My name is Pat Kiggins, The Veteran's Mentor

I owned my own successful technology company in Dallas.

My dad was career Army and I grew up as an "Army Brat" traveling the world.

I have four brothers and two sisters. I'm the oldest. Three of my brothers and one of my sisters were also in the military. In fact, two of my younger brothers are West Point graduates and are now retired from the Army.

One of my brothers was in the Air Force and he was in Viet Nam the same time that I was there.

I've had two combat tours and you'll learn that I also had a very comical tour between the tours of combat when you sign up for my newsletter, Veteran Business News.

Besides my immediate family, I have several uncles who served in various military services.

My former father-in-law was a full Colonel and his brother was a General. My current wife's father who passed away recently was also a Veteran.

I have two brothers-in-law who were also in the military. One just retired from the Air Force and the other is still in the reserves.

Like many of you, I really didn't pay much attention to all of the benefits that were available to Veterans over the years.

 I did take advantage of the GI Bill to help pay for my college education but other than that, I really didn't take advantage of the many benefits we have.

I actually began doing serious research a few years ago when my sister-in-law was having some challenges and needed some assistance.

She's a remarkable person who spent many years to finally reach her goal of graduating from college and getting her teaching certificate in Texas.

She did this while being a single mother of two wonderful kids. She teaches special education and I'm really proud of her.

She was trying to get her Master's Degree but couldn't afford the tuition. I decided to see if her father's Veteran status might provide her any benefits.

What I found amazed me! Not only was she eligible for two years of free college in Texas, her books and other expenses would be covered as well.

That meant that my wife was also eligible for the same benefits. Oddly, even though I was a Veteran with seven Purple Hearts, I wasn't eligible!

It seems that under this particular state benefit, you had to have been a Texas resident at the time you went into the service to be eligible. I went into the Army in New York City so I wasn't eligible.

After I sold my technology company, I sort of floundered a bit. I did some consulting. I even tried educating myself for a different career.

Nothing seemed as exciting as my all the events in my life up to that point. I just couldn't seem to find what I wanted to do next.

Maybe a bit of additional background might help you understand.

I was a relatively good athlete as I was growing up. Everytime my family moved somewhere, there was a new sport to try and I always excelled.

I used to swim and dive competitively. I was on the National Ski Patrol. I played semi-pro baseball. I played football, rugby, softball and I learned how to sail.

Heck, I even played rock and roll with a famous band for a time.

When I graduated from college, I worked for Ford Motor Credit Company financing commercial real estate.

That was really exciting because I ended up lending money to some of the richest people in the US at the time.

When the real estate bust came in the late 70's, I got to work on some of the biggest "work-out" problems facing our industry.

These were problem loans and I loved the fact that I could come up with so many creative solutions to the many challenges facing us at the time. Again, it was exciting.

After I left Ford, I worked for some of the largest commercial lending companies in the industry. I always took on greater responsibilities in each new assignment.

Finally, in my commercial lending career, I was hired by Digital Equipment Corporation to help them build a captive finance company.

My job was to make sure that all of their customers could "finance" the computers, software and services that Digital sold.

Building that organization was really exciting and a fantastic experience.

Ultimately, I spent 12 years with Digital and ended up on a management team that was responsible for the entire Central United States. We managed an annual budget of $1.2 Billion and that was really exciting!

After leaving Digital, I helped a small business owner grow his computer company and ultimately sell it.

The owner told me when he hired me that he wanted to be able sell his company it in two years. We sold the company after nine months!

I figured if I had done it once, I could do it again so I went to work for another company and I worked there for two years helping the owners grow their company. They ultimately sold it to a large company and were able to retire.

I realized that if I could do it for others, I could certainly do it for myself so I started my own technology company in Dallas.

My very first large customer was Microsoft! They spent several million dollars with my company and I ultimately sold that successful company.

That's when the excitement left my body.... I didn't know what to do after that.

After a few consulting ventures and other misguided attempts at keeping busy failed, my son and I went to a full day seminar on how to business on the Internet.

Most of the day was boring but we stuck it out. In the last hour and a half, that's when they started talking about the "good" stuff!

Although neither my son nor I joined their organization, we had some great brainstorming sessions on the way home.

By the time we got home, we had both decided that we would do some independent research and possibly go into business together to see if we could make our fortune online.  He already owned an Internet business.

In doing my research, I found so many Veteran benefits that could help me in my endeavor that I almost fainted!

So far, I've used lots of them to help me but I've learned about so many of them that my head began to swim!

That's when I decided to not only start my own Veteran-owned business, but to help other Veterans learn the amazing secrets that I learned during my search.

I started my own Texas Limited Liability Company (and it only took me an hour to do it online).

I have my own affiliate accounts so I can sell other people's products.

I have my own dropship accounts so I can sell "hard good" items online without having to maintain my own inventory in my garage. 

Once again, I'm selling someone else's product but I can buy at wholesale and sell at retail!

I also learned that Veterans have such a huge advantage over other people when it comes to running a business that it's almost hard to fail.

Did you know that the Federal Government actually sets aside a percentage of their budget to spend with Veteran-owned businesses? 

Last year, the Government spent over $1.2 Billion (yup, that's Billion with a "B") with Veteran-owned businesses... and they didn't even meet their target!

Do you know that it doesn't take much effort at all to qualify your new business to take advantage of that huge (no, make that AWESOME) amount of money?

Did you know that Veterans have a huge advantage if you want to purchase a franchise business?

Did you know that Veterans have FREE services available from the Small Business Development Centers across the country to help you make your business successful.

Services like counseling, helping you create your business plan, free courses on how to run a successful business, and many more benefits?

Did you know that the Small Business Administration provides outrageous incentives for Veterans who decide to start a small business?

Did you know that the Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE) can provide mentors to you at no cost to help your business be successful?

My mentor has been wonderful and helped me cut all the red tape so my business could be qualified to do business with the Government.