May 27, 2025 • 35 mins
Chuck Bailey, Founder & CEO of True North LLC, blends 26+ years of operational expertise with a passion for helping businesses grow. Since 2012, he’s led True North’s nationwide consulting and back-office services, driving client success, community impact, and entrepreneurial ventures across multiple industries.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
And welcome in. This is the CEOs You Should Know podcast.
I'm your host Johnny Hartwell, let's say a load to
Chuck Bailey of True North. Great to be with you today.
We're really excited.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Joe tell us everything we need to know about your company. Hey,
True North is a company that nobody knows. We are
a business outsourcing firm based in Chester, West Virginia. Imagine that,
and we provide services to companies across the country, ranging
from bookkeeping to medical billing and consulting and real estate services.
(00:38):
But the biggest thing is that it's really boring from
time to time to be in that business. The reality
is we're a data company and that's what's exciting. And
one of the things that we're really excited that we're
working on is the chester Fall Badge, which has been
around for twenty three years. It's a one point seven
million dollar charity event. We're on one day of the year.
(01:03):
We give out one point seven million dollars that benefits
the Chester Volunteer Fire Department.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
So this is a charity event, but everybody's invited to
the bash. Everybody's invited to the bashe This is available
online at Chesterfallbash dot com. But it's an in person
event at Mountaineer Casino, Racetrack and Resort. We will put up.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
The big top, have a live event and drawings throughout
the day. And one of the biggest things is that
we got involved in this thing about six years ago
when demographics were changing and it was an old school
raffle fundraiser, and we took and we modernized it, and
we used data to understand what the Fallbash customers wanted
(01:45):
and what they needed to.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Get excited about this program. All right, so get us excited?
What to you know? One point seven million dollars in prizes?
What can they win and how do they win? It's
and the date is September twentieth, correct, this.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Is September twentieth, twenty twenty five at mountain Air Casino.
And again it's twenty three years in the making. And
there are five different games that you can play throughout
the day. And remember these tickets sell out months in advance,
so we're will be sold out by July and then
the Fall Bash will be conducted throughout the day. Prizes
(02:21):
win a new escalade, win one hundred thousand dollars in cash,
and the way this works is just like the lotto
ball drawings. The firemen are up on the stage drawing
those four balls, and when your number comes up, they're
writing you a check for one hundred grand or a
brand new escalade or a range of other prizes from
(02:42):
guns to ATVs and related items.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
That is cool. That is cool, all right. So take
me back twenty three years ago. It started out as
just a small, little raffle, kind of little fundraiser kind
of thing. When did you get involved and how has
it grown over the last couple of years. So twenty
three years ago, the Chester All Volunteer Fire Department. These
are guys that live in the community. I live in Chester,
(03:09):
West Virginia. It's my hometown. It's where my wife grew up.
I grew up in Western Pennsylvania. She grew up in
West Virginia.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
And after college we met, we went off, traveled around
the country in my corporate life and came back to
the community. And when I came back to the community,
one of the big opportunities was to get involved in
that community. And I got the meeting that I got
the opportunity to meet these guys in our community that
(03:39):
really make a difference every day. They volunteered their time
to protect our community, but they needed a way to
raise money.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
They needed equipment.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
Training is expensive, safety year is expensive, and they started
this little raffled like any other volunteer community organization does.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
And what they did is.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
They grew this over time from BINGO and ultimately came
up with this event, a fall festival called the Fall Bash,
and it's been an institution. It really is an opportunity
to bring the community together with five to six thousand
people and all volunteers from the community staffing this event
for one purpose. It's to raise money for the fire
(04:19):
department to buy new equipment. And all those organizations that
participate and help out during the day, they earn money
for their little league baseball team or the high school
track team, and it's their way to come together on
one single day.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
You know, I have a soft spot for fireman my
father who passed away in two thousand and three. I
grew up in a little town just north of Pittsburgh
and New Wilmington. He started the first ambulance service in town.
And once he got you know that started, it was
housed in the fire department, and so he got roped
(04:54):
into becoming a volunteer and then he rose up the
ranks until he was the fire chief. And I know
the commitment that these volunteers have on a daily base.
They have a regular job, but if they're available at
that sound of that whistle, they're going to be there
helping their neighbors. And so that's the kind of commitment
these volunteers have.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
And you know that is exactly right. That sound of
the whistle is really interesting. In today's world, the technology
is available to ring a cell phone, ring a pager,
but in the community where the Chester Volunteer Fire Department is,
when there is an emergency event and these guys get
(05:38):
paged or their cell phone rings, there's also a fire
whistle that goes off in that town. And that goes
off for one reason. It's to remind the community that
their neighbors are jumping out of bed and running down
to the fire department to get in that truck to
go help someone that's fallen off a ladder.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
And never are these emergencies scheduled. You never know. You
could be at a you know, a Memorial Day picnic.
That whistle goes They're gone, they are gone.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
And so that's why you know, Chief Hissam of the
Fire Department really came up with the Bash was to
find ways to raise money to keep these guys engaged.
What gets them excited is about new equipment, new technology,
and a facility that is representative of the kind of
(06:28):
work that they want to do in their community. And
five years ago Chief Hissim came to me and he said, hey,
we you know, we want to sell some BASH tickets
on the internet. Go let's go do that internet thing and.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
Sort it out.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
Well, you know, true North, as I said before, you know,
we're we'ren't accounting in a medical billing and a technology
services firm working with companies in forty eight states, but
we're really a data company and we leverage data. In
most recent we are leaning full into AI technology to
(07:04):
improve what we do for our clients. But we went
to Chief Hissam and said, hey, we can do this.
So we put up a website, we put up social media,
we did all the things that people normally do. What
we really did was try to understand the type of
customers and we truly call them customers, know what they
(07:27):
wanted in an experience and how we could get them
to play these games and off we went. Five years later,
we are selling over a million dollars of tickets online.
We still have the old school mail in raffles, but
it's a live stream event. We get to showcase the
fireman and the technology, and most importantly, I think showcase
(07:49):
the personality that they have when they're up on the
stage engaging with the community. It's just a ton of fun.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
So streaming, how does that work? So I can buy
tickets but I don't have to physically be there, and
I could win that escalade by watching the stream. Well,
we really want people to come to the event. That's
the goal. Okay, come there because it is.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
A community event. It's a way that we can bring
thousands of people into one facility one day and get
that true fall, beautiful weather day experience. But yes, we
can do that online at chesterfallbash dot com. All the
drawings are streamed, all the prizes are posted on the website.
