The odds of them showing up and saying, well,
this looks pretty good. See, you know, got it.
Saw what you did. All good, man. Go home. Have
a nice day. And it's not exactly going to work
like that. Welcome to episode 16 of the Frugal
Firearms podcast, the podcast designed to help
you enjoy the shooting sports and save money
at the same time. But today's topic is going
to be really about saving money in ways that,
unfortunately, most people haven't thought about.
When you think about trying to be frugal, you
might be thinking about, you know, can I save
$100 here? Can I get a good deal there? Maybe
I get some free stuff here. Well, have you thought
about bankruptcy? Have you thought about not
being able to put your kids through college?
Have you thought about jail? Have you thought
about all the things that might go along with
what you think is a justified shooting, but get
you all those other unintended consequences?
And what are the statistics? If you're a concealed
carrier, you probably will never have to actually
use that weapon at anger. That's just the reality.
What if you do? What's the probability that you're
going to end up in court, either in civil court,
criminal court, or both as a result of that?
What happens if it's in your home? What happens
if it's not even a firearm? How are you going
to protect yourself from bankruptcy, from changing
your life, from things that go along with financial
stress like divorce, loss of assets, loss of
your job? How are you going to save yourself
from that happening to you? I say this a lot,
that we have important shows. Today might be
the most important show in an individual context.
So first off, I'm going to bring on my co -host
as always, Ken. Ken, say hello to our guests.
And why don't you go ahead and do the introduction
of our guests today? Okay. Hi, this is Ken. I'm
here to welcome Kent Brown, who's going to be
talking to us about CCW Safe. This is something
that's a topic I think that's extremely important.
Any CCW carrier has to have a company standing
behind them because I know personally as I approach
retirement, you're trying to look and see how
your finances are going to last for the next
30 years. And if something were to happen, you
need to have a company standing behind you. So
with that, I'll turn it over to Kent, and I want
to go ahead and introduce yourself, Kent. Thanks,
Kaz. First of all, I'm very pleased to be with
you. It is an important topic, and I'm glad that
you guys are having us on today to talk about
it. I know we have a lot of things that we want
to get through, but it's a real pleasure to be
with you. So, Kent, tell us a little bit about
the history of CCW Safe. How did it start? What
was the inspiration? By the way, I know the answer
to this because I listened to your excellent.
Excellent podcast. And in fact, I'm going to
say it right up front. When you get done listening
to our podcast, the next one you want to subscribe
to, listeners, is the CCW Safe podcast because
it is a wealth of information. And I did hear
discussed there once the history of the program.
But for those people who are not familiar with
the company, first talk about that and then talk
about your association, which I guess now goes
back about three years or so. You have been the
CEO. About three and a half years I've been with
the company. But yes, the company started in
2011. And it was really our three founders. Two
of them were retired Oklahoma City police officers.
They actually met on their first day at the police
academy, essentially. It was really the day before.
And they've been lifelong friends ever since.
The third founder. it wasn't a had been a police
officer here in oklahoma for a handful of years
and then became an attorney and so they were
all good friends mike darter who was really they
had the original idea for the business when he
was on oklahoma city police he was working in
an action with atf he was doing gangs and drugs
and all these other things and anyway they had
a an arrest warrant and things didn't go well.
