PODCAST · business
Bought The Biz
by Garth Fasano and Christi Loucks
Buying a business is one of the greatest bets you can make on yourself. You step into something that already has customers, cash flow, and a team — and now it's yours to grow. It's thrilling, it's life-changing… and it's also a crash course in all the things you never thought you'd be doing.Hosted by Garth Fasano and Christi Loucks, This show is about those lessons. The goal is to help new owners anticipate what's coming, avoid the early stumbles that slow momentum, and build a peer group where no one has to figure it out alone. Because buying the business is only the beginning — the real work, and real growth, starts the day after close.
Episodes
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George Vallone on Buying Small, Scaling Fast, and Using AI
Episode 24 | Garth Fasano with guest, George Vallone What happens when you buy a tiny business in the middle of a global mess and turn it into a scalable growth engine? In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth sits down with George Vallone, owner of Nuveldy's Apartment Turnover Services, to…
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Buy vs. Build: The Agency Shortcut
Episode 23 | Christi Loucks with guest, Karl Hughes In this episode of Bought the Biz, Christi Loucks interviews Karl Hughes, founder of Draft.dev and owner of The Podcast Consultants. Karl explains why he prefers the "buy vs. build" strategy, choosing to acquire his podcasting company to skip...
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A Different Kind of Grit for Women in Business Ownership
Episode 22 | Christi Loucks In this solo episode, Christi reflects on a season of life that's stretching her in every direction: five months pregnant, raising a toddler, and running two businesses. After reading Toxic Grit by Amanda Goetz, she finally found language for a feeling she couldn't...
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Why My Pro Forma Looked Right and Was Wrong
Episode 21 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks Banks love pro formas. Operators pay for them. In this episode, Garth and Christi pull up the exact pro forma Garth used to get his SBA loan approved and explain where it worked, where it broke, and which assumptions were quietly wrong from day one. They...
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Why Buying the Business Doesn't Make You the Boss
Episode 20 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks with guest, Evan Stewart Buying the business is the easy part. Leading it is not. In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth and Christi sit down with Evan Stewart, owner and CEO of Direct One, a 70+ employee commercial print and direct mail company. Evan...
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Buying Was Easy. Operating Was Earned.
Episode 19 | Garth Fasano When I bought Top Dog, I thought I was buying a boring, predictable business. A classic ETA play. What I actually bought was responsibility—hundreds of thousands of dollars in payroll, outcome-based contracts, and no safety net. In this episode of Bought the Biz, I walk...
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Laid Off and Served Papers. Then Bought a Business
Episode 18 | Christi Loucks with guest, Raj Kankaria Getting laid off and served divorce papers in the same moment usually ends a chapter. For Raj Kankaria, it started one. In this episode of Bought the Biz, Raj shares how personal chaos forced clarity and ultimately pushed him into buying and...
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Rebuilding an Acquired Business for the AI Era
Episode 17 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth is in the hot seat. After acquiring a cash flowing call center business through a traditional ETA search, Garth made a decision that most operators never plan for and many would avoid. He transformed the business...
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Is an MBA Worth It for Buying a Business?
Episode 16 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks So was an MBA actually worth it if your goal is to buy and run a business? In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth and Christi unpack the real value of business school through the lens of entrepreneurship through acquisition. Drawing from very different...
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Getting Paid, Staying Sane: Working Capital, Late Payments, and the Reality of Cash Flow
Episode 15 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks Cash flow is where the theory of small business ownership meets reality. In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth and Christi dig into one of the most uncomfortable but unavoidable parts of owning a business: getting paid. They unpack working capital…
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The Weird Stuff You Inherit: Policies, Holidays, and Other Surprises After Acquisition
Episode 14 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks When you buy a small business, you don't just inherit customers and revenue. You inherit habits, unwritten rules, and some truly bizarre surprises. In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth and Christi reflect on the strange, funny, and occasionally...
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Carrying the Weight on PurposeWhy Buying Seay HR Was the Best Decision of Marci LaRouech's Life
Episode 13 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks with guest, Marci LaRouech In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth and Christi sit down with Marci LaRouech, the new owner and CEO of Seay HR, a sixty-year-old HR consulting firm. Marci opens up about the emotional shift that hits the morning after...
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How Small Businesses Can Rethink Pricing, Reduce Complexity, and Charge What They're Worth
Episode 12 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth and Christi get uncomfortably honest about pricing. How do you know when it is time to raise prices, change your model, or simplify your packages. How do you do it in a small business where every client and every...