(08:30):
And not only do members of the community come together,
but people drive from hundreds of miles away. They camp
for the weekend, they have watch parties in their backyard
with the big screen TV, and they simply get a
chance to have fun and play some games.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Well, listen. If I have a chance to win an
escalade or a one hundred thousand dollars, I want to
be there. I want to now, Can I can I?
Since you work AI on me, can I work AI
and figure out how I can win that escalade? Unfortunate?
Speaker 2 (09:00):
No? No, yeah, this is you know, this is one
of the things that's really really interesting about this event.
And I'm an AI, I'm a data guy. I'm sixty
one years old. I got enough, just enough gray hair
to get away with saying anything, but not so much
gray hair that they're ready to dismiss me yet. No.
And so, in twenty three years of doing this, given
(09:23):
away more than thirty million dollars, there's not been one
instance of fraud, deception, or mistrust that's come into this organization.
It's totally amazing.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
Do you get people who mistrust the process?
Speaker 2 (09:38):
Well, I think anytime there's money involved, there's always a skeptic.
You know, there's insiders, you know these There's nothing more
random than four balls in a certified lotto ball machine
that randomly will give you the numbers, and that is
the only way that you can win. In fact, the
(09:59):
firemen themselves aren't allowed to participate in the games, just
to keep it totally honest. But this is one of
the best organizations I've had the opportunity to be around
in my you know, sixty years, forty years in business,
and it's just it's just a great.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
Day, all right. So it's a great day. You win
all these prizes. But I think one thing that we
we we didn't mention is is there going to be
beer offered at the big tent.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
So one of the things that has been a staple
in hallmark of this event for years is they roll
in the beer trucks. Your ticket gets you admission to
the festival grounds, which is unlimited adult beverages, as we say,
unlimited soft drinks and snacks and associated items nice.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
What else goes on at the at the bash.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
So there's there's music, there is side games are probably
one of the funnest things to do. There's what they
call side games randomly for our fans that are guns,
that are hunters, that are sportsmen. There'll be some very
unique guns that go up for raffle and they'll sell
(11:13):
tickets for those as well as ATVs and other types
of things. So the side games, the energy, the tear offs,
it's a social event, but it's.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
Also a game of chance day. But ultimately it goes
to a great cause. It does go to a great cause.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
And one of the things that the Chester Volunteer Fire
Department does is they give back to the community. So
not only the day of the bash do they give
fifteen hundred dollars to every local organization. There's more than
twenty of them that volunteer to help out that day.
They give them fifteen hundred dollars to buy new soccer
balls and whatever they want to do. The parents will
(11:52):
come out and volunteer that day, but they also give
back to the community. The Fire Department recently built a
brand new music stage for the in the in the
City Park. They sponsored the fireworks show and multiple other
events during the year that really bring the community together.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
So ultimately this is a huge community events.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
It is and and and so you know, when you
think about you know why, you know, our company, True
North is headquartered in Chester, West Virginia. I had lived
all over the country, in Chicago and Philadelphia and San
Antonio throughout you know, my wife and my thirty eight
years of marriage and four kids that had born in
(12:34):
every part of the country. But you know, I got
on one too many planes to China one day and
I thought, there there has to be something more out there.
And I had the opportunity to restart, move my family
back to western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, south eastern Ohio and
(12:55):
build a company that was all the things that I
had aspired to throughout my career. And that's where True
North came from. It was the opportunity to build something
in the framework that I thought could make a difference,
and we wanted to hire local people that were from,
(13:17):
you know, a depressed area the country, the Ohio Valley
steel mills, the pottery industry has been challenged for many years,
and I was able to bring some of these ideas
that I had and literally started this business in an
upstairs bedroom in my house. And today we now have
five divisions, multiple brands, eighty employees that are part of
(13:41):
our community. They're active doing many of the same things
that we do, such as for the Fall Badge. But
it's a company that just delivers amazing energy to that
local community.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Well, let's talk about the company. The name True North,
Why what what? How did you come up with the
name and is there a meaning behind the name there is,
so there's actually two meetings behind it.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
The first one is more kind of intellectual, right, so
it's it's in my corporate world for corporate life. For
twenty seven years before I formed the company. One of
the things I learned is it's the small things that
really make a difference in business. When you look at
two companies, what's the difference between a company that's great
(14:28):
and a company that's maybe just average, And it's just
that little bit of difference. And that's the difference between
north and true North. I was told when I was
going to school, if I if I set off on
a course, and I'm not a sailor, but if I
if I miss read the directions by just a couple
of degrees north versus true North, I will miss North
(14:49):
America completely. And so it was the little things that mattered.
And I saw in the companies that we wanted to service,
they were being underserved by by the companies that were
providing the services to them. And I wanted to make
that last little difference. But the other thing, though, is
true north is about the heart, all right, It's about
(15:10):
finding your true north. I had been somewhat disenfranchised by
Corporate America. I was missing my kid's soccer games. What
did you do prior to True North? So I ran
big companies. I was an industrial guy. I was a
manufacturing guy. I was working with large fortune, one hundred, fortune,
one thousand organizations, traveling all over the world. And I
(15:34):
thought the goal in life, you know, after growing up
on a farm in western Pennsylvania, it was to go
do what you saw on TV. And I did that
for twenty six years. You know, I went from having
the corporate jet on call, but realizing there was a
whole lot more that wasn't your calling, that wasn't my calling.
As I said, I grew up on a farm. You know,
(15:54):
my father never graduated from high school. You know, we
didn't have two nickels to rub together there and and
I learned the value of hard work. But you know,
my dad, my mother, they were entrepreneurs. They were they
were always looking to take a risk and trying to
do something new and and one of the big risks
that we took was trying to find a way to
(16:16):
afford Carnegie Mellon University. This this kid on a farm
in western Pennsylvania gets to go to the big city
and you know, two of my roommates had perfect scores
on the SAT you know, which was shocking to me.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
But but anyway, but obviously you had potential to go there, Yeah,
I had. I was blessed that.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
I had, you know, was blessed with athletics, got to
play a little football there. I was blessed academically, you know,
learning to work hard and study and all that, and
and and and and I got a great education. And
most of my roommates, uh, throughout the four years over
at Carnegie Mellon, they were tech guys. They were guys
that were always the smartest guys in the room. And
(17:01):
I went off to that industrial manufacturing path and the
printing industry, and they went down the tech path. But
I think I still had that in my heart that
I knew I wanted to do something like that in
the future. And after twenty six years, I had the
opportunity to go build True North, do it in the
(17:21):
framework of my heart of what I wanted to do
and what type of employer I wanted to be, but
also to leverage some of the technology that from thirty
years prior my roommates were doing while I was sleeping.
