 advice every now and then. Um, and I’d offer it to him. I’d offer him my thoughts and opinions. We really grew to
07:02 like each other. He wanted to exit. Um, and I wanted to acquire. And so, it’s
07:08 how we how we got here. You know, it’s the the thing I love about it is it’s like when the door shuts in your face,
07:14 right? And you feel like, “Oh my god, everything’s going to shit.” You know, the entrepreneur looks at the guy
07:21 delivering the divorce papers as an opportunity, right? Happens to ask a question then let him down thinking through it, right?
07:27 So many times in in my journey as an entrepreneur, it at the worst of times
07:32 and those challenges is where I find these opportunities, right? And I think it’s that mindset shift of looking at
07:38 things instead of like the world’s ending is like, well, hey, obviously there’s going to be a door that opens.
07:43 Where is that door? And uh so that’s it’s a it’s a pretty good way to walk into entrepreneurship.
07:50 Yeah. So yeah, it’s a really quick I guess for the listeners, can you explain to them what a process server is? I’m
07:55 guessing most listeners don’t. Fortunately, Casey and I probably do way too much legal, so we know a lot more from that. But what is a process server?
08:02 And maybe the more interesting thing is why were you thinking, you know what,
08:07 I’ll become a process server versus going back into investment banking.
08:13 Well, I hadn’t closed the door on investment banking. I was looking at opportunities in investment banking as
08:19 well. Um, but I don’t think at that time I was in the mindset to do well in an interview or hold that kind of job until
08:26 I had kind of recovered emotionally from what was going on in my personal life. So, that door hadn’t closed for me then.
08:32 um and then a process server. So in the litigation process, the first step is
08:37 for the attorney to file a petition to sue someone. Once that petition is filed, the citation and the petition
08:44 have to be as part of the American judicial process. Um the citation of the petition have to be handd delivered to
08:50 the defendant. So the guy getting sued as a defendant, those documents have to be handd delivered to them. The process
08:56 server has to be certified. Um the certification standards vary with stateto state, but essentially the
09:01 person has to be certified um to deliver these legal documents. They show up,
09:06 identify the the defendant, and serve them the legal papers. It is at that point at which the defendant can then
09:13 respond to that lawsuit. And so it’s a critical essential service that’s a part of our judicial process. I decided to do
09:20 it because it was just the fastest way for me to make a buck at the time. Um, I mean, you could drive Uber, you could do
09:26 Door Dash, but compared to 10 bucks a job, I’d rather get paid a h 100red. And it’s also thrilling because you get to
09:33 drive around in random parts of town. No one, you don’t have any food or people sitting in your car. Um, all you have to
09:39 do is deliver a paper and you can knock them out fairly quickly, too. And so, I was doing it just as something temporary
09:45 until I found my next role, which could have been an investment banking. Um, it could have been a corporate job. I
09:52 wasn’t really sure at the time. I just knew that I needed to do something. So, when you sat with the owner, so
09:57 you’re you’re at Lonear, you’re you’re you’re servicing for him. You’re obviously probably one of his better producers, consistent. You show up on
10:03 time. I’m sure you’re one of those employees that he was like, “I love you.” Were you employee or contractor? Actually,
10:10 I was a contractor working for Lonear Attorney Service. Yeah. And I was working for a number of different um
10:16 agencies. I had a couple of my own clients as well that were lawyers just
10:21 um starting up, but my biggest client was Lonear Attorney Service and they would kick me I mean you know 10 15 jobs
10:29 a day and so um yeah I was I was essentially a 1099 contractor doing these these deliveries of legal
10:35 documents. So you start getting into like asking him about how the financials work at the company like did all of a sudden you
10:42 know I guess in these business questions you and I have you and him start coming he starts to go you start to figure out
10:48 how much money he’s making, what his overhead looks like. I imagine th those things start happening for you to go,
10:53 “Man, this could be a great business to buy.” Yeah, absolutely. Um I mean, the the
10:59 business is very simple. Um the prices for each serve are written out on the
11:04 website. Um the volume he showed me one day in the office just to illustrate to
11:10 me the scope of his business. I knew how much each server was getting paid because I was one of them. And then
11:16 there may have been some minimal back office support staff costs. So, um,
11:21 you’re seeing margins of about 25 to 30%. Um, and so the math just made a lot
11:27 of sense to me. And then all the revenue is essentially recurring because the clients are very sticky. Um, once an
11:33 attorney finds a good process server, they typically don’t want to switch. And so, um, 90 to 95% of the clients are all
11:41 sticky sources of recurring revenue. Uh, very rarely do you have Yeah, go ahead.
