The home remodeling industry is continuing to grow, and a local entrepreneur is taking advantage by opening a painting franchise business.
Andrew Hughes opened a Fresh Coat Painters location in Augusta about two-and-a-half months ago and has completed about seven projects so far and is booked for nearly the full month of June, he said.
The national residential and commercial painting franchise company started in 2004 and has more than 170 franchise locations in the U.S.
The Augusta location doesn’t have a physical location yet, but Hughes said he hopes to have one in the next year or two for painting doors and cabinets.
The owner has hired four painters so far, with one being full-time and three starting as subcontractors with plans to eventually make them full-time, he said.
“Finding people takes as much effort as everything else in this business,” he said. “We interview about 50 people for each position.”
Hughes, who is originally from Canada, was previously in the oil and gas industry in Texas before earning an engineering degree and moving to Augusta in 2020 to work at Plant Vogtle.
“We have never looked back on the decision to move here,” he said. “We love the proximity to the beach and mountains and lake and have been able to meet some really great people at our Bible studies.”
When Hughes was ready for a challenge outside of engineering, he knew he wanted to do something in the residential service business.
Home renovation project spending increased from $328 billion in 2019 to $472 billion in 2022, according to the Joint Center for Housing Centers of Harvard University. In 2023, that figure is expected to rise slightly to $485 billion.
“Home improvement projects really spiked in 2020, 2021 and 2022 and they’re starting to taper off,” Hughes said. “But I didn’t want to look back in two years and go, ‘Man, someone else started a painting business when we were talking about it and look at them winning.’ We wanted to get in the game.”