Is this your passion, you know what. I can't wait
to get up every morning. As I said, I turned
(17:41):
sixty one years old here recently, and I've never been
more excited in my life than about what's possible than
I am today. We have our core True North business.
We are today a couple of weeks away from moving
into a brand new thirty one one thousand square foot
corporate headquarters in East Liverpool, Ohio. It's a remodeled nineteen
(18:06):
twenty four jcpenny building and it's in the historic Fifth
Street area of a beat up little old town called
East Liverpool, Ohio.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
Well, True North is just one of the companies that
you run. That's kind of the umbrella company. And what
other companies and what other facets, And I'm just curious
of what made you choose those different companies.
Speaker 2 (18:29):
So True North is our flagship brand. It's where it
all started, and that is our accounting, consulting and revenue
cycle management business that we provide to primarily healthcare companies
in forty eight states. But from there we began to
expand my tech guy background. I had the opportunity to
(18:51):
go build a company called Nerds to Go.
Speaker 1 (18:54):
It's a franchise.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
Some of my friends are in the franchising industry, and
I had the opportunity to buy Nerge to Go business
for Pittsburgh and we serve local businesses with technology services.
We then expanded into real estate management. A good friend
of mine from Causa Enterprises, Craig Causa, is a big
commercial real estate developer in the market. We do all
(19:16):
of his accounting and bookkeeping work. And he said, I
really need help managing our leases and our commercial portfolio.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
And I said, well, we have a solution for that.
Let's go build it.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
And we build a commercial real estate solutions business called
my Commercial real Estate Solutions.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
Imagine that.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
We then wanted to expand more into the franchising world,
and my friends and our clients started calling us and said,
we need a solution. I said, well, there's just a
couple of degrees difference between good and great. Let's go
make it great. And we built my franchise Bookkeeper. We
now supply accounting and bookkeeping services to franchises in thirty
(19:54):
five states.
Speaker 1 (19:54):
Now you're like the Mark Cuban, how I feel like
I'm on Shark Tank interviewing, you know, because how many
comes up with a great idea, you analyze it and
if it makes sense, you capture that well.
Speaker 2 (20:05):
So it's interesting that we actually throw away ten ideas
for everyone that we really do. We take a lot
of risk, but we don't do it without actually understanding
what this business is and if we can make a difference.
And it goes back to what I mentioned about true
and worth being just a couple of degrees between good
(20:26):
and great, and if we think we can make that
difference of a couple of degrees, then we're going to
go do it. And in fact, we are getting ready
to launch a new business of all things.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Imagine that in a couple of weeks called Latitude forty Digital.
What is that.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Latitude forty Digital is an AI enabled digital marketing company.
If you look around today, every guy in his basement
is a digital marketer or a creator. The reality of
it is eighty percent of it is probably just a
load of crap, and the difference it is the twenty
percent that's done right is really going to change the world.
(21:04):
And when I look at AI in general, I think
that is like the dot com was of nineteen ninety eight,
eighty percent of all the dot com companies were going
to fail and the twenty percent that made it changed
our world forever. I think AI is exactly the same thing,
is that two years from now, eighty percent of everything
(21:27):
that we're seeing with talking babies or dancing babies on
the internet will be gone, but the twenty percent that
comes out will change forever. And that's what we're doing
with the Latitude forty Digital, with True North, with my
franchise Bookkeeper, with my commercial real estate solutions, and our
security company called Advanced Security Technologies. We're on the twenty
(21:51):
percent side of that line where we can actually go
change the world.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
You're really kind of a renaissance man, aren't you. You
went from being a farm boy Matt going to Carnegie Mellon,
being athletic, but also brave enough to start a company
called Nerds on the Go. You're a little bit of everything,
aren't you. Well, you know it's fun.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
If it's fun, I'm going to go after and go
do it. But if there's an opportunity to go create
a great place for our team members to work, I
think that's what's really important for me in this part
of my career. And as I said, you know your questioned,
you know what was true and worth all about. Part
of it is what's in the heart. I would put
our employees up against any employees in the world in
(22:36):
terms of their commitment to our customers and their ability
to represent our brand when the one's looking. We implemented
unlimited PTO policies when when I first started the company
twelve years ago, when nobody knew what unlimited PTO meant,
and CEOs were afraid of that sure, and what that
(22:59):
is is a thought process that says, as a CEO,
I can take vacation anytime I want. I can go
to my grandson's baseball game, or I can go take
my mom to the doctor. And if I can do that,
why can't everybody in our company do that?
Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yet? I think that's a smart thing to do, especially
if you have an environment where it's fun and educational
and exciting. You know, you may not take the time
off because you're going to work where it's fun and
it's interesting and creative and you're giving people a chance
to grow. And so it's almost like, yeah, you can
(23:37):
have all the PTO you want, but you know what,
here's a great place to work. I don't have to
take time off because if I'm going into work. It's
not really work if it's fun.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
So that is really the key to why we built
this new corporate headquarters. It's a Silicon Valley meets East Liverpool,
Ohio rust belt, and it's very edgy, you know, with
coffee bars and lots of glass and cool spaces and
all that. The reality is that very few of our
(24:07):
customers will ever come to that building, and we are
a business where really all of our employees could work
from home. But the reality is they asked me to
build it. They wanted to be together, they wanted a
cool place to work, they wanted a place where they
could come in and get energy from the space. And
that's why we built it. We decided to go do
(24:30):
something for our team and they had a big part
of the design of that. Do you think this is
something that's going to grow the region. Well, it's a
huge opportunity to put eighty high paying jobs on the
streets in a town that has suffered eighty percent population
loss over the last thirty years. And this is really
(24:51):
commonplace for many small towns in the Ohio Valley. And
when we put four million dollars of payroll on the
street in two weeks. It has to have a profound impact,
from the local coffee shop on the corner, to the
restaurant down the street, to the school district that is
(25:11):
ideally going to pump out some interns that we can
bring into the company. It has to have an impact.
Where are you getting your employees? Are they locally?
Speaker 1 (25:21):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (25:21):
So that's what's most exciting is this building is not
only a place for our employees, but it's actually our
greatest recruiting tool. So now that we're building this facility,
it's becoming a showcase in the community. We get resumes
every day from people that would not have given a
(25:44):
small town company a shot. They're thinking about, maybe this
is a fun place to work. Here's the other thing, too,
is we've had the opportunity over the last two years
to hire four of the top graduates out of both
West Virginia University and Youngstown State that are from these
(26:04):
communities that would have otherwise moved out and went on
somewhere else. We're actually in the talent import business now,
which is really exciting.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
You know. And there's something about you know this area,
and I'm talking about the Tri State area that the
people have a great work ethic. Do you find that true?
