[0:04] Derrick Edwards: I think I had two vehicles for the full year.
[0:24] Derrick Edwards: that they were using and um I went in with it, you know, the standing the gap uh spill because we were actually picking up a uh person from from their facility for a broker and I spoke with the
[0:40] Derrick Edwards: transportation company and they actually agreed and they end up selling the company to another company.
[0:46] Derrick Edwards: So, it was uh just at a stalemate for like three or four months.
[0:50] Derrick Edwards: We didn't we didn't get any business with them.
[0:53] Derrick Edwards: And because we do stretchers, uh the new company called us like, "Hey, uh you guys do stretchers?" And we were like, "Yeah, because here to use a EMT, uh stretches are $1,000, $1,200, $1,600 for around town trip." And
[1:09] Derrick Edwards: we could do it for a third of that.
[1:11] Derrick Edwards: Long as it's not long as it's we'll we'll pull up and we'll take care of you for a third of that.
[1:19] Derrick Edwards: And uh and that's that's one thing I want to talk about.
[1:22] Derrick Edwards: You said where do I see us in 5 years?
[1:24] Derrick Edwards: That's another area what we're going to do.
[1:26] Derrick Edwards: That that's going to take a bigger investment.
[1:28] Derrick Edwards: But um what we want to do probably is get two to four uh four transits kind of equipped like the uh ambulance is with the new electronic uh stretchers that you don't have to use your back to lift
[1:46] Derrick Edwards: up. you know, a woman can go and press the button and load and unload the client.
[1:50] Derrick Edwards: You just have to roll them.
[1:52] Derrick Edwards: Um, what we would like to do is be the only we're the only NEMT company that do stretcher trips in Mobile County.
[1:59] Derrick Edwards: And we do we service five counties.
[2:01] Derrick Edwards: So, we're the only NEMT. So, if someone has to go to a doctor on a stretcher, they have to call the ambulance.
[2:06] Derrick Edwards: But now, they can call us.
[2:08] Derrick Edwards: So, what we're going to do is expand that and go to all the facilities and let them know you don't have to call the ambulance service.
[2:14] Derrick Edwards: If you have someone that needs to go on a stretcher, if it's non-emergency, you can call us.
[2:19] Derrick Edwards: But I don't I don't go to other facilities right now because we only have that one vehicle that we do that with.
[2:24] Derrick Edwards: And I don't want to get overwhelmed or get to a point where we can't service everyone.
[2:28] Derrick Edwards: So, when we're ready, we're going to step out.
[2:30] Derrick Edwards: And I know that we can do that uh because of the amount of money that it will save them.
[2:35] Derrick Edwards: we can save them $800 to $1,000 each trip by using us instead of an ambulance company.
[2:41] Derrick Edwards: So, that's one of the the next phases that we we plan on going going into as well.
[2:48] Nirav Chheda: I like how you have this focus on organic growth for your business because, you know, I mean, not just NEMT, any other industry you go into, people try to bite off more they can chew.
[3:02] Nirav Chheda: I mean, that's one of the biggest sources of of, you know, getting your business in trouble.
[3:07] Nirav Chheda: And you're just on the other side of the spectrum, which is, I think, the right side to be on.
[3:12] Derrick Edwards: Absolutely. So, I have a business partner and his uncle did NEMT in Virginia.
[3:21] Derrick Edwards: He retired. And I would talk to anybody in the beginning that that would give me any information, you know, if they could just point me in direction.
[3:28] Derrick Edwards: If I got one thing from them, you know, I would just keep my notebook, you know, write down everything, keep my notes together and use what I um what could benefit us and or if it was something that
[3:41] Derrick Edwards: I know could hurt us, I would make sure that I would highlight that and stay away from it.
[3:45] Derrick Edwards: But um he was doing NEMT at a time where his they didn't use brokers.
[3:53] Derrick Edwards: They just bill straight to the insurance companies.
[3:57] Derrick Edwards: And when I spoke with him about my plan and how we were doing things, he said, "Man, look, you don't need anything from me.