And there was a lot of shooting and Mike ended
up getting sued for the outcome of that officer
involved shooting and ended up getting sued in
civil court, federal civil court and all kinds
of things. And of course, for your folks who
are listening, who are police officers, you know,
the, the FOP, the paternal order of police takes
really good care of their folks when they're
in an officer involved shooting, they get. the
best attorneys they get counselors they get all
these other things and so it was really the power
of the resources that mike had access to that
helped him prevail in those cases so when he
retired he asked himself well who's going to
care for me now if something happens to me when
i'm just out and about in my personal life or
i'm at home and somebody breaks in and i get
into this shooting who's going to help me and
they all got together and Started looking at
the available services and they thought, well,
these are really not very good. You know, what
we got as police officers was so much better
than what's on the market. And there were really
only about two guys doing it back then, two or
three. And so they decided to start the business
essentially using that police model. that high
service high expertise you know personal care
model and bring that to everyday citizens who
are caring and that was the emphasis to start
the business in 2011 and it's been growing very
very rapidly since then and really that the growth
particularly in 2020 and 2021 the whole industry
was booming and if you remember the all the social
unrest and the riots and everything that were
going on in those years Everybody in the industry
got even bigger. And so as that was happening
here at CCW Safe, the partners decided, you know
what, we need to make sure that we're ready for
the future of the business and the size that
it's going to get to and that we're resourced
correctly. We have all the processes in place
to take care of people. The bigger we get and
the scale just gets bigger. And so they started
to search for somebody to run. the day -to -day
business, and ensure all of those things. And
that's really where I came on board because my
background is in operating businesses, scaling
things out, putting the correct processes in
place. They weren't doing anything wrong back
then. We just really needed to be scaled up and
ready for the future. And so I was contacted.
I was a firearms owner. My wife and I were firearms
owners for self -defense. We weren't carriers.
and we honestly we didn't even know the industry
existed which is kind of an interesting thing
that happens still uh craig and ken is that a
lot of people who own a firearm and even many
that carry they don't even know that a service
like this exists and i can remember when i was
interviewing to come here my wife said you know
you have to figure out if that's a good place
to work and those are the right people to work
with and for she goes that's up to you she goes
but we're going to be members. We're going to
join this thing, even if you don't go to work
there, because she said, I had no idea that if
we use these, our firearms and self -defense
like this, that this kind of stuff could happen
to us, that I just thought self -defense is self
-defense. Why in the world would I need an attorney?
Why in the world would I get arrested if I've
done all these things correctly and just defending
myself? And so, so it was an eye opener for us
then. And of course, and then in the last three
and a half years, you know, we've The businesses
continue to grow. We've done all kinds of new
and exciting things. But we will talk about that.
The awareness of the industry is still relatively
low. And you guys know these numbers. So concealed
carry permits in the U .S. approximately 24 million,
23, somewhere in that range. Right. Low to mid
20s. Firearms owners, mid 80 millions, somewhere
84, 85, 86. If you look at our whole industry
combined, all the competitors, nobody really
knows the complete number of people that have
a service like this. But it's, you know, on the
high end, maybe two million, probably more like
a million and a half. But so it's a really low
percentage. Below 10 percent is what you're I
mean, probably. Well, when when you talked about
the number of of people carrying or, you know,
there's firearms ownership that. You know, gun
sits in the dresser, never leaves the house.
And then there's people who have, you know, two
safes full of guns. And there's all the spectrum
in between those two things of the people who
are carrying. Were you including essentially
the entire population of concealed or of constitutional
carry states? No, those are actually permanent
people. Those are just permanent people. So it's
even bigger, right? So it's even bigger. So is
the business then? I mean, I don't want to make
this a show about. the business itself, because
I just found it entertaining. I didn't know this
about you, that you were recruited. I found it
just amazing. You were recruited to a business
that you didn't actually understand and were
invested in the industry. That's just so unique
just by itself. But additionally, that when you're
trying to look at the landscape, I guess, of
the opportunity space for how many people are
out there. We're really talking about if you
consider people carrying in constitutional carry
states well below the percentage that you even
implied. Right. And how many of those people,
I mean, Ken and I have talked about this before.
Sure. The number of people who seek out professional
training above and beyond what is necessary to
qualify for your permit is. Too small. Way too
small. Way too small. yeah way too small but
the whole thing you're talking about the constitutional
carry states which i'm i'm ecstatic that we're
moving more and more i think we're what 28 or
29 states now that are constitutional carry that's
right and the fact that most of probably the
vast majority of people there think hey it's
constitutional carry no problemo which is true
however you have a potential legal exposure that
they may be utterly unaware of And that's where
you got to have some company standing behind
you. You got to have somebody in your court,
in your corner. Yeah. So that's the history.
That's how I got here. I've been here three and
a half years. So I have learned a tremendous
amount. And I'm happy to share more about the
company and answer all these great questions
that you guys have about how we work and how
the industry works. So how many people think
that they, how do I phrase this? I'm just exercising
my rights. You know, castle doctrine. I shot
a guy coming into my house. You have to purchase
this, obviously, before the incident occurs.
