Vince Maffeo, Credit: Comfort Keepers

Vince Maffeo never thought he’d own his own home care company. But that’s been his role since 2008 when he took over his parents’ franchise in California. Nearly 15 years later, he has grown the firm from three to 10 Comfort Keepers territories spanning an 80-mile radius from Sacramento down to Modesto and east to Sonora. He has roughly 200 caregivers who provide personal care and companion care to approximately 300 clients.

This month, he’s embarking on a complementary franchise — TruBlue, which provides home repair, handyman services and general support. Given that a safe and comfortable home is key to keeping someone at home, he is betting that his Comfort Keepers clients will use TruBlue. He talks more to McKnight’s Home Care Daily Pulse about his business and upcoming venture.

McKnight’s Home Care Daily Pulse: Did you ever think you’d be as big as you are?

Maffeo: I knew that the market was expanding because of demographics. And so I eventually knew that we would get to this point, but t’s been an interesting journey to get there in terms of the acquisition part of it. So that I think was the thing for me that was the biggest surprise. I kept adding territories as other opportunities came up — either other Comfort Keepers owners that wanted to sell — or in the case of my territory in Sonora, an excellent independent agency approached me about buying them and then we converted that to a Comfort Keepers location.

McKnight’s Home Care Daily Pulse: What do you like about being a home care franchisee and what is most challenging?

Maffeo: What I like most about it is the variety of work. Every day there’s something different and I get to put on different hats. And that’s good about that for me, because when you’re in the corporate world, you’ve got your role and you’ve got to play that role and you’re either good at it or you’re not. What I like the least? I think that there are some days where you feel like you want the business to go ahead, but you’ve got to work on some things that you may be stuck on like an employee issue or client issue.

McKnight’s Home Care Daily Pulse: Tell us about this new layer to your business involving TruBlue.

Maffeo: TruBlue signed a partnership with Comfort Keepers franchising back in September of last year with the idea that we would co-market our services. And the more that I investigated what TruBlue was all about and the services that it offers, the more I realized I would rather be a franchisee of TruBlue rather than just a marketing partner. And so I investigated it in a lot of detail and realized that the message is pretty simple. With Comfort Keepers, we will take care of the client; with TruBlue we will take care of the actual home that they live in.

McKnight’s Home Care Daily Pulse: How will you be launching TruBlue?

Maffeo: I’ve decided to launch the TruBlue franchise in my Modesto territory. And the main reason for that is because we have an abundance of referral sources in that area that will refer clients on the Comfort Keepers side who can also become clients for TruBlue. I also have an outstanding team of people that work in my Modesto office who are hungry and ready for another challenge. And so the idea is that we’re going to launch the TruBlue in Modesto and then hopefully bring it to other areas of my Comfort Keepers territory that is not already served by an existing TruBlue franchisee.

McKnight’s Home Care Daily Pulse: You’re hoping Comfort Keepers clients will want TruBlue services.

Maffeo: Based upon my marketing research, 62% of my existing clients are either very or somewhat interested in adding house care services on top of the home care services that we already provide.

McKnight’s Home Care Daily Pulse: What is the biggest change you are seeing in home care?

Maffeo: You’re going to have a hospital system that is going to be following a patient at home with home health, with physical therapy, with a social worker, or possibly even old, old-fashioned house calls. How does Comfort Keepers fit into that continuum of care on the nonmedical side? And we think that we’ve got a seat at that table because our role is just as important as all of the other roles that I mentioned. And so that is a change that we’ve seen just in the last three to four years, especially with COVID accelerating that. We see that only accelerating even further based upon the demographics and the simple reality that not everybody can be treated in a hospital setting.

Editor’s note: Peer-to-Peer is a feature from McKnight’s Home Care Daily Pulse in which we talk to the leaders in home care, your peers, about their operational initiatives, efforts and ideas. If you think someone in home care would make a good subject for Peer-to-Peer, please email Liza Berger at [email protected].