Journey into EMS with Brian Haney
This week on Industry Insights with Route Consultant, we're in Atlanta, GA sitting down with Brian Haney, a serial entrepreneur and the owner of Trinity EMS Billing and Consultants. Brian shares his extraordinary journey from the corporate world to owning one of the fastest-growing EMS companies in the Southeast.
Brian delves into his early life, his transition from sales to the EMS industry, and the challenges he overcame to establish his private ambulance service. This episode provides invaluable insights for aspiring entrepreneurs and a deep dive into the EMS business landscape. This episode recounts his innovative strategies, relentless determination, and the personal sacrifices he made along the way.
About Brian Haney
Brian Haney is a serial entrepreneur and CEO with a passion for service and resilience. After walking away from a six-figure corporate role to pursue more meaningful work, Brian’s journey has taken him from being a farrier to founding one of the Southeast’s fastest-growing EMS organizations. Today, he runs multiple companies across transport, billing, consulting, and auto sales, all rooted in the EMS space. Additionally, through One EMS, his nonprofit initiative, Brian is on a mission to open doors for the next generation of emergency responders.
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Alright, we are here onsite in Atlanta with Brian Haney. Yep. Who is a serial entrepreneur. Crazy in the EMS space, and now is one of the fastest growing EMS companies. In the Southeast and beyond that, all kinds of other businesses you've tacked on to the EMS business. And we're gonna get into all of that.
But for now, welcome Brian to our little thank you offsite outside studio here in Atlanta. Thank you. Thank you. So today we're gonna go through really your journey on the [00:01:00] EMS side, how you got into your first business. We're gonna come back in a later session and talk about what that growth and scale looked like beyond as you added other businesses.
But let's start with EMS Now, was that. Your first career? Is that where you started? No, it goes way back. Okay. Like the old story, a true entrepreneur true entrepreneur is a person that always wants to own their own business, but doesn't know which one they wanna own. Okay. Yeah.
That's my idea. And I, this sort of fell into my lap. Okay. It really did, because I was in the corporate route. I should have been a chief operation officer. I should have been, I was going that route with my degrees, everything was, go to school. And so I went to school and I finished school.
It took me 13 years, but I finished school. You did? Hey, that alone determination to get there is, that's right. Yeah. Nothing stopped you, but the school of hard knocks is gonna outweigh any book education, I promise you that is out there at any level. Yeah. I promise you that. All that being said, the the trip was worth every experience that I had.
Achieving that four year degree was something that. Proven my determination and [00:02:00] that I could achieve it, and that basically time is gonna fix or cure anything. Whether good or bad that has happened to you will definitely be a reward if you can just outlast and allow time and patience to take place.
Yeah. And where'd you, where did you grow up again? What part of the country? So I grew up in South Florida. Okay. And I also grew up in, in Georgia. Okay. So that was a lot of fun. I got to I got to go to the beach as much as I wanted and I got to be in the woods as much as I wanted. Okay.
Yeah. So it was a win-win and I guess that's the best part that comes out of a divorce for kids and all those kids out there, just enjoy two Christmases, two birthdays. That's true. Double the presents. Yeah, there's always a good Yeah, you can if you can find the good. Yeah.
That's all you can do in some of those situations. Yeah. So you an extended college experience, but you said you went to the corporate world next. What was the first step there? Corporate world was basically got married, had a child, get to work. What's the quickest way I can make money?
And obviously for me it was sales because I didn't have a, an education. [00:03:00] And I wanted to make as much money as possible. I didn't want anybody to rely on, yeah. So sales was pretty much it. You work as hard as you want, little as you want, make as much as you want, or as little as you want. So that was my avenue to understanding my entrepreneur spirit and understanding that no matter what, it all relies on me if I'm gonna make it happen.
Yeah. And so that kind of helped me through the path of where I am now. And but I was nowhere near the level I'm at now, even though I was younger and had more energy and more everything. Yeah. It seems and you hear everybody talk about this is that your mind never catches up. Your mind out outworks anything else in the world.
