The realistic, cost-effective way to

Build your own local business
from scratch.

The mindset, process, and tools to launch and grow a real local business. No prior experience needed. Taught by someone who ran his own for a decade, from the other side of the world.

Join the MBA See the full curriculum
Watch first

Going remote: running a local
business from anywhere

The industry talk that explains the whole model in one sitting, from the man who teaches this programme.

Back when I started my cleaning company there wasn’t much out there on building a local business from scratch. At best, old blog posts and threads. It took me many hours of trial and error, and tens of thousands of dollars in mistakes, to get to where I am today.

The Local Business MBA is the course I wish had existed: truly step-by-step, from launch through hiring great teams, managing daily operations, and growing with the same strategies I used in my own businesses. It’s current, and it’s in use by hundreds of companies in sixteen-plus countries right now, from first-time owners to Inc 5000 companies.

After taking this course, you’ll have launched and be running your very own local business.

— Chris
The philosophy
“This isn’t academic theory, nor is it a surface-level ‘course’. It’s a decade of real-world operation, distilled into a clear path.”
Hundreds
of companies using it
16+
countries
New → Inc 5000
the range it spans
Who this is for

Anyone who wants the risk
taken out of starting

Aspiring entrepreneurs
9-to-5ers starting a side business
Stay-at-home parents
Tradesmen setting up their own shop
Small business owners
Students (I started as one)
The curriculum

Five stages,
in the order businesses grow

Starting, scaling, systemizing, delegating, and the quiet fifth stage the rest make possible: going remote. Open any stage to see its modules.

I

Starting

Foundation & launch
The fundamentals. Mindset, commitment, choosing your niche, residential vs. commercial. The foundation. Website, CRM and booking software, virtual phone system, online presence, bare-minimum systems. Pricing your services. The math that keeps you profitable from job one. Launch. The checklist, the soft launch, and getting your first job.
II

Scaling

$5K · $10K · $30K/mo
To $5,000/mo. The math behind it, growing with laser focus, your top two paid and two free channels, benchmark goals. To $10,000/mo. Your biggest roadblocks, one month per marketing channel, reinvesting profits, the fastest way to add $1–$3,000/mo. To $30,000/mo. Getting unstuck when the old playbook stops working. Marketing, organic and paid. SEO, Google Business, Nextdoor, Facebook groups; the Thumbtack strategy (300+ hires), Craigslist, LinkedIn. Becoming a sales machine. The closing script, follow-up sequences, and the review engine.
III

Systemizing

The business runs on paper
Systems 101. Rapid-fire testing and turning what works into written process. The health check. The 5×5 growth plan and the honest conversation: what am I worst at? Customer service. Professional responses to common complaints, retention, the no-show protocol. Operations. The daily workflow, automated follow-up and reviews, running the day without guesswork.
IV

Delegating

People do the work
Hiring your teams. Subcontractors vs. employees, the full hiring system: posts, scripts, interviews, background checks, pay. Hire & train your own VA. Handing off the office itself. Also available as a standalone course. Personal productivity. 80/20, ABCDE, batching, the three-list method, the Sunday night review.
V

Going remote

The owner becomes optional
Build your business from anywhere. The remote local business model, end to end. The remote daily workflow. What a week looks like when you’re 7,000 miles from the nearest customer. The template stash. Marketing plans, seasonal emails, landing pages, the if-I-started-again 30-day plan.
How it fits together

One programme,
three rooms

The curriculum teaches, the live group holds you to it, and the book club keeps you growing after. Everything is moving to one home on Skool.

01 · Self-paced

The curriculum

All five stages, worksheets, and the template stash. Work through it on your own schedule, at your own pace.

Best from $0 to $500k/yr
02 · Live

The live group

Group coaching calls, playbooks, peer accountability, and direct feedback on your business from me and operators a stage ahead of you.

Best from $250k to $2m/yr
03 · Monthly

The book club

One business book a month, read deeply and turned into an action plan you actually implement before moving on.

