Tackling Titletown Green Bay, Wisc.

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RISMEDIA-NRRE VOL 16-2 March 2000

Tackling Titletown Green Bay, Wisc.

ERA Titletown Realtors, Green Bay, Wisc. 1999 Sales: 2,000 homes

Even a non-football fan in Green Bay ? if there is such an animal ? would understand the reason behind the inclusion of Titletown in the company name. If football is a passion in this Wisconsin community of 60,000, then the object of that passion is the Green Bay Packers, one of the storied franchises in the National Football League.

“I go to as many games as I can during the season, but I don?t have season tickets,” says Tom Dalebroux, one of five directors of the one-year-old firm, ERA Titletown Realtors?. “There?s a waiting list of 50,000 on tickets.”

But the right ticket, he states, was last March?s real estate merger of Hallmark Group Realtors, Shorewest Realtors and ERA Montgomery Realtors. In this case, bigger became better. The new alignment constitutes the largest real estate company in Green Bay, with 72 agents, a staff of 20 and a unified drive to succeed.

“We had 23 percent of the market share when we started, and we finished last year with 28 percent,” says Dalebroux, who founded the Hallmark Group in 1983.

The new management team averages about 25 years of experience per member, and “opportunity” was the operative word that brought about the merger of the three competitors. “There?s actually more cooperation than competition in this business,” says Dalebroux. “We work with other Realtors all the time, and if you?re professional, you?re good to your competitors.”

For Hallmark and Shorewest, another plus in the merger was the fusing with ERA Franchise Systems, a national firm that brought name recognition and marketing expertise into the mix. ERA offers one-stop shopping with home sales and mortgage services augmented by its connections to moving services, utility hook-ups and more. The former Montgomery group had been associated with ERA since 1973.

Dalebroux has spent a total of 21 years in real estate, following a couple of years with a crane manufacturing company in Milwaukee. “I wanted a business where I could control my own destiny, not leave it up to anyone else whether I succeed,” he says.

Now if only one satisfied Titletown customer would will him some Packer season tickets, life would be complete.