We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Gunner Reed a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Gunner thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. We’d love to hear how you think where to draw the line in terms of asking friends and family to support your business – what’s okay and what’s over the line?

Your business is your blood sweat and tears. I have no problem asking my friends and family to support my business. I can remember scrolling through facebook before we had G&G and someone would post continuously about their business, and I would think is that their whole life? Yes, yes it is. :)

If you know someone who is doing everything they can to hustle, and hustle hard, to get their business booming and you see that drive in them – you support them.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Hi, my names Gunner and I own G&G Property Care, right here in Lee’s Summit MO.

We provide total outside property care to residential and commercial properties in Lee’s Summit, Blue Springs, and Independence. We take the stress away from keeping up with your greatest financial asset so you can enjoy more time doing all the things you love.

Our hard work and customer service is hard to beat. We are committed to investing in our customers. When you come onboard, you will immediately know you are working with a family business that cares.

We’d love to hear the story of how you turned a side-hustle into a something much bigger.

Yes, what once was my side hustle turned into my full time business. G&G started with my daughter wanting to make some extra cash over winter break, shoveling some driveways while it snowed. Then came early spring and we decided lets pass out some flyers for mowing and leaf cleanups. We kept one of our original advertisement, and now it is a good laugh to look at how far we’ve come. In this profession, word of mouth is your best friend, so next thing I knew I was working full time mowing after I got off of my full time corporate job. Eventually my daughter grew tired of manual labor and got another job but by then, G&G had prospered and allowed me to leave my corporate job a little less than 2 years after that first driveway.

Let’s talk M&A – we’d love to hear your about your experience with buying businesses.

2 1/2 years after starting G&G we were approached by a friendly competitor with the proposition of buying his business. This particular company had been a local staple for 10+ years and came with a solid customer base. Neither myself nor the gentleman who approached me had any idea on how to do this, he just knew he was ready to get out of self employment. He made an offer, I made an offer back and we sealed the deal with a lawyer and a legal contract. That was the easy part. Transitioning the 2 companies into 1 proved a little more difficult, as neither of us really knew how to merge the companies. First thing I did was work with this guy on his routes for the next month. I met his customers and learned his ways; all while working my route also. Things that definitely helped along the way were communicating with the onboarding customers and getting an accountant involved to handle the financial merge. My accountant was able to hold us true to the contract and make sure from a legal standpoint our bases were covered. She worked hand in hand with our tax accountant.
My best advice to someone who is considering this is to be hands on!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://gandgpropertycare.com/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/GandGPropertyCare
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/g-and-g-property-care-lees-summit-2
• Other: https://g.page/r/CctX6XkDnGQQEAo/review

Image Credits
Enlow Productions