Selling Your Veterinary Practice to Encore Vet Group: A Vet’s 2026 Guide

Key takeaways

• Encore Vet Group is a private equity-backed veterinary consolidator founded in 2018, headquartered in Saratoga Springs, New York, operating approximately 62 hospitals across an East Coast and Midwest regional footprint per the VetIntegrations roll call.
• North Castle Partners, a Greenwich, Connecticut private equity firm, holds the majority interest, acquired in a buyout effective January 1, 2018 per Mergr and PrivateEquityInfo. A minority interest is held by the founders and several shareholders.
• Encore’s pitch to sellers is built on three things per its own materials: keep your local brand, keep your clinical autonomy, and keep owning and staying involved in your practice after the sale.
• The regional concentration is the defining strategic feature. Encore builds density in specific states rather than chasing a nationwide map, which shapes how it sources, supports, and integrates the practices it acquires.
• The most reliable way to know what Encore, or any buyer, would actually pay for your specific practice is to run a structured competitive process. We call ours the Elite Selling System: we hand-select and vet every buyer who gets to bid, the way a doorman with a velvet rope lets in only the right people, then run a private bidding window inside that vetted group. When a buyer bids against a curated group of qualified competitors, the number is reliably very different from a single, direct conversation.

When a vet asks me about Encore Vet Group, the conversation usually starts with the pitch they’ve already heard. Encore tells owners they can keep their brand, keep practicing medicine their way, and keep owning their practice even after they sell.

That message lands, because it speaks to the two fears almost every owner brings to a sale: losing the identity they built and losing control of the medicine. So the first thing I do is separate what’s genuinely attractive about that model from what still needs to be pinned down in writing before anyone signs.

This guide is the same picture I’d lay out over dinner if a vet handed me an Encore offer and asked what to do with it. Who Encore is, who owns it, what the partnership-style pitch actually means for a seller, where the regional focus helps and where it constrains, and how to get the best possible outcome when a regional buyer like Encore is at your table.

The short version on selling your veterinary practice to Encore Vet Group: it’s a younger, fast-moving regional platform with an appealing seller-friendly message, and the way to use that message is to convert each promise into a contract term and then test the offer against the rest of the field.

Who owns Encore Vet Group? (North Castle Partners and the ownership structure)

Encore Vet Group‘s majority interest is held by North Castle Partners, a private equity firm based in Greenwich, Connecticut. North Castle acquired EncoreVet in a buyout effective January 1, 2018 per Mergr’s M&A deal summary, and Encore is still listed as a current North Castle portfolio company per PrivateEquityInfo.

A minority interest is held by the founders and several shareholders per PrivateEquityInfo. That matters for a seller, because it signals that the founders kept a stake rather than fully cashing out, which is consistent with the “keep owning your business” message Encore puts in front of sellers.

So Encore is a PE-backed group in the same broad category as most of the active veterinary buyers, with North Castle providing the institutional capital behind the acquisition program. Our veterinary practice consolidators directory maps where Encore sits among the broader field of named buyers.

One practical note. Encore was founded in 2018 by Ted Sprinkle, DVM, Lance Sprinkle, and Bo Iler, and entered the acquisition space in 2019 per BOSS Magazine.

Lance Sprinkle became president and CEO in January 2022, with founder Ted Sprinkle, DVM, moving to executive chairman per dvm360. That’s a founder-led leadership team still close to the business, not a rotating cast of operators.

Encore Vet Group’s footprint: how many hospitals and where

Encore operates approximately 62 veterinary hospitals per the VetIntegrations roll call of consolidators. Treat that number as approximate.

Hospital counts across this whole category move with deal activity, and Encore is an active acquirer, so the figure shifts over time.

The footprint is where Encore’s strategy shows up most clearly. Encore’s hospitals span South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Michigan, Ohio, Florida, Wisconsin, and Washington DC per the VetIntegrations roll call.

That’s an East Coast and Midwest regional concentration, not nationwide saturation.

For a seller, that regional shape cuts two ways. If your practice sits inside or adjacent to Encore’s existing density, you’re a natural strategic fit, and a buyer building density in your market often values that fit.

If you’re well outside the footprint, Encore may still be interested, but the strategic premium that comes from filling in a regional cluster is less likely to be there.

Encore is also actively managing its real-estate portfolio alongside the hospitals. In January 2026, B+E brokered the sale of Encore Vet properties in Northfield, OH and Virginia Beach, VA per EIN Presswire, which reflects sale-leaseback activity on the real estate rather than any divestiture of the practices themselves.

That’s a normal portfolio-management move for a PE-backed platform and worth understanding if your sale includes your building.

The Encore model: local brand, clinical autonomy, and “keep owning your business”

Encore’s seller pitch is unusually explicit, and it’s worth quoting how the company frames it. Per Encore’s own materials, the platform tells owners that “your hospital’s brand and the way you do medicine will stay the same so you can practice medicine your way and continue your legacy.”