Open to both rooms
From students

In their words

“I love Chris’ emphasis on rebuilding your foundation. The momentum you gain with small, consistent bites is REAL. My family has started to dream about moving to London once my business can be run remotely.”
Candice Hamilton
“If you do nothing else Chris teaches, do the Google strategies. I just booked out my last spot available, all clients at higher rates, and they didn’t even blink at paying it.”
Danielle Chaney
“Since we started our business we’d been stuck at the $10k/mo mark. Fast forward after joining and we already broke $15k in record speed.”
Ian Njogu
“Within one month I had enough regular clients to replace the income we had lost.”
Michelle Jenkins Rackley · mom of 7, Oahu
“First legit job! It gives me the faith this is going to work in a massive way — it came in organically, simply from having a website.”
Dominik Mikula · first booking ever, Bristol
“I’m on track to hit $1,000,000 this year thanks to you.”
Josh Brown · cleaning company, year two
“Scaled from $6k to $35k in monthly revenue in six months. It has been intense over here.”
Joel Wall · home services
“This course is beyond anything I’ve ever purchased in the past, and I’ve spent thousands.”
Dennis John · student, first jobs booked in week one
“I love Chris’ emphasis on rebuilding your foundation. The momentum you gain with small, consistent bites is REAL. My family has started to dream about moving to London once my business can be run remotely.”
Candice Hamilton
“If you do nothing else Chris teaches, do the Google strategies. I just booked out my last spot available, all clients at higher rates, and they didn’t even blink at paying it.”
Danielle Chaney
“Since we started our business we’d been stuck at the $10k/mo mark. Fast forward after joining and we already broke $15k in record speed.”
Ian Njogu
“Within one month I had enough regular clients to replace the income we had lost.”
Michelle Jenkins Rackley · mom of 7, Oahu
“First legit job! It gives me the faith this is going to work in a massive way — it came in organically, simply from having a website.”
Dominik Mikula · first booking ever, Bristol
“I’m on track to hit $1,000,000 this year thanks to you.”
Josh Brown · cleaning company, year two
“Scaled from $6k to $35k in monthly revenue in six months. It has been intense over here.”
Joel Wall · home services
“This course is beyond anything I’ve ever purchased in the past, and I’ve spent thousands.”
Dennis John · student, first jobs booked in week one
The results wall

Real businesses,
real numbers

A few students who kept me posted. Ordinary people, ordinary towns, doing the boring things consistently.

Joel Wall · home services
$6k→$35k
per month · in six months

“Scaled from $6k to $35k in monthly revenue in six months. It has been intense over here.”

Ian Njogu · cleaning company
$10k→$15k+
per month · after years stuck

“We’d been stuck at $10k/mo for ages. After joining we broke $15k in record speed.”

Josh Brown · year two
$1M
annual run rate · on track this year

“I’m on track to hit $1,000,000 this year thanks to you.”

Individual results vary and depend on the work you put in. Real students, shared with permission.

What’s included

Everything you need,
nothing you don’t

AccessImmediate access to all ten modules, forever.
WorksheetsDigital and printable worksheets with every module.
MilestonesScaling milestones to work toward at each stage.
TemplatesThe full template stash: marketing, sales, hiring, websites.
FeedbackActionable, personal feedback on your business in the student chat.
CommunityA private student community that’s proving as valuable as the course.
Deals$1,000+ worth of services and deals to start your journey.
Join the MBA

One price.
A business at the end of it.

$2,497
or 6 monthly payments of $499
Join the Local Business MBA

You’ll need stable internet, 5–10 hours a week, and $1,000–$1,500 in startup costs. 90-day withdrawal policy: 50% refund after completing the first three modules and a call with Chris.

Chris Schwab in a Think Maids t-shirt beside the company's booking site
Who’s teaching this

Chris Schwab

For nearly ten years I ran an award-winning Washington, D.C. cleaning company from Japan, 7,000 miles from the nearest customer, and shared the whole journey publicly. That became the remote local business model, now studied and run by thousands of operators worldwide.

Four exits later, this programme is where all of it lives: everything I learned building, buying, and selling local businesses, taught in the order you’ll actually need it.

The full story at christopherschwab.co.uk →
Questions

Asked often,
answered honestly

Are there any prerequisites?
Three: stable internet, 5–10 hours per week to devote to this, and $1,000–$1,500 for startup costs.
What if I have a million questions?
You will, and that’s expected. The private student chat gives you direct access to me and experienced students for exactly how to tackle the problem in front of you. It’s proving just as valuable as the programme itself.
What if someone else in my city is already doing this?
Local businesses have been stable forever, even with high competition. Five hundred cleaning companies in your city and you can still build yours comfortably. The more competition your industry has locally, the more demand it signals. It’s a good sign.
What kind of business will I build?
A local service business: cleaning, home services, trades. Boring on purpose: proven demand, low startup cost, and suited to remote operation later.
The monthly letter

The one email you’ll want to read
every month.

You’re in. See you next month.

Taught from Yokohama, in use across sixteen-plus countries.