It's not afterwards. It's kind of like getting
the vaccine before you get the disease. Yeah,
for sure. You definitely do, right? I always
use the different analogy, which is, right, you
don't, you know, you're hoping you never get
in a car accident, but you don't get in one and
then call Allstate or State Farm. sign up, right?
It's over. Too late. You know, we don't sell
insurance, but the principle is similar in terms
of you just need to be a member. Now, people
who are members, right, they're not just hopefully
not just waiting on whether they have an incident
or not because we have a tremendous amount of
educational and training resources for them to
partake in and hopefully make them more educated
about self -defense, learn from others, and be
better prepared should they ever have to face
it. So whether it's de -escalation or withdrawal
or whatever the tactics are, there's things that
we want them to study and learn in case they
ever do have an incident. And that's really a
big part of the business, right? I mean, most
of our members are not going to have an incident.
So we definitely stress that. We have a weekly
newsletter that comes out where we're publishing
new content all the time. And we hopefully...
They'll never get to the point where they have
to call us with an emergency. Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, it would be the last thing I would ever
want to do. Walk away, back off, leave if possible.
Yeah, but it's the absolute last resort to protect
you or your family. You know, other than that,
everything I have, cars, whatever it might be,
not worth it. I will try to walk away. The other
thing is, and people don't know this about when
you get... The cops show up. Really, anything
you say, they will start, can and will be used
against you. So one of the things that I think
is important is that you know what to do after
an incident occurs. Obviously, you call the cops
and you're probably call number two. And then
you literally say very little or almost nothing
until you actually are represented by a lawyer.
Yes, it's really true. You know, I would say
when I speak to people about, you know, what
what's the first thing I should do after this
incident occurs? The first thing is, you know,
make sure that you're safe. Right. Sometimes
you're still near the person or, you know, whatever.
Maybe you've withdrawn. Maybe you have. You've
got to make sure that you're safe because that's
the whole purpose of self -defense. And so once
you've done that, then you want to call 911.
Absolutely. And by the way, you want to be the
first to call 911. So if you're involved in an
incident that's a little lower scale, maybe you
didn't use your firearm, maybe you used something
else, you don't want to be the second to call.
You don't want the attacker to call first because
sometimes they do. Sometimes they perceive the
incident very differently. And then the police,
you know, have been known to have sort of a mental
preset on, well, This guy called first. So, you
know, we may presume until we get there that
they were the victim rather than the second person
who called. Now, over the long term, that won't
be the case. They'll sort out what happened.
But we always want you to be first call 911.
Then you call us or whomever you might belong
to. And then, you know, the fourth thing I tell
people is depending on the circumstances, if
you're safe or whatever, if it's possible to
render aid to the person, even though you've
just had to defend yourself against them. Or
make sure that when you call 911 that you're
reporting their injury or the severity of their
injury so that they can get the right resources
on the way. So just because you had to defend
yourself against them, it's still a good idea
to make sure that they get the care that they
need. Yeah, that can be an important point in
a trial, actually, showing that you did have
a concern for that other person's life. That
will play well in court, absolutely, I would
imagine. I don't know if you have any statistics
on how many juries have been swayed by the after
-action persona of the person who was actually
involved in the self -defense incident. Yeah,
I don't have any statistics on that, but you're
correct, right? It can absolutely be a factor.
Just in the same way that fleeing the scene...
And not reporting it to the police is going to
be a huge factor. You don't ever want to do that.
If it's really a self -defense situation, it's
fine to withdraw and get safe, but you need to
be calling 911 immediately. You can't just disappear
and then hope nobody finds out about it. That's
a terrible strategy. And that will really almost
preclude you. you know, in some cases from a
self -defense claim. So you really have to just
do a few basic things, which is call 911. You
want to let them know that you're involved in
a self -defense incident. You want to let them
know if someone's shot or injured and tell them
where you are. In some cases, you know, it's
a good idea. Tell them what you're wearing. Identify
yourself so that when they get there, they know
who they're looking for because there's bound
to be multiple people there. You want to secure
your firearm or make sure that you're dealing
with that correctly before the police show up.
