I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. There’s a point where chasing revenue can start hiding other problems.
You can grow the top line and still have:
For me, the better question has become: what does the next dollar of revenue actually cost us?
If adding another $10K a month means more payroll, more vehicles, more admin, more callbacks, and more of my time, I want to know what’s left after all of that.
We’ve also had to get more selective about service areas, frequencies, and customer fit because more customers did not always mean a healthier operation.
I still want growth, but I’m much more interested now in profitable growth that gives us more control.
At some point, I think a business owner has to decide what size business they actually want to operate, not just how big they can make it.
I think another good measure is whether growth is giving the owner more freedom or less. If revenue keeps going up but you are working more hours and carrying more stress then bigger may not actually be better. At some point I would want the business to work better without needing more of me.
