For ECS, 2011 was a bit of a banner year, with revenue growth that garnered national attention.
The electronic check services, prepaid cellular and prepaid card company was the highest-ranked local business on Inc. magazine’s 2011 Inc. 500 list, which reported that ECS’ revenues grew 3,188 percent between 2007 and 2010. Those figures nabbed the company a No. 69 spot on the list.
Though percentage growth isn’t quite as high now, ECS is still on the upswing. Its 2011 revenues were $82.1 million, up 1 percent from 2010 and 54 percent higher compared to 2009.
The company, founded in 1997 by Winfrey’s father, Dennis Winfrey, got its start collecting on bad checks via debit-card technology. But its expansion into the prepaid cellular phone service and bill-pay market allowed it to take off following the 2007 purchase of a small technology company now operating as Softgate Systems.
“What that helped us do, was it helped us leap forward in technology,” President Derron Winfrey says. “It basically allowed us to pour the concrete to build the house on.”
Today, the company has more than 300 sales agents and operates in more than 7,000 locations in all 50 states, and it is looking to become operational in Puerto Rico.
Winfrey attributes much of the company’s growth to the hard work of its independent sales agents across the country.
Ron Stanley has worked as a sales representative for ECS since 2008, serving more than 200 retail clients in a 100-mile radius of Auburn, Ala. He says Winfrey is always quick to respond to questions if a problem presents itself.
“Any issue that I’ve had in the last three to four years, he’s taken care of it,” Stanley says, pointing to returns on prepaid wireless cards sold by vendors as an issue that often require assistance.
“I don’t know all the reps that he works with, but I know about 10 or 12, and we all have his personal phone number, and we text and e-mail him and we get responses back, sometimes within 30 seconds but never more than an hour later,” Stanley says.
Winfrey says the introduction of new unlimited cellular plans in the retail industry curtailed ECS’ growth in 2011, but its reach is still expanding.
ECS added an average of 5.3 new locations per day last year through its independent sales agents.
And with new revenue streams just beginning to bud, Winfrey predicts that ECS will surpass $90 million in revenues in 2012.
He is particularly excited about the potential for Bogo Fetch, a coupon application developed by ECS for smart phones.
“As you travel with Bogo Fetch, it actually updates inside the app,” Winfrey says, explaining that the coupons pop up by proximity.
The company is marketing Bogo Fetch to small and midsize companies, and the program already is operating in Springfield and Fort Smith, Ark.
Winfrey anticipates expanding the program’s range as more people see the benefit of utilizing the personal identification number-based system. Winfrey says small-business clients have the most to gain because they can create their own coupons and market to app holders for $50 per month with no contracts. Through the system’s first seven weeks, more than 1,500 people had downloaded the application, Winfrey says.
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