Agree with nearly all of this, and especially "don't try to become a mini private-equity shop". One place I'd push back gently: I'm not sure trust and operational discipline are two separate lanes you combine. At small scale I think the discipline is what produces the trust. Nobody feels warmly toward the local shop who didn't call back. They just remember they didn't call back. Answering the phone and doing what you said on the day you said it is the local advantage, expressed. The roll-ups get there through process and they do invest in the tech to make sure processes are followed. I think what is tricky as agree home owners want to support independent owners, but they look at google reviews, get hit with ads and many times even after acquisitions the larger shops are still doing business with same name as pre-acquisition so hard to tell what is independent versus what is part of a larger roll up for the average consumer.