Speaker 2 (26:25):
That is absolutely true, and it was one of the
reasons why I wanted this to start the business. Here
many people are well educated but underemployed, and they have
to travel great distances to be able to find the
type of company that would be fulfilling for them. And
my goal with True North was to be that company
(26:48):
because I knew that the work ethic was there. And
one of the things that was important to me was
to bring a global or at least national perspective into
the local community because maybe they've never had the opportunity
to work outside the local area. So we spend a
lot of time teaching our team what good looks like.
(27:10):
That's where I had the biggest growth in my career.
As a farm kid from western Pennsylvania, I had the
opportunity to go to a great university. I had the
opportunity to work for a European based company and travel
to Europe. I had the opportunity to go get my
master's degree at the University of Cambridge in England, and
all of that taught me one thing is what good
(27:33):
looks like. And so now that we can start to
understand what good looks like we can compete with large,
world class companies using talent that is fully committed and
will answer that phone when none of our customers are
excuse me, none of our competitors went so the fun.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
You're in forty eight states now, as their plans to
expand worldwide, I think we're.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Focused on the US domestic market. You know, we're a
company that has its skills in providing business outsourcing services
to companies ranging from startups to about thirty forty million
dollars in size. That's our sweet spot. We're not going
to We're not going to work for billion dollar companies.
We love small businesses, we love entrepreneurs, we love family
(28:23):
owned businesses, and if we can do things to give
them a competitive edge, that's what we're.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Going to do. You know, I've never been afraid to
ask a question, but I'm a little hesitant to ask
this one because I have no idea where it's going
to go. What's the future of True North? So as
he grins, because I could tell the one.
Speaker 2 (28:46):
Thing is my team is figuring out a plan of
when they can kick me out. But there is there
is a plan behind it though, I there is a
succession plan. I was blessed with ten years ago hiring
another we call him expats, a gentleman by the name
of Drew Cooper. Drew grew up in East.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
Liverpool, Ohio.
Speaker 2 (29:06):
He moved away, went to the Naval Academy, spent fifteen
years like I did, away from the community, but through
an opportunity and family situation, he had the great opportunity
to come back to the community and through Drew's military
career in the Navy, through working for multiple companies and
(29:27):
actually taught at the Naval Academy at one point, came
back and has been a key member of our team
and our growth. But beyond that, I'm blessed to have
my oldest daughter, Allison works for us. She's been with
us for eleven years, originally on a part time basis
and then ultimately full time as a young executive for US,
(29:51):
and my daughter Mackenzie also works for the company full time.
In a world where children work at founders' companies is
often the case because they can't work anywhere else. In
my case, I'm blessed. I had to recruit them to
(30:12):
come to work for us, and they are both top
performers and it's really exciting for me. So not only
do I have an executive Drew Cooper, as president and
chief operating officer of our flagship company, True North, but
I also have a thirty five and a thirty three
year old daughter who are both a players who have
a clear line of succession collectively. And here's the great
(30:36):
thing that's really fun about this is there is a
document that says that when Chuck is starting to lose it,
it only takes three out of five votes to get
me out and sidelined me here because you know, how
many times do we see this that a founder will
run a company into the ground because either they're losing
(30:59):
it mentally, maybe they get a bad habit, you know,
maybe they're dogmatic, whatever that might be. And so while
we joke about it, there's actually a document that has
other than me five votes, four of which is my
family member and one is our president and COO that
can sideline me. But with that said, though I have
(31:21):
a ten year runway, I'm going to push into my
early seventies, I can't wait to get up in the morning.
I can't wait to see what's next, and most importantly,
I can't wait to see what our team really creates
over the next five years.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
You're an absolutely fascinating person. Have you ever considered doing
a podcast yourself? I haven't right now.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
I made this mistake of becoming the general manager or
excuse me, the general contractor on a multimillion dollar build
out because I just could not find the general contractor
that shared my vision of what our headquarters would be.
So I looked around, looked at and I said, you
know what, I'll just go do that too. And so
(32:05):
for the last year we've been building this state of
the art facility that will be our new home for
our employees.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
But I think it's just business.
Speaker 2 (32:13):
It's about rallying people, being clear on what it is
that we want to accomplish, giving the tools to that
team to go do it, and then just get out.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
Of the way. What are What are you most proud of?
Speaker 2 (32:27):
I think I'm most proud of my family first of all,
and I guess thankful for that as well. As I mentioned,
we moved around for twenty six years. I thought at
a point in my career, my career was the most
important thing, and I think I lost sight of what
was really important from time to time. But my wife
(32:48):
and I Joanna We've been married thirty eight years this year.
I have four children, all adults. They're all successful, they're
all great people, and I'm most proud of what they've
accomplished and what they've been able to do with their lives.
And I'm blessed with this idea of perhaps they can
(33:13):
take whatever it is we're building here and take it
to the next level at some point. And I guess
I'm most proud of the fact that we've made a
difference in our community, things like the fall bash we
talked about at the beginning of the show, the jobs
that we're creating in this community, and the fact that
I really think that the people on our team would
(33:34):
go to war for us.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
I really do.
Speaker 2 (33:36):
And I know for a fact that while we give
our team members the flexibility to do all the things
that this as a CEO that I can do, like
take my mom to the doctor or go to my
grandson's baseball game, they have the flexibility to do that anytime,
any day they want. But here's the other thing. At
(33:56):
nine o'clock at night, for one of our West Coast
customers on the phone, taking that phone call because they care,
and that and the first thing out of that customer's
mouth is why did you miss? Is not why did
you miss the four o'clock meeting? It is tell me
how your son did in this baseball game. And when
we have the relationship between our customers, our employees, and
(34:21):
the vision of what we're able to create here, I
think in the end maybe that's what I'm most proud of.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
You know, I've been blessed to really meet some really
fascinating CEOs doing this program, and I got to tell you,
I think you might be number one. You're a fascinating guy.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Well, thank you know what, it's a lot of fun.
Thanks for having me here. We can't wait to see
what's next.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
Chuck Bailey of True North and a CEO you Should
Know Chuck, thank you so much. Thank you. This has
been the CEOs you Should Know podcast showcasing businesses that
are driving our regional economy. Part of iHeartMedia's commitment to
the communities we serve. Johnny Hartwell, thank you so much
for listening.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
Appla
And welcome in. This is the CEOs You Should Know podcast.