11:47 No, no, I was going to ask just two interesting questions on this whole thing, right? I think again just for people to understand because I think
11:52 most people don’t understand the inner workings of the legal system, right? The attorney is hiring the process server in
11:59 this case, right? It was Lonear, which then hired you as a 1099, right? The
12:04 attorney is paying Lonear. They’re paying you, right? They’re obviously netting the profit. And I think the
12:09 question is a, if you don’t find the person, do you get paid? Right? And then
12:14 B is the attorney, you know, where is that money coming from that’s coming from the
12:20 attorney, right? Is it part of the court fees just to even initiate the the lawsuit? Is it the defendant? Is it the
12:26 plaintiff? I mean, where who is paying for that? Yeah. So, to answer your first question,
12:32 yes, it’s the um attorney paying for the job. Um the money comes from three
12:39 different places depending on what type of court case it is. If it’s a family law case, they typically collect money
12:44 from the defendant upfront um and then use those funds to pay for all the litigation support that goes into the
12:51 case. If it’s a personal injury case, for example, then they front the money
12:56 themselves and then reimburse on the back end uh once a settlement or um the
13:01 litigation process has completed. for debt collection. They’re really price sensitive because they can only
13:07 reimburse those fees that they fronted um after
13:12 uh the lawsuit is completed and they settle on some type of debt collection agreement. Um so those are the the sort
13:18 of sources of of funds for the attorneys to pay for this. Um, and then if people are not found, um, you do still get paid
13:26 because you’ve confirmed that the address is bad or you’ve exhausted the maximum number of attempts, which is
13:32 four. And then you have to provide a locate service to help find the defendant. I did not know that.
13:38 I didn’t either. And then and then maybe last question, we can get back to the business. This is for the listeners. It most you have a
13:44 really interesting story of whenever you’re out there trying to process someone. I mean, you know, because I can imagine that for for some people that’s
13:51 not a good day, right? And do people freak out? Anything interesting there to share? Yeah, I mean, yeah, the the this
13:59 business in this business we are basically um perpetual bearsers of bad
14:04 news. Um, and so there were I mean I have countless stories just um the most
14:11 interesting one that comes to mind was a attorney hired me New Year’s on New
14:17 Year’s Eve last year to infiltrate a rapper’s New Year’s party. Um, I don’t remember which one it was, but
14:24 apparently some rapper had flown in. He wanted to have a New Year’s party here in Houston. Um, it was some child
14:29 support case. They couldn’t ever he was avoiding service, but they knew that he was going to be here for a party. So,
14:34 the attorney needed a process server to go infiltrate the party as a attendee, find the guy, introduce themselves, and
14:41 then serve him the documents. So, I went and did that on New Year’s Eve. Um, made
14:46 a bunch of money off of it. But, that was probably the most thrilling experience I’ve had as a process server so far.
14:52 What was what did his face look like when he did that? Was it just caught him off guard?
14:57 Just caught him off guard. Um, he was kind of I mean, he was essentially expecting it. So, um, it was more like a
15:03 all right, you got me kind of reaction. Um, nervous people would get vi, hey, you’re
15:09 out. Get out of the party. Was it was it more like, “Hey, thanks. Get out.” Or stick around, hang out.
15:14 No, no, no. I mean, I typically after you serve someone, you you never want to stick around. So, um, whether it’s him
15:20 or anybody else, I just serve them, turn around, and and walk away. I I don’t really like to linger or answer too many
15:25 questions um because you never know how people are going to react after receiving one of these. So, um, I served
15:30 him and then just kind of bolted out of there. Not randon a recon mission there for you, right? I think I think Manny start a TV show.
15:37 All right. That’s how you can really grow Lone Star. You start a TV show just kind of serving and all the the things that happened.
15:43 There was one at some point. Um, I forgot what it was called, but there there there is a reality show for
15:49 service of process. Yeah. Because it’s kind of a sister business. There is a reality show out there. Yeah.
