You’ve Been Served: Buying a $1.3m Process-Serving Company

And these folks, how much money do they make a year? How many jobs do they do a day? Two or three?

So it just depends on the quality of the server. It depends on how many we have in that area. It's a bit cyclical where we'll find certain areas picking up more than others.

And then if they have their own clients that are law firms, then that's a very reasonable range for them.

Let's talk about the nature of the work, Raj. We're speaking very clinically about this, but as anybody who has been in the unfortunate position of being served or who's ever seen a movie or TV, some stranger approaches you, somehow confirms your name somewhat, what would be the word, deceptively, gets you to confirm your identity and then says, here, you've been served.

We imagine that the recipients of these papers are about to have a very bad day. This is never happy news, as you yourself experienced. What's the day-to-day look like for process servers? I imagine it could get actually pretty hairy at times.

So there's actually a wide range of emotions. It's not nearly as dramatic as what they show in movies. We never say you got served, for one.

You just kind of... have to really control your emotions and be able to deescalate these types of situations. A number of people are actually expecting these documents to arrive. And it's not always necessarily bad news.

So for example, if there's a child support case that's happening and they need to get child support readjusted, the spouse will typically know, but the Office of the Attorney General has to serve both parties. And so it's not necessarily always bad news. In many cases, it is.

But the art of being a good process server is presenting this news to someone without necessarily ruining their day. So you just kind of go in, knock on their door. I never ask what their name is.

I just say, hey, Eric. Hey, Will. How's it going? I say, oh, good. And that's kind of how they identify themselves to me. It's never, hey, are you Will?

Are you Eric? Or whatever the person's name is. And as soon as I get that positive affirmation that it's that person, I tell them... Hey, look, I'm really sorry.