JAR Bio: Revolutionizing COVID-19 Management With Carlos Gregory

POSTED ON January 13, 2021

The previous episode has been very informative about the role of private equity in medical sales, especially when it comes to medical startups. As Samuel Gbadebo continues to talk with JAR Bio’s Carlos Gregory, they shift their conversation to discuss the game-changing product that his company is putting out to the market. JAR Bio is creating a positive impact on the COVID-19 management sphere with their innovative disinfection technology powered by Medisystem. Imagine a device that will let you walk out of a room, leave it for seven minutes and come back with it completely disinfected. That’s what the company actually offers! It is a simple yet elegant technology that has a lot of applications – from medicine to air travel and lots of industries in between. Listen in and learn more.

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JAR Bio: Revolutionizing COVID-19 Management With Carlos Gregory

We are back for part two with Carlos Gregory, President of JAR Bio and also has a private equity firm that backs companies. That’s relatively new to backing companies in the medical device sales space. The rest of this interview that you’re going to read is fantastic because he gets deep into what his company does, what it means to be in the private equity space and be a caring company that truly wants to see other companies grow and reach their highest potential. It’s a great interview, a lot of things to learn and they have an amazing product that they’ve introduced to the world. There’s even an opportunity for you that are looking for new opportunities to be a part of it.

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Carlos, how are you?

I’m doing great, Samuel, how are you?

I’m fantastic. I’m making sense of 2020. I’m glad you could join us. Carlos comes from Florida and he’s the President of a company called JAR Bio. He is in the private equity space. Private equity merger is a lot of different industries including healthcare. Before I say anymore, I’m going to let Carlos introduce himself. Carlos, tell us who you are and what you do.

Thanks for letting us be on the show. We’re excited about the opportunity. I’m a leader and I enjoy being around people, serving others and helping other people achieve their goals. I’ve been fortunate enough in my life to have made some good decisions. That’s allowed me to invest in different spaces. Now, we are having a small, private equity group set up, we’re investing in a couple of different opportunities some in real estate. We’ve had this tremendous opportunity to get into medical device sales and primarily around the whole room of disinfection which is impacting us all and it’s real. We have a great product and one of the best products in our class on the market. The only thing is that nobody knows about it. We’re out here to try to tell our story, tell everybody about our product, continue to grow the business and help as many people as we can along the way.

We’re going to get into all of that but first I want to ask you, in general, how does the private equity space relate to healthcare from your vantage point?

Private equity gives healthcare a big boost in its ability to finance quickly, help companies that are a little bit smaller but grow faster, reach their goals and reach other audiences at a much more rapid pace. We all know about the perpetual growth model of some of the institutional companies like Johnson & Johnson that is in customer service-based model but we’re trying to achieve rapid growth through hard work, investing in the right people and the right places.

We’re all working through 2020 being the quarantine year. How would you say it’s affected private equity?

Out of the gate, it was concerning. There were a lot of deals that got sidelined. Of late, that’s turned a little bit. We’re seeing more deals close, coming together and because of the quarantine, people’s inability to meet face-to-face and valuations of companies were being looked at several different ways. There’s a term being thrown around called EBITDA, which is Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortization in COVID. We’ve always talked about, “Are you Amazon-proof? Are you recession-proof?” Now it’s like, “Are you COVID proof? What’s going to happen to you after that?” It’s affected the industry a couple of different ways but there are a lot of deals that are getting done and it’s been neat to see how some of the companies that were already in private equity portfolios have adapted and created a new revenue stream that they never even imagined possible.

In your opinion, a sales rep understanding how private equity plays into the company he works for. What is the best thing you think sales professionals can take away from understanding that since it includes leaders too?

The way private equity impacts them is numbers. Whole ownership organizations, if you think of Johnson & Johnson or something like that, they didn’t have quotas but it’s patience. They have no interest in selling or exiting their companies anytime soon. For them, it’s the long-term appreciation of values. Private equity is the immediate appreciation of value and then exit. When you think about that sales process private equity, it’s much more inclined to spend more money in commissions and marketing to get deals done faster than your typical institutional enterprise like Johnson & Johnson. That’s how it relates to a sales professional. It’s a unique opportunity to work in a private equity-backed organization because the urgency is there. For true sales professionals, that’s an exciting scenario for them. It’s, “How much money can I make? How quickly can I make it?” Versus the traditional, “I’m going to make X amount of money,” and it’s going to be over a period of time.

The difference with private equity is it’s not patient-focused but it’s business-focused. It’s speaking to people that are less about the impact they’re making in healthcare, on what patients experience and more about the money they want to make in their role.

