McKeon's Expert Tree Service - The Founder Mike McKeon on how it started...

From 1981 to 1985 I was enlisted in the Air Force. I served 5 yrs in the Air Force, stationed over seas - In Turkey for a full year, and in Spain for 2 years - I also had temporary duty for 3 months to Italy. I was then transferred to Hill Air Force Base in Utah.

I came to Phoenix on vacation for 2 weeks in November 1985.

My brother Jay, who was a very intelligent guy - extremely talented and very capable of expanding his knowledge, started trimming palm trees - his first ones were his own in the back yard. He did a great job, and seeing potential, he started knocking on doors to do this for others too.

Our parents were celebrating their silver anniversary in Hawaii when I came to visit. My brother Jay showed me how to climb a palm tree and trim it - to take the bark off it. I had never done this type of work before... It took some co-ordination to go up the palm tree, It was kind of awkward at first, but I got used to it after doing it a few times, and I helped him pick up the trimmings and clean up the big mess it made. He was making good money doing the palm tree work.

I knew I needed to get out of the Air Force for many reasons. I needed to do something when I got out, but didn't know what yet. At the time I was stationed in Utah. That was when something tragic happened. A real tragedy. During the 2 weeks that I was on vacation, my brother Jay was driving my car from our parents house. He was going to a nursery at 40th street and Bell and was apparently racing another car when the other car struck his rear quarter panel causing him to spin out. He lost control and went into the oncoming lane of traffic. The car went head on with another car, shearing his brain stem, and he was in a coma for many months.

Everyone was traumatized. My Grandfather was still alive, and had been suffering a lot of stress due to the younger of his two son's having lost his daughter from a real freakish accident with a semi truck and an ATC. My grandfather died about 2 months later due to the lost lives of his loved ones.

It was extremely difficult to get a transfer back to Luke AFB here so that I could be here to see my brother Jay - and to be closer to my family during this time of tragedy. When I got back, he was still comatose - scale 4 - this had been for 8 months now. Time went by, and I lived with my folks during this time.

My brother had purchased a motorcycle, on payments, and it was still there, so I took over payments on my brothers motorcycle - driving it out to Litchfield Road to the Air Force base every day for the next 6 months.

While I lived there, my brother Jay received call after call for palm tree work. He was not able to take calls - or do the jobs, so I started doing the palm tree work on the side while I was still in the Air Force - and found out I could make a good living - even more money than the Air Force was paying me by trimming palm trees.

I applied for an early out from the Air Force - at 5 years of my 6 year term - and I was able to leave with an honorable "EZ Out" type of exit that they were giving at that time.

My Brother Jay finally pulled out of his coma after about 13 months at Bryons Nursing Center after getting the tendons cut throughout his body to relax him. He was transferred to a trauma recovery center, in Redding PA - the best muscle/brain rehabilitation center around at the time where he spent 6 months. During those 6 months, my parents added on to the house and had the house modified to help him with his daily activities. He is now back and very content, and has a great memory of his childhood up to about 6 months prior to the accident, but no longer has an easy time with his current / short term memory because of the accident.

I kept taking my brother's phone calls and trimming a lot of palm trees. Eventually, the phone stopped ringing for him. I didn't know what I wanted to do.. so I began knocking on doors and trimming grass, or anything - getting more jobs for about 6 or 7 years.

I still did tree work, but it came and went. It was very difficult. I loved the tree jobs, but they didn't always come. My mentality was still to do the palm tree work. Eventually what happened was that one day while I was cutting down trees, the owner of another tree company asked me to come to work for him and taught me much more about how to do the tree work. This was a competitor who is no longer in business. He was a very nice man who gave me an opportunity for about 2-3 months. I learned a lot. He taught me how to trim, how to climb trees, and even how to use a stump grinder.

I also spent a great deal of time reading, taking seminars, and consulting with an arborist to further develop my knowledge of the business.