15:55 Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, the way I grew up, my my my father was a West Point grad. Uh, he was a Ranger and so I grew
16:01 up in a military family. I didn’t, you know, I didn’t he didn’t stay in he served his five years and then he went
16:06 into the the normal world. But it took him probably 10 10 years to no longer act in and become be a ranger,
16:14 you know, just kind of a different mentality. Um, but I always ask this. My dad did take incredible leadership
16:21 skills and things from the military that applied into his everyday life. Discipline, all of these different
16:27 things that I got to witness as a kid. Um, I was also not allowed to even talk about joining the military. It was like
16:34 the one thing I wanted to be was like my dad. And that was a conversation he did not want to have. But one of the things
16:40 that he did teach me is a lot of those disciplines and skills that he did. I mean, my dad woke up every morning and did 50 push-ups. Well, it was 100 for a
16:47 while. I mean, he did that forever. Like, he had the same routines. And so, one of the things I asked the military
16:52 guys that run businesses is, you know, talk to me a little bit about the skills that you learned in the military
16:58 leadership wise that you’re now applying into your current business because those are, you know, obviously running a
17:04 business is one thing, but leadership is everything. And so, what have you felt like has carried through to your current
17:09 business, right? That those skills and what are you what are you using as your leadership skills? Yeah. So the one there there’s two
17:15 skills that’s that that were really important to me and that I carry into my business now. The first one is um
17:21 dealing with adversity and just having a resilient mindset and expecting that
17:27 things aren’t going to go well. So you can you you you plan plan with the
17:32 expectation that it’s going to fail and then when something does fail you’re able to quickly pivot and and fix it. So
17:38 that’s more of an operational leadership skill. when it comes to managing people, there’s really only one principle that
17:45 um I truly live by um and that is that I would never ask anyone to do something
17:51 that I’m not able or willing to do myself. And I think that if you if everyone followed that one principle, um
17:58 people would follow them anywhere. Um, so any any any task that I have my staff
18:04 do, I know I’ve learned how to do myself and I would never them assign I’d never assign them anything that I’m not
18:11 willing or able to do u myself that I’m not willing to do myself. So if they need to um work late, I’m right there
18:19 with them. If they need to do something that’s tedious, I’m right there rolling up my sleeves helping them. Um, and it’s
18:25 not so much because the business needs it, but it’s because it’s a symbolic gesture to motivate everyone to um,
18:32 achieve the goals that we need to achieve to get where we need to be. I love it, man.
18:38 So then, I guess to to to kind of really get into the business, right? So you were, you know, I’m guessing one of the top
18:44 process servers for Lonear, right? You know, getting to probably know the the seller much better, which is really the
18:50 tip the best way to buy a business, right? If you can infiltrate quote unquote that business, you see behind
18:55 the scenes beforehand, you know what you’re getting into, you’re learning the space, you’re knowing when the owner is frustrated, when they’re not, right?
19:01 Because no business is easy, right? That’s those are some of the best ways. And so I guess the question is how did
19:07 the conversation of buying the business come up, right? The seller just mentioned it off the cuff and it clicked or, you know, was it something else?
19:14 No. So, um, around December of last year, he had mentioned to me that, um,
19:21 he’s he’s probably going to be selling the business, but in order to do so, he would need to merge with another company
19:27 down here in Houston to achieve the scale to get to the multiple that he wanted to sell the business at. So, we
19:32 fell out of touch for about 3 months from December to March. and he called me up in March and informed me that that
19:39 merger had fell through, the sale had fell through, and now he’s just looking to organically grow the business
19:45 um and sell it. So, he actually asked me to run the company versus buy it. And so, um instead of just accepting a job
19:53 offer, I countered it with an offer to buy the business instead because I was interested in becoming a business owner.
19:59 He was interested in exiting. So we had a few lunches um ahead of it and finally
20:04 came to the conclusion that what would be best for all of us would be if I if I buy the business and um he just stays on
20:10 as as a as a passive investor in it. Very nice. So how did you structure it?
20:16 How big is the business? What’s the revenue? What’s the structure? And kind of how did the whole deal look like?
