This company and I go back a long time.
In all fairness, they have the BEST business plan of any private security services contractor OR temp agency I have ever seen.
And the employees also tend to get the business as well... At least certain ones do in Austin, Texas.
Executive Security Systems, Inc. (hereafter referred to as ESSI) was begun by three persons who were supposed to have been CPAs, accountants or auditors or at least familiar with bookkeeping and business procedures. They were amazed at how much money there was in the temp business and decided that there would be even more money in the security services contracting business where the temps wear uniforms and can be commissioned by the State of Texas to carry a firearm... I DID NOT WRITE WHAT IS ON THE WEBSITE AND I AM NOT CLAIMING THAT I DID!
Here is their history from their own website:
The following is a brief summary of ESS's history (from their website and it as TRUE as I remember it.):
/" Begun in 1972 as a division of Peakload, Inc., ESS opened offices in Dallas, Houston, and Atlanta.
(Peakload is a temp agency that deals in human beings, hiring them and assigning them to various businesses then charging the businesses so much per head, paying the worker a pittance and pocketing the difference. Like slavery in a way except slaves had employment security and were cared for when they got sick and could not work. Some offices of this company used to specialize in the day labor type job for disposable, interchangeable, dispensible people. Apparently it also works well when formulating employment policies for security personnel too.)
/ "That year, our current Chairman and principal owner, Larry R. Hardtner, began managing operations for the Dallas office.
/" Mr. Hardtner purchased the Dallas operation in 1976.
/ "ESS purchased the assets of Charter Security Group, Inc.in 1991, providing expansion into Mobil Patrol and Response Services in Dallas, Austin and Bryan. (The circumstances of this aquisition are interesting but it was a BRILLIANT move on the part of the ESSI Corportate offices since the Austin branch is probably the largest! How profitable? Stay tuned!)
/ "ESSI established a San Antonio Branch Office in 1997.
/" Today, ESSI remains a privately owned company with each of the four principal owners involved in the day-to-day management of the company."
I first encountered ESSI in 1984 when I lived in Dallas, Texas and my former supervisor at Sentinel Security Services Inc. (Now out of business) and his wife were looking for a job because things had gotten slow at that company so they went and applied at ESSI.
There were apparently three main people in the office at that time, and human memory is rather fallable: Charlie and Sue Coleman and someone named Larry.in fact, there were apparently a LOT of people in there named Larry who worked there then and I do not know which one made the statement to my supervisor's wife. No other last names were mentioned to me (Charlie has since passed away.)
My supervisor and his wife were both Native American and they were both hired by Charlie based on their excelent credentials. Well, whichever Larry was at the lower management level and it could NOT have been the Larry that is listed on their web page NOW because THE US ARMY DOES NOT CONDONE DISCRIMINATION! Told my former supervisor's wife —before she had even had a day's work — to bring in her gear because he did NOT want ANY WOMEN working there! And then he assigned my former supervisor to a 12 or 14 hour construction site in a remote location with roads which were almost impassable for a car. (They could only afford one car) and there was NO restroom or potable water or first aid kit available there in compliance with OSHA rules and regulations. My former supervisor was also forbidden to leave the site to use the restroom, also a violation of OSHA rules and regulations. I went out there to take him some ice water since he couldn't leave and saw it for myself.
Many Dallas-area security companies got fined big bucks by OSHA for orders like those in the mid-1980s. It was also EXTREMELY hot out there and my former supervisor was diabetic. I remember being present in my former supervisor and his wife's apartment and hearing the discussion about ESSI.
(I do not know nor did I ever know any of the people in the Dallas office personally. And I have only heard GOOD things about the people who are there NOW.)
I am just reporting to events as they were related to me in person. I never worked for ESSI in the Dallas - Fort Worth Metroplex location. Not that I would care to after hearing what my ex-supervisor at Sentinel Security told me about them. He passed away in 1992, Sentinel is no longer in business and I don't know what happened to his wife.)
But the office in Austin, Texas is a whole other story.
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