Private equity is all about the investor return. As operators, we have to filter that expectation and create compelling mission statements around the value of the business and what that means to the team. At the end of the day, that’s what we’re trying to achieve but we don’t want to build an organizational culture that’s 100% money-focused. That’s why it’s important for these individuals to understand that it is private equity-backed. We also want individuals that are going to transition into account manager type roles and build out a client book business that is significant and keeps going into perpetuity.

Equity is getting beat up for destroying certain industries and organizations. It’s catching a bad rap. The reason why that’s happening is that there are a lot of private equity companies that don’t care. They saw the numbers, the numbers make sense and drive the numbers as hard as they possibly can with their intended result at whatever costs. For us, it’s a little bit different. We do believe in what we’re doing. We care about what we’re doing. We care about people’s lives that we’re impacting. At the same time, we’re trying to achieve aggressive goals.

Give me an example of what a bad representation of a private equity firm does and what you guys do.

You don’t have to look far. In the landscaping sector, BrightView and Brickman, there was a company called ValleyCrest which was the gold standard of landscaping at a national level. That landscaping company then sold large parts of KKR and it destroyed the company. They went 100% metrics-based. It was no longer about the customer experience and delivering a quality service. They could get to a point where they had financial analysts going out to sites and counting how many steps a landscaper took from the time that they got out of their vehicle to the time that they got on their mower and started working and try to figure out how to reduce that by a certain percentage because that would reduce the amount of time on the job and the cost of labor which would have a direct impact to their bottom line.

Which revenue equity firm is involved in doing this deal?

KKR.

Instead of allowing a better company to buy this landscaping company, they went to the highest bidder. Do they already know that it wouldn’t look good for the way that other company does the metrics and tries to manage the landscapers?

What they ended up doing was they took the company public and retain a significant amount of equity in the company. The stock has been a little over the place. I have a tremendous amount of respect for finance-minded individuals. The numbers are important and it helps us measure what we’re doing and where we should go but it should never be the leading factor of operations. I believe that customer service should be the leading factor of operations and then your ability to serve the customer well is what impacts your financials.

In that example, what would you guys have done differently?

In the example of what KKR did, you had a company that was already running well. They should have invested more in technology that would have streamlined operations and then in going out and counting how many steps somebody took. Landscaping is an industry that could be disrupted by significant advancements in lawnmower equipment and those types of things. Robotics is one of those examples. They should have invested a little bit more in technology and approached it from that perspective than taking away the service side of it and reducing the time on the job.

As a private equity firm, your main goal is to take companies public or is to get companies sold. What is your main goal?

Our number one goal is to create value for our companies which creates a return for our investors. We create value for those companies and it depends. If companies are performing well, the amount of profitability that the company has makes sense, it’s meeting what we believe our investors are looking for and those conversations happen regularly then we’ll hold onto it as long as we possibly can and have that perpetual growth model. From 1, 5, 10, 15, to 20 until it gets to a point where it becomes more valuable for the return on our investors to sell it, to go public and keeping it. I wouldn’t say that every single deal is the same and that our priorities are the same. The one priority that is the same across the board is to build significant value at a rapid pace.

The typical company that you guys acquire, at what stage are they when they go to you?

Usually, they’re looking for growth investment. They already have a product or a service that makes sense that we have some familiarity with and they need an investor to line up with them and an operating team to help support what they’re trying to do which is the scenario here. We have something, we believe it’s good but we don’t know how to get it out to the market. We need some money to be able to achieve that and scale. That’s where we aligned well with companies that were under $5 million in top-line revenue but have something unique that’s valuable. We believe that our network can get behind and then help grow.

MSP 33 | JAR Bio — JAR Bio To be considered Class 1 your device has to be harmless to humans and have enough support from the medical community

I thought private equity firms are there for funding. Meaning, they take on companies that have a lot of promise and they are there to help grow them. From what you’ve shared with the example you gave me of the company that wasn’t doing good things, it seems like they’re involved in the management and how the company continues to grow and make money.

I believe that’s what’s happening. It’s because of those stories like the KKR and there are many more where it was, “Here’s a bunch of money that you asked for. Now, go and achieve the results that you said you were going to achieve. If you don’t, we’re going to constantly beat you up.” Fewer companies were putting themselves on the market for private equity groups had to change. We’re competing against the guy at the private equity group who wants to not only give money but offer his experience, the work that he has and their experience. That’s an advisory board and help the founder of the company grow as a professional and as a person.