20:21 Yeah. So when I was buying the business, it was about a little bit over a million dollar business. Um, the way that we
20:27 structured it was we seller financed about 60% of it. The owner retained 30%
20:33 equity and then I made a down payment that was equivalent to 50% of enterprise
20:39 value. Um, I brought in a friend um to make the other half of the down payment. So, we came to a valuation of about a
20:46 million dollars uh seller finance 600,000 of it. He kept 300,000 of equity and I brought in a h 100,000 um split
20:53 two ways between myself and a friend from business school and and and in what did the acquisition
20:60 what was the the date the acquisition happened? Was this in the last couple years? I think March of 25, right?
21:05 No, we um we closed actually June 16, 2025. All right. So about four months.
21:12 Awesome. and and and and when you so when you talked with the Stellar because because one of the things that you know
21:18 I I try to do is get the Stellar to carry um paper. I mean it’s not because it’s some slick move or whatever. It’s
21:25 you know when I’m talking about legacy with them. Uh I tell them that the biggest risk the biggest risk about the
21:30 legacy is if we bring a banker into the the equation and things don’t go as
21:36 planned. You know it’s no longer our destiny. It’s it’s no longer coast. Yeah.
21:41 Yeah. it it’s it’s no longer here anymore, right? And by them, you know, they believe in the business. It’s their
21:47 business. They’ve they’ve live and breathe it. You know, if I show them the interest that they’re going to earn
21:53 while they’re carrying the note Yep. and they see that cash flow. So, when you were talking with them, were those
21:59 kind of the key things that you were doing? Help some of our listeners as well think about it because yeah, most people’s dream is, “Oh my god, I
22:05 don’t have to go get an SBA loan or I don’t have to go get a bank note.” And I’ll be honest with you, have taken those notes and doing stellar financing,
22:13 the pressure is really off when you can get that seller to finance. Yeah. So, um, aside from those two
22:20 points, there’s actually one other benefit that I illustrated to him as well. So, the first one was obviously if
22:26 we bring a bank into this, something goes wrong, there’s some big regulatory change, we both lose the business. Um,
22:31 the bank is going to seize it, they’re going to cut it up and sell it. Um, you know, whatever. They don’t know how to run a process service company. Um, in
22:38 the case that something goes wrong, one of us can keep the business. We can negotiate amongst ourselves. You get
22:44 your business back plus whatever personal guarantee that I signed, have beautiful house in the Heights, you can keep that too. Um, you know what,
22:51 whatever. Um, so basically the first one was that the assets stay between us.
22:56 Second one was um I illustrated to him um all the interest that he would earn
23:02 over the span of seven years which would essentially increase the value of what he could potentially earn by um you know
23:10 25 30 40% what I don’t remember the exact number it was but it was significantly higher than
23:15 it does it significantly higher then they they actually don’t even they don’t even know right but when you show them
23:21 that interest they’re like oh my god why why would I be the bank you know and you’re Exactly.
23:27 Exactly. Exactly. And you don’t have to even provide any cash. You’re literally just making free money, right? The third
23:34 one um comes in the form of tax benefits. So while the capital gains tax rate remains the same, you’re able to
23:40 defer all those payments over the span of a number of years. So when you look at that from a present value perspective
23:45 and opportunity cost perspective, um the earnings are quite significant because you can use that money towards something
23:52 else. So rather than paying um you know two 300 grand upfront, you’re spacing it
23:57 out over seven years and you can deploy that capital to do something else with it. Yeah. And those are all the really key
24:03 ways to get a seller motivated to seller finance, right? You know, listeners really should listen to that. And you
24:09 know that last point, it’s really like setting up a deferred sales trust, right? We did an episode on that previously. And you’re basically baking
24:15 that in without the seller having to go through the complexity of a true deferred sales trust. So, it’s really
24:21 valuable for any seller if you can explain all the benefits of why they should sell or finance. And so, for the
24:27 listeners, right, just to maybe put a bow on it and make sure they got the structure right. It sounds like you guys came up with a million dollar valuation.
24:34 And so, a million dollars is needed. The seller rolled 30%. He kept 30% of the
24:39 business. So, that’s about 300,000. Then he seller financed 60%. So, that’s 600,000. So really he carried 90% of the
24:47 business and you bought that last 10% right? Is that accurate? Yeah. Yeah. And and then what was the the
24:54 multiple of the IBIDA and the revenue of the business? Just so people can understand kind of what a process server looks like.