[4:03] Derrick Edwards: You just need to execute." He said, "You got a you got a great plan and what you what you're doing um is going to work." He but he told me one of his the big thing that I got
[4:14] Derrick Edwards: from him was the organic growth.
[4:17] Derrick Edwards: He said, "Look, I know companies that were out there that we were dealing with, they were making $2 million a year.
[4:23] Derrick Edwards: They would have eight or 10 vans.
[4:25] Derrick Edwards: They were making million dollars a year and they would go out of business in two years because their growth wasn't organic and it was poor management.
[4:35] Derrick Edwards: You know what I mean? So, they may be making a million dollars, but they have $950,000 of overhead.
[4:45] Derrick Edwards: You know, I don't want to be I don't want to do that.
[4:48] Derrick Edwards: That's spinning my wheels. You know what I mean?
[4:50] Derrick Edwards: So, one of the things he told me, he was like, "Look, man, just make sure your growth is organic.
[4:55] Derrick Edwards: Keep your overhead down and um always think about the next phase." Me, and this is a prayer of mine.
[5:04] Derrick Edwards: And I pray this all the time that I ask for multiple streams of income within the same industry.
[5:11] Derrick Edwards: And when I when something hits me, it's like, oh man, why didn't I think of that before?
[5:15] Derrick Edwards: And you know, because, you know, I just taking it step by step and we find a way to do it.
[5:20] Derrick Edwards: So, man, we have a lot to ahead of us, a lot to accomplish.
[5:27] Derrick Edwards: Um, we have a lot of plans.
[5:29] Derrick Edwards: I kind of try to keep them under wraps until the actual, you know, it's actuality.
[5:35] Derrick Edwards: So, um, you know, um, man, we have u we have big plans for the future.
[5:41] Derrick Edwards: We just, uh, we're taking it step by step, though.
[5:44] Nirav Chheda: I like it. I dig it.
[5:47] Derrick Edwards: I was looking forward to this, you know, and my wife was u she was like, she wanted to come.
[5:53] Derrick Edwards: So, I I'm going to come and record you.
[5:54] Derrick Edwards: I said it's going to be on YouTube.
[5:56] Derrick Edwards: You can watch [laughter] it. You can watch it there.
[5:59] Derrick Edwards: But she was just like, "Hey, you got this.
[6:01] Derrick Edwards: Go and, you know, represent us and, you know, just do well because I know that you will." We had a company meeting yesterday.
[6:07] Derrick Edwards: Um, it went great. You know, uh, and our vision and the people that I'm grateful for, you know, that my staff, you know, um, most of my people have been with me since we started, since I started bringing
[6:21] Derrick Edwards: people in and, um, because you just have to treat them right.
[6:26] Derrick Edwards: You don't you don't want to underpay people because they're going to be looking for somewhere else to go and they're gonna also do a okay job if they don't have that that character that high character that moral compass.
[6:41] Derrick Edwards: They're just going to you don't you don't want people to come to work to get a check.
[6:45] Derrick Edwards: You want people to like what they do and then also thinking this job is worth me keeping it.
[6:52] Derrick Edwards: So, you know, you want to try to compensate people accordingly.
[6:55] Derrick Edwards: You know, you you're dealing with grown people and you want to try to pay people a salary that's not going to hurt the company, but allow them to take care of their family as well.
[7:04] Derrick Edwards: You know, so we try to pay people what they worth.
[7:07] Derrick Edwards: Uh I don't know if you could use it, but I had a friend of mine growing up, he just say, "Hey, if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys." So, you know, you got So, you want to pay people
[7:18] Derrick Edwards: according to what you know, uh, how you respect them, you know.
[7:23] Nirav Chheda: I like that you [laughter] pay peanuts, you get monkeys.
[7:26] Nirav Chheda: I'm going to use that. because here's the thing with me.
[7:36] Derrick Edwards: I saw what it was. I saw how difficult it was to get any information.
[7:41] Derrick Edwards: It was like pulling teeth. you cannot get any information on anything.
[7:45] Derrick Edwards: So I had to do a lot of deep research.