When these competitive attributes begin to become more normal then companies have to start making those changes and adjustments. There are some that have thesis statements around that don’t even look for a company. They look for a professional, an executive and if that executive has a thesis around temporary staffing agencies then they’ll say, “We’ll invest in you. You go find a company that makes sense and then we’ll use that as a starting point or as a springboard to acquire other similar companies in your space.”

What kind of profile does someone have to have for a private equity firm to invest in that profession? What type of people are these?

It’s proof that you’ve been able to operate at a high level, lead teams to success and reach a certain revenue number at a basic level like height, strong character, highly ethical, integrity, loyal. There’s a lot of things that go into that conversation. We’re seeing more of that especially now that you see a lot more family offices going direct. What do I mean by that? Previously, family offices would invest in other investment groups. Morgan Stanley or Merrill Lynch would sponsor a private equity group and invest in that group. Now family offices are hiring investment bankers, going out and seeking out their own deals to invest in.

When you say family offices, what are you referring to directly?

Over the years, families that have acquired substantial amounts of money.

Private individuals that got some money.

Think of like the Bush family. They had acquired a lot of money over the years, established an office, hire a management team, investment bankers and the whole thing they go out.

They look for money, where to put some of this money and that’s it. Private equity firms are now getting involved in finding growth and helping grow their family wealth.

That’s how it’s been traditional. The family office would fall under the private equity group as an investor. Now, family offices are negotiating and competing against private equity groups for the acquisition of certain companies. That seems to be growing and becoming more common.

For you, as a private equity firm, what does a potential client have to have for you guys to even consider investing in them and helping them grow?

For me, it’s important that the product or service is proven, the customer base is well established, they don’t have all of their eggs in one basket and you either have a founding team or a management team that lives, breathes and dreams about the company. What they think they can do and understand whether or not our network within our team and with some of our investors can help the company grow. Once we get past the concept, what it is, what they do and that it’s proven and it’s like, “Can we help them with more than dollars? Can we add value to the team? Can we make some changes to the team that’ll add value? Can we leverage our network to grow revenue?” If we can answer yes to all of those questions then we start looking at the financials. Does it make sense? What we would be willing to invest versus what they’re looking for?

For you guys, whoever you take on as a customer, their business has to be making many dollars for you to even consider working with them?

Not necessarily. We’re on the low side of the lower middle market. There are a lot of institutional dollars and how upper-middle market, middle market, lower middle market. When I say that I’m talking about companies that are generating upwards of $20 million a year and then you have some of these smaller companies, which are still good in that same space. My thought is I can add a lot more value at those levels to get them to $5 million, $7 million or $10 million where the valuations to improve and change. I’d take every company that is doing $3 million, take the best of the three and now I have a $9 million company that’s going to trade may be at 7 to 8 times EBITDA by acquiring each one of those at 2 to 3 times EBITDA. It begins to scale. This is something that I enjoy doing. I enjoy putting deals together. I enjoy helping people do things that they didn’t believe that they could do.

I’ve been doing that in my entire career. There was a company years ago. The guy that came to me said, “I got this idea and I think I could do good at it.” He had $50,000. I didn’t take a dime, own 0% of the company. With his $50,000 in financial investment and years of sweat equity, he’s got a $3 million company eight years later. Those are the things that excite me about what I do and the reason why I do it. It’d be naive not to recognize that we’re on the right side of the economics and a lot of these deals that we do but we’ve earned that. At the same time, what’s exciting is watching it grow, watching the people grow, watching the businesses grow, dealing with the challenges, how those challenges defined the individual and the company and make it stronger over time. It’s exciting to see that all come together.

In your career, how many startup medical device companies have come to you?

Not many. A medical device is something that wasn’t even on my radar. This was an opportunity that fell in my lap. I did 250 hours of due diligence in the medical device industry and another 150 hours of due diligence on this particular project with disinfection. I saw that there was a unique opportunity in the space and the product. What I’ve seen in the medical devices that manufacturers, by and large, are proud, invention-based, engineer-based and a lot of them haven’t had the experience, lack the knowledge or don’t care about having a good investment thesis, a good business plan or a good marketing plan. That’s what’s been interesting to me at the level that we’re investing at. A medical device is nothing new. There’s lots of companies and over the last many years, a lot of private equity groups backing medical device companies and it’s performing.

