Leaving Academia: Buying a Business to Take Control Over Work/Life Balance

Heather Shattuck-Heidorn excelled in her career. 

After getting her Ph.D. from Harvard, she became a university professor and proceeded to consistently win grants, conduct research, and publish regularly. 

These hallmarks of scholarly success earned Heather a tenure-track position, a highly coveted role in academia, and no small accomplishment in a crowded field. 

Yet, regardless of all she had achieved on paper, Heather didn’t feel like a success. 

Despite her qualifications, she worked grueling hours for little pay and was constantly expected to “do more with less.”

The moment of clarity arrived when her husband suffered a workplace injury and went on disability for six months. She was at the top of her field, working excessive hours and still struggling to make ends meet. 

Heather knew something had to change, and she made it happen.

Today Heather is the proud owner of a custom closet design and install business and proclaims, “I cannot express how happy I am that I made this choice.”

Heather Works Hard and Excels in Her Field

Heather grew up in Southern Maine, where she also did her undergrad before completing both a master’s and Ph.D. in human evolutionary biology at Harvard.  

Heather had a blue-collar background, and she found the culture of the Ivy League uncomfortable. Nevertheless, her passion, diligence, and skill drove her to great academic success. She got her doctorate and went on to become a professor in her own right at the University of Southern Maine.

There, she continued to ascend the ivory tower, achieving every milestone an ambitious scholar could hope for. She was teaching and simultaneously conducting research. She was writing proposals and winning grants. She was consistently publishing work in her field and earning prestige for herself and the university. 

Heather’s work did not go unnoticed, and she was promoted to a tenure track position. In today’s academia, these roles are highly sought after and competition is intense. 

Heather’s capability was recognized even further when discussions were held about accelerating her track and granting early tenure. 

“On paper, I was doing excellent,” She claims. But the reality did not at all feel that way. 

Heather’s Work Goes Unrewarded 

To maintain the standards expected of her, Heather was working brutally long hours. Despite this and all her research and publishing, her pay was just $60,000. Hardly commensurate with the quantity and quality of work she was doing, not to mention the immense sacrifice of time and money it had taken to gain her qualifications. 

While the combined salaries of her and her husband, a train conductor, were enough to lead a typical middle-class life, Heather knew they were just one family emergency away from genuine financial insecurity. 

This uneasiness, and a general feeling of inequity about how much she was giving to her work versus what she was getting out sapped Heather’s enthusiasm.

“Five percent of my job was my favorite thing to do on earth. The other ninety-five percent was just work.”  

Times Get Tough, and Heather Sets Out to Change Career

Heather’s feeling that something in her work life had to change was slowly building when her situation was cast in even more stark relief. 

Her husband suffered a work injury and had to go on disability for six months. During this time, the family’s earnings were cut to the point Heather had to start racking up credit card debt to make ends meet. 

“I cannot believe that I have been working this hard for this long, I’ve got the gold ring, you know, I’ve made it. And I can’t pay my bills.”

Faced with this dire realization, Heather had an epiphany. She wasn’t permanently tethered to academia and its dim prospects. She did not have to continue laboring fruitlessly. 

So, she quit. 

Once out from under her academic responsibilities, Heather faced the daunting task of deciding what to do next. Two principles guided her decision. She wanted to earn more money and have more control over her time. 

First, she thought about going back to a previous job working with refugees for the state but quickly dismissed the idea since it wouldn’t pay more than she earned as a professor. 

Next, she entertained the idea of joining a research or UX firm, like so many ex-academics before her. The money was good, but Heather was unsure this type of job would offer her the sort of control over her time she was truly after.

That’s when Heather came to her third option – buying something of her own. 

Heather Decides to Buy a Business and Starts Her Search

Heather’s father, a painter, had retired by buying property and becoming a small landlord. Now faced with her own career shift, Heather investigated going a similar route. 

She and her husband had gone down this road once before, however, and had bad experiences. They could only afford low-income rentals in the residential space, and this time she was committed to avoiding residential altogether. 

She turned her attention to commercial real estate and stumbled upon the listing of a local bottle redemption center. 

Then it clicked for Heather. This wasn’t just real estate. This was an actual small local business for sale. 

Heather dove headlong into the world of small business acquisitions. She read the Harvard guide, Buy Then Build, listened to podcasts about buying a business, and trawled social media for information before establishing her criteria and setting her search in motion in early 2023. 

Most of Heather’s friends and family thought she was out of her mind. “Why are people selling these businesses?” they’d ask her. “There must be something wrong,” they cautioned. Heather had a different perspective. 

“Who cares why they want to sell? It’s not really important. What matters is what do the numbers look like? What is this business?”

First, she firmly locked in her geography. She and her family were set on staying in Maine. 