[7:48] Derrick Edwards: If I can help people with with uh you know with good information because you know a lot of people get into this industry and get out and some get in and they struggle because they don't have the correct
[8:00] Derrick Edwards: guidance. You know uh me um you're not going to outwork me.
[8:06] Derrick Edwards: I've always been the same person.
[8:08] Derrick Edwards: You know, I'm up before you up.
[8:10] Derrick Edwards: And by the time they get out of the bed at 9 or 10:00 and moving around 11 or 12, I'm on to tomorrow because I'm up at 4:30 or 5 every day, you know, and I stay till the
[8:20] Derrick Edwards: job is done. So, you're not going to outwork me.
[8:22] Derrick Edwards: I'm just going to I'm going to work.
[8:24] Derrick Edwards: I'm going to work efficiently. I'm going to figure out what I need to figure out for the business.
[8:29] Derrick Edwards: And um you know, I just I lead by example.
[8:33] Derrick Edwards: So, you know, um if I can help someone miss the hurdles that I had to cross, you know, then I would, you know, one thing I would do different probably is just, you know, I would probably start with
[8:49] Derrick Edwards: uh wheelchair van. That's ambulatory and wheelchair because I could have made so much more money faster.
[8:57] Derrick Edwards: But, you know, my first year we did great.
[9:00] Derrick Edwards: We did great. you know, we did really good.
[9:04] Derrick Edwards: Our first year, we did almost you know, and and one broker, we almost made I think we made about 90,000, almost 100,000 from one broker and without getting fair rates.
[9:19] Derrick Edwards: Without getting fair rates. Now, think about this.
[9:21] Derrick Edwards: We were not getting paid what we should have been getting paid.
[9:23] Derrick Edwards: And we still did a lot of money.
[9:25] Derrick Edwards: But I was working from the top of the day to the to the evening alone.
[9:30] Derrick Edwards: 175K in topline revenue. How many Uh I think I had two vehicles for the full year.
[9:41] Derrick Edwards: I got my first wheelchair van using it until almost February because in December all the rides are out, all the brokers are slow down and you know you got the Christmas holidays, then you have the New Year's holidays.
[10:05] Derrick Edwards: appointments kind of crank up again around the second week of January going into February.
[10:10] Derrick Edwards: So you know that that I was basically doing all ambulatory trips and we made good money.
[10:20] Derrick Edwards: I learned how to negotiate as well.
[10:22] Derrick Edwards: You know, that's another tool like don't, you know, get your worth.
[10:27] Derrick Edwards: You know, if don't overcharge, don't undercharge.
[10:30] Derrick Edwards: Don't beat yourself. You know, you have to charge a rate that's fair.
[10:33] Derrick Edwards: And if you're given a fair rate and you know you're going to give great service, just stick to that.
[10:39] Derrick Edwards: Sometimes they might just say, "Okay, let me find someone cheaper." And they might do that, but that's okay.
[10:44] Derrick Edwards: they'll be back because if your service is great, the people that you transport, they're going to request you.
[10:50] Derrick Edwards: We get request request. We can't fill all our requests.
[10:53] Derrick Edwards: If you look at some of our broker list and the trips that they send over, you'll see in the comments, client request Premier Transit.
[11:01] Derrick Edwards: Client only wants to ride with Premier Transit and we can't even service them all.
[11:06] Derrick Edwards: And that's a great problem I have.
[11:08] Nirav Chheda: You're in a good spot. I'm so excited about this year.
[11:12] Derrick Edwards: Me, too. next year this time and we should be in a great space.
[11:17] Derrick Edwards: If the growth continues at the rate it is and and the expansion into the other areas, man, this I'm looking so forward to just completing things this year.
[11:31] Nirav Chheda: That's awesome, man. I'm so happy for Thank you.
[11:34] Derrick Edwards: Thank you. But I'm happy for you guys because we need the industry needed Bambi.
[11:39] Derrick Edwards: We need a user friendly but not popcorn because I've seen apps that were so simple that they were like this not gonna work, you know, this is not good.
[11:52] Derrick Edwards: You know what I mean? It was too cheesy.