It’s a sector that’s been growing and not surging but it’s had steady growth. The companies are attractive because they have high margins, they have good growth metrics and they vary. You have people that don’t even manufacture anything. Zero widgets. They’re the distributors of widgets and there are private equity companies backing the distributors of the widget. There are a lot of ways to get into it. The compelling argument for me and this investment strategy was not a medical device that’s made for healthcare, although that is what it was intended to be, I think what’s happening with COVID, what’s happening in society and what we’ve already been able to prove is that there’s a broader spectrum of industry where it can be helpful.

When it comes to a startup company and they’re in the medical device space, have you experienced them coming to you at any stage from idea to a full-blown company that’s an operation they’re trying to get bigger? When do they typically come to you? When would you prefer jumping in?

It’s been a little bit of a couple of different things. We’ve had the ones that I have an idea on paper and looking for venture capital. We turn those away quickly. We have other people in the venture capital space that we know and we try to connect them with the right people that will be able to help them at the stage that there are. For me, that’s a true startup. If you got an idea, you think it’s going to work, you’ve had some market research that supports your thesis but you haven’t built it yet.

The way we operate, we need to be a little bit further down the road than that. We need to have a product that’s already out there, a product that’s already been registered with the right agencies. We want to make sure that the market is fairly broad and that they’re looking for not only a financial partner but a partner that’s going to help them put together the plan for success. That’s where we get excited when you already have a device and it doesn’t have to necessarily be a device, it could be Medtech. We’re talking to a company in Germany that has simple software. That’s also an application that is a reservation for emergency rooms and doctor’s offices.

There’s some software out there that already does that but this one is user-friendly and they’ve done a good job of tailoring it to the patient which will be attractive as far as the adaptability. We’re working on that with some investors out of Spain to introduce that in Europe and then potentially bring it over to the United States. Medtech is an opportunity there as well. The app is already running. They’ve already tested it. It’s been going for a couple of years now so they have some traction and they’re trying to figure out, “How do we take on market share? What is our business plan? What should we be focusing on now? We’ve already developed it. What do we need to do to adjust it? How do we figure that out?” That’s where we add value and that’s the type of company that we get excited about.

Do you guys get involved with the hiring of the sales teams of these companies? Do you get that deeply involved? Do you step back and let them do whatever they feel needs to be done?

It depends. We want the company to be successful. Sometimes, the founders or the people running the company at the time that we get involved haven’t had the experience or the opportunity in their careers to interview 1,000-plus people. You learn a couple of things when you’ve interviewed 1,000-plus people. You can learn much from a book, HR training and all that stuff but nothing like the good old gut along with some support. We want to move a little bit earlier, for me, what we do and how we invest, you got to focus on the team. The team will create the financial results. The financial results don’t create the team.

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It’s obvious that a company you’re starting got to find great players to play some leadership so that you can establish a great team. Have you guys helped people establish their leadership team? Not just the Salesforce bringing on like interviewing thousands of people but a CEO and 1 or 2 other people and they need a leadership team, there’s promise in what they have. Have you guys helped them put their leadership team together?

It’s all based on what the founders were trying to do and that’s an important part. In some cases, you think of a Mark Zuckerberg. What success story? Highly atypical that a founder continues to operate a company once it’s gotten to that size. It’s unusual. It’s the same thing here. They’re good and passionate. Sometimes, they can be their own worst enemy because they get boxed into this way of thinking because they’ve never been exposed to other things before or other experiences or larger organizations.

We have to balance that carefully, helping the founder achieve their full potential and add tremendous value to the organization if they wish to stay in it, which is a whole other conversation. Once they reached their maximum and recognizing that, you’re better suited to serve as an advisory board member, chairman of the board, vice-chair or something like that and then putting an operator who’s already had success scaling a business that size or greater or there’s somebody within the organization that isn’t a founding member but a member of the management team that’s been growing through the company who has a tremendous amount of potential and is willing to look at things a different way to be able to reach the full value for the organization.

That often happens then when a founder, not the idea, who’s got everything going, when you guys step in the private equity firm, you ask the founder, “You need to take a seat.”

Sometimes they know they need to.

When they do that, they’re not losing ownership. They’re losing control of the day-to-day.

We step in and we’re acquiring equity in the company. There’s always a redistribution of ownership that occurs. In many scenarios, it’s 1 of 2 things. They’re selling because they want out and the founders have had it. They have a great idea. They love it. They want to take their money and move to the Bahamas and never think about it ever again, which we don’t like investing in that type of situation. We prefer the founder who’s like, “This is what I got. It’s great. This is what I need to do. I need some money and people to help guide me to the next level.”

