From Single Mom to $9M HVAC Owner: Lacey Coleman's Incredible Journey

Lacey Coleman is the owner of Coastal Comfort, an HVAC company based in Salisbury, MD.

In 2008, Lacey started answering phones for her dad's struggling HVAC company. Today, she runs a $9 million operation with 46 employees across six counties.

Here are seven lessons from my conversation with Lacey:

Back in 2008, Lacey was a 20-year-old single mom studying business administration. Her Dad's HVAC partnership had just dissolved, and the company was in chaos.

"I started out filing papers, answering phones. I didn't know what heating air conditioning was. I honestly don't even know if I really understood what my dad did for a career in my whole first 20 years of life."

But after a couple of years, it started to click. She fell in love with the challenge, the fast pace, the direct customer relationships.

Then came some friction. Her dad wanted to keep things small, while Lacey had bigger plans.

"I think failure's not an option. And he was more scared of failure. We just had two different paths. So I said, ‘Dad, you're in my way. You either need to get on board and let's move forward or get off to the side.’"

The conversation wasn't easy. It took months of back-and-forth.

But her parents recognized she'd earned it. They got a third-party valuation, brought in attorneys and accountants, and did it right. She didn't pay full market value, there were discounts because she was the one who had grown the business to that point.

She bought the company from him. And hired him back as an employee.

When it comes to growth, it’s easy to get caught up chasing every opportunity that comes your way: Commercial jobs, new construction, property management contracts. But Lacey doesn't.

"I try to keep new construction and light commercial under 15% total. The rest I really try to focus on what generates the most revenue and profitability for the company, which is residential replacement."

Why turn down the revenue? Because focus creates efficiency: "Whatever we do the most, we're the most efficient at. We're faster, we can do better with fewer callbacks."

When a builder approached her about an 84-unit townhome development, she passed.

"I can take that same amount of resources that I would put into that project and focus on what we do well and what creates the most revenue, which is residential replacements, then I can make so much more money with the same amount of resources."

Lacey tracks everything. Service call conversion rates, technician performance, warranty callbacks by equipment brand, and crucially call types by season.

"At the end of the year, we pull all these different reports to see how many different types of calls I have: no heat calls, service calls, maintenance calls. That helps with staffing for the next year. We know how many people to bring on that we could keep."

Tracking this data also helps to figure out what is causing any issues for the business. For example, when one premium system started generating too many warranty calls, she eliminated it entirely, even though it had higher margins initially.

The cost of callbacks and warranty calls are one thing. But it can also damage your brand long-term, so cutting the system that caused the most problems helps ensure Coastal Comoft leaves more customers satisfied. 

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When Lacey's sales team presents options, they don't overwhelm customers with endless choices. It's simple: standard, good, better, best.

"If you have a heat pump, I'm going to give you a standard, a good, a better and a best. Each one of those proposals has financing built in. All of the model numbers are very transparent. You get the full model number, the efficiency ratings, the price, any rebates that are available."

But Lacey’s team follow up the standard, good, better, best offers with storytelling. Instead of just sharing the ratings, efficiency numbers and costs, they paint pictures of how the equipment fits into the customer's life.

Let’s say a customer does a lot of outdoor entertaining, they may want an outdoor unit that is quieter and could pay a premium for that. 

Instead of just saying “the top unit costs $5,000.” Lacey will pitch it in a way that shows how it fits into their life:

It's not about the air conditioning unit, it’s about the enjoyment of entertaining and your air conditioning unit not getting in a way of that. 

"People don't really think about HVAC because it's not sexy. Nobody thinks about it until it's broken. But it’s actually a major part of your life."

When Coastal Comfort can't get to a customer immediately during peak season, they don't just apologize and hope for the best.

They stock 30+ window units and space heaters.

"If I can't get to a job, we drop off and install window units, or in wintertime bring space heaters to help supplement in the meantime."

Instead of losing customers to competitors who can get there faster, they're actually strengthening the relationship by solving the immediate problem.

"Customers choose Coastal Comfort because we are Coastal Comfort, so they're willing to wait. Sometimes it helps close the deal with the window units. Other times it's just the step of customer service."

After an install is completed, crews bring the units back to the shop where they immediately go out to the next customer. It's a revolving door—28 to 30 units out on loan at any given time.

"We started with like six or eight and that was manageable. And now it just keeps growing every summer."

But here's the key: customers sign a contract when they get the temporary unit. They're committed to Coastal Comfort, not shopping around while they wait.

Like every HVAC company, Coastal Comfort faces a technician shortage. Lacey estimates she's leaving $1-2 million in annual revenue on the table due to capacity constraints.

"I could hire a hundred service technicians in the summertime and still not have enough."

And Lacey stopped trying to hire techs from other companies:

"If they're going to leave the other company for a dollar more, they're going to leave you for a dollar more."

Her solution: hire green.

She recruits high school students and motivated young adults, starts them as apprentices in the install department, then moves them through a structured progression: 

"We have guys that started with me last year that are service technicians now, 18 months later."

The key is creating a path where people can see their future.

She promotes from within whenever possible. Her current general manager started as a service technician. The service manager who wouldn't take the promotion for two years? He finally came around.

"Natural leaders always emerge if you have a group of people in any industry, any situation, any room. You're going to have natural leaders that just come to the top."

Private equity companies call Lacey constantly. But she doesn't take the meetings. Not because she'll never sell, but because she wants to hit a personal goal first: $20m in annual revenue. 

"I would love to be able to hit $20 million without bringing in anyone else. Just so I know that I can do it."

Broadly, her take on PE consolidation is nuanced. She sees both sides.

"I am pro anything that disrupts an industry because it can be good. There's market disruptors that make you look at yourself and what you're doing, and you can rise to the challenge and be better."

But she's not a fan of all their tactics.

"I don't like some of the tactics that they use for both employees and customers. I think they oversell and under deliver. The home services industry had a bad rep for a long time, and they still do because of companies that do those types of things."

The ultimate irony? When PE companies buy local competitors and change everything, the employees often leave and join companies like Coastal Comfort.

"I think at one point I absorbed like six employees from one of the very first companies that sold. That does happen. Although it doesn't matter because they keep buying, because eventually people are still selling."

Lacey Coleman started with zero HVAC knowledge and a struggling company. Today, she runs a $9M operation that competitors can't touch.

The difference wasn't luck or connections. It was systems, focus, and the courage to make hard decisions.

Every lesson in her playbook is actionable. You could implement her window unit strategy next week. You could start tracking data to help you make better decisions tomorrow. You could restructure your sales process to tell stories instead of reciting specs.

Lacey Coleman proves that with the right systems, the right team, and an absolute refusal to accept limitations, there's no ceiling on what you can build.