[11:55] Derrick Edwards: And I've seen them that were like you have to do chemistry and algebra to figure out the formulas of how to use this stuff.
[12:03] Derrick Edwards: That's not good. And I've seen them where everything's a add-on.
[12:08] Derrick Edwards: It's $50 a vehicle. It's $50 to add a driver.
[12:11] Derrick Edwards: It's $50 to add uh uh the maps.
[12:14] Derrick Edwards: It's $50, you know. So, for each vehicle, you're looking around, you're paying $300, $400.
[12:18] Derrick Edwards: You can't afford that in this industry.
[12:21] Derrick Edwards: You can't pay 250, 200, $300 for one vehicle in in the software to run your company.
[12:29] Derrick Edwards: So, one of the major companies that I looked at, they were so expens I kind of liked the software even though it was a little complicated when and when I did the demo with the uh the live zoom
[12:41] Derrick Edwards: with the person, but when I got into the started figuring out the factors and I was a new company at this time, uh it was like $50 per vehicle.
[12:50] Derrick Edwards: Then it was $50 to add the driver to that vehicle.
[12:53] Derrick Edwards: It was $50 to add like notifications to the to the client that you arrive to use the maps to, you know, when I looked around it was like almost $300 per vehicle.
[13:06] Derrick Edwards: And you're a new company, you just can't afford that, you know.
[13:09] Derrick Edwards: So, they're they're they they're overpricing what they do.
[13:14] Derrick Edwards: So, and I'm thinking I'm already thinking ahead at this time.
[13:17] Derrick Edwards: I had two maybe three vehicles and I'm thinking man that would be $1,000 $800 a month just for routing software and I'm not going to do that because you know at the end of the year I'm going to
[13:30] Derrick Edwards: have six vehicles you know with the way that we were making progress and adding on to the company and reinvesting and I'm like just adding up I'm like no that's just going to be too expensive.
[13:41] Derrick Edwards: So, when I saw you guys on the MJ podcast and uh I, you know, clicked on the link and I talked to Max and and when he gave me the price, I almost didn't believe it.
[13:53] Derrick Edwards: I said, "Okay, so what else goes with this?" You know, so he gave me the price per vehicle and that's and that's I was like, "Okay, so I'm waiting on these hidden." Now, if you want to um add
[14:05] Derrick Edwards: a period, it's going to be another $50.
[14:07] Derrick Edwards: If you want an exclamation point, I was waiting on all that, but that wasn't the case.
[14:11] Derrick Edwards: And I was like, "Okay, well, man, well, let me make sure the software is good.
[14:16] Derrick Edwards: Make make sure that this is this can work for us." And I was like, "All right, man.
[14:20] Derrick Edwards: I that's why I never that I feel like, you know, always God always lead me in the right direction because I pray for the best direction to take the company in." And I think I never jumped on any
[14:31] Derrick Edwards: other software and just did it myself because I was waiting on the right one.
[14:35] Derrick Edwards: And you guys came, Bambi came and it was Hey, I knew it was right from the very beginning.
[14:44] Derrick Edwards: You affordable, user friendly. My back office learn it fast.
[14:49] Derrick Edwards: Uh my drivers can use it well with the app, you know, and I like the guys, you guys are not 100%, but you're 90 something.
[14:58] Derrick Edwards: 90 something. And any suggestions that we have, you guys like, hey, we're working on it.
[15:03] Derrick Edwards: We we a lot of times I say I might have a suggestion and you're already working on it.
[15:08] Derrick Edwards: You you know what I'm saying?
[15:09] Derrick Edwards: you're already working on getting it done.
[15:12] Derrick Edwards: So, you know, uh I look forward to just growing with you guys and continue to work with you guys.
[15:16] Derrick Edwards: Man, I I love what you're doing.
[15:18] Derrick Edwards: Just stay affordable, stay reachable, um and you know, continue to put the companies first because, you know, we're going to make sure you guys are great, but is going to blow up, man.
[15:29] Derrick Edwards: When more people learn about your company, these other softwares are in That's my opinion, and I know good when I see it.