24:59 Yeah. So the the the business was valued at 1 million. The IBIDA at the time was
25:05 um forward-looking 250,000 and so I applied a 4x multiple to it. Typically
25:10 businesses of this size, you know, probably would get somewhere between a 3 to 4x multiple. I was on the higher end
25:16 of that just because the financing structure was so favorable and it was
25:21 Yes. So structure. Yeah. And it was worth more to me
25:27 because I understood the business. I saw the potential and um you know Patrick
25:33 was essentially going to stay on so um I was comfortable paying him a higher multiple for it.
25:38 Nice. And then and then maybe there what’s the revenues on a business like that just to kind of break down just margins.
25:44 Um so yeah the revenue at that time was about a million um EBITDA including
25:49 owner salary so SDE they call it was 250,000 about 25%. And so yeah you’ve mentioned
25:56 a couple times that’s whenever you bought it. So, how’s it been? Right, you’re about 6 months into it, not even 6 months, probably four months into it,
26:03 right? Feeling feeling great about it, things improving or you going through a J curve, which is what we see, right?
26:08 You typically you buy that business, there’s the paying, you know, getting just payments in line in terms of
26:14 getting people situated, paying them better, getting benefits, right? You’re going to lose a little bit of customers
26:20 possibly, right? You’re putting yourself on payroll, you’re stumbling through some things, all the above. And that’s the J curve, right? But then you come
26:25 out start to kind of come out of that much stronger. So, what have you seen so far? Yeah. So, um I’ll just tell you the
26:32 timeline of of what I bought, what I did, and where we’re at now. But I bought this business. Um and I was
26:39 fortunate enough to surround myself with the right people who gave me some really good advice. Um and I heard from multiple people that the best thing to
26:45 do is go in um so I started working in the office be like while we were doing the acquisition. So my due diligence was
26:52 actually, you know, working in the business. And so we really had no formal diligence process. Anytime something
26:58 popped into my head or I had a question about something or I wanted to look at something, he he would just let me look.
27:04 He would send it to me or I I was sitting in the office, so I saw operations firsthand for about a month before even buying before even buying
27:11 the business. So we had no formal diligence. Um so I knew exactly what I wanted to change as soon as we closed on
27:18 the deal. Um, so the I I was able to surround myself with with a lot of good people um that gave me some really good
27:24 advice. And one thing that I’d heard over and over and over again that actually went against the grain was in
27:29 the first 30 days after you buy a business, the employees are most open to change. Um because they’re afraid of
27:34 losing a they’re afraid of losing their job. They don’t know if you’re going to keep them. They don’t know if you’re going to let them go. And so if all you do is make a couple of changes but keep
27:42 them on board, um that’s a that’s a favorable outcome for them. and that’s when they’re most willing to adjust to
27:47 any kind of change. And so I came in and within a couple of weeks just put all the policies in place that I thought
27:54 would work for the business um that would keep things running smoothly. Um things that I didn’t like I changed
27:60 around um and then let go of one person as well um in in a in a span of about 3
28:06 weeks. Um so I wanted it to be a place where um the culture was one that I
28:11 enjoyed coming into every single day. Um, so I did that first. Um, when I had
28:17 the right staff in place, I immediately started implementing something called EOS. Um, I’d gotten some great advice
28:24 that whatever operating system you use, have something in place to um to have
28:29 goals, keep everyone aligned, working towards the same end state, and um a me
28:35 a framework for holding everyone accountable. And so did those two things and immediately just saw the business uh
28:43 start to grow. So when I bought it, we were doing about 7 to 800 jobs a month
28:48 and in the month of September we just closed on 1,200. So,
28:54 um, ever since we made those changes, it’s been growing quite rapidly as well because every week we have our L10
28:59 meeting where we identify the issues that are keeping us from growing and come up with solutions and what we need
29:05 to do to reach the targets that we’ve set for for that quarter. That’s that’s a respectable amount of
29:12 growth in a very short amount of time. Right. in question. Whenever I hear those kinds of things, it makes me
29:17 think, you know, what you focused on really was the the the leads side of the
29:22 business, right? Not the production side. And so, I mean, was it the big, you know, the big increase? Was that due
29:28 to sales and marketing strategies that you put in place that were kind of missing or was it just lack of
29:34 consistent followup? And and maybe the other part of the story we didn’t ask is how long had the seller run the business
29:39 before you bought it? So, I was actually the second owner of