The minute I don't sleep a whole lot anymore for several reasons, but the, main reason is it. There's my old trade right there, fire and EMS. So yeah, 24 hours you never quit. But that being said, it's just weird. I always knew I always had a good heart.
I always wanted to serve people. I always had a politeness. I always loved old people and babies. Okay. Those were my two things. So I was always like, Hey, this is great. I got [00:04:00] babies. I love my grandparents. But I never felt really fulfilled just selling something. When I got to the corporate world and I spent about 15 years in it I looked around my dinosaur was going away.
I talked to you a little bit about that at the beginning with the Yellow Pages. The internet was coming into play, websites were coming into play. I was doing the best I can to try to transition and it just wasn't working out. It really wasn't, no matter what I could do, I still was failing because of a dinosaur.
That's a big transition. Yeah. So that affected more than just you? That was, yeah, absolutely. You had something that people relied on for years as a book sitting by the phone. Yeah. That, that was, it wasn't just that was how you found things. That was the foundation of marketing. Yeah.
That was how you got your name out as a business. Yeah. Especially if you have, a lot of transient people moving in, coming by, staying, whatever. People that live and you know this, wherever you live, you know where to go to eat. You know who to call to fix your plumbing. You know who to, do this, do that.
But when you don't, that's what you relied on. It was like, the Yellow Pages and the Bible, it was like two things in every hotel room or in, in everything that, [00:05:00] people would have around their house or anything. Phone books back in the days, phone books were hanging from telephones that were just, hanging out and you had to put quarters in, so you always carried around quarters.
Nobody knew why he needed to carry change. That's why he carried change. But yeah. It was awesome, but those are the good old days. But getting back to the point is so that timeline ran out for me and I wasn't very happy at that point in my life. And I went home and I told my wife, Hey, I'm quitting my a hundred thousand dollars a year job because I'm not gonna be able to make a hundred thousand dollars a year more.
Yeah. Hey, and I'm gonna get into, sometimes those choices are the hardest to make, where, I'm in a good place now. Yeah. But if I don't make a change, I won't be in a few years. But just giving it up in advance as opposed to waiting till everything falls apart. I'm very impatient when I was younger.
Yeah. And I always wanted more and it might not have been a good thing. I think it, looking back now, it was a good thing because I didn't wanna settle, become complacent in my life. I can't stand myself when I get complacent. And that's now too, I. Yeah, I really don't like myself very much when nothing's going on.
And my wife will tell you left and right, that I [00:06:00] always have to have some, she calls it chaos. I call it disorderly, functioning, it'll work itself out and something great will happen from it. Yeah. But she likes to say that I like to be in the storm, and that's where I find my peace.
I really do, because I've never known anything different, from a little kid all the way up till now. It's just something you get used to and what everybody needs to understand that about themselves. Yeah. And I think that's the true vision for the, for everybody personally. Yeah. Is understanding where you're comfortable and then what drives you.
And then obviously finding a method that you can drive it, find a way to make money from it. Yeah. But so I went home, told her that she was. Like, what are you talking about? We have, a $3,000 a month mortgage. We have two horses in the back. We have two kids that are in middle school and they need shoes.
And I need shoes and I need new dress to go to church on Sunday. And yeah you know what's going on here? We need food in the refrigerator. Let's just talk the basics here. Yeah. And so finally I was just like, I just, I, I got a little severance package, walked away, like I was saying, it was a union thing and so it was a good opportunity to have a good, [00:07:00] hardworking 15 years, paid off. But we got to a point to where I was just wasn't happy and for me to go out and do what I need to do, I needed to be happy. And we had horses. Like I said there was a gentleman that was taking care of our horse's feet.
They gotta get trimmed just like your fingernails gotta get trimmed. They gotta, their feet gotta get trimmed and taken care of. So I was looking at him, I said, how you doing man? I said, you seem so happy. I've never seen a person happier in my life, or at least one of the few. Yeah. And he goes, Brian, he says, I've an, I was an engineer, he was a civil engineer and he quit his job to do this for a living and trim horses feet.
