Founder · operator · builder
Thad Paschall
I build tools that help people start a company and actually run one. The website, the phone answered while you’re on the job, the booking, the reviews, the follow-up, and the work that gets you found on Google and ChatGPT.
In 1992 I started Protect America with one truck and no outside money. No investors, no safety net, and no idea how hard it was going to be. Over the next 23 years that company created more than 800,000 customer accounts and over $600 million in revenue, and then I sold it.
Here’s what nobody tells you when you’re starting out: the work isn’t the hard part. Getting found is. Your first customers can’t hire you if they don’t know you exist, and that stays true at year twenty, it just costs more to fix.
I’m not an operator anymore, and I’m not going to be. What I build now is the stuff I wish somebody had handed me on day one, for the owners still doing it the hard way.
The short version
- 1992
Started Protect America from scratch with one truck, funded at first with my own and my family’s savings.
- The 2000s
Ran it the traditional way for more than ten years before we changed the model. Up to about a thousand employees. A million dollars a month on Google ads to find customers. Nationwide, not one state.
- 23 years
Created more than 800,000 customer accounts and over $600 million in revenue. We were in the top 15 of the SDM 100, the industry’s ranking of the biggest security companies, for more than a decade.
- 2015
Sold the company and walked away. My last day was in January of that year.
- Now
Building websites, phone answering and growth tools for small business owners, because the way customers find you has changed and most owners have no idea it happened.
Read the long version. How it started, what it cost, and why I do this now.
The part you can check without taking my word for it
Anybody can put a number on a website. Protect America has a Wikipedia article, and my name is in the first sentence of it. Here is what is documented there, so you can go and read it yourself rather than trust a page I wrote about myself.
Founded Protect America in 1992.
The company is documented as being founded in 1992, with Thad Paschall as its founder.
Introduced the first monitored self-installed home security business model, in 2005.
Wikipedia credits the company with the first monitored self-installed security system business model. Whether that was good for homeowners is a separate question, and one Thad answers differently today.
About 200,000 systems installed by 2001, and about 400,000 customers by 2012.
Those are point-in-time figures. Accounts were sold in bulk throughout the life of the company, which is why the cumulative number created over 23 years is far larger than the number active in any single year.
Sold to Rockbridge Growth Equity for approximately $100 million in 2010.
Thad stayed on and ran the company until January 2015.
Ranked in the top 15 of the SDM 100 as of 2014.
The SDM 100 is the security industry's annual ranking of the largest companies by recurring monthly revenue. Protect America held a top-15 place on it for more than a decade.
Acquired by Brinks Home Security in 2020.
Five years after Thad left the company.
Source: the Protect America article on Wikipedia. I have never edited it and I never will. Two notes on the numbers, because they look like they disagree and they do not. Wikipedia reports about 400,000 customers in 2012, which is a count at one moment; over 23 years the company created more than 800,000 accounts, because accounts were sold in bulk the whole way through. And the sale figure you will read there, approximately $100 million in 2010, was not me leaving. I stayed and ran the company until January 2015.
What I’m building now
Every one of these exists for the same reason: getting found is the part that kills good businesses. People used to search Google to find a local company. Now a lot of them ask ChatGPT “who’s the best near me?” and take the answer. Most good small businesses aren’t in those answers at all, and nobody tells them.
Fast Digital Marketing
Websites and an AI receptionist for local business owners, so the phone gets answered and the business shows up when people ask Google or ChatGPT who to call.
LiveAI Security Edge
The same tools built for independent security company owners, the industry I spent 23 years in.
LiveGrow Your Chiropractic Practice
Websites, call answering and follow-up for chiropractors who would rather treat patients than chase them.
LiveMost Recommended
Boards that measure which local companies Google and ChatGPT actually name, city by city. Most good ones never get named at all.
LiveOne Truck Startup
Everything I wish somebody had handed me on day one, for people starting with one truck and no cushion: the website, the phone answered around the clock, booking, reviews from customer number one, and a monthly call where you bring whatever you're stuck on.
Coming soonSecurity Systems Review
A ranking of the independent security companies in each city, the small operators the national review sites leave out because they can't pay to be listed.
Coming soon
How this company is run
Every one of those is run by AI agents. They find the customers, write the first drafts, check each other’s work and watch the systems overnight, and I approve what goes out. It is the same job I did for 23 years, with a different kind of workforce. Here is what that actually looks like day to day, and how to have me show you the live system.
How I work
If you want me in your corner, you get somebody who has done every part of running a company, startup to exit, and learned all the hard lessons along the way. What I won’t do is sell you a promise.
No guarantees. Nobody honest can promise your business succeeds. I'll give you the best answers I can. You still have to get out of your chair and go to work.
I answer my own phone. If you’ve got a question, the number is (737) 325-3777. If that sounds fair, let’s talk.