Today we’d like to introduce you to Tom Ackmann.
Tom, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
In high school, I was a 3 sports athlete and a good student but sports kept me from being able to work much. The summer before college, I got my first internship and was pretty excited but as it turned out all I did was push papers and glue things together in a warehouse. I went to the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign to major in Industrial Engineering with a secondary field in business. I had always wanted to run my own company and figured this would be a good path to get there. Having had such a bad experience with my first internship I didn’t pursue any internships my freshman year and ended up caddying that summer. Towards the end of that summer, I started to feel behind. I was going to be a sophomore and on paper was average professionally. So, I looked for something worthwhile and stumbled across the College Works summer internship.
College Works is a student based internship program where the students get a chance to run their own painting business from start to finish with no investment and zero risks. The program sells itself and incredible work experience, huge earning potential, and a lot of fun with events such as a trip to Cancun. The only part that sounded enticing to me was the work experience. I talked to a few alumni and my basic question was do you actually get to run your own company and when I heard the answer was yes that’s all I needed to hear.
I remember showing up to training on a very cold morning in February. I had borrowed my girlfriend’s car because I didn’t have one yet (even though I had been told I needed one to do the program) ready to see what this internship was all about. I don’t remember much from training but one thing that sticks out was at the start Taylor Duncan actually get to run your own company and when I heard the answer was yes that’s all I needed to hear.
Even though it was 12 years ago a few things stick out about training. I remember when the speaker started the weekend by mentioning you may meet some of your closest friends during the program and thinking that’s not what I signed up for. I also remember getting really excited to launch my first company. The first weekend after training was cold calling residential houses to muster up some exterior painting leads. I had been door to door for fundraising but never to sell a product or service. My first couple hours went poorly but I started to get the hang of it. The challenge was it was February and near freezing with 2 feet of snow on the ground. At one point, walking down a street having just been told no for an hour, I thought am I really doing this? Those 5 seconds of doubt were the closest and really the only time, I thought about throwing in the towel.
As the program progressed, things went pretty well and I ended up being one of the top interns. I ran about a $72,000 branch, made $17,000 and learned a lot along the way. As the summer wrapped up, I started to think about what would be my next career move. Even though, I had no intention of staying with CWP I realized that a promotion to district manager may be the best thing for me. I sat down to get the details on the role and realized that high-level management in college would be perfect for me.
That next year, which was my junior year, I gave it my all in the district manager role. I ended up finding something that really suited me and I set the national record in the history of the company with just under 1 million dollars in business.
At the end of the summer, I left the company. I had in my mind gotten everything I needed out of it and being a senior it was time to get a “real job”. At the end of the year banquet in Cancun, I was one of 7 District Managers nominated for district manager of the year and they made a comment that 6/7 were becoming vice presidents and 1 was leaving and that was me. I did win the award and could not have been prouder.
That fall, I went to the career fair and got a bunch of offers but I realized very quickly that I had no interest in doing anything but running my own business. I called up Taylor Duncan the guy who owned the IL division and set up a meeting to discuss options. We grabbed sushi and at that meeting we discussed me buying the business. When it was all said and done we decided that if we could grow the business we could become partners so I ended up buying half.
Since that day, we have tripled the size of the division from around 4 million to close to 12 million dollars. In addition to running and operating the largest division of the company which includes Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, New York and Colorado I was promoted to executive vice president nationwide.
Has it been a smooth road?
Definitely not, lol! The biggest struggle is rebuilding the business year after year. One of the greatest things about the company is that it develops college students into future leaders, however, 95% of them use this a stepping stone. So, we are constantly replenishing the ranks which on its own can be challenging.
The second challenge is working with Gen Z and Millennials. Young people these days want instant gratification and our program is the exact opposite. Managing and motivating young people to invest in their future is a daily challenge
We’d love to hear more about your business.
We are a residential painting company that specializes in customer service in an industry that has very little of it. College works hire the best college students to give them an opportunity to run a local branch of the business. They learn marketing and sales to grow their clientele and then hires crews of painters to produce the jobs.
We do about 11,000 jobs per year with a customer service rating of 92% in an industry that averages 45%.
Even though we are a painting company what we really specialize in is providing the number 1 hands-on management and leadership internship for college students.
98% of our interns are able to get a job after graduating within their field within 3 months compared to a national average of 56%.
Is our city a good place to do what you do?
Chicago is an incredible place for a painting business. There are tons of houses and great people who like to take care of their properties.
Contact Info:
- Address: 6650 N NW Highway Suite 205 Chicago, IL
- Website: collegeworks.com
- Phone: 888-450-9675
- Email: tackmann05@collegeworks.com
- Instagram: collegeworkspainting
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