Today we’d like to introduce you to Robert Douglas.
Hi Robert, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
I grew up in upstate New York. My dad was a police officer, and my mom was a homemaker. I had three brothers. We didn’t have much money, so I did what kids did back then, I got a lot of part-time jobs. I was a paper boy, lawn mower, lifeguard, I parked cars, and when I got into wrestling, I cross-trained at the feed store loading 100 lb. bags of feed onto trucks.
I wrestled all the way through college. I received one of the earliest Computer Science degrees offered at York College and went to work as an entry-level system operator at an insurance company. The work didn’t challenge me too much, so I asked the programmers if they could give me some coding projects. I’d work on them all night and present my work to them the next day. The programmers appreciated my work ethic and recommended the company put me on the programming team. Fast forward 10 years and SkyTel recruited me to work in Mississippi. After a couple of years there I decided it was time to open my own programming firm. I told my boss my plans and, lucky for me, he asked if he could be my first client.
My company, Interware, developed the first online billing systems used by major players like SkyTel, MobileCom, and Netcom Online. Netcom Online asked me to come out to Silicon Valley. It was the tech goldrush, so I loaded my servers in my yellow Defender and drove out West. My best programmers followed. We thrived with contracts from Microsoft, AOL, CompuServe, and Advantis. In 1998, I started a second company—PlanetMagpie, a hosting company, along with my new Black Lab pup, Magpie. We worked day and night to build our own datacenter, or “the cloud” as it was ultimately to be known. The idea was before its time; customers weren’t willing to store their data offsite. Pivot!
I started a web design division so that I could host the websites we developed. Then customers started asking for desktop support. We created an IT Support division. Then customers started asking for Microsoft deployments and new networks. We added an IT Consulting division.
PlanetMagpie became a full-service IT & digital marketing services company, able to act as a one-stop IT shop for small and mid-market businesses. In 2018, we opened our first office in Texas and have loved serving the Texas market ever since. We currently serve customers in Dallas-Fort Worth and Austin.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I doubt any business owner would say it’s been easy. In the early years, it’s very tough because you are developing a product, learning how to start & run a business, and trying to get customers & hire employees – at the same time!
Only 10% of first-time founders succeed in the long run and it’s no wonder. Especially with self-funded startups, you can expect to be sweating bullets over funding payroll, learning/doing basically every job in the company, making mistakes that get you in hot water with the IRS, trusting employees you wish you hadn’t, taking on customers who don’t pay their bills, and being the last man standing on any given workday.
That said, few things build tenacity like founding and running a business, so it’s a great way to find out what you’re made of. I remember back when I first told my grandfather I was going to start a business he said, “oh Robbie, don’t do it.” Funny, but I’d do it again.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Thanks for asking! PlanetMagpie offers the gamut of IT services for small and mid-market companies. Our top services are cybersecurity consulting, network design, cloud services, IT support, cloud hosting, and digital marketing. We are security fanatics and build it into every solution we offer. We do things the right way every time. Plus, we are responsive—like 1990’s responsive. Our employees have a minimum of 9 years of IT experience, so we stay efficient when resolving our customers’ issues.
We are unique in that we have a highly skilled digital marketing team known as the Creative Lab. Our Creative Lab has garnered over 25 Website Awards in the last 18 years. We also run own Cloud Datacenter, which is rare for an IT Consulting firm. It makes us expert at troubleshooting outside cloud services and networks. Plus, our customers can host their servers with us and get personal support.
Finally, our team is all American. We do not use offshore workers to improve our margins. We invest in training the American tech workforce and have since our founding in 1998. We have spoken out for many years against the H-1B worker visas that allow hundreds of thousands of foreign workers to take American tech jobs, while leaving many American STEM grads without jobs in their field. This depletes America’s technology brain trust and threatens national security. We hope the bills making their way through Congress will finally, after 35 years, put the brakes on the H-1B program and let Americans do what they do better than anyone—creative abstract thinking and problem-solving.
So maybe we end on discussing what matters most to you and why?
When I’m not working, I’m building. My wife and I are restoring a Craftsman home and an American Gothic home. We love restoring old homes and creating beautiful spaces that we can live in. Next to the smell of sawdust in the morning, I’d say our kids, grandkids, 4 dogs, and my Franklin smoker probably make me the happiest.
Pricing:
- Our hourly rates are typically between $150-300/hour depending on the technical or design resource needed.
- Our cloud hosting rates are often 50% of what you’d pay the major providers (Azure, AWS, Google).
- Plus you speak to a live person instead of getting “email support.” That’s a bigger deal than most people know.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://planetmagpie.com/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robertdouglas/
