Turning Missed Calls Into a $48M Exit

This week, I sat down with Brian Cross, president and CEO of A Advanced Services, a multi-service home service company based in Seattle. Brian grew up in the trades, his parents owned a commercial development company, and he spent years doing everything from rough plumbing to tearing off roofing squares before a short stint in corporate America at Johnson & Johnson.

The turning point came when he and his wife were selling their home and could not get a licensed contractor to come out and change a breaker. That frustration became the seed for Pinnacle, a company Brian built from a Chevy van doing weekend roofing repairs into a $48 million, 140 employee operation before it was acquired by McKinstry.

We covered what it took to run a nine-to-five job and a five-to-nine startup at the same time, why he never took outside capital, how an unsolicited acquisition offer led to selling a business he never intended to sell, and how he ended up as the outside CEO of a family-owned company, A Advanced Services, that wants to expand beyond Washington state.

The Key Takeaways

Below are the most essential insights from my conversation with Brian that you can apply to your home services business today.

1. A Stalled Home Sale Sparked the Idea for Pinnacle

While Brian was still working in corporate America, he and his wife were selling a house and spent about two weeks, including six-plus hours of phone calls, just trying to find a licensed contractor to swap out a breaker. The delay actually stalled the sale of the home, and it convinced Brian there was room for a company built on simply showing up, doing honest work, and delivering real value.

“If you could build a company that was honest, that provided a really high level and a high quality of work, and if you showed up and built value, I thought that alone would be a really good business model. As basic as that sounds, that was really the premise, and that was actually the start of Pinnacle.”

— Brian Cross

2. He Ran a Five-to-Nine Startup on Top of a Nine-to-Five Job

Brian couldn’t afford to leave his corporate job right away, so he built Pinnacle in the hours before and after it, selling his truck for a van and doing sales calls and quotes on drives home from the airport. His wife answered phones and handled bookkeeping from their house until the business outgrew it within a month.

“I had my nine-to-five job with Johnson and Johnson and then I had what I called from five to nine. So I was leaving that job and then I was fully engulfed in this company that I was trying to create. I did work 395 days in a row. My wife and I still joke about that.”

— Brian Cross

3. Answering the Phone on Thanksgiving Built the Client Relationships That Mattered

As a 24/7 response company, Brian was the one taking emergency calls on Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day when no one else answered. Those moments became leverage later, letting him remind large commercial clients that Pinnacle showed up when their other vendors did not, which helped grow those partnerships on a bigger scale.

“Looking back, that was huge. It allowed me to build really good partnerships with some of these large clients. I would remind them that hey, we were there when nobody else answered, and we would love to continue to partner with you on a much bigger scale.”

— Brian Cross

4. Pinnacle Grew to $48 Million Without Ever Taking Outside Capital

With his wife’s banking background guiding the finances, Brian made sure Pinnacle was never starved of capital and never took a loan or outside investment. The company grew organically across roofing, plumbing, electrical, commercial maintenance, and eventually an HVAC division, reaching $48 million in topline revenue before it was acquired.

“We never ever ever went outside for capital. We never had a capital injection. We grew it organically. There was M&A, some very small ones that we did more for the licensing side or to get the technicians, but it was never beyond that.”

— Brian Cross

5. He Wasn’t Looking to Sell, and That Made the Deal Work

Brian had no plans to sell Pinnacle. His goal was to reach $100 million and he was excited about eventually bringing his three sons into different parts of the business. When McKinstry reached out unprompted, his lack of urgency to exit gave him clarity and leverage in the negotiation that someone actively looking for a sale would not have had.

“I wasn’t looking to sell. I had no desire to sell. Not wanting to sell provided a tremendous amount of clarity, and it allowed me to negotiate maybe a little differently than somebody that was looking for an exit.”

— Brian Cross

6. From Consulting to Becoming an Outside CEO of a Family-Owned Company

After the sale, Brian tried consulting, but missed building teams and cultures on a large scale. Josh Gouna, the second-generation owner of A Advanced Services, reached out because he wanted the company to expand beyond Washington and needed someone who had already scaled a home services business. Brian took the CEO role even though he isn’t part of the family that owns the company.

“He wanted a Advanced Services to go multi-state. Right now A Advanced Services is the largest privately held family-owned wastewater company in Washington, Idaho, and Montana, and Josh has said he wants us to go to other states, whether that be Texas, Arizona, or Florida.”

— Brian Cross

7. Why the Trades Are the Best Bang for Your Dollar Right Now

Brian argues that trade school beats a traditional four-year degree on return, since you get paid while you learn the craft instead of taking on six figures of student debt. He also points to a supply and demand crunch in the trades, with five people leaving the workforce for every one coming in, which is pushing prices and opportunity up for anyone getting into the business today.

“For every five people that are leaving the trades right now, only one is coming in. So companies can’t keep up, and the price goes up. What used to be a $200 service call is now a $595 non-refundable service call to get to your house.”

— Brian Cross

Looking Ahead

Brian’s advice for anyone weighing a corporate career against the trades comes back to passion over paycheck. He points to his own path, from a stalled home sale to a $48 million company to running a multi-state family business, as proof that building something honest and valuable tends to pay for itself, even when selling was never the goal.

“I just tell them all, find something you’re passionate about and engulf yourself in it and be the best in that field, and the money will follow. It just does. I was more concerned about building a company that was reputable, that was honest, and that was the best in Seattle.”

— Brian Cross