On ownership, Encore goes further than most. Per its own materials, Encore states “we believe you should keep owning your business after you sell it to Encore” and “we don’t just hope you’ll stay involved after the sale, we encourage it.” That language implies a partnership or retained-involvement structure rather than a clean 100-percent buyout.

Here’s the honest read on that. The message is genuinely attractive, and it aligns with where the broader market has moved.

The specific rollover-equity and partnership terms, though, are not publicly published, and the language in marketing materials is a philosophy, not a contract. The job in any Encore conversation is to translate “keep owning your business” into actual numbers: how much equity you retain, at what valuation, with what buyout window and formula price.

Rollover equity means keeping a slice of ownership in the new entity, or in your own practice, instead of taking all cash at close. If Encore’s model is built around that, the terms of the retained slice become as important as the cash at close, sometimes more so.

Our PE pricing guide walks through how retained-equity and partnership structures actually price out.

What Encore offers sellers: support services, the Performance Academy, and retained involvement

Encore’s value to a partner practice is concentrated on the operational side, which is consistent with the brand-and-autonomy-preserving philosophy.

Centralized back office. Per Encore’s own materials, the platform centralizes accounting, payroll, HR, IT, marketing, and operations coaching for partner practices. The idea is to lift the administrative load off the owner so the clinical team can focus on medicine.

The Encore Performance Academy. Per Encore’s materials, the platform runs the Encore Performance Academy for leadership development, business management, medical training, and professional development across partner teams. Encore also acquired VetSupport, a veterinary consulting group focused on training, education, and practice management per the VetIntegrations roll call, which adds consulting depth to the network.

Technology investment. Encore partnered with CoVet to integrate AI scribe and automation tools across its hospital network per CoVet’s announcement, a signal of continued operational investment heading into 2024 and 2025. For an owner thinking about staff workload and documentation burden, that kind of tooling is a tangible support, not just a slide.

A credibility signal. Encore became the first corporate partner of Cornell University’s Center for Veterinary Business and Entrepreneurship in 2019 per Cornell’s College of Veterinary Medicine. That’s an academic-credibility marker that few newer platforms can claim this early in their history.

The way Encore describes itself ties all of this together. Per its own materials, Encore positions itself as “like a boutique buying group” that is “more responsive, tailoring solutions to your individual needs,” and says it “reverse-engineered the acquisition process.” Whether that responsiveness shows up in your specific deal is something a competitive process tests directly.

Leadership and track record

Encore’s leadership is founder-anchored and still hands-on. Ted Sprinkle, DVM, co-founded the company in 2018 and now serves as executive chairman; Lance Sprinkle has been president and CEO since January 2022 per dvm360; and Bo Iler rounds out the founding team per BOSS Magazine.

That founder continuity is a real data point for a seller. A platform whose founders kept a minority stake and stayed in leadership roles tends to behave differently from one run entirely by a financial sponsor’s appointed operators.

It doesn’t change what you should negotiate, but it does shape the relationship you’d be entering.

Have an offer from Encore Vet Group? Get a Free Practice Value Estimate and we’ll decompose the terms, identify what’s typically negotiable, and project what your practice would likely clear in a structured competitive process with the broader qualified buyer pool. No upfront cost, no obligation.

Is Encore Vet Group a good fit for your practice? Who it suits

Encore tends to suit a specific kind of seller well, and it’s worth being clear about who that is.

Owners who want to stay involved. If your plan is to keep practicing, keep a hand on the wheel, and retain a stake rather than walk away clean, Encore’s “keep owning your business” model is built for that. An owner who wants a full exit and a clean handoff may find a different structure fits better.

Practices inside the regional footprint. If you’re in or near South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Michigan, Ohio, Florida, Wisconsin, or Washington DC, you sit where Encore is building density, which makes you a natural strategic fit.

Owners who value brand and clinical continuity. If keeping your practice name, your team, and your way of practicing medicine matters more to you than the absolute highest cash number, Encore’s stated philosophy is aligned with that priority.

The fit question is real, but it’s not the whole question. Even a great-fit buyer offers their strongest terms only when they know other qualified buyers are at the table.

So “is Encore a good fit” and “is Encore’s offer competitive” are two separate questions, and you want both answered before you sign.

How Encore compares to larger national consolidators

If you’re considering Encore, you’re implicitly comparing it to the other buyers who could compete for your practice. A few useful contrasts.

Versus Mars Veterinary Health (VCA, Banfield, BluePearl). Mars is the strategic, family-owned exception in the buyer pool per Mars company disclosures, which distinguishes it from Encore’s PE-backed structure. Mars also operates a nationwide footprint and historically transitions some acquired practices toward a Mars-network brand over time, which contrasts with Encore’s stated local-brand-preservation approach.