[15:38] Derrick Edwards: Run, Bambi, run Bambi, run. Uh, my people already asking.
[15:46] Derrick Edwards: They like, "Oh, I want to see it." I said, "Hold up.
[15:48] Derrick Edwards: We got to record it first." We have a total of eight people with drivers in office.
[15:58] Derrick Edwards: That's all. And you? Some of them about two of those they you know maybe drive one day a week or one guy is retired and he may not even drive this month you know just here and there plug
[16:10] Derrick Edwards: in. So you know we basically running with about six people.
[16:14] Nirav Chheda: You know our run Bambi run button do you use that on a regular basis?
[16:20] Derrick Edwards: So Max asked me that the other day and I have a you know I have a scheduling background.
[16:26] Derrick Edwards: So uh I do use it.
[16:31] Derrick Edwards: The way I use it is okay I know all my clients.
[16:36] Derrick Edwards: So I know that this person needs this type of van.
[16:38] Derrick Edwards: This person likes to go with me.
[16:40] Derrick Edwards: This person you know what I mean?
[16:41] Derrick Edwards: So uh this person has a because you got to know what you're doing.
[16:45] Derrick Edwards: Uh the electric wheelchairs they're four or 500 lb.
[16:48] Derrick Edwards: So if you have somebody that's bariatric that may be 275 300 lb up, your lift has a 800 lb capacity.
[16:56] Derrick Edwards: You know what I'm saying? So you may have to send the other vehicle.
[16:59] Derrick Edwards: So if you have certain certain uh people that ride in certain vehicles for certain reasons, what I would do is just go ahead and place them where they need to be placed.
[17:09] Derrick Edwards: And then I didn't know about this when Max told me about the lock feature where you can lock those trips because if you place them where they want to go and then you use run Bambi Run, it'll rearrange
[17:19] Derrick Edwards: everything. It'll move. So they're like, "Hold up.
[17:21] Derrick Edwards: I thought I had Miss Johnson with me.
[17:23] Derrick Edwards: Now he's over here with John or over here with Mike." And I know I put them here.
[17:27] Derrick Edwards: So you have to lock them in.
[17:28] Derrick Edwards: Once you set people that have to go with certain places or certain vehicles, lock them in.
[17:33] Derrick Edwards: Then use Run Bambi Run and it'll, you know, kind of do everything.
[17:37] Derrick Edwards: Then you may have one or two trips that you may have to place yourself because when you have will calls, what I recognize with um with Bambi is when you have will calls, it kind of uses will calls
[17:49] Derrick Edwards: like it's a definite time. So it won't put a trip in that time, but you can move them over there because most will calls are not going to be at that time anyway.
[17:58] Derrick Edwards: So yeah, that's the way I use run.
[18:01] Derrick Edwards: And I didn't know until this past week when Max told me about the lock feature to go ahead and lock the trip in then use run Bambi Run that makes it easy.
[18:11] Derrick Edwards: So yeah. yeah, [snorts] I will use it under those pretenses and sometimes if I look at the list of what's going on and I don't have it's always somebody that I have to place because somebody's in electric wheelchair,
[18:24] Derrick Edwards: somebody has you know an attendant going with them.
[18:28] Derrick Edwards: They may be, you know, it's it's some some people that I have to place, but rarely do I don't have to put anyone in a specific vehicle or time or with a specific driver.
[18:39] Derrick Edwards: But if not, then I use Bambi and just let it kind of do its thing and then I'll place anything else that's left where it needs to go or those are the ways that I use them.
[18:51] Nirav Chheda: good to know. Yeah, just curious to know because I mean this is this is one of the first things that we built and um just curious to know like how much of the heavy lifting you let it do
[19:03] Derrick Edwards: on a regular basis. Yeah, it's a um it's a great concept.
[19:08] Derrick Edwards: uh me and you know my wife and even my partners or some of my people they always tell me even with other businesses whatever I'm doing that I um I like to do all the work you know what
[19:22] Derrick Edwards: I mean I just feel better about me doing things you know I'm not a micromanager but you know I am a manager I want to make sure that things are like they're supposed to be so the beginning I
[19:35] Derrick Edwards: didn't use it as much because I would and schedule everything because I'm used to scheduling.
