Timothy Smith is a former member of the United States military and served a tour in Iraq in 2004. When the man retired from the military three years later, he had a lot of trouble finding a new job for over six months.
Instead of staying on the unemployment line, Timothy decided to channel his inner entrepreneur and start a small business.
“When I first got out of the military in 2007, it was hard for me to find employment,” he said to KDSK. “I couldn’t find a job for about six months.”
Because Timothy wanted to give back to his fellow veterans, most of his employees are either veterans or their family members. The proud owner of Patriot Commercial Cleaning employs more than 40 fellow army and marine veterans.
“We start from top to bottom,” Timothy said. “We’ll disinfect all the restrooms, we’ll vacuum the floors, take out all the trash.”
Timothy still has vivid memories of the horrible things that occurred during his tour in Iraq almost fifteen years ago, where anti-vehicle mines were extremely common and army Humvees weren’t as protective as they are now.
“Back then,” Timothy recalls, “we didn’t have any up-armored Humvees so what you used to do is put double sandbags on the bottom of the Humvee in case we did take impact.”
“April 29, 2004. Eight of my buddies from Charlie battery were killed in action over there.”
Kenneth Griffin, a longtime 26-year veteran in the United States Army, is one of Patriot Cleaning’s proud employees and fought in Iraq as well. He has now finally found a new home with his fellow vets. The name of the company was absolutely well chosen.
“When we do things together, we smile at each other because we know veterans helping veterans is our motto,” Kenneth Griffin said.
Former US Marine Howard Battle is also part of the team.
“It’s like one big family,” the former Marine said. “So even though at 18, I left home but I fit right in with another family.”
With currently over 52 employees – about 40 vets and 12 close family members – business is going well for Timothy’s company.
“We do for each other. We help each other and we help others out,” employee Bradley said.
Unfortunately, Timothy had to deal with lung cancer and couldn’t work for a couple of months, but thanks to the support of his fellow veterans and rounds of chemotherapy, the tumor is now in remission.
“It just means a lot to be working with these guys and gals that I served with,” Timothy concludes.
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