The best-performing PE portco no one’s talking about. SRS Distribution.
While most of the industry was busy chasing AI and SaaS, three private equity firms quietly turned a roofing supply business into a $10B+ revenue juggernaut, then exited for $18.25B.
No hype. No headlines. Just a masterclass in disciplined execution.
Here’s how it went down:
2008: AEA Investors launches SRS by acquiring Suncoast Roofers Supply......just 7 branches in Florida. Over five years, they acquire 27 distributors, grow to 100+ branches, and hit $650M in revenue.
2013: Berkshire Partners takes over. SRS keeps the same M&A pace, expands greenfield locations, and builds national reach. By 2018, they’ve doubled revenue again, approaching $2.5B.
2018: Leonard Green & Partners buys a majority stake. Berkshire stays on as minority. The M&A engine hits another gear. SRS acquires 30+ more businesses, builds out 760 locations, adds 4,000 delivery trucks, and cracks $10B in revenue.
2024: Home Depot acquires SRS for $18.25B, one of the largest building products deals in history. It expands their total addressable market by $50B and gives them a national B2B distribution engine overnight.
So what can we actually learn from this?
1. Boring categories still beat hype cycles
These markets weren’t sexy, but they were fragmented, defensible, and recession-resistant.
2. The strategy never changed
Three firms. One playbook. Buy regional distributors, keep their brands, align operators with equity. No pivot. No rebrand. Just compounding scale.
3. Culture mattered and paid
SRS had deep employee equity participation from the start. Branch teams ran their businesses like owners. That culture survived three ownership changes and helped power retention, productivity, and integration.
4. Multiple arbitrage still works
SRS bought small players at 6–10x EBITDA. Home Depot paid 16–17x. In a market where everyone says arbitrage is dead, this deal proved otherwise.
5. Execution > innovation
SRS didn’t invent anything new. It just ran tighter ops, smarter M&A, and built a national platform in plain sight.
This isn’t a case study in disruption. It’s a case study in discipline.
Most people never heard of SRS until the exit dropped. That’s the point.
When you build well, you don’t need noise. Just performance.