You don't want to be standing there holding your
gun out in front of you when the police show
up because they don't know who's who. They're
trying to protect themselves when they show up.
So you want to deal with that. We have some resources
on our website, which will help people with that.
But, you know, we had a member in an incident
and he had studied quite a few of our. our resources
and he got involved in a very serious incident
and so he knew what to do and he said you know
when they got there i had the firearm down on
the sidewalk in front of me i had my hands up
palms out and i had already identified what i
was wearing and when they got out of the car
and they said get on the ground i got on the
ground face down nowhere near that firearm and
you know everything turned out great for him
but in the process they don't know who you are
what your attentions are so you just because
you think you're completely justified you still
have to do some things in a way that give them,
you know, a peaceful feeling about the situation
and as much as possible. I mean, obviously, yeah,
your weapons should be put away. perhaps on the
ground and do whatever the cop says you know
all that um anyway i was just about to say as
a side note as a ccw holder you obviously as
soon as you get arrested or you may get arrested
or maybe not but as soon as this process start
it's it's a it's a year two sometimes it's a
long process but one of the things about it being
a ccw holder is that you shouldn't usually only
have a single firearm on your CCW license, okay?
You should usually have at least two, sometimes
three, whatever you have. And the reason is,
whatever happened in this incident, that firearm
now becomes evidence and will be taken away from
you. So if you live in a state that requires
a CCW and all of a sudden you don't have one
and maybe you just torqued off the local motorcycle
gang or whatever it might be, you want to have
the ability to have something else that's on
your license but that it that happens right the
firearm they are going to take the firearm you
know in it certainly if you've discharged it
even in cases where it might just be a brandishing
incident sometimes they'll take it then too and
it can be difficult to get that returned even
you know we we just uh we just did one today
so we have in our program if you're weapon is
taken, your carry weapon is taken in your incident,
and we just can't get it back from the police
after the conclusion of when they would need
it, whether in this case where they dropped all
the charges and we're still fighting to get it
back and we can't get it back, that we have a
firearms replacement program. It's one of the
few things we do that we reimburse somebody for.
Everything else we pay up front, but of course
we can't buy you a firearm because of the federal
processes. What we do is we just authorize the
member once we've determined, hey, the odds of
us getting that back right now are not great.
So go ahead and replace it. Send us the receipt
and then we send them the money. We just did
just did one today. And I'll tell you about how
bad the process is. The guy's incident, I believe,
was October of 2023. Oh, boy. Do the math on
that, how long we tried. Now, he had other firearms,
of course, to your point, Ken, but this one in
particular, you know, we tried for a long time.
So it does happen. Absolutely. So that's a distinguishing
characteristic that I, I mean, I'm a member of
CCW Safe, and I didn't know that. How many other,
well, have we really gone down the list of why
CCW Safe would be, in your opinion, Kent? you
know, the optimal choice. And I'm going to put
that in the context of, you know, balancing cost
and efficacy, experience, all those things that
are going to matter. I mean, I think that anybody
would, you know, can, you know, kind of went
down the path of saying, you know, like putting
on your seatbelt before. after the accident occurs,
I imagine you probably get a couple calls from
people occasionally saying, I was just in an
incident. I'm not a member. I'd like to become
a member. And cost is not an object at that point.
But by that point, I imagine it's too late. And
I'm not saying that it shouldn't be too late
because you should have thought of this ahead
of time, just like with auto insurance. But at
the same time, you have stratification of different
plans. And I'll bet you that there's very few
members who would say, No matter what they were
spending, the plan was worth it. But what are
we getting for those different levels of spending?
Yeah, I mean, there's a lot. So there's a lot
to in all those questions there. I would tell
you, yes, we have people call in after they signed
up 10 minutes earlier, but the incident was the
day before. And of course, we don't cover that,
right? Our resources are there to be dedicated
to active members. so that does happen we've
had people call in like that and of course we're
not gonna cover them because they're not a member
or they joined after the incident and some of
those people cancel they're like oh i don't you
know right they didn't cover me well wait a minute
you weren't a member and then some people have
an incident on their own And they call in and
join and they say, I know you guys are not covering
this incident, but I can't afford to go through
this again by myself should this ever happen.