I'm your host Johnny Hartwell, let's say a load to
Chuck Bailey of True North. Great to be with you today.
We're really excited.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Joe tell us everything we need to know about your company. Hey,
True North is a company that nobody knows. We are
a business outsourcing firm based in Chester, West Virginia. Imagine that,
and we provide services to companies across the country, ranging
from bookkeeping to medical billing and consulting and real estate services.
(00:38):
But the biggest thing is that it's really boring from
time to time to be in that business. The reality
is we're a data company and that's what's exciting. And
one of the things that we're really excited that we're
working on is the chester Fall Badge, which has been
around for twenty three years. It's a one point seven
million dollar charity event. We're on one day of the year.
(01:03):
We give out one point seven million dollars that benefits
the Chester Volunteer Fire Department.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
So this is a charity event, but everybody's invited to
the bash. Everybody's invited to the bashe This is available
online at Chesterfallbash dot com. But it's an in person
event at Mountaineer Casino, Racetrack and Resort. We will put up.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
The big top, have a live event and drawings throughout
the day. And one of the biggest things is that
we got involved in this thing about six years ago
when demographics were changing and it was an old school
raffle fundraiser, and we took and we modernized it, and
we used data to understand what the Fallbash customers wanted
(01:45):
and what they needed to.
Speaker 1 (01:47):
Get excited about this program. All right, so get us excited?
What to you know? One point seven million dollars in prizes?
What can they win and how do they win? It's
and the date is September twentieth, correct, this.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Is September twentieth, twenty twenty five at mountain Air Casino.
And again it's twenty three years in the making. And
there are five different games that you can play throughout
the day. And remember these tickets sell out months in advance,
so we're will be sold out by July and then
the Fall Bash will be conducted throughout the day. Prizes
(02:21):
win a new escalade, win one hundred thousand dollars in cash,
and the way this works is just like the lotto
ball drawings. The firemen are up on the stage drawing
those four balls, and when your number comes up, they're
writing you a check for one hundred grand or a
brand new escalade or a range of other prizes from
(02:42):
guns to ATVs and related items.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
That is cool. That is cool, all right. So take
me back twenty three years ago. It started out as
just a small, little raffle, kind of little fundraiser kind
of thing. When did you get involved and how has
it grown over the last couple of years. So twenty
three years ago, the Chester All Volunteer Fire Department. These
are guys that live in the community. I live in Chester,
(03:09):
West Virginia. It's my hometown. It's where my wife grew up.
I grew up in Western Pennsylvania. She grew up in
West Virginia.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
And after college we met, we went off, traveled around
the country in my corporate life and came back to
the community. And when I came back to the community,
one of the big opportunities was to get involved in
that community. And I got the meeting that I got
the opportunity to meet these guys in our community that
(03:39):
really make a difference every day. They volunteered their time
to protect our community, but they needed a way to
raise money.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
They needed equipment.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
Training is expensive, safety year is expensive, and they started
this little raffled like any other volunteer community organization does.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
And what they did is.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
They grew this over time from BINGO and ultimately came
up with this event, a fall festival called the Fall Bash,
and it's been an institution. It really is an opportunity
to bring the community together with five to six thousand
people and all volunteers from the community staffing this event
for one purpose. It's to raise money for the fire
(04:19):
department to buy new equipment. And all those organizations that
participate and help out during the day, they earn money
for their little league baseball team or the high school
track team, and it's their way to come together on
one single day.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
You know, I have a soft spot for fireman my
father who passed away in two thousand and three. I
grew up in a little town just north of Pittsburgh
and New Wilmington. He started the first ambulance service in town.
And once he got you know that started, it was
housed in the fire department, and so he got roped
(04:54):
into becoming a volunteer and then he rose up the
ranks until he was the fire chief. And I know
the commitment that these volunteers have on a daily base.
They have a regular job, but if they're available at
that sound of that whistle, they're going to be there
helping their neighbors. And so that's the kind of commitment
these volunteers have.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
And you know that is exactly right. That sound of
the whistle is really interesting. In today's world, the technology
is available to ring a cell phone, ring a pager,
but in the community where the Chester Volunteer Fire Department is,
when there is an emergency event and these guys get
(05:38):
paged or their cell phone rings, there's also a fire
whistle that goes off in that town. And that goes
off for one reason. It's to remind the community that
their neighbors are jumping out of bed and running down
to the fire department to get in that truck to
go help someone that's fallen off a ladder.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
And never are these emergencies scheduled. You never know. You
could be at a you know, a Memorial Day picnic.
That whistle goes They're gone, they are gone.
Speaker 2 (06:06):
And so that's why you know, Chief Hissam of the
Fire Department really came up with the Bash was to
find ways to raise money to keep these guys engaged.
What gets them excited is about new equipment, new technology,
and a facility that is representative of the kind of
(06:28):
work that they want to do in their community. And
five years ago Chief Hissim came to me and he said, hey,
we you know, we want to sell some BASH tickets
on the internet. Go let's go do that internet thing and.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
Sort it out.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
Well, you know, true North, as I said before, you know,
we're we'ren't accounting in a medical billing and a technology
services firm working with companies in forty eight states, but
we're really a data company and we leverage data. In
most recent we are leaning full into AI technology to
(07:04):
improve what we do for our clients. But we went
to Chief Hissam and said, hey, we can do this.
So we put up a website, we put up social media,
we did all the things that people normally do. What
we really did was try to understand the type of
customers and we truly call them customers, know what they
(07:27):
wanted in an experience and how we could get them
to play these games and off we went. Five years later,
we are selling over a million dollars of tickets online.
We still have the old school mail in raffles, but
it's a live stream event. We get to showcase the
fireman and the technology, and most importantly, I think showcase
(07:49):
the personality that they have when they're up on the
stage engaging with the community. It's just a ton of fun.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
So streaming, how does that work? So I can buy
tickets but I don't have to physically be there, and
I could win that escalade by watching the stream. Well,
we really want people to come to the event. That's
the goal. Okay, come there because it is.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
A community event. It's a way that we can bring
thousands of people into one facility one day and get
that true fall, beautiful weather day experience. But yes, we
can do that online at chesterfallbash dot com. All the
drawings are streamed, all the prizes are posted on the website.
(08:30):
And not only do members of the community come together,
but people drive from hundreds of miles away. They camp
for the weekend, they have watch parties in their backyard
with the big screen TV, and they simply get a
chance to have fun and play some games.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
Well, listen. If I have a chance to win an
escalade or a one hundred thousand dollars, I want to
be there. I want to now, Can I can I?
