Service Experts Bets on Conversions in First Franchise Year

Eight franchise agreements is a small number for a brand ranked No. 117 on the Franchise Times Top 400. That gap is the story at Service Experts, the Richardson, Texas residential HVAC company that started franchising in 2025 after more than three decades of running mostly corporate-owned locations.

Five of the eight deals landed in the third quarter, its best stretch since opening the door to franchisees, the company said Oct. 8. The Top 400 ranks systems by worldwide sales, so the debut reflects the corporate base far more than the franchise count.

The conversion play

The quarter mixed new operators with existing contractors switching to the brand. The first conversion franchise will be in Corona, California. New agreements in Ridgeland, Mississippi, serving the Jackson market, and in Boise, Idaho, push the franchise network into new markets.

"We're seeing a different caliber of franchise candidate coming into Service Experts because we're not asking people to take a concept from the ground up," said Nick Ridgway, vice president of franchise development. "The systems and the infrastructure has been built over the course of 30 years."

That pitch reads differently to an independent HVAC owner than to a first-time buyer. A contractor already has technicians, trucks and a customer list. A conversion trades some independence for a national brand, operating systems and vendor relationships. Those same owners are also hearing from consolidators, including American Service Partners, which launched Oct. 7 promising sellers a retained stake, and multi-brand groups like Rocket Group. For an owner thinking about the next decade, a franchise conversion is now one of several offers on the table, and the only one where the owner keeps running the business under someone else's name.

The company says 40% of its franchise owners are military veterans. What it hasn't said yet is how corporate branches and franchised territories will share markets as the system grows, which is the question any converting contractor will want answered first.