Protecting Senior Rep Territories Without Killing the Team

Every growing roofing company eventually hits this wall: the senior rep who built a $2M book over four years refuses to give up any of his territory, and meanwhile your three rookies are drowning in leftovers. Handle it wrong and you lose the senior rep. Handle it right and you scale without a mutiny.

Earned vs Assigned Territory

Every territory falls into one of two categories:

• Earned: the rep built the book, knocked the doors, signed the original customers, and created the referral pipeline
• Assigned: the rep inherited the zone from a predecessor or was handed it on day one

Earned territory gets protected. Assigned territory is fair game for rebalancing. This distinction matters because most "senior rep hoarding" fights are actually assigned-territory disputes where the senior rep is claiming earned status they have not actually earned.

How to tell the difference: pull the CRM data. How many customers in the territory came through this rep's own door-knock or phone-call? If 60%+ of the active customer base in the zone was signed by this rep personally, it is earned. Under 40%, it is assigned.

The Home Turf Zone

Give your proven senior reps a protected "home turf" of roughly 2,000 to 3,000 doors that they keep across rebalances. This is their core neighborhood, usually centered on their highest-producing streets. Nobody touches home turf without explicit permission.

Beyond the home turf, the rep works an expanded territory that can grow or shrink based on performance and team needs. When you hire a rookie, the rookie might get 1,500 doors carved out of the senior rep's expanded zone, never from the home turf.

Protect the Customer, Not the Commission

A senior rep's real asset is their relationship with the customer, not the geographic zone. So protect the customer book, not the territory. A senior rep who has sold 80 jobs in a zone keeps permanent ownership of those 80 customers plus their referrals, no matter who else is knocking in the area.

This lets you rebalance territory without touching the senior rep's book. New rep works the streets, senior rep keeps the customers and the referrals, and nobody loses money.

Veteran Retention Math

A senior rep producing $2M in gross revenue at 45% gross margin is worth roughly $900k in gross profit per year. If they quit and take their book to a competitor, you lose some of that. Even at 30% loss you are out $270k in year one.

Replacing a senior rep takes 12 to 18 months. The new hire does $400k in year one at best. So the real cost of losing a senior rep is closer to $500k to $800k over two years.

Compare that to the cost of protecting their home turf: maybe $150k of foregone rookie production from the carved-out zone. The math is not close. Protect veterans.

Preventing Hoarding

Protection does not mean the senior rep keeps everything forever. Set hoarding limits:

1. Home turf caps at 3,000 doors. Anything above that is expanded territory and subject to rebalancing.
2. Expanded territory requires production. A senior rep not working their expanded zone gets it reassigned after 60 days of inactivity (under 100 knocks per week in the zone).
3. Customer book is permanent, but new knocks in the expanded zone go to whoever is assigned there now.

The Conversation

Telling a senior rep they are losing 1,500 doors of territory is a hard conversation. Have it in person. Show the data. Offer something in return: a pay plan bump, a lead stream from company marketing, or an override on the rookie working the carved-out zone (1% to 3% is standard).

Reps will accept losing territory if they feel the process is fair and they come out even on money. They will quit if they feel ambushed.

What to Do When They Quit Anyway

Some senior reps will leave no matter what you do. When that happens, the non-compete and non-solicit language in their contract matters. Standard terms we see working:

• 12-month non-solicit of existing customers
• 6-month non-compete within 25 miles
• Customer book and territory data remain company property

Enforce these. If you do not enforce the first time a rep leaves, no future rep will respect the contract.

See also: roofing CRM buyers guide for the data-ownership angle.

FAQ

How long does a rep need to tenure to earn home turf protection?

Minimum 18 months at the company and top-quartile production for the last four quarters. Rookies do not get home turf.

Can a senior rep be fired from their home turf?

Yes. If production drops below team average for two consecutive quarters, home turf protection is suspended pending a performance review. Protection is a reward, not an entitlement.

What about when we expand into a new market?

Home turf rules apply only to the rep's original market. Expanding the company does not extend any individual rep's home turf into new cities.