As we go through the levels, it’s then understanding, “What are your capabilities as a professional or CEO to drive the business? Are you better at research and development and that’s your stronghold?” We never let the founder feel like they’ve lost complete control of the company. We always want to make sure that they feel like they continue to add a tremendous amount of value and have those conversations early on, those expectations are set before the first dollar is delivered. We never want it to be uncomfortable or a surprise so we’re careful.

Let’s talk about your company. Let’s talk about what you guys are doing. Explain your company and then I’ll get into it for more questions.

This company JAR Bio is a company that is distributing a Medisystem. Medisystem is a whole room disinfection device and it was originally designed for operating rooms. We all know that hospital-borne illnesses are a billion-dollar problem and there’s a lot of evidence behind the aerialization of hydrogen peroxide as the method to disinfect a space. There’s proof that it reduces hospital-borne illnesses by 70%. That’s a big dollar figure when you’re talking about billions of dollars. It was originally designed to solve that problem. The inventor of the company of the device Medisystem was focused wholly on that.

We looked at it and said there’s an opportunity here with what’s going on with COVID, inventor or founder, the marketing and the business plan. We know a lot of people in the government and the healthcare industry and many other industries that we think could benefit from this product and why. What we’re seeing now isn’t going away anytime soon as far as the disinfection of facilities and spaces. It’s something that we’re going to slowly grow into. When you have a product that’s been already proven, we have some of the most important infectious institutions in Italy that support the product. We have the Jackson Memorial Hospital out of Miami which is one of the top five largest hospitals in the entire country where we’ve had some trials completed and proven to be successful.

When you have something that’s already been proven and can have this type of impact on society, it’s a great combination for us. In simple terms what it does is that aerializes a micro nebulizer, a hydrogen peroxide, silver sulfate solution, which is proprietary as well into the air like if you’re blowing into a balloon. Imagine your office is needing a disinfection treatment. We would come in, we would measure the space, height, width and length to get the volume. The user interface of the device allows us to plugin that volume. It knows exactly how much of the Evolyse, which is the name of the solution, needs to deploy into the air in order to completely disinfect your space. I plug in the volume, I press start, I walk out and when I come back, I open the door and there’s no need to do anything else. It’s dry. There’s nothing wet. There’s no residue. I don’t have to wipe anything down. I walk into space, I take away my Medisystem and you’re ready to walk back into the completely disinfected room.

How long does it take? Let’s say a school gym or cafeteria.

We did a classroom. It’s roughly 9,000 cubic feet and it takes seven minutes.

With this device, you walk into a relatively large room, you put it down and you plug in the size of the area. You walk out and come back seven minutes later and it is 100% good to go.

There is some dwell time after it deploys the solution into the air but it’s fast. The comparison is let’s say that I am the best professional cleaning company in the world. I have trained my people and every single one of my people are robots. They all do it exactly the same way perfectly. This is typically how it works, they get a chemical that has to be diluted in water. They’re mixing it on their own but they mix it perfectly every single time in. When they go into space, they’re going to wipe down every single surface.

Think of your office, you’ve got a microphone in front of you, you’ve got the cables coming out of the back of your computer, blinds on your windows, bookshelf, ceiling, carpet, walls, paintings on the walls, every single surface, they wipe it down perfectly and they do it every room in your house or your office the same way. How do they disinfect the air? They can’t. They’re in there. That’s where this it’s amazing because number one, that person and that company don’t exist. If they did exist, the time it would take that individual to clean every single surface and do it the exact same way, nobody would pay for that. That’s the difference. It’s taking the person that’s wiping down all the surfaces or the high touch areas. They’re doing the best they can, maybe they diluted the chemicals that they were having a good day. They’re in and out there as quickly as they possibly can be because their bosses are telling them time is money. You have a partially disinfected room. You could not have a more appropriate product.

Hotels and airlines are the first things that come to mind. I’m assuming you guys are ready to capitalize on those industries.

We are working with a lot of the homeowner’s associations. We’re working with hotel and lodging associations. We’re having some high-level conversations now with a couple of airlines. We’re doing a test. Some of them have asked us to prove it inside of an airplane because that’s the other part of it. Some of the stuff that’s on the market is wetting in order to disinfect. If you think about the electronics inside of an airplane, you can’t let that get wet but if you do it too much, corrosion, these things start to happen. We’ve heard a little bit on the news about airplanes are going to use UV lights because it doesn’t wet anything but think about for a minute, how much shade there is in an airplane. You are trying to go down the aisle. That fad will pass. That’s the unique thing about our device solution and process, Medisystem leaves no residue. All of those electronics are safe. We also have food packing warehouses.

