PCO Bookkeepers & M&A Specialists collaborated with equity research house William Blair & Co. to create the monthly William Blair/PCO Bookkeepers & M&A Specialists Pest Index in 2020.
The Pest Index tracks the monthly performance of more than 150 PCO clients — privately held pest control companies across 36 states with combined annual 2022 revenue of $538 million.
The purpose of the report is to track the results of several U.S. pest markets, including residential, commercial, mosquito and termite. The index does not include residential door-to-door companies.
The Pest Index started as an information source for institutional investors, but it has evolved into an important guideline for small businesses and publicly traded companies alike.
PCO is the only organization in the pest control industry with the access to this type of granular data and the capability to analyze and produce such a report.
How to use the Pest Index
The Pest Index serves as a statistically significant benchmark for the U.S. pest market. Owners of pest control companies can use it to compare their results to the Pest Index’s performance over time.
The index is also a popular report among William Blair’s institutional client base, including portfolio managers, mutual funds, hedge funds and private wealth managers. They use it as a tool to gauge how public pest control companies are trending. The Pest Index is published monthly, while public companies report their earnings quarterly. The Pest Index helps investors position their portfolio ahead of these earnings reports.