As we've been building out Thompson Burton over the past few years with my longtime friend and business partner, Walt Burton, there's one simple concept coined by Jim Collins that's never failed us: Get the right people on the bus. Kevin Grimes is the right person. I'm excited beyond measure to be announcing the addition of Kevin to our team! Kevin and I have a history that goes back close to seven years. Back in the day when I was an in-house lawyer for Orrin Woodward, one of MonaVie's distributors, I worked closely with Kevin. He was serving as their outside legal counsel on MLM and FDA compliance issues. During those interactions, I came to really respect and appreciate his level of expertise.

Great Character

I also came to admire him as a person. The business relationship was secondary. When I chat with him, he makes me better. And that, by itself, was worth the effort to get him to join. Also, we both share a passion for helping abandoned teens. I was raised by a single mother and I've been doing whatever I can for young men over the past several years. I still recall having lunch with him and our CEO and hearing Kevin pour out his heart about his work for distressed teens. He was a foster parent for 13 years and fostered 24 teenage boys! He continues to mentor a myriad of at-risk teenagers in various programs. His comments left a mark. And whenever I've had interactions with him as a competitor, he along with his other partners were always incredibly gracious. I always tell my prospective clients, there are about 5 good MLM attorneys out there. KG was one of them.

Great Lawyer

Aside from being a good person, he's a great lawyer. He's been working with network marketing companies for over 22 years, with a few $1B+ clients under his belt. His experience is vast and he's not afraid to acknowledge the challenges facing the industry today. He's seen the industry evolve over the past two decades, going from very little startup activity to the environment we're seeing today. He's also been part of over 3 significant regulatory matters. One more thing, and I'll stop bragging about him: he's not afraid to poke around and explore opportunities. He does different things, and they all revolve around education. He was the first to create a compliance training module, which consisted of over 4 hours of footage and 47 separate video segments. It was deep! Speaking of the compliance training....yes, it landed him in hot water. And he's dealing with it. For the uninitiated, Kevin Grimes was sued by the Receiver in Zeek Rewards for, among other reasons, improperly providing Zeek Rewards with compliance training. The gist of the complaint: KG allegedly improperly sold compliance training to a company that he should've known was unfixable (Zeek Rewards paid for his compliance training). It's one of the reasons why he's no longer with Grimes & Reese, now R&R Law Group. With that being said, he's gone close to 29 years without a bar complaint filed by a disgruntled client (it happens to the best of us, eventually). But Kevin...he's got a great record and I know with 100% certainty that Kevin's skill is unmatched by anybody else in the country. So regarding those challenges he's facing, he's going to make his positions clear soon. It's a shame that the public doesn't know him better, but that'll change over time. As for me, I've been a lone operator in MLM law for close to eight years. I've literally had to reinvent the wheel, and it's been a good exercise for me and it's been good for the clients. Now, it's refreshing to have an extra set of eyes on these matters. He's got more gray hairs than myself and his feedback is going to be priceless. Another point: Kevin is going to focus a lot on his FDA law practice. There's huge opportunity there to be "the guy" and Kevin is the guru when it comes to FDA regulations. In fact, he wrote a 430+ page ebook regarding dietary supplement marketing. Everyone, I'm honored and proud to introduce you to KG! As my good friend said, "Two Kevins are better than one" ;)ps, I hope you had a wonderful Christmas holiday and a Happy New Years. I'm overflowing with abundance and gratitude for the friends, family and partners in my life (including YOU). Cheers to a prosperous 2015.