It’s food-safe so this can be this can get on the meat. It’s hard to believe. In the pharmaceutical space, it’s all about the white paper. It’s all about what’s been clinically-proven. In my space, it’s not much different. How has this been proven? What tests have been done that allow you guys to have this kind of confidence and go in there and say, “Let’s see.”

We have fifteen-plus trial reports on the Medisystem itself since 2015. That have been conducted internationally and locally here in the United States by some of the most prestigious hospitals and infectious pathogen institutions where the product has been proven to do as it was intended. Evolyse, the actual solution came first. There’s a lot of studies behind the chemical compounds in it, the hydrogen peroxide, silver sulfate mixture and how that’s practical for use and disinfection, use as an airline or micro nebulized disinfection process. We have tons of information. It’s funny you mentioned that because I want to go back to the comment that you made, “It’s hard to believe,” that is the most common reaction that we get when we’re presenting the product. It’s first like, “Prove it,” followed by, “Why doesn’t everybody know about this?”

That’s funny because I was going to go in that direction as well. How do you prove it when you’re out there in the field and you’re trying to make the case for a potential customer to use this product?

The greatest thing that we have is that our device is registered as a class one medical device with the FDA and that’s not easy to do. In order to accomplish that, you have to be able to show that you have trial reports that are sufficient to prove that your device is not going to be, number one, harmful to humans. Number two, the process itself has enough support by the medical community that this is your device and this is how exactly how your device works. That’s the first thing that we point at and people understand that. People that are in this space, particularly in healthcare or pharmaceuticals understand the weight that the FDA carries and they understand that those things don’t happen overnight. You don’t submit an application and they register your device by the FDA. That’s the first one.

Once you’re looking at other industries and even in some healthcare, at some hospitals, for example, if you’re talking to a chief medical officer, they don’t even want to see it until you show them the clinical or the trial reports. We graciously provide that which is fun because when they call you back, they’re like, “Why doesn’t anybody know about this?” When you get outside of that healthcare industry and using that terminology in the hospitality industry, I can talk to them about the FDA, trial reports and efficacy all day long. It’s like a deer in headlights. In a couple of scenarios, depending on the size of the opportunity but one in which they have 7 or 8-plus resorts that have 1,000 units or more, we conducted lab tests inside of one of their villas after the company that they’re using had disinfected it. We do before treatment and after treatment that gets sent out to a third-party lab and then we present the results to them.

What’s your biggest target? Is it hospitals, airlines or hotels? Who are you most focused on?

As an organization, we’re focused on in three sectors. We’re focused on the healthcare, government and restoration space. Think of Servpro and those types of companies. Healthcare because they’re being heavily impacted by COVID. All of the first responders whether it’s helicopter ambulances or regular ambulances or your first responders coming out of fire stations that are carrying COVID-positive patients inside of those vehicles and then taking them to the COVID floor of the hospital. They have an urgent and immediate need for this type of disinfection. We have a lot of focus there.

When you think of government, we think of the VA and then a lot of the bases that have their own nursing facilities and smaller clinical facilities where COVID is active. Inside the government, you have those facilities. In the restoration space, we’re seeing a lot of like, “My staff member contracted COVID and now three of them have it. I have to shut down my business while they go and get tested, quarantined and do all these things. If some of them come back that they were negative, what do I do?” That space can be disinfected. The Medisystem certifies it’s processed, the actual machine provides a certificate that you download onto a USB. That gives comfort to the owner of the business, manager, supervisor or director to be able to tell the team, “If you’re tested negative, it’s okay to come back. We had the space certified.”

Also, for customers as well to come back in if that’s the type of business that it is. Those are the three areas that we’re spending a lot of energy. The government and healthcare are two ambitious spacious to be going after. Fortunately because of the network that we have in the sales professionals that we look for, we already have connectivity into that space. It’s a matter of getting into the right presentations with the right people and then putting those proposals together to get the positions done.

What happens if someone gets stuck in a room where this device starts working? Is it dangerous for someone to breathe in and be around? How is that managed? Is it something that’s easy to manage?

The preference is for nobody to be in there. If somebody is in the space then you want to make sure that you’re wearing the proper PPE. The worst-case scenario, you get stuck in there with zero PPE and the device goes off, I’m sure you’re going to get out of there quickly but you’ll smell it. When you go in after treatment, the most common is it smells like a hospital room. It’s completely safe. Hydrogen peroxide is the active ingredient inside of it. It’s at a little bit stronger level and at a quality that’s not what you and I would buy in the pharmacy but it’s completely safe.