Versus NVA (JAB Holdings). NVA is far larger and owned by JAB Holdings, a long-hold investment vehicle. Both NVA and Encore emphasize preserving local practice branding per their respective materials.

The contrast is scale and ownership horizon: NVA is a national platform with a long-hold owner, while Encore is a focused regional platform under a PE sponsor.

Versus the other regional and mid-size PE-backed groups (Western Veterinary Partners, Heartland, United Veterinary Care, and others). This is Encore’s most direct peer set. Each regional platform has its own target states, integration philosophy, and structure preferences.

Regional buyers sometimes bid more aggressively for a practice that fills a specific geographic gap in their map, which is exactly the dynamic a competitive process surfaces.

The right way to find out which of these pays the most, on the best terms, for your specific practice is to put the qualified ones in a competitive process and let them surface their best offers in parallel. Our guide to who to sell your veterinary practice to walks through how to think about the full field.

How to get the best outcome when selling to a regional buyer like Encore

Selling to a regional buyer with a seller-friendly pitch calls for a specific discipline: enjoy the message, then make it real on paper. Here are the priorities I’d focus on.

Turn the partnership promise into terms. Encore says you keep owning your business. Negotiate exactly what that means: the percentage you retain, the valuation your retained stake is set at, the buyout window, and the formula price.

A retained stake is only as good as the terms governing it.

Protect the earnout, if there is one. An earnout is part of the sale price paid later, only if the practice hits agreed performance targets after closing. If your deal includes one, negotiate protective provisions: no major operational changes without your consent during the earnout window, a clear definition of what counts in the EBITDA calculation, and a prohibition on shifting central-services costs onto your practice in a way that depresses the number.

Pin down clinical autonomy and brand in writing. Encore’s materials emphasize both, and that’s a good starting point. But marketing language is not a contractual commitment.

Negotiate explicit language in the definitive purchase agreement: you make the medicine decisions, your practice name and signage stay, and which business decisions remain yours versus migrating to Encore’s operations team.

Understand the cash mechanics. At closing, the buyer wires the agreed funds directly to you and any lienholders; the signed documents take effect once the wire confirms. Any post-closing indemnification holdback is a portion the buyer holds back and pays later, for a defined period, to secure your reps and warranties.

That’s the buyer retaining funds, not money sitting with a third party. Negotiate the size and duration of any holdback.

Test the number against the field. This is the highest-leverage move, and it’s the one most owners skip. A single buyer in a direct conversation has no structural reason to lead with their strongest terms.

The same buyer, knowing a curated group of qualified competitors is underwriting the same practice in the same window, tends to put forward materially stronger cash, protections, and autonomy language. That gap is reliably worth real money.

What our Elite Selling System actually does

When a vet comes to me with an Encore offer, the process runs in three moves.

First, the term audit. Before anything goes to market, we deconstruct the offer in front of you, the cash at close, the retained-equity or partnership terms, any earnout, the clinical-autonomy and brand language, the holdback, the non-compete, against the comparable terms we see across the qualified buyer pool. That tells us where Encore’s offer is already strong and where it has room.

Second, the bidder mix. From the field of named veterinary consolidators TE actively tracks, we invite only the ones that genuinely compete for your specific practice, the regional platforms building density in your market, the brand-preservation buyers, the partnership-structure buyers. The right group is typically a handful of bidders, each competing on a dimension you actually care about.

Third, the term-by-term comparison. Bidders return full term sheets, not just headline numbers. You see cash at close, retained-equity terms, earnout structure and protections, non-compete scope, post-sale role, and brand commitments side by side, and you choose on the dimensions that matter to you, sometimes the highest number, sometimes the structure that keeps you most involved, sometimes the buyer who’s the best long-term fit.

The economic result holds across deal types: practices that run a structured competitive process consistently clear materially better total outcomes, typically multiple seven figures of additional value, than the same practice would have cleared by signing the original direct offer without testing the field.

Closing thought

The honest read on Encore Vet Group: it’s a founder-led, PE-backed regional platform with one of the more seller-friendly messages in the market, keep your brand, keep your medicine, keep owning your practice. Owners who fit the regional footprint and want to stay involved often find that message resonates.

What separates a well-negotiated Encore outcome from a mediocre one isn’t whether the pitch sounds good. It’s whether the pitch makes it into the contract, and whether the headline number was tested against the rest of the field before you signed.

Get those two things right and a regional buyer like Encore can be an excellent home for your life’s work.

If you’ve received an Encore offer, or Encore’s team has reached out to start the conversation, the highest-leverage move is to understand how the rest of the field would structure the same practice before you commit to anything. Get a Free Practice Value Estimate and we’ll lay out the same comparison we would for a client across a dinner table. You can also start by learning how to sell your veterinary practice or getting your practice valued.

