The Brisbane fencing contractor hasn’t had an open week since he started and has a following of about 75,000. He told Az why he still quotes every job himself, runs one job at a time and treats content as the last thing on his list.
Evan La Motta has not had an empty week in his diary since La Motta Group started five years ago.
He has a full time team member, a school based apprentice and customers who ask on site which pub the crew is heading to for its weekly Friday video.
What he does not have is a plan to get bigger. On The Good Builder Podcast, he made a calm case for why that is a business decision rather than a lack of ambition.
The business still runs through the owner
La Motta still does every quote and every site visit himself. He does the invoicing too.
“Every quote I send is from me and every site visit I do is me,” he told Az.
For residential customers, he says, that removes a common point of friction. The person who prices the fence is the person who turns up to build it, so there is no gap between what a salesperson promised and what the crew can deliver.
His face and contact details are, in his words, plastered all over the internet. He treats that as accountability rather than risk.
“It’s probably impossible for me to do a runner or ghost someone,” he said. “I hold myself accountable… it’s my reputation online.”
One job, one invoice, steady cash flow
The operating model is deliberately simple. The crew starts one job, finishes it and moves on. There are never two jobs open at once.
“Start, finish, send the bill. Start, finish, send the bill,” La Motta said. “A couple of times a week I’m sending an invoice. So there’s always something coming in. I’m not waiting on big drawdowns.”
For builders carrying long progress claim cycles, that contrast is the useful part. A short job cycle keeps money moving in small, regular amounts, and La Motta says it keeps his own stress down.
Start, finish, send the bill. Start, finish, send the bill.
He was cautious with money from day one. His bookkeeper set him up to pay himself a wage and put money aside for tax and super, and he put away more than he needed. Turnover came quickly enough that he had to register for GST within a month or two.
The caution went further than most would go. Before launching, he sold both the family home and an investment apartment and moved in with his in laws, worried he would not meet a mortgage payment if work dried up. In hindsight, he says, he probably should have kept them.
Turnover still edges up each year with the same headcount. He puts that down to repetition. The work is similar week to week, so the team keeps finding quicker ways to do it.
What is an owner operator trade business?
An owner operator trade business is one where the owner works on the tools and personally handles the client facing parts of the job, such as quoting, site visits and invoicing. The model limits how much work the business can take on at once, but it keeps one person accountable from first contact to final payment.
Growth is a choice, not an obligation
La Motta is direct about the pressure on trade businesses to keep expanding.
“There’s this massive expectation and stigma with construction trade businesses that you just need to scale, scale, just keep going, keep growing,” he said. “I don’t feel the need to.”
Part of it is personal. He is 36, loves being on the tools and is still digging holes by hand. Part of it is what the business is for. If it covers the mortgage, looks after his kids and lets his wife stay home with them, he says, it is doing its job.
He is not ruling growth out. He said he might feel differently at 45, and his full time team member has started doing some quotes on his own. For now, La Motta is not planning that far ahead.
Hard early lessons shaped how he leads
His start in the trade was rough. Straight out of school and playing semi pro rugby, he took a labouring job that came about because the boss, an assistant footy coach, needed a driver. He was paid $100 cash a day no matter the hours, and later learned his boss held no qualifications.
He was yelled at constantly. Looking back, he credits that time for his work ethic and for showing him how not to treat people.
“Everything they taught me was what not to do,” he said. “So I’ve just incorporated all that.”
After injuries, a stint as a baggage handler and years of labouring, he took a mature age carpentry apprenticeship, completed his Certificate IV in Building and Construction and got his QBCC licence while still employed, building a fence every Saturday on the side.
Finding staff took time. He worked through family members and friends on casual rates before finding Jim through an Instagram story asking whether anyone wanted a day’s work carrying palings. When Jim later moved home to the Northern Territory, La Motta offered him a full time role, a new ute and a tool kit to come back. He did.
Content works because it is not a sales pitch
The Instagram page started with before and after photos. The shift came when, working alone on a 58 metre fence, he leant his phone on a bucket and filmed himself setting posts. It passed 10,000 views within hours, five times his follower count at the time.
Ideas now come straight from the job. He jots them in his phone and films in batches on quieter days. He has stopped worrying about posting times and hashtags.
“It’s the content,” he said. “If it’s gonna pop, it’s gonna pop.”
His own approach for anyone starting out is to introduce yourself, show your first job and not lead with selling. He only promotes products he actually uses. “I’m not an actor and I’m not gonna lie to someone,” he said.
What still gets under his skin is public criticism from other trade businesses on his posts, where potential customers can see it. He would rather get a direct message. “We’re in this together,” he said. “You’ve got a small business as well as mine.”
Be the captain, not the coach
Asked our signature question about what makes a good builder, La Motta, who is careful to say he is not one, pointed first to looking after employees, then to leadership from inside the team.
“You want to be the captain of the team because you’re with the team and you’re in the trenches,” he said. “You don’t want to be the coach or a spectator on the sideline.”
He says his team rarely pushes back on a request because they know he has done the work himself and will be beside them doing it.
The Good Builder Take
Scale is often treated as the default measure of a successful trade business. La Motta’s model is a reminder that it is one strategy among several.
A tight operation with short job cycles, frequent invoicing and an owner whose name is on every quote carries less cash flow risk and fewer handover points. The trade off is capacity. Which suits a business depends on what the owner wants it to deliver.
That is the thread running through La Motta Group. The owner quotes the job, builds the job, sends the bill and stands behind it online under his own name. Scale may come later. For now, the trust is the business.
Frequently Asked Questions
Evan La Motta is the founder and owner operator of La Motta Group, a Brisbane fence and gate business serving South East Queensland. A carpenter by trade and former semi pro rugby player, he started the business about five years ago and has built a social media following of about 75,000.
Evan La Motta says he enjoys working on the tools, the business already meets his family’s needs, and staying owner operator keeps stress down. He has not ruled out growing later, but says he is not planning that far ahead.
The crew runs one job at a time and invoices on completion, so La Motta Group sends invoices a couple of times a week rather than waiting on large progress payments. Evan La Motta also sets aside more than required for tax and super.
He says the content matters more than posting times or hashtags, that ideas should come from real work on site, and that a first video works best as an introduction rather than a sales pitch. He only promotes products he uses.
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Published November 2026.
General Information Only: This article provides general information only and does not constitute legal, financial or professional advice. It reflects the experiences and views of the person interviewed. Readers should obtain advice specific to their circumstances before making business decisions.
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