Beyond location, Heather found it easiest to narrow her search by clarifying what she didn’t want. 

No restaurants. She had worked in food service before, and the industry left her with a bad taste. No high-volume retail, and no business that relied on paying minimum wage to make a profit. Lastly, no ecommerce. Heather wanted a business she could come to grips with hands-on. 

Heather wanted to find a business in the $750,000 - $800,000 range with $250,000 - $400,000 in SDE, knowing that she’d need a loan to cover 90% of the purchase. 

With her parameters in place, Heather began communicating with brokers.  The first one she worked with didn’t treat her seriously. He didn’t believe an ex-professor such as Heather would genuinely be interested in running the sort of businesses that she claimed to be searching for. After the broker refused to communicate with sellers on Heather’s behalf, she left him. 

Luckily, another broker approached her with information on a local closet company. Though initially skeptical since the business was a franchise, Heather took the meeting.

(For more on acquiring an existing franchise business, see Buying Franchises: A Primer for Searchers.)

Heather Buys The Tailored Closet and PremierGarage of Southern Maine

After meeting with the closet company’s owner, Heather determined that this business was a perfect fit. She took out the loan, bought the business right away, and set to work. 

At the time of purchase, The Tailored Closet and PremierGarage of Southern Maine was doing about $1.2 million in gross revenue and $300,000 in SDE. It had been around for 6-7 years and had a strong reputation in the local market, with 95 five-star Google reviews. It had three full-time employees, plus the owner and his wife. 

Heather and her husband replaced the old owner and his spouse and retained the three installers. 

The business itself is rather simple. A customer calls to discuss redoing their closet. A designer visits the customer’s home, takes measurements, and works with the customer using proprietary software to design and plan the closet renovation. Once decided, the software backends with mills and suppliers to order all the necessary materials. Lastly, the installers bring everything to the customer’s home and install the new closet within a day. 

The margins are 30%-33%, and the average order size is about $6,000, though it can range from $3,000 to as much as $70,000. 

Heather’s initial skepticism about buying a franchise was quickly addressed. The franchisor, Home Franchise Concepts, provides tremendous value with low franchise fees and a lot of flexibility. Most importantly, they provide software that backends with mills and suppliers and which is constantly improving its design capability thanks to a team of in-house designers.   

Heather Implements Plans to Grow Her New Business 

Heather stuck to her initial plan of putting half the SDE into servicing her debt and then decided to pay herself $70,000. The rest would go to building up a war chest and growing the business.

To an observer, Heather’s decision may seem strange. Why leave your stable academic job to buy a business with a substantial loan for only a $10,000 raise? For Heather, it’s about far more than money. Control over her time and over the trajectory of the business itself are far more important. 

What’s more, after realizing how extensive an undertaking running the new business would be, Heather brought her husband on board as well. The business would be replacing both of their salaries and become a true family business. 

By the end of the year, once on surer footing, Heather hopes to give herself and her husband raises from $70k to $80k. This would bring them from $120,000 before her husband’s injury to $160,000 and with significantly more free time and control over their workdays. 

In the meantime, Heather has already gotten well underway implementing her plans to grow and improve the business. The first thing she did was start a 401k plan for employees with a 4% match. Next, she wants to grow from closing about 30 deals per month to 120 by significantly increasing the amount of business gained through partnerships and referrals. 

Currently, 75% of leads come from search engine marketing, while only the remaining 25% come from partnerships and referrals. The goal is to flip those numbers. Heather plans to do so by becoming the go-to custom closet purveyor for Southern Maine’s builders. While an individual homeowner may only redo their closet once in their lifetime, builders provide a pathway to consistent recurring business. 

The next opportunity for growth in Heather’s sights is on the garage side of the business. While they’re currently ramping up sales of epoxy flooring, Heather sees a chance to boost sales in garage cabinetry.  

Finally, Heather envisions a new, expanded showroom for the business. The current showroom is by appointment only and functions as little more than a Murphy bed display. The new showroom will be larger and fully staffed for walk-ins.

Heather Reflects on Her Decision to Buy a Business

Six months after buying her business, Heather couldn’t be more pleased with how things have turned out. 

“I would be happy having left academia if I worked nights at a parking garage doing security and reading books.” 

But beyond simply leaving behind the grind of her old career, Heather now has a thriving business of her own. Though that doesn’t mean all her worries are behind her.

“As stressful as business can be, I have a lot less stress and I just love my day to day.”

To completely avoid stress was never Heather’s plan. The difference is that now Heather is in control and no longer has to worry about working incessantly for little benefit. 

“My advice, I guess, is trust your gut. At the end of academia, I knew it was wrong. I knew it had to stop. I’m glad that I trusted myself.”