Episode #21
Brian von Tress: "We Burned the Ships and Said We're Doing This"
At 53 years old, Brian von Tress cashed in his retirement, walked away from a COO role at a 19-shop chain, and opened his first body shop with no private equity and no safety net. "We burned the ships and said we're doing this." In this episode, I sit down with Brian von Tress, the Founder and President of Collision Pros Inc., a 13-location MSO spanning Northern California and Nevada with 170 employees. Brian's collision career started at 15, sweeping floors and washing cars to earn money for his first car. He went on to earn his MBA while working full-time, spent time at Caliber Collision when they had just 15 locations, and climbed to COO of a 19-shop chain before betting everything on himself. Brian breaks down what it really takes to scale a bootstrapped MSO, including why the jump from four to six shops was a nightmare and what infrastructure he had to build to get through it. He shares his acquisition playbook and how it's shifted from buying small underperforming shops to buying market share. We talk about the devastating Camp Fire that destroyed his Paradise location and displaced eight employee families, and how he kept every one of them on payroll. Brian also gets into why he still sends handwritten birthday cards to all 170 employees, what Tesla certification actually costs and how it's changed, and how independent operators can compete against PE-backed consolidators through what he calls guerrilla warfare. Whether you're running one shop or thinking about your tenth, Brian's journey is one you need to hear. The BodyShop Leaders Podcast is powered by BodyShop Marketing , the agency helping collision industry leaders grow smarter and lead stronger.
