Crash Champions Revenue Soars 540% to $2.75 Billion

Matt Ebert, the founder and CEO of Crash Champions, has transformed his car-collision repair business into a national powerhouse with over 650 locations and $2.75 billion in revenue. Ebert's journey began in a small town in Indiana, where he grew up with modest means and no expectation of attending college. His passion for cars and entrepreneurial spirit led him into the collision-repair industry after fixing his own wrecked car as a teenager. Starting with a single shop in 1999, Ebert expanded Crash Champions into a national powerhouse, largely employing workers without college degrees.

Ebert's company has seen a 130x revenue growth since 2019 and employs more than 10,000 people. Like Ebert, 83% of his workforce doesn’t have a college degree. Ebert believes that college is not the only path to success and that many trade jobs offer lucrative careers without the burden of student loan debt. At Crash Champions, technicians make more than $100,000 a year, which is about 1.6 times that of the average U.S. worker. The company views college as a bonus, not a requirement, and focuses on continued learning and development for its employees.

Crash Champions offers a leadership development program and an apprenticeship program where technicians can start from scratch and work with experienced team members for a couple of years before going solo. Ebert credits his employees with many of the company’s accomplishments and believes in surrounding himself with better and smarter people. He was the mastermind behind the company, starting his own Subway franchise after high school and eventually opening a bodyshop with a local car repairman in 1999. The business was first named Lennox after a town in Illinois, but Ebert changed the name to Crash Champions to reflect the idea that the bodyshop is a hero in a customer’s time of need after an accident.

After taking over the business, Ebert knew he wanted to expand and acquired a struggling bodyshop, which quickly snowballed into buying the business’ third and fourth locations. He worked with an investment banker who suggested private equity as an alternative to debt, recognizing industry trends like tech advancements in vehicle repair would require more capital. The COVID-19 pandemic forced a shift in strategy, but Ebert also saw a need for his business model on a national scale. Crash Champions’ major growth came in 2021 when it merged with Service King Collision, another large auto body repair company, to expand its business. The merger added 330 locations to Crash Champions’ current 650, and the company saw its revenue skyrocket from $327.1 million in 2021 to $2.1 billion in 2022. For this year, it’s projecting around $3 billion and plans to ramp up growth next year. Ebert is determined to make Crash Champions the number one car-collision repair business in the country, with a ton of growth ahead for the company.