We were lucky to catch up with Zach Freeman recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Zach thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?

In 2008, a former Marine at my family’s church lost his job and began going through a difficult divorce all in the same month. My family offered to let the young man stay in our home for a few months until he could get back on his feet. He ended up living with us for almost 3 years.

In that time, I got to see a lot of the common struggles that veterans face firsthand and it created a large soft spot in my heart for the challenges that veterans often go through after getting out of the military. In particular, this young former Marine struggled to find a workplace where he didn’t feel misunderstood or like an outsider. It was primarily because of this experience that I chose to start a company with the primary mission of supporting and encouraging American veterans.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

Veterans Moving America (VMA) is a values-based moving company that only hires veterans. We provide moving and moving-related services (professional packing, storage, etc.) to anyone in the general DFW area or anyone within the US moving to/from DFW. We are known for providing quality service (just google us and read our reviews) and for being authentic in our mission to serve veterans.

I am most proud of the work that our teams provide to our clients and the culture we have been able to create within the organization. Staying true to our values by only hiring veterans has been a challenge at times, but I am proud that we are not willing to compromise like many other companies. There are a lot of other companies that have a firefighter/police/veteran name, but none of them (to my knowledge) have stayed committed to only hiring that group of people. VMA’s culture is unique, the service we provide is superior, and the experience that our guys and customers get is one of a kind.

Can you open up about a time when you had a really close call with the business?

The biggest “near death” timeframe for VMA came in 2015. We were coming off a somewhat successful year (successful meaning we didn’t lose a ton of money) and were, if I’m being honest, a little too confident about where we were as a company. That mindset changed very quickly the further into the year we got.

No matter what we did or how much revenue we brought in, we kept losing money each month. I slowly watched our bank account get lower and lower until it became very clear that we were about to completely run out of cash. It was so bad that I created a spreadsheet that tracked every single transaction expected to come into and out of our account to make sure we would have enough cash. Several times the anticipated balance would dip to only a couple of hundred dollars and I would have to scramble to figure out how to keep the account out of the negative. At one point I even transferred every last penny I had in my own bank account (which wasn’t very much) to buy some time until the company could bring in more money.

Eventually I had to go back to my board of investors and ask for more money to keep the company alive. I outlined the changes I wanted to make and the impact they would have on our performance and thankfully they were willing to give me one last chance. Fortunately they were willing to invest more and the changes we made resulted in the company becoming profitable again after a few months.

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

I’ve always found that people prefer to be lead much more than feeling like they are being managed. Part of being a leader, in my opinion, is knowing how to get the performance you want out of your team without a ton of direct management. It starts with the hiring process and the culture you bring people into. When I’m hiring, I look for characteristics that can’t be taught as easily like honestly, work ethic, humility, and coachability more than work experience. If you can get the right type of people on the team who are willing to learn (which also means being willing to fail), you will find that your team will require minimal “managing” and, with the right leadership, will accomplish great things. Your role as a leader is to set the direction and unite your team in achieving the same goals. If you can do that, maintaining high morale is significantly easier.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.VeteransMovingAmerica.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/VeteransMovingAmerica/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/VeteransMovingAmerica/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/VeteranMovers
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/veterans-moving-america-fort-worth
• Other: https://bit.ly/3H1mmcR

Image Credits
FW Magazine Zach Freeman