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Guardrails for Diligence, Financing, and Saying No Even When You Want the Deal
Episode 11 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth and Christi break down what they wish they had known before signing their acquisition documents. From surprise lender pullouts and nineteen percent debt to due-diligence must haves and emotional landmines, they...
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Rebuilding Systems Without Burning the House Down
Episode 10 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks New owners walk into a maze of legacy tools, habits, and hidden dependencies. Garth and Christi unpack how to triage urgent vs important, when to keep a "weird" CRM config, why email deliverability and payments can sink you, and how to pace org and…
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Leading in Harmony: How Two Co-Owners Made a Smooth Transition at Custom Channels
Episode 9 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks with guests Joe Comer & Kurt Oleson What happens when one leader steps in from the outside and another grows from within—then they become co-owners? In this episode, the CEO and COO of Custom Channels share how they navigated that transition, set...
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How to Run a Small Business While Raising a Family
Episode 8 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks Garth and Christi get candid about blending parenthood with small business ownership. Christi shares the timing whiplash of buying a company, doing IVF, and having Wyatt one year to the day after close, plus what it means to add baby number two while her...
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Keeping the Key Employee: On Trust, Surprises, and Transforming Top Dog Into Raynmaker
Episode 7 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks with guest, Jason Trinka Garth and Christi sit down with Jason Trinka, the longtime operator and GM of Top Dog, before and after the acquisition. They unpack the messy middle of a surprise transition where Jason learned about the sale after close and…
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The Reality of Being an SMB CEO
Episode 6 | Garth Fasano & Christi Loucks Everyone dreams of being the CEO — setting strategy, driving vision, and leading from the top. But for small business owners and ETA operators, the reality looks very different. In this episode, Garth and Christi pull back the curtain on what it really...
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Looking Down the Barrel: Quintin Graves on Scout Security, Cash Flow Crises, and Comebacks
Episode 5 | Garth Fasano with guest Quintin Graves What happens when your dream acquisition suddenly bleeds $50K a month? In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth talks with Quintin Graves, owner of Scout Security in Denver, about the rollercoaster ride of buying and running a business. From...
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The Dream vs. The Grind: The Emotional Toll of ETA
Episode 4 | Garth Fasano and Christi Loucks In this episode of Bought the Biz, Garth and Christi pull back the curtain on the emotional roller coaster of running a small business after acquisition. From the thrill of landing a marquee billion-dollar client to the gut-punch of losing customers in...
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How to Win Over a Team That Didn't Choose You
Episode 3 | Garth Fasano and Christi Loucks Buying a business means you inherit more than revenue—you inherit people, culture, and relationships that didn't choose you. In this episode, Garth and Christi dive into the messy, rewarding process of building trust with an existing team after...
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The First 90 Days — How Not to Wreck Your New Business
Episode 2 | Garth Fasano and Christi Loucks You finally own it. Now the record scratches. Garth and Christi unpack the real first weeks after close. How to plan your internal comms, announce to a leadership team before the all hands, pace one on ones, coordinate with the seller, and choose the...
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Why We Started Bought the Biz
Episode 1 | Garth Fasano and Christi Loucks In this episode, we set the stage for Bought the Biz by exploring the real leap from searcher to operator. Yes, there are the highs of meeting customers and shaping strategy — but there are also the surprises, like spending weeks just figuring out…
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Buying a business is one of the greatest bets you can make on yourself. You step into something that already has customers, cash flow, and a team — and now it's yours to grow. It's thrilling, it's life-changing… and it's also a crash course in all the things you never thought you'd be doing.Hosted by Garth Fasano and Christi Loucks, This show is about those lessons. The goal is to help new owners anticipate what's coming, avoid the early stumbles that slow momentum, and build a peer group where no one has to figure it out alone. Because buying the business is only the beginning — the real work, and real growth, starts the day after close.
HOSTED BY
Garth Fasano and Christi Loucks
CATEGORIES
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Bought The Biz have?
Bought The Biz currently has 24 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Bought The Biz about?
Buying a business is one of the greatest bets you can make on yourself. You step into something that already has customers, cash flow, and a team — and now it's yours to grow. It's thrilling, it's life-changing… and it's also a crash course in all the things you never thought you'd be doing.Hosted...
How often does Bought The Biz release new episodes?
Bought The Biz has 24 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to Bought The Biz?
You can listen to Bought The Biz on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Bought The Biz?
Bought The Biz is created and hosted by Garth Fasano and Christi Loucks.
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