I said, you kidding me? He goes, I love it. It's physical. I. I get to talk to people and horses, they don't talk back and he says, I do my job. I get paid and I go home. I said, that sounds wonderful. And being an athlete for a long period of time in my life, I love the physicalness. I love being around horses.
We didn't even talk about that. What was what? Sports. It's crazy. It was football and baseball. Yeah. And then it was ended up being baseball because I didn't keep growing. I was good enough and fast enough, but just [00:08:00] the hits were just coming. Yeah. The big guys you gotta realize playing the big guys hurts.
So I ended up being baseball. I, finished up as a junior at Auburn University. Okay. And blew out my arm. The old tail of the guy that never made it the greatest baseball player, never actually played the professional league. Just letting you know right now. He just never got there. Yeah. But burned out as a junior, but he would've made it.
Just letting you know. But so all that being said, he, it fit the boxes. It checked the boxes. I was like last question, how much money you make. Yeah. And he says, I do. About. 70 to 80,000 depending on a good year. And I said, average. He said, yeah, average. I said, I'm in. Teach me, show me. I got some time really that it is.
That was the next step was trimming horses. That's right. Wow. That's awesome. Who knew? And lemme tell you something. Everything that I've learned, experienced all you younger guys, trust me. Just because you're not where you wanna be, embrace where you are. That's all I gotta say, because it's teaching you something that you're gonna need later down the road.
[00:09:00] Yeah, I promise you 100% you're gonna be like, that's why I was in that place that I really didn't like watching my words. Yeah, it'd be a little different if you and I weren't in front of a camera right now. But so just be patient with yourself. Be patient where you are and keep driving. But all that being said bring it back up.
I did that. I learned, I apprenticed, I learned fast because I didn't have an opportunity to learn slow and so I did what I had to do and I started making money and a little career came out of it, and then I was like, okay. I said, what else am I gonna do? The pharmacy sales isn't working out.
Nobody wants to hire me. I got into an argument with one of the head hunters. I got an argument with one of the managers and I was just like, this ain't gonna work out real good for me. So sales wasn't it anymore. But I believed in myself and I could sell myself. And I knew that I would be good at something, whatever I did.
So those three things were like my prime, tactics. So I ended up doing the horse thing for a while, and then I was like, you know what? My father, my grandfather [00:10:00] was a cop in Miami. My uncle was a fireman in, he and a paramedic in Miami. My cousin was a fireman and a par, a paramedic in Stewart, which is the Treasure Coast, the right near West Palm Beach.
And so I was like, maybe I give public service shot because I love again, kids, babies and old people. people. Yeah. So I was like, give it a shot. I love, I've always been the kind of guy that if something's going down, I'm in there. I'm helping. And I don't have a problem with that.
I love doing it. All that being said, I said, Hey, I'm going to go to EMT School. I called my uncle, my cousin is, they said they loved it. It's the greatest rewarding thing I ever done. 24 on, 48 off. So guess what I do on my off days? I. Horse trimming. So that's how it all came sorted together.
And I went to school, got my EMT license and started doing that and I started applying and I ended up getting on the fire department just outside of Atlanta. And I did my 24 40 eights and it was my thing. And everything was working great at that point. Okay. And so at some point in there, you're a [00:11:00] firefighter and you find out the EMS world exists, I assume, is that just something you encountered and.
Found out it was an actual business opportunity. I, it's, I got a couple stories for you and it's funny how it all, you never know until, yeah. And time again is your key factor. Always remember that. But so I went and I got my EMT license. I was a fireman doing my thing. And then I was like, okay, the horse business was declining because, oh eight.
9, 10, 11, 11, everything was kinda declining. Yeah. Nobody was affording horses. They were actually dropping horses at different people's properties. Wow. Because they couldn't afford 'em anymore. They were leaving them in. If there was a big acreage area that was just open, they would let their horse loose.
