30 BCBUSINESS APRIL 2017
L I F E S T O RY: During his summers
while attending university, Igor Trninic led
a College Pro painting franchise. Trninic
learned the value of hard work early:
his mother and father, an auditor and a
lawyer, respectively, had to restart after
the family fled approaching war in the
former Yugoslavia for Vancouver in 1994.
Although he holds a bachelor of business
administration in accounting and human
I G O R T R N I N I C
Co-founder and
managing partner
BREAKTHROUGH ACADEMY
A G E : 2 8
resource management from
SFU, cubicle
world wasn't for him. After graduation,
Trninic managed a B.C. division of College
Pro before becoming head of operations with
Shack Shine, a provider of detailing services
for residential and commercial buildings,
when it opened in 2014. The company soon
launched its first franchise partner, and
1-800-Got-Junk founder Brian Scudamore's
O2E Brands bought it the following year.
Those experiences showed Trninic that
skilled tradespeople often lack business
know-how. So, in mid-2015,
he started Breakthrough
Academy with fellow
College Pro alumnus
Danny Kerr. Through
its online training
and development programs—most pricing
is monthly—the company helps trades and
home services outfits with annual revenue of
between $1 million and $5 million to grow.
"We've hit the nail on the head in terms of
the concept and market need," Trninic says.
"It's just been a matter of execution."
T H E B O T T O M L I N E : Last year
Breakthrough Academy hit $1.4 million in
sales, for a net profit of some $330,000. The
nine-member team has more than
100 companies as clients;
their total 2016 rev-
enue was about
$120 million.
—N.R.
