We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Street Ready Llc. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Street below.

Alright, Street thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

The idea for our business came to us one evening in Newark, NJ, in the spring of 2022, shortly after a train shooting in NYC. We were reflecting on the state of the world and realized that, despite advancements in technology and medicine, danger still exists in our daily lives. We thought, “Imagine if everyone knew some of the skills we do, like practical first aid and self-defense.” That idea sparked the creation of our business.
We developed a curriculum to teach these essential skills to inner-city residents in New Jersey through training programs. With this concept in hand, our co-founder Yvan, a medical student at Rutgers, used his connections to pitch “Street Ready” as a summer project, and that’s how we got started.

Street , love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Street Ready LLC is led by two passionate founders: Yvan Yomba, a fourth-year medical student specializing in emergency medicine and a skilled martial artist, and Michael Loureiro, a lifelong martial artist with over 15 years of experience in wrestling, Muay Thai, boxing, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, where he holds a third-degree black belt. Together, we formed Street Ready as a proactive response to the increasing dangers in today’s world.

We entered the field of personal readiness in 2022 after recognizing a gap in the practical skills available to everyday people for handling emergencies and personal threats. This realization was sparked by a conversation between Michael, who grew up in Newark, NJ, and Yvan, who had recently moved from California. Michael shared his experiences with the dangers faced by inner-city residents, and Yvan, through his clinical rotations, saw firsthand how many people end up in the emergency room due to a lack of basic first aid, street smarts, and self-defense knowledge.

From this, our mission became clear: to create “Street Ready” as a platform that empowers people with the skill set of emergency room doctors, the self-defense expertise of seasoned martial artists, and the situational awareness and de-escalation abilities of top-tier communicators. We envision creating competent, capable, and safe individuals who are prepared for any situation life may throw at them.

Our primary goal is to provide practical, easy-to-understand training so that you know what to do when a pilot passes out, a train derails, your child ingests poison, you face a sudden attack, or even when your cell phone catches fire. Our commitment is to deliver this vital knowledge through various engaging and accessible training programs.

What sets Street Ready apart is our ability to take someone with zero prior knowledge and, within just a few hours, equip them with the essential skills needed to navigate the complexities of the world confidently.

We excel at bringing practical medical knowledge—often confined to medical schools and dense textbooks—and merging it with decades of self-defense expertise and effective de-escalation strategies into an engaging, two-hour training session. Our methods are accessible to anyone, from ages 5 to 75, regardless of education level or physical ability. We offer both online and in-person options, ensuring flexibility and convenience for all.

Our key differentiators are the speed at which we can teach the Street Ready skill set, the practicality of the information provided, and the adaptability of our training programs.

Our Services Include:

#1: Street Ready Complete Citizen 101 Training: This foundational program teaches essential first aid skills for the three most common life-threatening emergencies and basic self-defense techniques that everyone should know. Our curriculum is adaptable to different groups, ensuring relevance and effectiveness for each audience.

Women’s Violence Survivor Groups and Sororities: We provide training on neutralizing common attacks, such as hair grabs and unwelcome approaches, and offer guidance on body language and situational awareness to avoid potentially violent encounters.

Law Enforcement & First Responders: This program focuses on de-escalation techniques before physical contact and innovative, safe detainment strategies, along with practical first aid skills for working with limited resources.

Schools (Stronger Kids Curriculum): We teach verbal assertiveness to deter bullying and nonviolent, leverage-based techniques for handling physical confrontations, along with child-specific abduction prevention strategies and first aid.

Non-Profits & Businesses: We cover workplace-specific de-escalation techniques, navigating medical and personal injuries on the job, and enhancing company safety protocols.

Families and Individuals: We provide training for at-home medical emergencies, home safety strategies, and methods for protecting neighborhoods.

#2: Street Ready De-Escalation & Situational Awareness Seminar: These specialized seminars are designed to help various groups manage conflicts and stressful situations effectively.

For Businesses: We cover handling conflicts among employees, difficult customer interactions, management disputes, handling layoffs or terminations, and high-stress situations.

For Medical Facilities: We teach medical professionals how to navigate conflicts with aggressive or anxious patients, handle distressing conversations with families, de-escalate non-compliant patients, and manage conflicts among staff.

For Families and Individuals: We focus on vocal fundamentals, body language, understanding the escalation ladder of violence, and communication techniques to manage verbal disagreements and avoid unprovoked violence.

For Schools: We guide schools on managing student conflicts and bullying, parent-teacher disagreements, classroom disruptions, emotional outbursts, mental health crises, and school safety incidents.

#3: Street Ready 7-Day De-Escalator Online Course: This online course is designed for individuals or businesses looking to master de-escalation techniques. We cover the fundamentals of conflict, recognizing escalation, de-escalating potentially violent situations, and managing physical confrontations if they arise.

#4: Corporate Consulting for Companies: We offer tailored advice to businesses to improve their safety and conflict resolution protocols. This includes first aid for the workplace, conflict resolution training, and a comprehensive analysis of existing safety measures with recommendations for improvement.

What are you most proud of, and what do you want potential clients to know about your brand?

We are incredibly proud to have provided our Street Ready training to over 6,000 individuals, including many schools and businesses. Our most significant pride comes from the stories of survival and empowerment from our clients after taking our training. We’ve had attendees perform the Heimlich maneuver to save a choking child, successfully de-escalate road rage incidents, stop severe bleeding in emergencies, and even prevent abductions. These real-life stories are what fuel our passion and commitment to what we do.
We want our potential clients to know that we are a growing brand, eager to work with anyone looking to become more prepared and capable in their everyday lives. We are approachable, and we encourage anyone interested to reach out and learn more about how we can work together to enhance safety and readiness.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

As the founders of Street Ready, we have learned many lessons along the way, particularly about what it takes to start and grow a business in the education sector. One of the biggest lessons we had to unlearn was the belief that “you need a lot of resources and a well-established name to start a business.” When we started, we didn’t even have a website; we simply identified a need and created a solution from scratch. This experience taught us that you don’t need to be the biggest name to make a significant impact—you just need to be bold enough to start. The story that solidified this lesson was seeing the genuine appreciation from individuals who benefited from our training, not because of our brand’s size, but because of the value we provided.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

We built our social media audience by consistently offering innovative and practical solutions to common problems. Our approach was to create engaging reels depicting scenarios like “choking while alone,” “being attacked at a bar,” “navigating a seizing individual,” and more. By consistently producing high-quality content, we were able to provide real value that encouraged sharing and following. We also made a point to keep our audience updated on our travels and training sessions and actively sought feedback to create a sense of community and engagement.

For new creatives, my advice would be to remain consistent and find unique ways to make your content both entertaining and valuable. Social media is a crowded space, so creating captivating and well-planned content is crucial for standing out and growing an engaged audience.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.streetreadynj.com
• Instagram: @streetreadynj
• Facebook: Street Ready LLC
• Other: Course: https://streetready.us/

Image Credits

Photo Credits: Luca Mostello