91.1 F
San Fernando
Thursday, Mar 28, 2024

Live Response

Credit card processing clients who call Elite Merchant Solutions get a live person on the line, not an annoying automated system. Justin Milmeister said fast and personal service is the key behind the success of his growing company Elite Data Processing Inc., known to customers as Elite Merchant Solutions. “With us, you call for any kind of service and you get a live operator right away (who) answers your call and directs you to one of our Elite staff,” Milmeister said. “I always wanted to have control over the customer experience as much as possible.” He says another competitive advantage is customers are likely to speak with the same sales people and build relationships with them. Since the Van Nuys-based company started in 2002, Milmeister has opened several offices in the greater San Fernando Valley region, as well as offices in three other states. Elite Merchant Solutions serves clients in all 50 states. The company started as a one-man operation and has grown to a business with 48 employees and about 100 independent contractors, Milmeister said. Annual revenues have grown, as well, Milmeister said. Annual revenues increased from $4.1 million in 2009 to $5.7 million last year. Revenues are expected to reach about $9.6 million this year. Vince Tuomey, owner of AAA Wholesale Tools & Supply in Northridge, has been a customer almost since the company’s start. He said he likes the competitive rates, and being able to reach the same customer service representative on the phone when he has a problem. “You want to feel like you know who you’re dealing with, because they’re handling your money,” Tuomey said. He said that hasn’t been the case with other companies he’s used in the past. Michelle Albert, accountant for the restaurant Drago Centro in Los Angeles, said being able to quickly receive technical support from the company is important. “When you’re in the restaurant industry, you can’t have your systems go down,” Albert said. Continued Growth Milmeister was working in commercial real estate industry and was growing tired of its instability when a friend gave him the idea of starting a credit card processing company. He said he became even more encouraged to start a company after hearing complaints from a tenant about the frustration of having his credit card processor down for days. Milmeister did research into the business and then rented 150 square feet of office space at a storage property in North Hollywood in early 2002. He landed his first account in August of that year, he said. Milmeister eventually recruited a sales person, so he could focus on other aspects of the business, he said. He later expanded his office space at the North Hollywood site. After attracting more clients, Milmeister opened his first full-service call center in Grand Rapids, Mich., in 2005. His brother ran the office’s daily operations and became a company partner. That was a turning-point year for the company, Milmeister said. He learned by making mistakes — such as overstaffing and using the wrong software products — and growth soon followed. “We started to do a significant amount of deals through that operation,” Milmeister said. “We were finally able to get a core group of solid (employees), some that are still there today.” Going forward, the company’s revenues had steady growth. Milmeister groomed future partners at his North Hollywood site, and then positioned them to head other offices. Most of those offices serve as separate business entities under Elite Merchant Solutions, he said. Between 2007 and 2009, the company opened a second office in North Hollywood, an office in Lenexa, Kansas, and another one in Thousand Oaks. Founder: Justin Milmeister Location: Van Nuys CORE OF BUSINESS: Credit card payment processing NUmber of Employees: 48 Revenues in 2009: $4.1 million Revenues in 2010: $5.7 million Projected Revenues in 2011: $9.6 million In 2008, Elite Merchant Solutions left its 1,800-square-foot office at the North Hollywood storage property and moved its headquarters to a 5,000-square-foot space in Van Nuys, Milmeister said. The Thousand Oaks team later moved to the headquarters site. With the headquarters relocation, the company was able to hire about 25 more employees, allowing the company to work with more clients, Milmeister said. “In this office alone, we were increasing business over 60 percent within a fairly short period of time,” he said. Now Elite Merchant Solutions is working on its newest office in Wellington, Fla., which Milmeister expects will start operating in mid-July. “Our goal is to open either company-owned or agent offices throughout the next couple of years,” Milmeister said. “Our goal is to continually expand, but (through) manageable expansion. We don’t want to jump into anything we’re not ready for.” Changed Focus In its beginnings, Elite Merchant Solutions relied more on sales of credit card processing equipment as a revenue driver. However, Milmeister said he always knew he wanted the processing service end of the business to be his main focus. He started to shift focus to processing transactions about six years ago, along with many others in the industry. Credit card companies started lending out more processing machines to clients who qualified, he said. With this change, the goal of the business became getting more long-term clients. Elite Merchant Solutions started targeting businesses that had been around at least for a couple of years and appeared to have some sustainability. He paid more attention to the quality of service and added other services, such as gift card supply and processing, payment processing through the Internet and mobile applications, and other financial services. More recently, the company started offering text message marketing as a value-added service. Milmeister said he knows companies eventually reach a point where they can no longer grow at such a fast rate – but his company isn’t there yet. “We’re scheduled to nearly double in revenue this year because we’re still in that expansion phase,” he said.

Featured Articles

Related Articles