Students Work for National Services Group
Excellence in Entrepreneurship Awards. Special Report
By SANDI CAIN
Matthew K. Stewart’s National Services Group is the outgrowth of a failed company, Student Works Painting, where Stewart and his partners worked while in school.
Stewart and his colleagues were sold on the idea of the summer internship program de-signed to help college students gain hands-on business experience under the supervision of a mentor. But the company had too much overhead, and the paperwork required to analyze each student’s business was overwhelming.
But Stewart and the other partners,Jeff Gunhus, Jason Reid, Spencer Pepe and Tracy Meneses,were all veterans of the program and thought they could make it work. So they purchased the rights to the name, tweaked the business model and in 1996 launched National Services Group from a Santa Ana headquarters with Stewart as general partner.
That year, it had $1.5 million in revenue, five employees and operated solely in California. Their goal, they said, was to spread the scope of Student Works Painting and the newer College Works Painting outside the state to provide more university students the opportunity to run a business while in school.
Since then, the company has grown between 25% and 40% each year, and now has 120 employees managing 800 student businesses in 15 states. There are more than 800 student-run businesses under the National umbrella.
That’s not to say getting into the program is a breeze.
Stewart said only about 10% of the students interviewed are hired. The company, he said, looks for students with a strong work ethic.
“Hard work and perseverance always pay off,” he said.
Stewart predicts company revenue will exceed $10 million in 2002.
“Our goal is to be painting in 24 to 28 states and to grow from a $10 million to a $35 million company,” he said in a recent interview.
As part of that expansion, Stewart said, the company would like to add two or three other service-related businesses and expand in 2003 to as many as eight new states. Already this year, the company has formed National Windows Specialists in Illinois and Direct Hit Marketing in Southern California.
Part of the business model that makes such fast expansion possible is National’s Internet-based management system. Through a proprietary intranet, the company tracks sales, manages client and student data, handles accounting for student businesses, handles customer complaints and provides warranty information. Its intranet,dubbed MANTIS,was runner-up in the INC Web Awards last year.
Stewart said it’s still a challenge to raise capital for the company. And, he said, he sometimes struggles with allocating responsibility.
Though the partners carefully avoid the perception of a hierarchy,the company has no chief executive,Stewart is widely credited for much of the company’s growth.
Alton Burkhalter, an Irvine attorney, said Stewart has “management and leadership ability that is very rare in a person of his age.”
That ability spills beyond the workplace, too. Stewart, who was a finalist for the 2000 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award, sits on the board of Costa Mesa-based Share Our Selves and is president of the Orange County chapter of the Young Entrepreneurs Organization.
He and his wife, Jill,whom he met while working for Student Works Painting,have a 2-month-old son, Jake.