It was that bad in this area. At least that I know. And the mountains was even worse. We were doing the best we could and I was doing the best I could for the people that did keep their horses and stuff, but. All that being said I had to start picking up more shifts and because I was only making $10 and 27 cents an hour, and we'll get to that later down the road with one EMS, but, we're at doing the horses as many as I can, [00:12:00] but I had to pick up more shifts. So I was working for a lot of private EMS services and I was trying to get on some 911 e em, EMS services. But they weren't hiring me. I was just doing the 9 1 1 for the fire department and then private EMS.
And I went to work for a company that actually the owner, I found out it was privately owned. As soon as I found out it was privately owned, and then it was privately owned by a guy that wasn't even an EMT. I was like, wait a minute, what's going on here? Yeah. So I did a little research and found out that actually, there's an opportunity here for me to own my own business.
If I, and I always told myself if I'm gonna work for somebody, I'd rather work for myself. There's an old saying that you get busy building your dreams before somebody else hires you to build theirs. And I've never been the guy to wait around too long. And that's put us in a lot of stress in our family.
A lot of arguments. Yeah. But when you truly love the person you're with, it all works out. So you found this opportunity and it is funny how these things happen. A lot of people don't even know this business exists even now. You stumbled into one of these things and then everybody's [00:13:00] you own your own private ambulance service.
Yeah. Like, how do you do that? What's that? Do you work for the hospital? Yeah. They like have no clue. I didn't even know you could do that. I was like, neither did I, but I'm glad you don't know till you do. I'm glad I found out. Yeah. So what was your first step once you found out this exists? How do you get into it?
I first tried calling other private EMS services. I tried talking to the guy that owned the company and it, nobody wanted you opening up your own ambulance service. Nobody, and you're talking almost 20 years ago. Yeah. And nobody wants competition. And I'm like, that's what makes us great.
There's enough patience to go around and there's too many. Yeah. That's the sad thing. But ultimately. And we can get into a very deep, detailed conversation about how people are being overlooked and treated in the EMS world. Not only that, but being transported to get the level of care that they need, and then insurance companies controlling all of it.
But I don't want to get into all that right now because it'd be too long. Yeah. And I know we got a little little, a few more things to do later today. Yeah. Okay so you've, you called around. What was, what's, what did you do [00:14:00] first to actually get started? Everybody shoved me out and I was like, okay, let me get online.
The internet, I'm not, trust me, I'm not a huge internet savvy person. I can learn anything if I really put my mind to it, but I knew enough to be dangerous, and that's all I needed. I love being dangerous, but it is controlled danger, it's like walking the ledge, but also being clipped in when you're walking the ledge.
Yeah. Or, when those is tight, grand Canyon walks down to the Grand Canyon River. But so all that being said, it was just like, okay, if you're not gonna talk to me and help me and be partner with me or gimme a, I'm gonna be your competition and I'll figure out how to do it.
So I did and I went online. And so there was a couple options for me to do it. But the funniest thing is that we faced a lot of adversity at that point. Nobody would've do, done, or do what I've done without a few things involved. And for me it was a determining factor for me to, there was no other option.
Failure was not an option. Trying was not an option. [00:15:00] Our home was being foreclosed on. And the funniest part is I got my wife a new Ford expedition. And guess what? I, we have a gate to our property, so when it's closed, you can't get in. But when you open it for a brief night that you forget to close it 'cause you're drag ass too tired.
And, excuse me for saying ass from working 60 hours a week outta 72 days. Yeah, 72 hours. You just forget to, to leave it closed. And guess what? The repo guy out there wants to come get your car, take it away from you because you have you're about, 120 days behind. And he played it right and that one night he got the car and my wife went out to go to work and she's Hey, where's my car?
Did you do something with it? And I'm like I'm sorry babe. Maybe the repo guy got it. And she, I've, been as transparent as possible and she knew it was any time, any day, and I. So we paid a few licks on that. And but she looked at me and she goes, oh, okay, this is great. She goes, I'm gonna take your car.
I'm like, that's fine. I said, I'm gonna be on the computer all day today. And she goes, what are you doing? I'm like I'm working on [00:16:00] my ambulance service. I'm trying to do this, do that. And she goes, okay. She goes do you want me to pick up groceries? I said we have about 150 bucks left in the bank.
