We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Matthew Cote a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Matthew, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear the backstory of how you established your own practice.

Let me start off with a little information about the company, AMSCO Medical.

Alpha Medthrift Scientific Company (AMSCO) is a family-owned full line distributor of medical, surgical, and laboratory equipment & supplies. Founded in 1985, AMSCO Medical has been serving physician offices, laboratories, surgical centers, hospitals, veterinarians, and home healthcare facilities for over 25 years.

AMSCO is based out of Frankfort, IL about 45min south of Chicago, IL. This has the majority of our accounts being in the IL/IN areas.

May 2022, I decided to Seneca, SC and begin to expand us into the Southeast market.

Establishing yourself in a brand-new market where not many people know who or what AMSCO Medical is, is like starting from the very beginning when we were founded.

So where do you start?

What has led to AMSCO’s success in the Midwest was the ability and desire to build personal relationships. That is the same exact approach that I am taking in the Southeast. At AMSCO we still believe that visiting each account and being able to be face to face is the best way to truly be able to be a support and be a valuable resource for each of them.

It’s well known that as a small business your success is a direct correlation of your customer service abilities.

This starts with being available for those that have questions and needs. Weekly Monday-Friday 9am-5pm you will see me out in the areas visiting and making sure all accounts have the supplies fully stocked they need to support their business day in and day out. While also being a resource for anything that maybe new or any supply shortages that are being foreseen coming down the road. Aside from that just being personal. Ultimately the goal is to be able to build a personal relationship with all accounts, I don’t want to be just the person that sends you supplies I want to be a part of your day that makes you smile when you see me stopping in just to say hello.

Matthew, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

When it’s said all things happen for a reason it sometimes comes across as just a cliché. However, with my journey to AMSCO Medical I would have to say it is true. Before joining on with ASMCO Medical I had spent 11 years running a sales division with my previous employer, a big box publicly traded corporate health club. That company decided to eliminate a few management roles and that included mine. This was a total shocker as I had assumed this was the place I would retire from. A couple months later I had crossed paths with AMSCO Medical owner Sanjay Shah through a friend of a friend. To bring it all full circle Sanjay and I had previously known each other from the big box health club where he was a member and I was an employee at the time. It was a no brainer after a couple conversations with Sanjay that AMSCO Medical was the right place for me to land.

As mentioned before AMSCO Medical is a full line distributor of medical, surgical, and laboratory equipment & supplies. We are able to provide a customer service based, cost effective alternative to other distributors that are out there. We make sure every account that works with us is treated as if they are they are our only account. It doesn’t matter the size of account or the amount they spend monthly every account is just and important and gets as much attention as the next one. Every account that works with AMSCO Medical is top priority!

What do you think helped you build your reputation within your market?

Your reputation will create itself with your actions or lack of actions. Day in and day out I make sure my accounts know I am here to assist them with their needs. Making sure you are available for them when they need you is step one. From there if you say you are going to do something do it. It’s a very simple process to stand out in the world of customer service when everything is so automated. Just being a person that is going to respond to questions and concerns goes a long way. As long as you are being that go to person for your accounts your reputation will start to formulate and will work for you.

What’s been the most effective strategy for growing your clientele?

Strategically to grow my clientele can be boiled down to just going into the offices and having conversations with the various employees that would be doing the ordering or would be connecting me to who would be doing the ordering. The face-to-face interactions have all but disappeared. You don’t see very many people out and about wanting to hold in person conversations. Most want to either email or call. Being different and showing up to meet and great goes a long way. It shows you are actually someone that is going to be around and that you aren’t just passing by trying to snag an extra account or two. Truly being around to visit accounts and have conversations with people is a lost art and those that are willing and able to bring it back will notice a significant growth to their business. When you are in the people business interact with the people.

Contact Info:

• Website: Amscomedical.com
• Instagram: @MatthewMedSpa
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AMSCOMedical
• Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/matthewacote