Frequently asked questions

Who owns Encore Vet Group?

Encore’s majority interest is held by North Castle Partners, a private equity firm in Greenwich, Connecticut, which acquired EncoreVet in a buyout effective January 1, 2018 per Mergr and PrivateEquityInfo. A minority interest is held by the founders and several shareholders.

North Castle remains the current PE owner per PrivateEquityInfo’s portfolio listing.

How many veterinary hospitals does Encore Vet Group own?

Encore operates approximately 62 veterinary hospitals per the VetIntegrations roll call. The number is approximate and moves with deal activity.

The footprint spans South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Michigan, Ohio, Florida, Wisconsin, and Washington DC, a regional East Coast and Midwest concentration.

Where is Encore Vet Group located and what states does it operate in?

Encore is headquartered in Saratoga Springs, New York, with some profiles listing nearby Gansevoort, NY per PrivateEquityInfo. Its hospital footprint spans South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Michigan, Ohio, Florida, Wisconsin, and Washington DC per the VetIntegrations roll call.

Does Encore Vet Group let you keep your practice brand and autonomy?

Per Encore’s own materials, Encore tells sellers their hospital’s brand and the way they practice medicine will stay the same, so they can practice their way and continue their legacy. The model emphasizes local brand preservation and clinical autonomy.

The specific commitments for any acquired practice are defined under the definitive purchase agreement on a case-by-case basis.

What support does Encore Vet Group offer after you sell your practice?

Per Encore’s materials, the platform centralizes accounting, payroll, HR, IT, marketing, and operations coaching. It also runs the Encore Performance Academy for leadership, business management, medical training, and professional development, and has integrated AI scribe tools through a partnership with CoVet.

Does Encore Vet Group use a partnership model?

Per Encore’s materials, Encore frames its model around continued seller ownership and involvement, stating you should keep owning your business after you sell it to Encore and that it encourages sellers to stay involved after the sale. That language implies a partnership or retained-involvement structure.

Specific rollover-equity and partnership terms are not publicly published and are negotiated case by case.

Who founded Encore Vet Group and who is the CEO?

Encore was founded in 2018 by Ted Sprinkle, DVM, Lance Sprinkle, and Bo Iler, and entered the acquisition space in 2019 per BOSS Magazine. Lance Sprinkle became president and CEO in January 2022, while founder Ted Sprinkle, DVM, moved to executive chairman per dvm360.

Is Encore Vet Group a good company to sell your veterinary practice to?

Encore is an active regional acquirer in 2026 with a model built around local brand preservation, clinical autonomy, and continued seller involvement per its own materials. Whether it’s the right fit depends on your practice profile, your goals for post-sale involvement, and how its offer compares to others.

As with any buyer, Encore is best evaluated head-to-head against a curated group of qualified buyers in a competitive process.

Sources

Ownership, M&A, and PE sponsor materials

1. PrivateEquityInfo. Encore Vet — private equity portfolio company profile (North Castle Partners; HQ; ownership structure). privateequityinfo.com
2. Mergr. North Castle Partners Acquires EncoreVet — M&A deal summary (buyout effective January 1, 2018; Greenwich, CT). mergr.com
3. North Castle Partners. EncoreVet portfolio page. northcastlepartners.com

Encore Vet Group company materials

4. Encore Vet Group. Partner With Us (brand and autonomy preservation; “keep owning your business”; continued involvement). encorevet.com
5. Encore Vet Group. Our Approach (centralized back-office support; Encore Performance Academy; “boutique buying group”). encorevet.com
6. Encore Vet Group. 2025 in Review — Strong Demand But Not at Any Price. encorevet.com

Industry, trade press, and partnerships

7. VetIntegrations. Roll Call of Veterinary Consolidators (approximately 62 hospitals; state footprint; VetSupport acquisition). vetintegrations.com
8. dvm360. Encore Vet Group Appoints Lance Sprinkle as President and CEO (January 2022). dvm360.com
9. BOSS Magazine. Encore Vet Group profile (founded 2018 by Ted Sprinkle DVM, Lance Sprinkle, Bo Iler; entered acquisitions 2019). thebossmagazine.com
10. Cornell University College of Veterinary Medicine. Encore Vet Group Signs as First Corporate Partner of the Center for Veterinary Business and Entrepreneurship (2019). vet.cornell.edu
11. CoVet. Encore Vet Group and CoVet Partner to Empower Veterinary Teams Through AI-Powered Efficiency. co.vet
12. EIN Presswire / B+E. Veterinary Real Estate Emerges as Hot Target as B+E Brokers Multiple Encore Vet Sales (Northfield, OH and Virginia Beach, VA, January 2026). einpresswire.com