And so sometimes that works both ways where people
are like, I need to get this because who knows
if I can handle this again. Even if it was a
low level incident, a lot of times that's enough
to inspire somebody to look for assistance should
they ever have to face it. But you had a question
and we had some questions we talked about. I
think one of those was really what are the elements
of a comprehensive self -defense legal services
plan. And I think that's a good place to start.
You know, for us, the sort of table stakes as
we look at it, and not everybody offers this,
is unlimited legal defense funds paid up front,
no out of pocket for the member. So anything,
whether it's attorney's fees. Expert witnesses,
investigators, exhibits, all the things you might
need in the worst case scenario trial. Those
should be unlimited funds with no caps, no out
of pocket for the member, because otherwise,
what's the point? So the industry 10 years ago
was not like that. CCW Safe actually innovated
that. That was one of the reasons that they started
the business with it because I think at the time,
and I don't remember who they were looking at,
it's really irrelevant, but whoever they looked
at as a baseline and probably in 2010 or 2011,
it was like capped at $150 ,000. Well, all our
founders had been officers and attorneys. They
knew $150 ,000 is not going to get you through
trial where you could be facing a murder charge.
It just isn't going to do it. It won't. cover
it. And then they, and so they started the unlimited
and then other people followed that. And then
even one of the bigger providers in the industry
does unlimited attorney's fees, but they have
a cap on investigators and expert witnesses.
What, you know, that stuff gets really high too.
And so the cap that they have, we think is too
low. So we don't cap any of that. So that's table
stakes. You've got to have that for us. You know,
we're looking. If I was selecting, you know,
I want someone who has the ability to get me
the best local attorney for the circumstances
that I'm in. So we have some there's people in
the industry that like, oh, I'm an attorney in
this state, but I'm going to work your case in
another state. You know, there's an advantage
to having a local attorney. Of course, they need
to be qualified. But who knows the people in
the. da's office who knows the people in the
courthouse who knows the homicide investigators
that all these connections are going to facilitate
better process and potentially better outcome
for the member so if they're not getting you
a local attorney and they're not really helping
you get that attorney that should be something
that's a bit of a red flag some people use lists
of attorneys the challenge with that is Okay,
they send you a list of 10. Are all 10 of those
good for exactly what you did and exactly the
location you were in? Maybe, maybe not. You mean
they leave it to the customer to figure out which
of the 10 they want to call when they're under
stress and making bad decisions? They do. And
of course, think about, Craig, potentially you
could be in a jail cell. So now the list goes
to your spouse or your sister or whoever. What
are they going to do? How are they going to know?
Much less you're going to know. And to your point,
it's a super high stress situation. So our model
is different, right? We have in -house counsel.
They're not your attorney. But they locate and
vet the best attorney in the local area for your
specific circumstances. And people always ask,
well, what does that really mean? Well, let's
just pick a major metro area, whatever. Chicago.
So if we had three incidents in Chicago on the
same day, which. Thank goodness we don't. You
know, one could be a brandishing incident. One
could be a lethal shooting that may end up in
a murder charge. Those are going to be two different
attorneys. You know, can the guy who handles
the lethal shooting and has trial experience
in a self -defense case with a murder outcome
handle the brandishing? He probably can, but
he probably isn't going to take that case. And
so we're dialing it in to the specific circumstances.
of what's happening for you and it's local and
so we we bet them the member gets a chance to
have some input if they want we do have members
who have a preferred attorney we keep that on
file we do a little vetting of those just to
make sure and there's been many occasions where
we've used the attorney that the member wanted
we've had some occasions where we've had to say
no you know this is the guy that did your divorce.
He's not really who we need in this circumstance.
And they understand. So the member gets input.
It's not as though we say, hey, this is the guy
and you don't have any choice. But the overwhelming
majority just have no idea. You know, just like
you probably know somebody maybe who did your
will or, you know, helped your kids with an apartment
lease, right? I mean, these are all fine attorneys,
but they're not who we need in these circumstances.