And she goes, really? I said, yeah. I said she goes what are you doing now? I said, I'm designing my business cards and I'm gonna buy 'em. She goes, how much are they? I said, $99 for 500, though. Oh man. So she's are you outta your damn mind? And I said, I gotta be at this point. Yeah, we have no other option.
And so that was my determining factor, my oh shit moment, excuse my language. And so I finally got to the point to where nothing else mattered except this. And it's, I paid the price for it because my family became second and I never wanted to be 'em second. And they never, ever will be second because of how hard I had to work.
At this point in my life, they will always be first. I will always put anything aside. If my wife and kids showed up right now and they said, let's get outta here, I would have to exit this interview and go, because that's first man. And that's how, that's the sacrifice that you gotta be willing to make.
Yeah. So you're literally your bottom [00:17:00] dollar entire family stressed, but you got 500 business cards, got 500. I don't know what I'm gonna do with 'em. 'cause I can't give 'em to anybody because I'm not even an ambulance service yet. Yeah. But I knew that's what I could do. I could control that. The faith in yourself and the ability I could control that knew you have the ability to get there.
That was one step closer to the the dream up here, the mouth talking, putting it on paper, and then physically it's actually an action. And these are little actions that you do. You start dreaming it, you start talking it, it gets more comfortable with it. You start putting it on paper. You put a plan down, you start designing your own business cards, and then you take that business card and you actually go get it printed and you go, now I have to do what?
You gotta give it to somebody, right? Yeah. So that's the process. That is the process of opening your own business or believing in yourself or taking action towards something that's gonna make you successful. So you have, do you, you don't even have any vehicles at this point in terms of ambulances.
You have you It took me two and a half years to open up my ambulance service from that point. Yeah. [00:18:00] Wow. Okay. Yeah. So those two and a half years must have been tough, miserable, yeah. Frustrating. Yeah. I didn't sleep, I didn't sleep for about seven years. Whew. I know that sounds like a really bull crap thing, say, but I didn't sleep for seven years, and I'll tell you why.
Took me two and a half years to open it. I was working 60 outta 72 hours, and on that, the 12 hours I didn't have, I was either at a baseball game or with my wife, or trying to be a husband or a father or whatever. I could be. Of those 12 hours out of 72, I had to be at the fire department for 48. I had to work at an EMS service for 12 hours that's 60 hours.
I didn't see my family for 60 hours at a outta three days. I didn't, I only saw 'em for 12 hours and four hours outta that was sleep because I was working. When I, when they were sleeping. Yeah. And I needed sleep, so I would take naps. 15 minute naps here, 15 minutes here. Couple hours here, a couple hours there.
But all that being said, let's fast forward two and a half years. So I took my, I, [00:19:00] I built my business plan. I did my cards. I picked out the colors that I designed, the logos. I was doing everything that I could do that I could control for free. Then I started taking my business plan. I started showing it to people of a higher level.
I went to the Georgia SBA. Every university has this. Every college has a person that's in the business side that will help people. Yeah. And get them connected to someone or a person that can help them start their own business plan. need a business plan and, I'll talk more about tomorrow Yeah.
About business plans. But so I took that and I had it down and I never looked at it again because I didn't have a business. So I didn't need a plan, but I was taking action every day. Every, any minute I'd get a chance to take action. And so I went to several banks and I started looking for private equity.
I started researching how much ambulances are I'd go online. How much is this ambulance? How much is that ambulance? If, what do I need? Okay. The state checkoff sheet says, I need this, and this. How much does that cost? I pick up the phone, I start, going online, I'd say, how much are masks?
How much are gloves? How much are this? And I was putting all [00:20:00] of it together for two and a half years. Then I would go to banks and I said, Hey, I need $150,000 for my first year. Hey, great, what you got? What kind of business? Ambulance service. No, thank you. We don't know anything about the ambulance service.
