As some of you will know, I rarely speak about my personal life.

Professional standard while

representing my customers is something that I hold in extremely high regard, but I've decided to let
pride outshine my ethos to share this moment with a little background as to how we got here.

Elite Custom Services has been in business for 10 years today! A much younger version of myself picked
the name, but I think we’ve lived up to enough of his youthful idealism to justify it now.

June 10th 2009: I had quit my first job in the telecom industry just in time to be told that my new one
was no longer available. I thrived off of uncertainty at the time, so while still sitting in the house that my
previous employer was still paying for and with absolutely no idea what starting a business actually
meant, I threw my last $800 at Legal Zoom to form an LLC. What could go wrong?

I subsisted by doing what I was good at, troubleshooting telco equipment and learning new skills to
better troubleshoot telco equipment. My former employer even let me subcontract through them,
mercifully knowing how unprepared I was for what lie ahead. It worked well for a time, but eventually
that project ended, as they all do. I was left with no customer base and barely more business knowledge
than I had gone in with. I took a contract job for something that seemed trivial enough to learn as I
went. The work was simple enough, but seeing the phrases “Purchase Order”, “Net 60”, and “Incorrect
invoice format” for the first time certainly taught me some humility. I survived off of the generosity of
my peers, nicotine, and a thermal sleeping bag in my cargo van for longer than I care to recall.

But I was my own boss! As long as I did what I was told to do, when to do it, and how to do it. I really felt
no different than I had as an employee, so when the chance came around again, I switched back to a W2
position. I didn’t shut the LLC down though, partly to keep the dream alive, mostly because I had no idea
how. I felt like I was part of a team again, for a while. I watched how things operated a lot closer this
time, and I started forming stronger working relationships in the industry. An opportunity arose to work
for one of the major OEMs, and I dove in. The networking and exposure were in another league
compared to previous experiences, and the learning process continued. Once again facing the end of a
project, but with several additional years of maturity and experience to apply to the same situation. I
decided drive ECS from a moonlighting operation to a legitimate business.

Learning the breadth and scope of insurances required, taxes owed, filings and reports to maintain was
a new layer on top of just performing the work I enjoyed, and the curve is steep. Fortunately, in this
modern world there are an incredible number of tools and resources available to quickly navigate back
into compliance once you realize you’ve inadvertently broken a law that shouldn’t exist. With a handful
of family and friends ready to help get ECS off the ground, a few start and stop opportunities failed to
produce meaningful returns. We were eventually able to secure an ongoing project for integration work
in the southeast through former coworkers. The rate we began growing from this project required the
addition of “overhead” on a scale I was once again unprepared for, pleasantly for once. Making the
conscious decision to let go of individual responsibilities and place them in the hands of your capable
team is one rewarding moment that doesn’t suffer diminishing returns. This allowed us to expand our
capabilities, reach, and reputation further than I ever could have expected on my own.

We continued growing, learning, teaching, and making mistakes. We have had many great years, with an
excellent team scattered across the country. Constantly cross training every able-bodied tech you can
get your hands on works very well on the way up, and is very expensive on the way down, with regards
to the sine curve industry we work in. I sold my Cadillac CTS-V to make a payroll one week while waiting
on overdue payments that were “in the mail”, one of my more painful lessons in financial management.
Finding my incredibly supportive wife helped smooth over some of the more reckless elements I had
remaining, much to our team’s relief I’m sure.

As ECS started to mature, we tried to look internally and gauge the morality of our effort. What was the
true value in our partnership to entities that operate specifically for margin targets? Do they view us as a
partner, or a tool? Does it matter? Do we want our culture to operate like theirs? We decided that we
wanted to work with partners, rather than for clients. Applying this philosophy accelerated the
conclusion of one our larger contracts, which caused some doubt and anxiety about our immediate
future. We pulled through and learned a lesson, as has been our story since 2009.

We’re now working with stronger partners than we ever have before, and forming new connections
with our values laid out upfront. Bringing in new talent is allowing us to handle the ever-increasing
complexity of project and scope the telecom industry is demanding, and we are poised to take on these
new challenges with more experience and knowledge than ever before. The overwhelming majority of
the individuals and companies we have worked with, for, under, or even against, have had a positive
impact on my life and my company, and I am extremely grateful for each of your parts in our story. But
to be honest, I’ve learned the most from the rest!

TL;DR:

Happy 10th birthday ECS! I disagree with the phrase “If you do what you love, you’ll never work a day in
your life.” I have never loved my work more, nor have I ever worked harder. ECS is the journey that has
made me who I am today, and will guide me into the future. I am grateful to everyone who has
participated in the experience so far. Owning a business has been unlike anything I ever imagined, and
the awareness this has imparted enriches every aspect of my life. I encourage everyone to try it!

Best Regards,

Eric Gruschow

Elite Custom Services, LLC

Chief Executive Officer

To apply an acquired lesson, this is an excellent place for marketing!

If you are in need of a time-tested, full-service Ericsson integration partner, we’d love to connect with
you. We specialize in DAS, Small Cell, and cRAN deployments from retail stores through stadiums, ENM
support, and Firstnet deployments with a focus on external PIM mitigation. Please email me at
egruschow@elitecsllc.com for a full competency and reference list.