And you don't know a criminal defense attorney
with the right experience, but we do. Have you
had situations where someone has wanted to change
their attorney? And did you help them do that?
Okay. Yes, we do. We do. Absolutely. And it's,
you know, it's very rare, very, very rare. So,
but the member can absolutely call in and say,
to let us know what's going on. If they're for
some unforeseen reason, it's not working out
for them. It is an option to change. Everybody
needs to be happy with them. We just, we will
always make sure whoever it is, is qualified.
experience for exactly what we need. And we're
very, very, very, very, very picky about who
we select. Okay. So I already stated upfront
that the probability of, you know, of using a
weapon in a self -defense incident is statistically
low. It could happen. That's why we carry, that's
why we're prepared for it, but statistically
low. That being the case, what's the probability
you're going to get arrested as a result? And
at least initially, and what is the probability
that you will face either criminal or civil actions
against you? So I can't give you any specific
numbers on those because it is a very broad spectrum,
right? And of course, in the context of firearms,
and we think about self -defense, a lot of people
are thinking about that, really that worst case
scenario where you've had to discharge the weapon
in self -defense. And the person that you've
shot, your attacker may or may not. be alive
you know and in those cases again it's really
circumstantial so if it's inside your home does
that improve the odds that you're not going to
get arrested Of course. Have we seen, have we
had a member get arrested for an incident inside
their home? Yes, we have. People don't think
that's a possibility. It is a possibility. So
it's a broad spectrum, but the majority of the
incidents that our members get in don't involve
the discharge of the firearm. And so it could
be, you know, where they're displaying the firearm,
brandishing. It could be incidents where they're
using pepper spray. So all this is sort of circumstantial
to what level. response that they used, the most
evident circumstances to the police as they begin
to investigate, you know, where it happened,
where their witnesses. So there's all these factors
that come in to play. But even if you're not
arrested, there'll be times where they're going
to take you down to the station and maybe they
don't know exactly what's happened yet. So they're
going to have you there waiting for your attorney
and then try to sort out what they think has
happened and decide, make a decision. And I would
think that the venue that you're at, I mean,
if New York City is different than rural Texas
or whatever it might be, and there are places
that are more gun friendly and places where if
you even are a firearms owner, you're obviously,
something's wrong with you. And obviously you're
the criminal and the instigator and yeah, just
the DAs, just that whole mindset and certain
larger cities I'm particularly thinking. Yeah,
it's, I mean, we do see. you know a little bit
of consistency in certain geographic areas in
terms of the response where they're a little
more cautious in terms of law enforcement and
the prosecutors are a little more cautious to
not just go ahead and assume this was a clean
self -defense incident so they want to do a little
more investigation and that's normal again if
you've done all the right things there is going
to be something that you have to deal with you
know the odds that of them showing up and saying
well this looks pretty good see you know got
it saw what you did all good man go home have
a nice day and it's not exactly going to work
like that and so we encourage the members right
don't become frustrated that the police are going
to be dealing with you don't become frustrated
if they put you in the back of the police car
or even take you to the station you know we're
already getting the attorney for you so you're
going to be fine but there is a process that
they need to go through and they really don't
have ill intention. You know, they have the best
intention, but they have a duty to really sort
out what's going on and, you know, based on what's
in front of them and what you tell them is only
part of what they're taking into account. So
earlier there was a little bit of discussion
on this subject. The differences between the
types of organizations that provide this type
of coverage. Maybe we're roundly calling this
insurance, but Actually, in CCW Safe's context,
it is not literally insurance, right? It is something
else. And I guess there are several types of
options out there. Maybe you could speak to the
benefits of different approaches that different
companies have and why yours, in your opinion,
is the preferred method. Sure. And it really,
this is sort of part of the answer to what are
the key elements of a good self -defense legal
services policy. And I'll classify this under
sort of a demonstrated ability to have the financial
resources to do what you're going to need done.