[19:40] Derrick Edwards: But it was it was much faster than typing everything into Excel, moving around, you know, you know, based on time and all that type of stuff.
[19:49] Derrick Edwards: So even once we had the trips in, I would make sure like I dispatch our back office, put all the trips in for those days and I could go in and just I would just go ahead and schedule.
[19:58] Derrick Edwards: But now I'm using it a little more as I got more comfortable with the software and I'm seeing the pros of it, you know.
[20:06] Derrick Edwards: So I use it a little more, but I it's not like uh I don't just 100% use it, you know.
[20:12] Derrick Edwards: I don't think nobody can if you if you have specific uh clients that have to ride in specific vehicles, specific times with certain drivers or whatever that this guy may handle this person better, have more experienced than the
[20:27] Derrick Edwards: new guy. I need to send, you know, this person.
[20:30] Derrick Edwards: So, um, you know, you may not be able to 100% use it once you, you know, once you put people where it's supposed to be, then you can use it.
[20:38] Derrick Edwards: But I started to use it more as I got more comfortable with Bambi.
[20:45] Nirav Chheda: Okay. Good to hear. Yeah. It was never going to be like a 100%, but the idea is like, hey, it can get you 90% there and cut down a lot of the time you spend every day.
[20:54] Nirav Chheda: So that's it's good to know that, you know, it's actually, you know, working for you.
[20:59] Derrick Edwards: Yeah, it it's getting me home earlier.
[21:01] Derrick Edwards: I mean, for real. And if I stay late, I can be working on something else, not that, you know what I mean?
[21:06] Derrick Edwards: Not trying to schedule trips for tomorrow, you know, doing doing everything by hand.
[21:12] Derrick Edwards: Um, it just became a once we started to hit the 7500 trip a week threshold, I just couldn't do it anymore.
[21:23] Derrick Edwards: could do it, but I knew I needed to find a software that worked, a dispatch software that was good for us, that worked for us.
[21:29] Derrick Edwards: And and man, I I'll tell you, my wife and I have been talking about it for months anyway.
[21:35] Derrick Edwards: But in that two weeks uh prior to running into the MJ uh video on YouTube and about the Bambi situation, uh I was just like, we were almost every day like, "Hey, man, we got to find some software.
[21:48] Derrick Edwards: We got to because it was a couple that we were considering." And and when I saw this and I told my wife, I said, "Hey, check this out." And she like, "Oh, when are you going to talk to
[21:56] Derrick Edwards: him? I think that's the one, you know." So, uh, you know, the rest is history, man.
[22:01] Derrick Edwards: I'm so glad I found you guys, man, because uh, you're You know, you're user friendly.
[22:08] Derrick Edwards: Like I say, you know, we hired a girl, a young lady, um, last week.
[22:12] Derrick Edwards: She started Monday and we started showing her how to input trips, you know, how to move things around when the drivers will call in and you know, I didn't have to show her too much.
[22:24] Derrick Edwards: I mean, she's a smart girl, smart, smart young lady.
[22:27] Derrick Edwards: She's a college student. Uh, but still, you know, it it's not like a huge learning curve at And that's important.
[22:37] Nirav Chheda: You you are Bambi's marketing team.
[22:39] Derrick Edwards: That's it, Derek. Just don't just don't forget about me when you guys blow up.
[22:55] Derrick Edwards: All right. All right. All right.
[22:56] Derrick Edwards: I got you on Facebook. Welcome to it.
[22:57] Nirav Chheda: This is This is recorded right now.
[22:59] Derrick Edwards: Recorded. This is a recorded conversation.
[23:01] Derrick Edwards: Yes. My wife told me to ask you that and I'mma tell him.
[23:03] Derrick Edwards: He agreed. My grandfather. Run. Run.
[23:09] Nirav Chheda: Run. Bambi, run. Do that again.
[23:13] Derrick Edwards: Run, Bambi, run. [laughter]
