Owned and Operated Podcast
Episode Title: How to Rebrand Your Company and Add $500K in Revenue
Date: November 18, 2025
Host: John Wilson
Guest: Rich Jordan, Sanford Temperature Control

Episode Overview

In this episode, John Wilson welcomes back serial guest Rich Jordan of Sanford Temperature Control to discuss the intricacies of rebranding multiple acquired home services businesses into a single cohesive brand. The conversation details the strategic, cultural, and operational factors behind moving from a multi-brand structure to a unified "branded house," exploring the pros, cons, risks, and expected growth opportunities—including the financial investment and anticipated upside of the entire process.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. The Pros and Cons of Running Multiple Brands (02:05 - 11:33)

Pros:

• De-Risk Reputation: Multiple brands spread risk; issues in one don’t necessarily tarnish the others' reputations.
  • Rich: “You’re de-risked from like a reputation standpoint. You could feasible have one brand that screws up, gets bad reviews, whatever it is.” (03:44)
• Avoid Disruption: Maintaining original brands post-acquisition minimizes initial customer confusion and operational headaches.
• Easier Rollout: No need to immediately re-wrap trucks or unify uniforms—old assets can be phased out over time.

Cons:

• Bandwidth Strain: Running branded marketing across more than one brand quickly becomes unmanageable for small teams.
  • Rich: "It gets really hard to do when you’re doing it for more than one brand...you end up neglecting some brands. And that's kind of the story for us." (07:33)
• Vendor Negotiation Challenges: Vendors struggle with different names, even under the same EIN.
  • Rich: "Vendors just really struggle with the fact that you’re not the same name...big pain in the neck." (08:25)
• Team & Culture Friction: Difficult to promote a unified culture, distribute swag equitably, or streamline internal messaging.
  • Rich: "There's friction in that when you’re, like, wearing different colors under a different name, different taglines." (09:39)

2. The Tipping Point and Rationale for Rebranding (11:12 - 12:46)

• The third acquired brand and upcoming greenfield expansion triggered the decision.
• Rich’s team always desired unity, and adding more brands became unwieldy and unsustainable.
  • "It was the third brand that sort of just, like, kind of was like, all right, man, are we gonna do this or not?" (11:16)

3. The Logistics of Rebranding & Customer Considerations (12:46 - 17:43)

Customer Retention Playbook:

• Keep legacy digital real estate (websites, Google Business Profiles) intact temporarily.
• Call center answers by the old name, books service, and shares partnership news at the end.
  • Rich: "For like six months, the call center answered the phone as... 'Thanks for calling Bill Trombley...' and then, at the end, 'we recently partnered with Sanford...'" (14:28)
• CSRs are trained to address concerns and reassure on continuity of warranties and service.

AI in Call Centers:

• Siloed bots handle separate brands, but preparing for brand transition by training bots on the new brand and transition messaging.
  • Rich: "If a call comes in from... this service titan account, then it’s... a separate bot that knows nothing... only this one brand." (17:17)

4. Strategic Brand Selection: Why Not Just Use the Largest or Existing Brand? (17:43 - 22:09)

• Using Sanford’s name in new markets would just swap one unfamiliar founder surname for another, not building a new story or values.
  • Rich: "It basically just seems like...an acquisition...That story is just like, hard to tell and hard to get people behind." (19:23)
• The new name, High Ground Service Pros, was chosen based on a core company behavior—“Seize the High Ground”—reinforcing values.
  • Rich: "The winner was 'seize the high ground.' Do the right thing even when not easy or profitable...So we’re rebranding as High Ground Service Pros." (21:40)

5. Financial and Operational Investment (24:14 - 32:24)

Rebrand Costs:

• Approximate total investment: $500,000
  • Truck wraps ($300,000), uniforms ($50,000), website and other assets
  • Rich: "It’s like a half a million bucks... $300k in truck wraps, $50k in uniforms..." (24:19)

Timelines and Execution:

• Work on the rebrand (logos, copy, web assets) began in August; full launch and team reveal in November.
• Gradual transition: two trucks per week per branch rewrapped, mass media and websites updated contemporaneously.

6. Preserving Digital Real Estate & SEO Considerations (24:47 - 32:13)

• Bought HighGround.com for $10k for new brand (inherited DA 48 from an old HR platform).
• Strategies discussed for leveraging old site’s SEO:
  • 301 redirects for top pages, retaining old site for legacy searches.
  • Concerns about backlink context and Google algorithms.

7. Why Don’t Private Equity Roll Up Brands into One? (32:57 - 35:34)

• Unclear rationale; could be conservatism, desire to avoid "J-curve,"
• PE might view execution risk, prefer maintaining stable EBITDA, or lack operator-centric motivation.

8. Operational and Growth Advantages of a Branded House vs. House of Brands (35:34 - 39:06)

• Unified branding unlocks growth: John cites 60% YoY growth after rebrand and location consolidation.
• Branding consolidation streamlines marketing, mass media, event sponsorships.
• Bill Delisandro’s “shower thought” analogy: Focused teams and brands enable creative and strategic breakthroughs.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

"You’re de-risked from like a reputation standpoint."
— Rich Jordan (03:44)

"It gets really hard to do when you’re doing it for more than one brand...you end up neglecting some brands."
— Rich Jordan (07:33)

"For like six months, the call center answered the phone as, you know... 'Thanks for calling Bill Trombley.'... then on the end, 'we recently partnered with Sanford...'"
— Rich Jordan (14:28)

"It was the third brand that...was like, all right, man, are we gonna do this or not?"
— Rich Jordan (11:16)

"We have core behaviors...The winner was seize the high ground. 'Do the right thing even when not easy or profitable.'... we really go above and beyond for our customers."
— Rich Jordan (21:40)

"So we’re rebranding as High Ground Service Pros."
— Rich Jordan (22:09)

"It’s like a half a million bucks. It’s like $300 grand just in truck wraps...another $50 in uniforms."
— Rich Jordan (24:19)

"I bought highground.com...it had a 48 domain authority."
— Rich Jordan (26:44)

"We rebranded all...into the same company and the next 12 months was 60% year over year growth...it clicked, we were all one team, we were cohesive."
— John Wilson (35:07)

"If you’re in marketing working across multiple brands, it’s really hard to have like the shower epiphany...no one can put 100% focus into one thing."
— John Wilson (37:05)

Timestamps for Important Segments

• 02:05 – Introduction to Rich and his multi-brand background
• 03:44 – Pros of running multiple brands, reputation risk
• 07:33 – Cons: bandwidth, vendor, and culture challenges
• 11:16 – Why rebranding became necessary after third acquisition
• 12:46 – Playbook for retaining customers during a rebrand
• 17:17 – Call center AI challenges and solutions for multi-branding
• 19:23 – Importance of brand story, adopting a new name
• 21:40 – Team culture and the “Seize the High Ground” value
• 22:09 – Announcing the new brand: High Ground Service Pros
• 24:19 – Financial and operational cost estimates for full rebrand
• 26:44 – Domain strategy and SEO tactical considerations
• 35:07 – John’s experience: unified brand accelerates growth
• 37:05 – The “shower epiphany” insight for focused brands

Conclusion

This episode offers an in-depth, candid roadmap for service business operators considering a rebrand—detailing both the strategic reasons and operational nuts-and-bolts behind unifying multiple companies into a single, mission-driven brand. Rich and John share hard-won lessons on team buy-in, customer retention, digital marketing tactics, and the enormous upside possible when a rebrand is executed with purpose and data-driven discipline.