So in the industry, you see a lot of different
methods for this. And a common one is that the
service provider that you sign up with is going
to get an insurance policy issued by a third
party in your name. self -defense liability policy
or something of that nature. So you will be the
named insured or they'll be able to produce a
policy that has your name on it. That does have
some potential drawbacks, but at the very least,
it's a modest demonstration that there's somebody
out there with money who can pay. There's a company
in the industry that's been around for a long,
long, long time and they have a fund and they
just. have accrued a fund over years and they
tell their members this is how much money we
have sitting out here for your incidents and
it's a demonstrable number at least that we're
reporting to you and that it's of a size that
you can have belief that that's more than enough
to take care of anything that might happen and
that's okay that takes away the disadvantage
of the insurance policy which we'll talk about
in a second and then our method and then you
have there's actually one or two people in the
industry that don't demonstrate anything at all
you're just hoping they have the money. They've
done nothing to show you that they've put any
financial instrument in place to fund your incident
or fund multiple incidents at one time. And that's
a huge red flag. So if they don't have anything
that they can demonstrate or explain to you on
where that comes from, I'd be concerned about
that. In our case, we use a captive insurance
company. So just think almost like private insurance.
So it's an entity that Our owners created that
all it does, it's only insured entity is CCW
Safe. So it allows us to provide benefits to
the members according to our terms of service
and it funds all that. So I literally pay a premium
into that insurance fund every year to allow
us to do what we need to do for the members.
And then that private insurance company, again,
CCW Safe is its only client, reimburses. the
company for the things that I spend on the member's
behalf. And it's completely managed by a third
party. So I'm not in control of it. My founders
are not in control of it where they say, hey,
you know what? Maybe we don't need to put so
much in there anymore. We don't get to do that.
So we have an independent third party manage
that. And then it goes through independent. actuarial
review underwriting review every year and then
they tell me based on all of our history and
all this stuff that actuaries do that this is
what you need to pay in and then it's always
a whole lot more than we ever pay out and then
everything that's in excess of that just sits
in a reserve fund so if we ever have you know
oh my gosh we just had six lethal shootings you
know in a month that's going to cause a lot of
outlay All that money is still there. We've never
taken a penny out of the reserve since 2017 is
when it started. So we've never taken a penny
out. So that's how we have a financial tool for
us to have the resources. What's different about
that than having an insurance policy in your
name from a third party through one of these
other providers? Well, we're not selling you
insurance, so we're not indemnifying you against
anything. Our contract is our terms of service.
So if you if you get involved in a self -defense
incident, here's the things that we'll do. Here's
the things that we'll pay for. Here's the resources
that will, excuse me, provide. In the insurance,
real insurance policy game, they should be doing
the things that they say they're going to do.
The challenge they have is that there's. an insurance
board or insurance regulators in every state.
And just, you cannot insure or indemnify someone
against the outcome of a criminal act. Okay.
I didn't commit a criminal act that I was defending
myself. Well, you could end up charged with a
crime. Okay. So you're going to go to trial and
you lose. Now what happens? The company has spent
however much on your behalf, big case, two, 300
,000, maybe more. They have a recoupment clause
in their contract where the state may require
them to ask you for the money back because now
you've indemnified someone against the outcome
of their criminal act. What if you don't go to
trial and lose? What if you take a plea? Well,
you're now guilty of that lesser charge, which
may be advantageous for the member. of that organization
depending on the circumstances and that's okay
so we're fine if members take a plea if that's
what makes sense for them we don't get involved
in that decision but now you're guilty of that
act and so again the recoupment clause could
come into effect and so that's a severe concern
and that's really one of the reasons that we
have the structure we do is because we never
wanted to have to go to a member and say well
you know what we gotta have that money back or
you lost the case and you want to appeal you
know oh no we can't do that because the insurance
regulators don't allow for that. And so we never
wanted to be in that situation. And which is
one of the reasons why we had to part ways with
Washington State years ago, because they wanted
to require us and every company in the industry
to do it like they said, and be an insurance
policy and be regulated and have these recruitment
clauses. And we said, we're not going to do that
to members. And so we left the state altogether.