I still didn't have any money, so for 4 or 5 years, I put a little add in the paper and went around doing little tree removal jobs for residential homes.

It was taking a while to build up any kind of calls and develop the business. I finally tried to get out of trees and go into something different. I tried to go back into the military by turning in an application for oversea work in the field I had worked in before for the Air Force. That did not pan out.

After the 8th or 9th year of tree business a big wind storm went by and knocked down a lot of trees. I went to an apartment complex and landed a big job. I managed to buy a pickup truck and a tandem axle trailer. When I first started I had an old beat up dodge, I had used for about 5 years. This truck was much newer and I was able to do more work - and could rent a stump grinder to take out a few stumps at a time when I needed to.

Before this I would get up every single morning from 4:30 - 5:00 and could quickly empty the truck from the previous day by myself, but now that I had the trailer it was taking longer over half an hour just to empty the trailer to go out and work the next day. A typical day would end after I had gotten back from the field - to answer my messages, type up estimates, call back customers, schedule appointments, pay the bills and whatever else needed to be done - falling asleep on the couch around 11:00 at night. This went on for 8 long years.

In 1991 I finally got a big truck, but it was not a box truck for trimming / chipping. It took a lot of work, but I finally saved up enough money - a couple thousand dollars to have a steel box welded on it to catch the power chipper debris. I went to a company called Vermeer and was able to get a lease on a brush chipper. At that time, there was not a lot of competition - so I ran a dollar bill size add in the phone book before the competition got tough.. this was about 1991. For the first several years that add pulled in calls like you wouldn't believe. I had to hire help. I also did the work out with the guys - for 13 years emptying the trailer or the chipper truck.

I began to get better equipment like blowers, chain saws, etc. and now I also had employees helping.

So by the time 1996 rolled around -August 15, 1996 at about 18:30. The worst storm I had ever seen in my life came through the valley out of the north east. It tracked southwest - it took out over 400 telephone poles in Glendale.. It took out nearly 100 year old trees throughout the the valley. I bought a brand new truck, a brand new chipper, and a brand new stump grinder along with many other tools.

These tools have made me what I am. 1996 was the break year - it really made a difference. There was steady work for 5 or 6 months as a result of that storm.

That time truly let people know that I was prompt and professional, doing what I said I would do for the price I quoted and that we do a good job cleaning up.

I have never had a job where I started a then I had to raise the price because I knew I was losing money on it.

The equipment that I run now is the finest that can be had. Our chipper runs a John Deer 6.8 Turbo diesel and is towed behind a 2001 international 4900 series truck with the higher horsepower power plant and the allison transmission for more reliable service.

Most of my business has been built by word of mouth referrals and return customers - who are very satisfied with the work we have done and the good service.

It's been a long road and has taken 20 years to go where we are today.

After the storm of 1996 I had grown so much that I bought a piece of land and put a building on it, however due to health issues, I was not able to grow the business to fill the building the way I planned, so I sold the building in May 2003.

I set up the sale contract of my building so that I could lease a portion of the building back which is where we are now.

The past 20 years I have learned the tree business and grown to what I am today.

The key factor that I have learned and that I feel has made me successful is the way I treat people. My employees are worth more than all the money and gold in the world. I take extra care of them and I believe that is a reflection of the work and the job they will do for my customers on their property.

I feel that when you are taking care of your personnel first, it becomes a reflection on your customers. Now I have 4 employees that have helped me to grow that do different things for us. They have company trucks that are ours - that they take home after work. They are allowed to use them after work. I feel that this is one of the best things you can do in business is to treat your employees great. They are what have made the business what it is, and I am confident that without them the business would not be what it is.

I would not be in business without them. I would not be where I am today. I am very thankful for them. Even with my own health issues that have taken time to get rid of, they keep doing a great job and making the business successful.

That is the story of my business.

Thanks for reading it, and for everyone that is a part of this rewarding business!

Mike McKeon - Founder - McKeon's Expert Tree Service

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