Brian Scudamore goes to the gutter

The founder and CEO of 1-800-Got-Junk has moved into house detailing

Credit: Paul Joseph

Brian Scudamore has a new dirty business. With his latest venture, Shack Shine, the founder and CEO of 1-800-Got-Junk has moved into house detailing. It’s another unsexy, service-based play, but Scudamore’s franchise has turned out to be popular with millennials looking to run their own businesses.

Shack Shine is O2E Brands’ (O2E stands for “ordinary to exceptional”) fourth franchise brand, along with Wow 1 Day Painting, You Move Me and the junk removal flagship. Using a model much like 1-800-Got-Junk’s, it provides gutter cleaning, window washing and power washing in a single visit.

Fifteen months after launching in May 2015, Shack Shine had generated $1 million in revenue from 12 franchises across Canada and the U.S. That’s 16 times the growth that 1-800-Got-Junk—which now has 159 franchises worldwide­—saw during its first year in 1989, Scudamore explains.

“The similarities are in the structure,” he says of Shack Shine. “We do the bookings and dispatch for our franchise partners so they can really get out there and drive the customer experience.” In addition, every franchisee receives support from O2E’s financial, public relations and legal experts.

Scudamore, winner of the 2015 EY Entrepreneur of the Year award in the business-to-consumer category, now employs more than 4,000 people, including 300 at O2E’s head office in Vancouver.