views

It all tastes the same in the dark.

Lee McCabe

16 Feb 2026 — 1 min read

That is modern private equity marketing in one line.

Same agency decks. Same attribution models. Same promises about growth. Different logos, identical output. Turn the lights off and you could not tell which portfolio company you are looking at.

This is not a creative problem. It is a measurement problem.

When every business optimizes to last click, the outcome converges. Search ads look the same because they are bought on the same keywords. Social looks the same because everyone chases the same audiences. CRO looks the same because everyone copies the same best practices blog post from 2019.

The data backs it up. Median paid search conversion rates in home services sit around 6 to 8 percent. CAC variance across scaled competitors is often within 10 to 15 percent. If everyone is using the same channels with the same incentives, no one is building advantage. They are just renting demand at market price.

Private equity keeps asking for differentiation while funding sameness. The mandate is grow faster. The mechanism is hire another agency. The result is more noise at higher cost.

Real edge shows up upstream. Proprietary data. CRM depth. Call center performance. Speed to follow up. Offer construction. Channel mix that actually changes unit economics, not slides.

Most portfolios do not lack ambition. They lack daylight.

Until boards start demanding real operating leverage instead of prettier dashboards, it will all keep tasting the same.

Lifestyle (w/e 2/19/26)

Vox on the rise of “admin nights” — friends hanging out while doing life chores (budgeting, emails, meal prep), i.e., the new nightlife for people with calendars and back-to-back calls. link Reuters on “sober raves” taking off with Gen Z — earlier nights, no hangovers, still a proper dance floor. link

News (2/19/26)

McKinsey Declares “The Fog Has Lifted” on Private Equity McKinsey’s 2026 Global Private Markets Report says the fog has finally lifted, with buyouts up, exits rebounding, and IPOs creeping back after three flat years. That may be true, but the backlog of PE-owned companies is at record highs and

Deals (w/e 2/19/26)

Ariel Alternatives Acquires Front Line Power Construction Ariel Alternatives has acquired Front Line Power Construction, with Cherokee Nation Businesses joining as a minority co-investor. Power grid infrastructure is no longer theoretical. It’s cables, substations, and hard backlog tied to AI data centers and electrification mandates. This isn’t energy-transition

Capital doesn’t scale businesses. It scales whatever dysfunction is already there.

You see this constantly in home services and other PE-backed, multi-location businesses. New locations are added faster than systems mature. Marketing budgets increase, but lead quality becomes harder to explain. Revenue targets go up, while visibility into what’s actually driving demand goes down. On paper, the business is scaling.

Read more

Lifestyle (w/e 2/19/26)

News (2/19/26)

Deals (w/e 2/19/26)

Capital doesn’t scale businesses. It scales whatever dysfunction is already there.