Since you work AI on me, can I work AI
and figure out how I can win that escalade? Unfortunate?
Speaker 2 (09:00):
No? No, yeah, this is you know, this is one
of the things that's really really interesting about this event.
And I'm an AI, I'm a data guy. I'm sixty
one years old. I got enough, just enough gray hair
to get away with saying anything, but not so much
gray hair that they're ready to dismiss me yet. No.
And so, in twenty three years of doing this, given
(09:23):
away more than thirty million dollars, there's not been one
instance of fraud, deception, or mistrust that's come into this organization.
It's totally amazing.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
Do you get people who mistrust the process?
Speaker 2 (09:38):
Well, I think anytime there's money involved, there's always a skeptic.
You know, there's insiders, you know these There's nothing more
random than four balls in a certified lotto ball machine
that randomly will give you the numbers, and that is
the only way that you can win. In fact, the
(09:59):
firemen themselves aren't allowed to participate in the games, just
to keep it totally honest. But this is one of
the best organizations I've had the opportunity to be around
in my you know, sixty years, forty years in business,
and it's just it's just a great.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
Day, all right. So it's a great day. You win
all these prizes. But I think one thing that we
we we didn't mention is is there going to be
beer offered at the big tent.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
So one of the things that has been a staple
in hallmark of this event for years is they roll
in the beer trucks. Your ticket gets you admission to
the festival grounds, which is unlimited adult beverages, as we say,
unlimited soft drinks and snacks and associated items nice.
Speaker 1 (10:47):
What else goes on at the at the bash.
Speaker 2 (10:50):
So there's there's music, there is side games are probably
one of the funnest things to do. There's what they
call side games randomly for our fans that are guns,
that are hunters, that are sportsmen. There'll be some very
unique guns that go up for raffle and they'll sell
(11:13):
tickets for those as well as ATVs and other types
of things. So the side games, the energy, the tear offs,
it's a social event, but it's.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
Also a game of chance day. But ultimately it goes
to a great cause. It does go to a great cause.
Speaker 2 (11:30):
And one of the things that the Chester Volunteer Fire
Department does is they give back to the community. So
not only the day of the bash do they give
fifteen hundred dollars to every local organization. There's more than
twenty of them that volunteer to help out that day.
They give them fifteen hundred dollars to buy new soccer
balls and whatever they want to do. The parents will
(11:52):
come out and volunteer that day, but they also give
back to the community. The Fire Department recently built a
brand new music stage for the in the in the
City Park. They sponsored the fireworks show and multiple other
events during the year that really bring the community together.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
So ultimately this is a huge community events.
Speaker 2 (12:14):
It is and and and so you know, when you
think about you know why, you know, our company, True
North is headquartered in Chester, West Virginia. I had lived
all over the country, in Chicago and Philadelphia and San
Antonio throughout you know, my wife and my thirty eight
years of marriage and four kids that had born in
(12:34):
every part of the country. But you know, I got
on one too many planes to China one day and
I thought, there there has to be something more out there.
And I had the opportunity to restart, move my family
back to western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, south eastern Ohio and
(12:55):
build a company that was all the things that I
had aspired to throughout my career. And that's where True
North came from. It was the opportunity to build something
in the framework that I thought could make a difference,
and we wanted to hire local people that were from,
(13:17):
you know, a depressed area the country, the Ohio Valley
steel mills, the pottery industry has been challenged for many years,
and I was able to bring some of these ideas
that I had and literally started this business in an
upstairs bedroom in my house. And today we now have
five divisions, multiple brands, eighty employees that are part of
(13:41):
our community. They're active doing many of the same things
that we do, such as for the Fall Badge. But
it's a company that just delivers amazing energy to that
local community.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Well, let's talk about the company. The name True North,
Why what what? How did you come up with the
name and is there a meaning behind the name there is,
so there's actually two meetings behind it.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
The first one is more kind of intellectual, right, so
it's it's in my corporate world for corporate life. For
twenty seven years before I formed the company. One of
the things I learned is it's the small things that
really make a difference in business. When you look at
two companies, what's the difference between a company that's great
(14:28):
and a company that's maybe just average, And it's just
that little bit of difference. And that's the difference between
north and true North. I was told when I was
going to school, if I if I set off on
a course, and I'm not a sailor, but if I
if I miss read the directions by just a couple
of degrees north versus true North, I will miss North
(14:49):
America completely. And so it was the little things that mattered.
And I saw in the companies that we wanted to service,
they were being underserved by by the companies that were
providing the services to them. And I wanted to make
that last little difference. But the other thing, though, is
true north is about the heart, all right, It's about
(15:10):
finding your true north. I had been somewhat disenfranchised by
Corporate America. I was missing my kid's soccer games. What
did you do prior to True North? So I ran
big companies. I was an industrial guy. I was a
manufacturing guy. I was working with large fortune, one hundred, fortune,
one thousand organizations, traveling all over the world. And I
(15:34):
thought the goal in life, you know, after growing up
on a farm in western Pennsylvania, it was to go
do what you saw on TV. And I did that
for twenty six years. You know, I went from having
the corporate jet on call, but realizing there was a
whole lot more that wasn't your calling, that wasn't my calling.
As I said, I grew up on a farm. You know,
(15:54):
my father never graduated from high school. You know, we
didn't have two nickels to rub together there and and
I learned the value of hard work. But you know,
my dad, my mother, they were entrepreneurs. They were they
were always looking to take a risk and trying to
do something new and and one of the big risks
that we took was trying to find a way to
(16:16):
afford Carnegie Mellon University. This this kid on a farm
in western Pennsylvania gets to go to the big city
and you know, two of my roommates had perfect scores
on the SAT you know, which was shocking to me.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
But but anyway, but obviously you had potential to go there, Yeah,
I had. I was blessed that.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
I had, you know, was blessed with athletics, got to
play a little football there. I was blessed academically, you know,
learning to work hard and study and all that, and
and and and and I got a great education. And
most of my roommates, uh, throughout the four years over
at Carnegie Mellon, they were tech guys. They were guys
that were always the smartest guys in the room. And
(17:01):
I went off to that industrial manufacturing path and the
printing industry, and they went down the tech path. But
I think I still had that in my heart that
I knew I wanted to do something like that in
the future. And after twenty six years, I had the
opportunity to go build True North, do it in the
(17:21):
framework of my heart of what I wanted to do
and what type of employer I wanted to be, but
also to leverage some of the technology that from thirty
years prior my roommates were doing while I was sleeping.
