Similar businesses sell at 1.4x to 6.6x SDE. Compare live listings and connect with sellers.
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Founded in 2017, this company is one of the fastest-growing firms in the $280+ billion U.S. staffing industry. By year-end, it is projected to rank within the top 1% of all staffing companies nationwide. Specializing in high-volume, long-term, multi-site temporary placements in the light industrial sector, the company has built a strong national footprint. It currently serves clients across Texas, Florida, Louisiana, Georgia, Ohio, California, Kentucky, and North Carolina. What truly sets the company apart is its innovative model—the only staffing firm in the country to offer Profit Sharing to its temporary employees. This unique approach drives higher worker retention and client satisfaction while aligning incentives across the board. With an annual billing rate of approximately $32 million, the company has established a solid and diversified client base. Its two largest customers account for significant recurring revenue: Client A: Estimated annual billing of $11,000,000 Client B: Estimated annual billing of $6,400,000 The remaining $15 million in annual revenue is evenly distributed across eight additional clients, underscoring the company’s balanced and resilient revenue structure.
Founded in 2023, a fast-growing recruitment services provider, based in Florida, specialized in accounting, finance and tax industry. The owner is seeking a strategic partner to expand and grow its scope of services.
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The sellers of this very well established staffing brand located in the Twin Cities metro area have reduced the listing price! This company, in business since 2017, has built its service-focused reputation to serve a client base exceeding 210 signed staffing contracts and over 1,300 employees placed since its opening. The business has standard clients and a consistent candidate pool and continued to invest in its people and candidates. It has an expansive territory allowing a buyer to expand it reach. The company enjoyed top-ratings on a local basis and wants to continue that for the new owner. Growth is up over 15% this year and continues to grow weekly with new clients within the first three months of activity.
National transaction benchmarks for staffing agency businesses.
Under $500K
$500K to $2M
Over $2M
A variety of factors can cause businesses to trade outside this range, including earnings quality, operational transferability, key-person risk, growth trajectory, and geography, so a listing priced above or below the typical multiple usually reflects real differences in the underlying business.
Cofounder & CEO
Key diligence, valuation, financing, and transition considerations for buyers evaluating staffing agency acquisitions.
You pay temporary workers every week but collect from clients on 30- to 60-day terms. That gap, called the payroll float, ties up far more cash as you grow, not less. Many buyers underwrite the purchase price and forget they also need a payroll-funding or factoring line to cover wages between paychecks and collections. Model the working-capital need at your target revenue before you sign anything.
Contract and temp revenue behaves nothing like direct-hire placement revenue. Temp staffing is recurring, lower-margin, and earns a spread on every hour billed; direct-hire is a one-time fee that is lumpy and tied to hiring cycles. A book that is mostly recurring temp revenue is more predictable and usually more valuable than one riding on a few big placement fees. Get the revenue split before you value the business.
Check how much of the revenue rides on the top three clients. Staffing relationships can end with a single procurement decision or a master service agreement non-renewal. If one account is 40% of billings, the business is one phone call away from a very different valuation. Ask for revenue by client and the status of every major contract.
As the employer of record, you carry workers' compensation, unemployment, and co-employment exposure. Your workers' comp experience-modifier rate directly drives cost, and worker-misclassification claims (treating someone as a contractor who should be an employee) can be expensive. Review the comp history, the classification practices, and any open claims before close.
Many client and candidate relationships live with individual recruiters, not with the company. If a producing recruiter leaves and takes a desk's worth of clients to a competitor, you have bought less than you paid for. Identify the key recruiters, understand their compensation, and make sure enforceable non-solicitation terms and retention incentives are part of the deal.
Staffing agencies tend to trade around two-and-a-half times SDE. Across 132 staffing and employment-placement transactions in the comp data, the median sale was about 2.4x SDE, with most deals landing roughly between 1.6x and 3.8x, and revenue multiples near 0.36x. SDE means seller's discretionary earnings, the profit plus owner's salary and add-backs. Marketplace listings have skewed toward Tier 2 ($500K to $2M), with a median asking price around $800K.
Answers to common buyer questions for this market.