If it can get on food after a certain amount of time, you can touch that food and don’t have to worry about it. If you walk in right after a treatment, you can touch the surfaces and you don’t have to be worried about any danger to you and yourself?

That’s one of the great things about it is that it’s not some Clorox-based or chlorine-based chemical pound that is damaging, not only to the environment but also to humans, material things and electronics. It’s hydrogen peroxide. It’s been around forever. We put this stuff on our kids on their knees from falling down.

I love what you guys are doing. You guys are growing. This is happening now. You’re looking for sales reps to continue to make this happen and get to the point where everybody knows about it.

That’s our goal. We want to continue to build out our team with sales professionals. We have identified a couple of the major metros throughout the United States that we’re focusing on and filling roles to bring the product to market there locally. We want to make sure that we identify with the right people. People that have some medical device, healthcare-related training or some technical type of sales positions that have a proven record of being successful in sales that are more than about getting the deal done that they want to have a relationship with their customer. That’s an important part of a non-negotiable. We’re not looking for the sales professional who’s, “I sold it and I’ll see you later.” We are looking for the sales professionals that like, “I sold it,” and then they’re following up, “How can I help?” All of those things to make sure that they’re using the product consistently. That turns into referrals. We’ve organized the compensation package for sales professionals to align with that mentality and those behaviors.

How did you discover the company that makes this device or the person that makes this device? What happened?

An old friend of mine that I helped start a business many years ago, his business was severely impacted by COVID. As a result of that, over the years he had made a lot of friends in the hygiene space and remembered that somebody had told him about something like this. We’ve looked into it together and he presented it to me and I said, “This is something we’d like to invest in, get behind and let’s go.” Thanks to COVID, we’ve had this opportunity and it’s been incredible. So far so good.

From that conversation, how long has it been?

We had that conversation in March and April 2020. March jumped into due diligence. April, May, June, July 2020 was when everything was formalized up to now.

You’ve been generating quite a bit of revenue. Things have been happening fast.

Things have been happening fast but it’s great. It’s exciting. We have fourteen sales professionals. Two of our sales professionals are starting to build out teams in their markets. We’re looking at those people. We continue to interview, we want to grow, we want to get the right people. We want to get it out to the market. We want to solve problems for a lot of people and companies who need it. I’m having a blast. From a cultural standpoint, we are a faith-based company. Integrity is important. The other thing is we work smart, we work hard. We know that in order to reach our goals, we have to pursue them on a daily basis, persevere and have the right mentality, help each other and work for each other as another guiding principle.

For the readers, what would you share with them? I know that our readership, we have people that are in pharmaceutical companies, medical device companies, genetic testing companies, anything related to medicine and sales. They’re in there from the sales rep all the way to the directors, VPs and CEOs. What would you like to share as far as what you’re looking for in your company?

First and foremost, I like to share that anything that I can do for anyone to help them grow or to connect them with people that are inside of my network, I’d be happy and honored to do so. Anybody that’s connected to your show that I can help grow or connect with the right people in whatever way makes sense for them or even to have a conversation about what they’re doing, it would be my pleasure. As far as the company goes, JAR Bio and the Medisystem, lookout and feel free to contact me if you want to learn more about it. We’re excited. We’re incredibly bullish on the opportunity that we’re dealing with. Everything that’s happening in the market now, not only for ourselves but for some of our competitors tells us that the runway that we have is long and we’re at the beginning of it.

The growth potential with our company is significant. If you’re someone who is a go-getter, who has a good track record in sales and is looking to make a change into something that’s a little bit different, please feel free to reach out. We’re looking for the right individuals to continue to grow our sales team and have a greater impact nationally. That’s the other thing that’s great about the project. It’s something that has a real impact on people’s lives. We believe it’s one of the key reasons why we’ve been fortunate in winning business and reaching the level that we have so far. I’m here to help and support others in whatever endeavors they have. We’re looking for the right people to get out there and help us grow.

I can’t wait to see where you guys take things. I’m going to be keeping a definite pulse and we’d have to do a follow-up so you can tell us how much this has exploded in the next few months. Thanks for being on the show and we’ll be talking to you soon.

Samuel, thanks for having us.

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I dare you to tell me that wasn’t an interesting episode. That’s a fascinating product to be able to step into an environment that had COVID, set up a device, leave, come back seven minutes later and not only have it COVID-free but have a dry environment. That’s impressive stuff. I have nothing but high expectations for how far they’re going to take this product. The episode was great. We learned quite a bit. We learned the value that a sales rep can find in working for a startup and how private equity plays such an important piece in the value proposition, a sales rep that’s considering working in a startup can have. We learned about how private equity, even though they are focused on the numbers and they want to get as much valuation of that company as possible, there are a lot of private equity firms out there that are intentional with making sure the service, the product and what it’s doing for its customers is not compromised.