Now. If you're a contractor, we'll help you. We know all about houses. We all know about. We get the house back. We know how to sell a house. Yeah. We don't know how to sell an ambulance. We don't know how to sell medical supplies. We don't know how to do this. Yeah, I went to so many banks and you think you really, they all want your business until they don't know your business.
But so banks are out. Don't worry about banks. And then I started, looking at other opportunities. And it's funny I said before, it's funny the things you do in the past add up to get you to where you are in the future, in the next step. The place I was working at, the manager there at the private EMS service that the guy owned, it never was around, but the manager was there and I started bombing him with questions, started asking, who I could talk to, blah, blah, blah.
And I finally got to him. I said, Hey, how would you like to be part owner? [00:21:00] And this is how I really started getting closer to achieving, opening the business. He says, what are you talking about? I go I wanna open up my own ambulance service. And I'm like, why haven't you thought of this? Yeah. Some people manage, some people own It's just the way it They don't want the stress. They don't want the liability. Okay. Don't. So we're at that point and he's I'd love to man. And he was connected. He had a network, but he never thought of being an owner. Nobody ever thinks of being an owner. So I'm like, okay, I'm thinking of being an owner.
I want you to be a partner 50 50. Because you have the network, you know the people you know and can manage the people. I don't not do any of that. So that's your 50% your operations, and I'm gonna oversee the money, I'm gonna oversee the billing, I'm gonna oversee all these other things that you don't really wanna deal with.
Your strengths and weaknesses. My strengths and weaknesses. Get that partner. Okay, now we need an investor. You start reaching out to people, I start reaching out to people. That being said, that's where the next progression [00:22:00] was to finding someone, because banks weren't gonna lie. I've been to almost 20 banks, nobody, and I heard the same thing.
Oh, by the way, your credit source sucks. Alright. My credit score was a 5 69. Big deal. I had a car repo. Big deal. All right, fine. Got it. No problem. I'll never call you again. So I found somebody that actually believed in me. And believed that I would be successful, not the business. Yeah. I'd worked my butt off at the fire department.
My fire captain noticed that I was up all the time and I was at the truck every night before anybody else when we got a fire alarm or an EMS alarm. And then he also noticed that I would be at the computer when I was done. Or I would be over on the side at the desk, just working on stuff. And yeah, he knew I carried around this big six inch thick vanilla vanilla envelope.
And we were trying, I kept all my stuff in it and it was like my bible to open this business. And he knew was [00:23:00] like, what's that? And he started asking questions left and right. And he was older and he was at a better state in his life. He had some stuff paid off. His wife was very successful.
What she done and he's making good money and he's put his time in 20 years and he just saw what I was doing. He is I've never seen a work ethic out of anyone else. I know. I'm like, you're kidding me? I'm like, I'm just trying to open a business. And he goes, Brian, he goes, how much you need? I said, $150,000.
Give me 150,000. That's all I need. One year, $150,000. He goes, interesting. And he says, lemme see your business plan. He started reading through it. He says, look, can I take this file? I said, if you lose this. I am out. Yeah. I'm never coming back. I'm disappearing. I'm going to the, I'm going to The Bahamas and I'm going open up a fishing charter.
This is two and a half years of my life. You're holding Start fishing live on The Bahamas. I'm like, oh my gosh. Two and a half years of my life, accumulated in a six inch thick vanilla vanilla envelope or folder. And so he says, no problem. He comes back our next shift and he goes, Hey, I already called the credit union and he says they're gonna loan me.
He took out line of equity [00:24:00] or loans out on his paid off. Three cars he had paid off and a Harley motorcycle. Anybody that's willing to take a loan on their Harley Uhhuh is in. They've got faith in you. Yeah. So if you can find a guy with a Harley that's willing to take a loan on it and give you money, that's your guy.
Yeah. He told me, he says I got a number for you. He says, it ain't hundred 50. I said, what is it? He says, it's $37,500. I said, what's that gonna do? And he says, I don't know what can you do with it? And I did read in my numbers. I said, I can open the doors. That's all I got. He goes, let's open the doors.
