WEBVTT

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My name is Robert Rabroker.

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I've had the privilege
with 55 years in the business,

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all related to fire protection.

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My wife and I were finished
with our schooling, and then

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our first son was coming along.

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So I started working part-time
for a gentleman who had a small

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fire equipment company, Extinguishers
Only, and his name was Tom Koetter.

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I ended up working for him for 25 years.

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And in 1995, I purchased
that business from Mr. Koetter.

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Rabroker Fire Protection
just didn't sound too appealing.

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Koetter had a good name, so
it remained Koetter from that point on.

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Bob Rabroker is a bit of a legend
in our industry, very well-respected guy.

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The success that we achieved,
I think, was just keeping our ear

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to the market, our ear to our customers.

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It gave us position, so to speak,
in the brains of our customer.

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I met Bob Rabroker through Tom Nardini.

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Bob and Tom go back a long way through the
industry, and those two have great mutual

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respect, I think, for each other.

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It's just friends, but also business folks
in the fire protection industry.

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Bob's loyal, honest, fair, and as great of
a person that one would ever want to have

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in what you would call a true friend.

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It was easy to talk about
pretty much just about everything.

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Things that we were doing to grow
the business, things that we were doing

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to become better at what we were doing.

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I think it helped both of us.

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Selling your business is
not an easy thing to do.

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It's emotional.
It's an emotional and conflictive process.

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He would call me every once
in a while and ask me something

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about this or something about that.

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The day he called Pye and said,
This is what we're going to do.

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This is what I want to do.

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He sold them six of the seven,
kept Dallas.

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It wasn't long after that same
day, he called me and said, I made

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the decision and we're going to do it.

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When I pull up to any one of our offices
and I see all those cars, I imagine

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all those people's families and their
mortgages and everything in those cars.

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It's my responsibility to make sure
that if they are interested enough

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and committed enough to take care
of Koetter, I am interested enough and

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committed enough to take care of them.

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I stepped up and they knew Koetter.

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They engaged with that personality,
the company.

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So it fit my needs, my desire
to stay connected with Dallas and have

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my son essentially take over the role
of leadership As a majority owner

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in the international group,
Pye demonstrated that they could do that.

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The legacy is such a dynamic thing.

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It doesn't start when you get
out of picture or when you pass on.

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It just means how are you perceived by
people you care about, people

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you value, people who depend on you?

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How do you conduct your affairs?

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It's no different in business.

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I think every owner on their exit, they
want to feel like the company they built

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doesn't just poof, go off the map.

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It just doesn't evaporate.

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I think that they get a lot
of enjoyment and satisfaction out of

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seeing what they built the next level.

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They want to know that their business
is going to be around in one form

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or another for a long time.

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And I think you guys listen to that.