Over the past five years, this car repair chain revenues 130x and 83% of the workforce are not a college rate including its CEO

CEO Accident championThe $ 2.75 billion in revenue last year came from a small town that won a college rate, where a college rate was not given and a wait.

“There was no more than a financial point of view,” he said Fortune. “College and great career planning was no discussion in my family.”

Ebert had a spirit of entrepreneurship and drew the meadows in the age of 10 or 11 years old. True interest, though, could not turn on his hood in his first car, to turn off their tires.

“For me, a car mean freedom,” he said. “I still remember I’m in a car, thinking I can still go where I want to go.”

However, he destroyed his first car in the age of 16: Ford Exp for two people. He visited the local car repairman, who did not want to make insurance claims or cancel the insurance, and asked how it could show his car. The repairman did and launched a career in cars that repaired the Ebert.

Six-digit work without a degree

Ebert took a job with the repairman after high school, so he came to the industry “literally”. It now controls a company that has seen 130x revenue growth since 2019 and employed by more than 10,000 people.

And Ebert, like 83% of the workforce There is no college degree.

“I really have never done really good in life,” he said. “And I’m not anti-college. I think the college is excellent. But I know it’s not an opportunity for everyone.”

Ebert’s company is ahead of the curve when he hires people who do not have a four-year degree. The college has historically considered a one-way ticket to a profitable career, but younger generations begin to keep the only way to success. Too Gen Zers carry out trade works and the student loan is not loaded by debt. Moreover, some are more than six digits.

Eybert, technicians of technical workers in the accident champions earn more than $ 100,000. US Census Bureau in the first quarter of 2025 declare 120.9 million of the nation was the median profit of full-time wage and salary workers, about $ 62,000 every year. This is approximately 1.6 times from the US average employee of the accident.

“We see college as a bonus,” he said. Of course, there are certain positions that require a certain degree, which the supervisor and the law expert in the General Law added as they needed degrees.

In spite of does not require college rates For most of their work, the accident is aimed at learning the champions. Culture and retention, financial and operational leadership, strategic leadership, communication and recognition, sustainable learning, as well as the employment of the team, created a leadership program aimed at issues such as the employee. Thousands of employees took part in these programs.

“We can hire the best technique. We can teach the best techniques, but if they work for bad managers, he said.

Crash Champions also offers an apprenticeship program that “the technicians can start from scratch.” They have been placed with a team member where they work for several years and their own.

Accident champion ‘growth story

Ebert provides loans with many companies success.

“I have done the key to my success, better people, more intelligent people, than me,” he said.

Again, Ebert was a master behind the company. After high school, Chicago went to the suburbs of the suburbs and remained with his grandparents for several years and found a job in a body shop. At that time, he still wanted to start his work, but he knew “to be a young child who does not know anyone” and the start of his body shop, “a little said,” A little bit “.”

With the spirit of entrepreneurship, Ebert examined different enterprises and eventually opened his head Subway By franchise cash-developing $ 100,000 on credit cards. Although the first place does not make any money, he decided to open a second “thinking way to make money”.

But it was wrong. He did not make money. Thus, he returned to the roots of his car and approached the local car repair and in 1999, together in 2014, when Ebert was 26 years old, and in 2014 sold the business to Ebert.

This was the beginning of an accident called Lennox for the first time in Illinois city of Illinois. Ebert changed the name of the work for the champions who came to the champions who were a hero when Bodyshop needs a hero when he needed a crash.

“Shops beautifully, knock down some of these stereotypes, I wanted to make a place where people want to come,” he said.

After taking the business, Eybert knew he wanted to expand, and he quickly had a bodyshop that had a long time to buy the work of the third and fourth place in the work.

At that time, Ebert still used financing of small business management and “largely grew up” as soon as possible in Chicago. He wanted to get more shops, but he did not know SBA financing, so he worked with an investment banker that offers private capital as an alternative to debt. Ebert was first afraid to do this, but industrial trends, known as technical progress in the repair of vehicles, demanded more capital. The COVID-19 pandemia forced a turn in the strategy, but Ebert also needed a national work model in a national scale.

The accident champion ‘2021 was great growth. Service King ClashAnother large car repair company has grown very quickly and made a bad decision, and it takes them to financial problems. The debt would be paid in 2022 and could not afford. The company’s bondholders are mainly Clearlake CapitalProbably, it can take it, so Ebert has contacted a proactive clearllake to combine the work of the king of service to expand his work.

The current crash champions turned 330, and the company reached $ 327.1 million in 2021 $ 227.1 million in 2021.

“I don’t want to stand until I have number one. Today is the third largest in the country,” Ebert said Caliber clashes and Gerber collision and glass. “The company has a ton of growth. We have slowed down or two in the last year or two, because we have grown so fast and prepared to grow further.”