29:45 this business after the founder. The founder started the business in 1995. So, the business had actually a really
29:51 nice foothold in Houston and Harris County and Texas. Um, the owner that
29:57 bought it from the original founder, uh, he bought it in 2021,
30:02 ran it for five, four, yeah, four years, and then sold it to me in 2025. Um, and
30:09 so he ran it for four years. when he bought the business, it was actually half of what it was when he sold it to me. So, he bought it when revenues were
30:16 about 500,000 um and they were doing 3 to 400 jobs a month. I bought it from him at a at a
30:24 million dollars when they were doing about 7 to 800 and then have grown it since then to a volume of about
30:30 consistent 1,200 1,200 jobs a month. Wow. And last last question for me is
30:35 sorry, was it because of a big sales push though or were some other factors that kind of really helped get that growth? Yeah. So, um there’s a couple of
30:42 factors. We were very well set up with our tech provider, Infotra. Um and we
30:47 became a preferred vendor for them in the state of Texas. I really haven’t even um I to be quite fair, I had a
30:54 couple of strokes of really good luck when I first came in. Um I mean, we had to get the company operationally set up,
30:60 but um I got the company operationally set up, got the name out through, you know, a couple of podcasts, LinkedIn
31:05 posts, my own personal network that I did. That was really the only marketing that I did. Um, but we were set up really well with our tech provider. Um,
31:12 they really liked us. We liked them. We had scale in Texas. We had the operability. So, we signed a preferred
31:18 partner agreement with them. And then Infotra sends uh most if not all their Texas jobs. They kick them over to us.
31:25 Then I had um a windfall in securing a client that was a tax protest company.
31:30 Um, they sent us a couple hundred jobs every month. Um and that I did um on my own uh just by uh meeting them through
31:39 my my my partner, my life partner, not business partner. She introduced me to to Okconors. Um we signed up
31:46 Conor Associates. I know them. I use them. Yeah. Signed with them. Um I’ve met
31:53 Yeah. Patrick O’Conor. Yeah. Yeah. Um so we signed up with them. Um
31:59 and uh are their are their exclusive provider for their collections business. Awesome. Very nice, man. And then I
32:06 think you were going to ask a question, Casey, on that. Oh, I I just within technology gains, did you come in and go, man, they’re
32:11 doing this like an like, you know, one of the first things we look at is like where can we add technology to make
32:17 things more rapid? Did you find something that was like, man, I can bring this in and make things more efficient?
32:23 um not necessarily, but we work very closely with our tech provider to um
32:30 help them help them through their development cycles for what we think would be great changes to help with our
32:37 processes. And so we essentially work handinand with them um advise them on what updates they need to make. They ask
32:44 us for feedback and opinions. And um you know we we’re just in lock step on what
32:49 technology changes would be most beneficial to processes in the industry across the board for all their users.
32:57 And the nice thing about your business too is that it’s a people business, right? I don’t see robots going to serve
33:03 people, you know, anytime soon, right? There’s a lot of needing to verify, validate, you know, that person. So
33:10 you’re you’re at least a little bit in a a safe business from that perspective. I would have never thought about that
33:15 business, but I love the sticky revenue. I like I mean it’s it’s that’s pretty solid. Yeah. And actually, I’ll ask one more
33:21 question before we wrap up. It’s kind of maybe even related to sales on Equity Launchpad. What’s stopping you from growing? Right. Is it you know, do you
33:28 have a vision of let’s go buy three other companies in the space? Is it about buying companies in other states? Or are you looking at it purely from
33:34 just an organic perspective? No, I mean nothing stopping me from growing. I just I just haven’t operated
33:40 long enough to I mean, you know, talk to me after a year and we’ll probably be in a um a very different sized business. Um
33:48 so, no, there there’s nothing stopping the growth. Um we’re looking at acquisitions. We’re looking at um we’re
33:54 looking at growing organically. We’re structuring our operations to handle a massive amount of volume. Um offshore,
34:01 we’re doing all the things that we need to grow. Um the only thing that’s stopping me is just hours in a day. on
34:08 time. I love it, man. So, it sounds like a fantastic start to your acquisition and
34:13 very excited. Forward to hearing more about it maybe in a year and see kind of where you’re off to. Yeah, absolutely. Yep. Um, no, we had we
34:20 have set some fairly loft we just had our um we just completed our EOS implementations and set some pretty
34:25 lofty goals for for the year and the quarter and um you know so far there
34:30 doesn’t seem to be any obstacles but um you know in in these kind of things you never you never really know what could
34:37 go wrong and something is going to go wrong. Um just need to be flexible and and adapt to those.
