Brenda Bouw
When Faith Wilson decided to start her own real estate brokerage three years ago, she quickly realized that size does indeed matter.
In the case of her namesake firm, Vancouver-based Faith Wilson Realty Group Inc., it wasn’t a case of bigger is better, but instead big enough to handle clients without spreading herself and her employees too thin.
Given that her name is on the door, clients expect to have some dealing with Ms. Wilson when they buy or sell homes. “As my client base grew I recognized I couldn’t split myself,” says Ms. Wilson.
Today she has a team of 11 to 15 real estate agents and a handful of support staff, including a marketing agent and administrative workers. The company has about 18 employees, who together can handle about 125 transactions per year.
“That’s our magic little number,” says Ms. Wilson. “After that it would be fragmented, and where that fragment would start to come would be in our service to our clients. Even though you think it would be better. I need to still, as a business owner, be connected to our clients.”
It’s long been a dilemma for small businesses across Canada: How big should they grow while still maintaining the quality of the products or services being offered? For some companies, the goal is to grow big, sell more stuff and make millions. Others find more success by maintaining a certain size.
A recent Statistics Canada study shows that firms with 10 to 20 employees tend to be the most profitable, based on return on assets.
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