I said, I ripped his hand. I ripped his arm off. I took the check, I put it in the bank I bought two ambulances for 15 grand. I put medical supplies on 'em. I got insurance on those bad boys. I got 'em state checked off. I was ready to roll. I got the logos on the shirts. Got a few pens. Got a market.
Uhhuh cards. Uhhuh. I still had the cards. You stole the [00:25:00] cards. Yeah. But all that being said that's basically in a nutshell how I opened up. The company. Okay. And there's a few more chapters of Yeah. The stress that we went through the first three years. I imagine that, yeah. Because at that point you still don't have clients, so you've got, you got ambulances.
Yeah. We don't have to go through all of it right now, but talk a little bit about getting the first client. Yeah, I know that's, there's other challenges, but getting the first one, so my partner, the one that managed his nickname was Wild Card. Okay. Para Paramedic Flight nurse.
All I ever seen this guy did. He never ate, didn't see him put a piece of food in his mouth. For as long as I've known him, he carried around two, two liter. Okay. Bottles, warm bottles of Diet Coke. Caffeine free Diet coke. Two liters you said, right? Two liters. The stuff you drink off of for a week, two of them.[00:26:00]
And never seen him eat a thing. And that's all he carried around was those. And he would just, the two liter just chug dico, and that's all he would drink all day long. All right? And I'm trying to figure it out, but his name was Wildcard and he was on his A game all the time. Like his energy was through the roof and good and bad.
Come to find out. But him and I are sitting there looking at all this, and we're getting our first, and so the state says that you cannot run one patient until you get your state license every day. As soon as we open the doors, I was asking, when are we getting our license? When are we getting our license?
When are we getting our license? We have everything done, and it was literally down to the day that we opened. We were supposed to get it, but the state didn't process it, so it was literally within 24 hours that we were supposed to do it. Wildcard has already told people, patients, people that he knew through his network clinics that we [00:27:00] wanna go ahead and open this up and get it going.
He's getting offered patients. The first one we took, I can't believe I'm saying this on a recorded video, was borderline not one we should have took. Yeah, because literally. I get a picture of wild card loading a patient into our ambulance and closing the doors and driving off several pictures from the Department of Health, the regional director, and he says, Hey, Brian, text me and sends me the picture.
He says, y'all running calls without your license, and I said, thank you. I will address this and no sir, no way, shape, or form are we running calls that might have been a one-off, just something that we were doing as a voluntary thing [00:28:00] and we're not charging anybody for anything. Yep. It was just a courtesy, get this guy home because he had no other way to get home.
And he said, okay. And then the next day. We got our license. Okay. And the next day, the same patient we took home. Did a real call. Yeah. Was a real call man. So that was our first patient. So thank you for bringing that up. Yeah. And making me relive that. Yeah. Yeah. The stress and the kind of the levels and the borders of excitement that you've been on to get this started up are, we can go forever.
Yeah. And I don't know if two sessions is gonna be on there. Yeah. So at this point, you've got the doors open. Yep. And I guess before we go too much farther, just quickly if you could, if nobody knows what an EMS. Company does. Yep. Just loosely define what the industry is. So private EMS is a creature of itself.
You have opportunities and options. You can do mutual aid, you can do, you can try to go after 9 1 1 contracts, you can try to do [00:29:00] just scheduled, transports, whatever you want to do. It's a variance of different things. The things are gonna put the bread and butter on the table Are your scheduled appointments.
The backup, the mutual aid's gonna make you feel good about serving the community. Yep. And then there's another one called the inner facility Transports, which is actually getting patients that have serious medical issues to a higher level of care because they weren't being able to be taken, they needed to be stabilized as fast as possible.
Yeah. There's a few rules that we work off of an EMS, and so you only have so much time if a person has a stroke. You only have so much time. If a person has a cardiac so much time, if a person's, this person's that. And so we try to work in those timelines and parameters, and they need certain drugs, blood clotting, drugs, strug drugs, all these different things to help out if they're in anaphylaxis, if they're having some kind of allergy issue and they need certain things.
