Hitting 200 episodes of Business by the Numbers got me thinking. Not just about how long I’ve been talking into a microphone, but about what really matters to shop owners who’ve been listening all this time. And what I kept coming back to was this idea of 200.
What would it look like if your business hit 200% of where it is today? Not a 200% increase—that’s a whole different math problem—but simply doubling what you’re doing now. Doubling sales. Doubling gross profit. And most importantly, doubling net profit.
Sounds great, right? But here’s the thing: most people chase the wrong number.
Let’s start with sales, because that’s usually where everyone’s head goes first. If you want to double your sales, you really only have two options: charge more or do more work. That’s it. Business growth 101. You can raise your labor rate, improve your parts pricing, increase productivity, add hours, add people—or, ideally, some combination of all of the above.
But here’s where reality kicks in. Doubling your labor rate overnight—from $125 to $250 an hour—probably isn’t happening. Not without losing customers. That doesn’t mean it’s impossible long-term, but it does mean this needs to be a plan, not a fantasy. Multi-year pricing strategies, incremental increases, and intentional projections are how this actually works.
The Road to 200: How to Double Your Sales, Profit, and Net Income
What would it really take to double your business—and are you chasing the wrong number? In this episode-turned-article, Hunt breaks down the road to 200% and explains why doubling your profit is a lot more achievable than you think. Listen to the episode.
Production has limits too. If you double hours, you’re probably doubling technicians, space, equipment, and headaches. Growth that happens too fast can break systems that were already stretched. Trust me—I’ve seen it.
Now let’s talk about gross profit, because this is where things start to get interesting. Gross profit dollars can almost always be doubled over time. Percentages? Not always—and if you can double your gross profit percentage, that’s probably a red flag that your pricing is broken.
If your margins are weak, you need to work smarter before you work harder. Fix pricing first. Then feed more work through the system. If your margins are already strong, then yes—volume becomes your lever.
And then we get to the number that actually matters: net profit.
You don’t increase net profit by staring at net profit. You increase it by either cutting expenses or driving more gross profit. And unless you’re sitting on a pile of unnecessary overhead (which usually means you’re just shifting expenses around), cutting your way to double the profit isn’t realistic.
Driving gross profit is.
Here’s the part most shop owners miss: you don’t need to double sales to double profit. In many cases, a 30–40% increase in production or pricing can get you there because of how the numbers compound. Small, intentional changes at the top line can create an outsized impact at the bottom line.
That’s really what the road to 200 is all about. Understanding your numbers. Knowing which levers to pull. Making a realistic plan—and then actually sticking to it.
Because when you do that, doubling your profit stops being a pipe dream and starts becoming a process.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR – Hunt Demarest, CPA, is a Partner at Paar Melis & Associates and a leading financial expert in the auto repair industry. As host of the Business by the Numbers podcast and a published author of Beyond the Bays, he educates auto shop owners on how to improve profitability and cash flow through proactive tax planning and practical financial insights.