34:43 That’s great advice. All right, so let’s move on into our rocket round. It’s when we ask our guest three major questions.
34:50 I’m going to go ahead and start off with the first one first if you don’t mind. So, what do you like to do in your free time, Raj?
34:56 Um, so I have a I have a couple of hobbies. I um love I like to fly planes. Um I got a pilot license recently.
35:02 What are you based at? Um I don’t have a plane myself, but I typically fly the uh the Piper Cherokee.
35:09 Um got an instrument rating, got a private pilot license, so I enjoy doing that. Um I love watching football. um
35:15 follow my fantasy team religiously. Have been in a league for several years. So um every Thursday, Monday, and Sunday,
35:21 you’ll find me um occupied with that. Um and then I just I love meeting other entrepreneurs, um expanding my network,
35:29 talking to people, implementing um advice that’s been given to me to
35:34 people who have gone through the same thing. Um just chopping it up.
35:39 Awesome. Fantastic. We’ll talk planes after the show. Uh next question. What’s your most memorable moment in your business
35:45 journey? Um, the most memorable moment has definitely been in this last month
35:50 seeing the company um go from a ceiling that it had hit to just busting through
35:56 it and breaking every company record that um that o over the past 30 years.
36:01 Um so just and also seeing the the staff’s mindset completely shift once we
36:06 um implemented EOS. So they operate completely differently from from the way they did in in in the first week that I
36:13 bought it. So complete mindset shift um growth and just a lot of lot of great things that that I’ve been seeing here
36:19 um last month. Last question. What’s your favorite tool or resource?
36:25 I’m sure you probably hear this a lot, but uh Open AI’s chat GPT. Um, I go to
36:31 it for I mean I I use it in my personal life. If I need to um dissect something
36:37 to to send to my former spouse, I use it. Um, if I need to dissect something to send to my current partner, I I use
36:44 it. If I’m having any conflicts or issues in life, I go to it. Um, and then as far as business, I mean, it’s a
36:49 invaluable tool for for helping me plan, strategize, deal with any staff issues,
36:56 um, create documents, create policies. I mean, it just it’s allin-one tool for essentially everything in life and
37:02 business. Speeds things up pretty it’s pretty it’s pretty amazing tool. Yeah, I think each day people learn new
37:09 ways to kind of leverage it. So, super powerful. Yeah. Awesome. Well, Raj, definitely enjoyed
37:15 the conversation. It was great learning a lot more about process servers. How can people get a hold of you?
37:21 Um, LinkedIn. They can reach out via LinkedIn. Uh, my email is also a great way to get a hold of me. Um, I’ll send
37:28 I’ll send an email with both of those and you can add it into the description. Um, the only thing I ask is
37:33 the only thing I ask is that um for people that do or are are interested in the business, I just ask that you
37:38 explore getting a process servers license and serve a few documents before um before reaching out because I think
37:44 that understanding the operations is is critical to uh to doing this type of of
37:49 business. Is it easy to get that license? It’s pretty easy to get it. Um the hard part is actually going around dangerous
37:56 parts of town and and serving documents. But yeah, um I’m a firm believer in the idea that you have to be able to do the
38:03 work and and understand what the business is before um before buying one
38:08 like this. That is great. It’s hard. Yes. Haven’t found one yet. That’s easy.
38:19 Exactly. Raj, thank you very much for today and uh we look forward to seeing you hopefully in May at our Houston
38:25 conference that we’re going to be having. Would love you to have you come out and give everybody an update on how you’re doing. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. I’m looking forward to
38:32 that as well and I’ll definitely be attending. Awesome. Awesome. Thank you, man.
38:37 Yeah, thanks so much for having me on. Thank you for listening to the M&A Launchpad podcast. If you’ve enjoyed
38:42 today’s podcast and would like to support us, please leave us a rating and a review after you listen. I’m Casey Mchu and I look forward to talking with
38:49 you next week.