So we always try to work in parameters and work with the closest capable hospital. Quick decision stuff, lifesaving stuff that go unappreciated so much in so many different ways. But all that being said. We, that's the last part is you transport sick people [00:30:00] to a higher level of care so they can get that treatment that they need.
Yeah. So there's different variations. You can do a private EMS. Okay. It's a bunch of different services. At the end of the day, it's transporting patients to and from where they need to go. And you get paid by the insurance. Insurance providers, insurance. Yep. Yep. So we're not gonna go too far down this road, but.
Yeah. At the end of, let's say the first year. How were you still one, two ambulances? What did you grown to at that point? Two ambulances, we were running two ambulances. And I was. Almost having no money coming in. And that's gonna lead us to the next topic. Okay. So we'll pause there At this point where you've built something that a lot of people would say you shouldn't have been able to, and you should have stopped No.
At this, but you got there through grit. Termination, patience, grit, determination, patience, drive. Yeah. Sleepless nights. But the last thing too was, is that. And not many people might know this about me or not. And if they do, it's great. And if they don't, that's fine too. And it's a, a topic a lot of people don't wanna talk about.
There's a spiritual aversion as well. Yeah. And the version was for me is I've literally fasted for 40 days, and I don't share that [00:31:00] with a lot of people. Wow. Yeah. I just did liquid fast. I didn't do no nothing. I know I need water to survive, but I didn't eat anything. It was all liquid soup, but just like broth.
Beef broth, chicken broth. And 40 days. And I knew that I needed to outta myself not only physically, mentally, but spiritually. Wow. And so for me that was the turning point to where I was so focused and so engaged that there was no other option. Failure was not an option. And I made sure I covered those three things.
Yeah. I'm excited to hear the rest about where you've gotten to, but we'll pause there. Yeah. But one thing I do. And I'll make you answer this in two parts. One in this week and one next week. One of the things I always like to have people do is give what is their favorite book or movie that they're watching right now or of all time.
But since we're doing it in two parts, you get to answer both. So we'll start if you're reading books, actually, I don't know if you have any favorite books that you've read or are reading or if it's mainly, and if you don't, we can do TV and movies. It's two separate questions. I'm more YouTube motivational.[00:32:00]
Okay. And lately I've been doing a lot of mob movies, so you don't want to get me involved with that because I just had a. I had a situation where one of my upper level managers said, we're getting rid of our, one of our, or we're taking one of our lower level managers out. And I looked at him and I go, no, we're not.
And he goes, what are you taking? He says, he's gonna have to go back to be an EMT. I go, no, we're not. I said, when have you ever asked this guy to do something? And he said, no, number one. Number two, I said. When have you asked them to do things that you didn't want to do? Number two. I said, so I'm like, it's like the mafia.
I said They always have that guy there. Yeah. That they really don't need, but they really need. Yeah. And they really don't wanna act and don't want to do what he needs to do. I said, you need somebody whacked. That's the guy to go do it. I said, and he's looking at me like I'm crazy. He's I'm like, I'm looking at him like I'm crazy.
And I'm like, but that we need that guy. We need it. Yeah. So he's not going anywhere. Okay. I go, we just gotta little do a little bit more coaching and training with this guy a little, if he's a little too hard on people, we just need to work on some softness. Maybe we teach him some phrases.
Let's figure out his [00:33:00] weaknesses and help him be a little stronger, a little bit more patient, but we're not getting rid of him. But YouTube there's so many people I love to hear and I love YouTube for that fact that I can, it, it follows what you like to hear. Yeah. And motivational speakers, all of them.
Yeah. There's just so many and that I follow Les Brown's probably my favorite. Okay. He's just the number one for me, awesome. Yep. Alright, we'll pause here. Yep. Brian, thank you for everything you've walked us through and showing the highs and lows of a journey as you get into the EMS space for the first time.
And we'll see on the next session what it can look like as you continue to grow and expand. Crazy. We got two more stages and I'll make 'em short, I promise. Perfect. All right. Thank you.