We got to hear from an example of that and how focused they are on making sure that the customer experience is everything that it should be as well as growing the company and allowing everyone that works within the organization to reach their highest potential. I love some of the things we talked about. What must a company have that will even allow Carlos’ private equity firm, what do they have to have to go on to even be considered to be backed? Right off the bat, he said highly ethical, the product or service is proven, the customer base is well-established and a management team that lives, breathes and dreams about the company. Those are the true movers and shakers of the world. The companies that go the extra mile to make sure they’re contributing to making a big impact in this world.

He ended it with a belief they have the network to truly help them grow. They take on a level of risk themselves like any private equity firm but I like how Carlos delivered that because it’s important to them that they see that their resources can help to the Nth degree with any company they choose to work with. You also got to see the work ethic that Carlos puts into what he’s doing now with this new opportunity with JAR Bio. I couldn’t believe it when I heard what they’re working on. He gets that a lot from new customers that are completely dumbfounded on how the whole world is using this left and right. Honestly, they will be. They’re new so they got to get the word out.

It’s exciting. If anyone out there wants to get a new opportunity or they’ve been looking for an opportunity and they’re trying to get their foot in the door or they’re even leaving from a previous medical device, pharmaceutical company or biotech company and they want to do something different, this is an excellent opportunity to consider. They have a phenomenal product with a phenomenal company and some phenomenal backing. Thank you for reading this blog. It’s our first episode of 2021. I’m excited to bring it to you. It is 2021, a new year, which means a brand new start for all of us especially for you.

If you’re someone out there that’s looking for that brand new start, a brand new role with a brand new company specifically medical sales. You need to make sure you take our assessment. You can go to EvolveYourSuccess.com and take the assessment. You can find us on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook. Take the assessment, get some clarity into this thing that you want so badly. You want to get into this role. You want to make something happen. You want your life and your career trajectory to look completely different. Learn what you need to have to get the job you want. This doesn’t just go for those of you that have no experience in the industry. If you were displaced, you left, laid off or want something different, you need to visit EvolveYourSuccess.com and take the assessment.

If you’re someone that loves where you’re working and things are going well. You’ve landed this new opportunity and you’ve been able to change your own trajectory. You now want to enhance your performance and be a top performer or you want to start thinking about laying the groundwork so you can have this amazing rock star career then you need to go to the website. Right there on the homepage select Improve Sales Performance and have a conversation with one of us from Evolve Your Success to talk about how we can light to evolve your success and give you the best 2021 year you can deliver for your career and your company. As always, I love bringing guests so that you can learn new insights around what happens in the medical sales industry whether it be in a field that you know well or in a field you’ve never heard of.

As we grow, we’re getting in touch with more and more people from all reaches within medical sales. We’re connecting leaders-to-leaders or companies-to-companies. If you’re a company that’s looking to maybe have a product that you want to get out there or maybe you have an opportunity that you need certain people to hear, visit us at EvolveYourSuccess.com. You can find me on LinkedIn. Samuel@EvolveYourSuccess.com, you can send me an email, let’s have a conversation and let’s make 2021 your most amazing year. I like to consider this the comeback year because 2020 was such a setback for many people but let’s take it one step further. This isn’t the comeback year, 2021. This is going beyond all achievements you have experienced up until 2021. That’s what 2021 is. You’re going to blow it away in 2021. You’re going to do things that you’ve never done before. You’re going to take your career, your life to new heights that you’ve never reached before. We want to be a part of it if we can. Continue to read the show. Visit the website if someone wants to get into a role, improve your role or get connected to other leaders in other companies.

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About Carlos Gregory

I’ve joined LinkedIn to exchange ideas and information to better serve both my company and clients. Perhaps we can collaborate and share informal networking advice, guidance and contacts across all facets of executive leadership, private equity operational partners, real estate investment and development, strategic business planning and organizational development.

Topics of interest include how to: create and execute company vision and strategy; lead high-performing teams to drive revenues and improve market share growth while maximizing operating margin and net income; rapidly identify opportunities and obstacles to business objectives and develop innovative solutions by collaborating with key stakeholders.

Projects we can discuss: developing and building teams that thrive in a hardworking, high engagement and customer-focused cultures; inspiring dedication, loyalty and accountability by utilizing adaptive leadership methodologies; achieving aggressive goals by leveraging results-focused priorities.

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