The power of strategic business investments in the roofing industry

By Emma Peterson. 

Consolidation and investments can be intimidating, but they can also be powerful if done correctly. Randy Korach shares his experience from both sides of the table. 

In Season 5, Episode 65 of Roofing Road Trips®, Heidi J. Ellsworth hosts CEO Randy Korach from Roofing Corp of America (RCA) to talk about how investments, when done correctly, can be instrumental to business success. Randy has been in and out of all corners of the roofing industry for over 25 years now. His career has taken him from Tremco, to joining RPM during a merger and to Sherwin-Williams and their subsidiary product lines like Geocel, Uniflex and Kool Seal.  

Then, in 2018 he went a different route – he bought his own business in Atlanta in the roofing space – it was a contracting business called Innovative Roofing Group (IRG). He saw opportunity there, saying, “The market was ready for some meaningful consolidation. There was a lot of activity in HVAC and in landscaping, and in fire and life safety. All these facility services markets that had seen some consolidation. I saw an opportunity and wanted to see if I could make something of that.” 

His plan was to take IRG as far as he could, but then the 2020 COVID pandemic forced him to pause and rethink. Randy described that moment, saying, “I was just trying to survive there for a few months, to figure out, ‘Were people going to ever order a roof again?’ My business was all negotiated repair and replacement work. My contracts all got pulled. If not for federal subvention, I would've been toast, truthfully.” 

Then, near the end of 2020, he got a phone call from the New York-based private equity fund, Soundcore Capital Partners. They wanted him to sell. At first, Randy was hesitant. He described a common experience for owners, sharing, “Maybe once a month, they'd call. It was a young kid doing some buy-side cold calling. They'd pronounce my name wrong.” 

Usually he ignored these calls, but he listened that day because of Soundcore’s thesis. He explained, “They had a thesis in the space that they could go and, call it, roll up or buy and build in the commercial roofing space.” It sparked a realization for Randy – the key thing they were missing was a person to help them design that program, to find the right characteristics for their investments in the commercial roofing space.  

Randy saw that gap, sold IRG and began work on RCA. Now, it’s been over two years since RCA formed. He shared, “They made nine acquisitions in that period. They’re coast to coast, from California to Charlotte, from Dallas-Fort Worth to Cincinnati. They’ve deployed over $200 million of capital buying roofing companies. They’re going to do over 400 million in revenue this year.” The key to their strategy? Randy’s understanding of the importance of aligning company cultures and objectives in order to have success during investments and consolidation.  

Read the transcript or Listen to the whole episode to learn more about how to choose the right investment partner.