Is this your passion, you know what. I can't wait
to get up every morning. As I said, I turned
(17:41):
sixty one years old here recently, and I've never been
more excited in my life than about what's possible than
I am today. We have our core True North business.
We are today a couple of weeks away from moving
into a brand new thirty one one thousand square foot
corporate headquarters in East Liverpool, Ohio. It's a remodeled nineteen
(18:06):
twenty four jcpenny building and it's in the historic Fifth
Street area of a beat up little old town called
East Liverpool, Ohio.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
Well, True North is just one of the companies that
you run. That's kind of the umbrella company. And what
other companies and what other facets, And I'm just curious
of what made you choose those different companies.
Speaker 2 (18:29):
So True North is our flagship brand. It's where it
all started, and that is our accounting, consulting and revenue
cycle management business that we provide to primarily healthcare companies
in forty eight states. But from there we began to
expand my tech guy background. I had the opportunity to
(18:51):
go build a company called Nerds to Go.
Speaker 1 (18:54):
It's a franchise.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
Some of my friends are in the franchising industry, and
I had the opportunity to buy Nerge to Go business
for Pittsburgh and we serve local businesses with technology services.
We then expanded into real estate management. A good friend
of mine from Causa Enterprises, Craig Causa, is a big
commercial real estate developer in the market. We do all
(19:16):
of his accounting and bookkeeping work. And he said, I
really need help managing our leases and our commercial portfolio.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
And I said, well, we have a solution for that.
Let's go build it.
Speaker 2 (19:24):
And we build a commercial real estate solutions business called
my Commercial real Estate Solutions.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
Imagine that.
Speaker 2 (19:32):
We then wanted to expand more into the franchising world,
and my friends and our clients started calling us and said,
we need a solution. I said, well, there's just a
couple of degrees difference between good and great. Let's go
make it great. And we built my franchise Bookkeeper. We
now supply accounting and bookkeeping services to franchises in thirty
(19:54):
five states.
Speaker 1 (19:54):
Now you're like the Mark Cuban, how I feel like
I'm on Shark Tank interviewing, you know, because how many
comes up with a great idea, you analyze it and
if it makes sense, you capture that well.
Speaker 2 (20:05):
So it's interesting that we actually throw away ten ideas
for everyone that we really do. We take a lot
of risk, but we don't do it without actually understanding
what this business is and if we can make a difference.
And it goes back to what I mentioned about true
and worth being just a couple of degrees between good
(20:26):
and great, and if we think we can make that
difference of a couple of degrees, then we're going to
go do it. And in fact, we are getting ready
to launch a new business of all things.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Imagine that in a couple of weeks called Latitude forty Digital.
What is that.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Latitude forty Digital is an AI enabled digital marketing company.
If you look around today, every guy in his basement
is a digital marketer or a creator. The reality of
it is eighty percent of it is probably just a
load of crap, and the difference it is the twenty
percent that's done right is really going to change the world.
(21:04):
And when I look at AI in general, I think
that is like the dot com was of nineteen ninety eight,
eighty percent of all the dot com companies were going
to fail and the twenty percent that made it changed
our world forever. I think AI is exactly the same thing,
is that two years from now, eighty percent of everything
(21:27):
that we're seeing with talking babies or dancing babies on
the internet will be gone, but the twenty percent that
comes out will change forever. And that's what we're doing
with the Latitude forty Digital, with True North, with my
franchise Bookkeeper, with my commercial real estate solutions, and our
security company called Advanced Security Technologies. We're on the twenty
(21:51):
percent side of that line where we can actually go
change the world.
Speaker 1 (21:55):
You're really kind of a renaissance man, aren't you. You
went from being a farm boy Matt going to Carnegie Mellon,
being athletic, but also brave enough to start a company
called Nerds on the Go. You're a little bit of everything,
aren't you. Well, you know it's fun.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
If it's fun, I'm going to go after and go
do it. But if there's an opportunity to go create
a great place for our team members to work, I
think that's what's really important for me in this part
of my career. And as I said, you know your questioned,
you know what was true and worth all about. Part
of it is what's in the heart. I would put
our employees up against any employees in the world in
(22:36):
terms of their commitment to our customers and their ability
to represent our brand when the one's looking. We implemented
unlimited PTO policies when when I first started the company
twelve years ago, when nobody knew what unlimited PTO meant,
and CEOs were afraid of that sure, and what that
(22:59):
is is a thought process that says, as a CEO,
I can take vacation anytime I want. I can go
to my grandson's baseball game, or I can go take
my mom to the doctor. And if I can do that,
why can't everybody in our company do that?
Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yet? I think that's a smart thing to do, especially
if you have an environment where it's fun and educational
and exciting. You know, you may not take the time
off because you're going to work where it's fun and
it's interesting and creative and you're giving people a chance
to grow. And so it's almost like, yeah, you can
(23:37):
have all the PTO you want, but you know what,
here's a great place to work. I don't have to
take time off because if I'm going into work. It's
not really work if it's fun.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
So that is really the key to why we built
this new corporate headquarters. It's a Silicon Valley meets East Liverpool,
Ohio rust belt, and it's very edgy, you know, with
coffee bars and lots of glass and cool spaces and
all that. The reality is that very few of our
(24:07):
customers will ever come to that building, and we are
a business where really all of our employees could work
from home. But the reality is they asked me to
build it. They wanted to be together, they wanted a
cool place to work, they wanted a place where they
could come in and get energy from the space. And
that's why we built it. We decided to go do
(24:30):
something for our team and they had a big part
of the design of that. Do you think this is
something that's going to grow the region. Well, it's a
huge opportunity to put eighty high paying jobs on the
streets in a town that has suffered eighty percent population
loss over the last thirty years. And this is really
(24:51):
commonplace for many small towns in the Ohio Valley. And
when we put four million dollars of payroll on the
street in two weeks. It has to have a profound impact,
from the local coffee shop on the corner, to the
restaurant down the street, to the school district that is
(25:11):
ideally going to pump out some interns that we can
bring into the company. It has to have an impact.
Where are you getting your employees? Are they locally?
Speaker 1 (25:21):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (25:21):
So that's what's most exciting is this building is not
only a place for our employees, but it's actually our
greatest recruiting tool. So now that we're building this facility,
it's becoming a showcase in the community. We get resumes
every day from people that would not have given a
(25:44):
small town company a shot. They're thinking about, maybe this
is a fun place to work. Here's the other thing, too,
is we've had the opportunity over the last two years
to hire four of the top graduates out of both
West Virginia University and Youngstown State that are from these
(26:04):
communities that would have otherwise moved out and went on
somewhere else. We're actually in the talent import business now,
which is really exciting.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
You know. And there's something about you know this area,
and I'm talking about the Tri State area that the
people have a great work ethic. Do you find that true?
Speaker 2 (26:25):
That is absolutely true, and it was one of the
reasons why I wanted this to start the business. Here
many people are well educated but underemployed, and they have
to travel great distances to be able to find the
type of company that would be fulfilling for them. And
my goal with True North was to be that company
(26:48):
because I knew that the work ethic was there. And
one of the things that was important to me was
to bring a global or at least national perspective into
the local community because maybe they've never had the opportunity
to work outside the local area. So we spend a
lot of time teaching our team what good looks like.
(27:10):
That's where I had the biggest growth in my career.
As a farm kid from western Pennsylvania, I had the
opportunity to go to a great university. I had the
opportunity to work for a European based company and travel
to Europe. I had the opportunity to go get my
master's degree at the University of Cambridge in England, and
all of that taught me one thing is what good
(27:33):
looks like. And so now that we can start to
understand what good looks like we can compete with large,
world class companies using talent that is fully committed and
will answer that phone when none of our customers are
excuse me, none of our competitors went so the fun.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
You're in forty eight states now, as their plans to
expand worldwide, I think we're.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Focused on the US domestic market. You know, we're a
company that has its skills in providing business outsourcing services
to companies ranging from startups to about thirty forty million
dollars in size. That's our sweet spot. We're not going
to We're not going to work for billion dollar companies.
We love small businesses, we love entrepreneurs, we love family
(28:23):
owned businesses, and if we can do things to give
them a competitive edge, that's what we're.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Going to do. You know, I've never been afraid to
ask a question, but I'm a little hesitant to ask
this one because I have no idea where it's going
to go. What's the future of True North? So as
he grins, because I could tell the one.
Speaker 2 (28:46):
Thing is my team is figuring out a plan of
when they can kick me out. But there is there
is a plan behind it though, I there is a
succession plan. I was blessed with ten years ago hiring
another we call him expats, a gentleman by the name
of Drew Cooper. Drew grew up in East.
Speaker 1 (29:05):
Liverpool, Ohio.
Speaker 2 (29:06):
He moved away, went to the Naval Academy, spent fifteen
years like I did, away from the community, but through
an opportunity and family situation, he had the great opportunity
to come back to the community and through Drew's military
career in the Navy, through working for multiple companies and
(29:27):
actually taught at the Naval Academy at one point, came
back and has been a key member of our team
and our growth. But beyond that, I'm blessed to have
my oldest daughter, Allison works for us. She's been with
us for eleven years, originally on a part time basis
and then ultimately full time as a young executive for US,
(29:51):
and my daughter Mackenzie also works for the company full time.
In a world where children work at founders' companies is
often the case because they can't work anywhere else. In
my case, I'm blessed. I had to recruit them to
(30:12):
come to work for us, and they are both top
performers and it's really exciting for me. So not only
do I have an executive Drew Cooper, as president and
chief operating officer of our flagship company, True North, but
I also have a thirty five and a thirty three
year old daughter who are both a players who have
a clear line of succession collectively. And here's the great
(30:36):
thing that's really fun about this is there is a
document that says that when Chuck is starting to lose it,
it only takes three out of five votes to get
me out and sidelined me here because you know, how
many times do we see this that a founder will
run a company into the ground because either they're losing
(30:59):
it mentally, maybe they get a bad habit, you know,
maybe they're dogmatic, whatever that might be. And so while
we joke about it, there's actually a document that has
other than me five votes, four of which is my
family member and one is our president and COO that
can sideline me. But with that said, though I have
(31:21):
a ten year runway, I'm going to push into my
early seventies, I can't wait to get up in the morning.
I can't wait to see what's next, and most importantly,
I can't wait to see what our team really creates
over the next five years.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
You're an absolutely fascinating person. Have you ever considered doing
a podcast yourself? I haven't right now.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
I made this mistake of becoming the general manager or
excuse me, the general contractor on a multimillion dollar build
out because I just could not find the general contractor
that shared my vision of what our headquarters would be.
So I looked around, looked at and I said, you
know what, I'll just go do that too. And so
(32:05):
for the last year we've been building this state of
the art facility that will be our new home for
our employees.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
But I think it's just business.
Speaker 2 (32:13):
It's about rallying people, being clear on what it is
that we want to accomplish, giving the tools to that
team to go do it, and then just get out.
Speaker 1 (32:23):
Of the way. What are What are you most proud of?
Speaker 2 (32:27):
I think I'm most proud of my family first of all,
and I guess thankful for that as well. As I mentioned,
we moved around for twenty six years. I thought at
a point in my career, my career was the most
important thing, and I think I lost sight of what
was really important from time to time. But my wife
(32:48):
and I Joanna We've been married thirty eight years this year.
I have four children, all adults. They're all successful, they're
all great people, and I'm most proud of what they've
accomplished and what they've been able to do with their lives.
And I'm blessed with this idea of perhaps they can
(33:13):
take whatever it is we're building here and take it
to the next level at some point. And I guess
I'm most proud of the fact that we've made a
difference in our community, things like the fall bash we
talked about at the beginning of the show, the jobs
that we're creating in this community, and the fact that
I really think that the people on our team would
(33:34):
go to war for us.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
I really do.
Speaker 2 (33:36):
And I know for a fact that while we give
our team members the flexibility to do all the things
that this as a CEO that I can do, like
take my mom to the doctor or go to my
grandson's baseball game, they have the flexibility to do that anytime,
any day they want. But here's the other thing. At
(33:56):
nine o'clock at night, for one of our West Coast
customers on the phone, taking that phone call because they care,
and that and the first thing out of that customer's
mouth is why did you miss? Is not why did
you miss the four o'clock meeting? It is tell me
how your son did in this baseball game. And when
we have the relationship between our customers, our employees, and
(34:21):
the vision of what we're able to create here, I
think in the end maybe that's what I'm most proud of.
Speaker 1 (34:25):
You know, I've been blessed to really meet some really
fascinating CEOs doing this program, and I got to tell you,
I think you might be number one. You're a fascinating guy.
Speaker 2 (34:34):
Well, thank you know what, it's a lot of fun.
Thanks for having me here. We can't wait to see
what's next.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
Chuck Bailey of True North and a CEO you Should
Know Chuck, thank you so much. Thank you. This has
been the CEOs you Should Know podcast showcasing businesses that
are driving our regional economy. Part of iHeartMedia's commitment to
the communities we serve. Johnny Hartwell, thank you so much
for listening.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
Appla
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