And in fact, there's not really, there's maybe
one provider you can get in Washington State
anymore. It was a long -winded answer, but it
does make a difference. The recoupment clause
would cause me a tremendous amount of concern
if I were looking at it. I don't know if they've
recouped. I don't know if they ever will recoup,
but the fact that it sits there is something
that needs to be considered. Well, it becomes
a liability. I imagine in the extreme case, let's
say you had a very expensive case and it goes
the wrong way, and then there's a recoupment
clause. I don't know if you just have a notional
number. if let's say the average number is three
hundred thousand dollars just just to throw a
number out and murder case yeah that being the
situation i mean right you could you could have
to declare bankruptcy just to avoid the debt
to the company that you thought was covering
you yeah it agreed yes and that is a good number
right if it's a try i mean it's probably hard
we had a case we were the first ones in the industry
uh to successfully have a member defended in
a trial that had a potential murder one outcome
and that was in that was about eight years ago
in that case we spent a little over four hundred
thousand dollars and of course at the time we
didn't even have the setup that we had today
that we have today that was prior to that we
were just funding that through money that was
in the company and that was really the impetus
for us where it's like okay if that size of company
that's okay but in the future We have to have
a better mechanism in place so that we have the
funds that we need and that the members can be
confident that we can support anything that would
happen. And, of course, so they started that
in 2017. That incident was in 15 and 16. And
so it took two years to get through that trial.
It is something to consider. Again, I don't know
whether they asked anybody for the money back.
I don't know if they've ever gotten any or they
will do it in the future. I have no idea. I would
not want that hanging over my head, particularly
when you think about just taking a plea. You
did something that was OK. You got charged with
a felony. And now the prosecutor is saying, hey,
let's just do this little misdemeanor and get
it over with. And maybe that's a good decision
for you in your own circumstances. And you want
to do that. Fine by us. We don't get involved
in that decision. We don't encourage that or
discourage that. That's between you and the attorney
that we've hired for you. But if you do it, we're
not going to ask for the money back. If you go
to try and lose, we're not going to ask for the
money back. If you go to try and lose and you
want to have an appeal and that makes sense,
we're going to fund that too. What then would
be things that would, now maybe this is almost
a two -part question because it may go to the
core of the differences between your membership
levels, but what sort of things are explicitly
not covered that someone should know about, you
know, like? i have fire insurance but i burned
my house down therefore you know the home insurer
insurance doesn't pay off because it doesn't
cover me burning my own house down you know that
kind of a right sure well obviously firearms
i mean knives hands you know baseball bats well
i mean yes well that's a good so ken let me answer
that portion first so we cover and it's really
at the core of almost everything we do is a self
-defense incident so it does not have to be firearms
we've had numerous incidents that don't involve
a firearm. Pepper spray, fists. We had an incident
where all the member had was their fists to defend
themselves in that particular case. So that part
does not matter. Whether it's a firearm or not,
it's still covered. So if at the core of it,
it's a self -defense incident, that's really
where everything, the nexus of how everything
revolves. And it can be things that spin off
of that. Like you might end up with an administrative
action, which would also be covered as part of
your incidents. If you live in Illinois and you
have a FOID card and you get into some, even
a low -level incident, they're going to take
that firearms owner's identification card away
from you and you're going to have to go to court
to try to get that back. We've done several of
those in the last year, more in the past. So
there's a lot of things that can sort of spawn
off of the incident that are covered. But that's
really the root of it. Just like losing your
firearm, you know, and not able to get that back.
We cover it. There's a couple of things that
we do that are not self -defense related. Like
we in some of our premium plans, like our ultimate
plan, we have coverage for accidental TSA violations.
So you're going through screening at TSA and
in your backpack, you have some rounds of ammo
or magazine loaded magazine in there. and now
they've stopped you and it's going to be a real
inconvenience to say the least we have some funds
available to help you with something like that
because we were having members having that occur
and it is common that you just sort of forget
you grab that backpack and you don't know what's
in there There were some high -profile cases
with that, with a person with one round of ammunition
wedged down, and they're in Bermuda. They entered
the country with no problem. It was on leaving
it that they found one round that was jammed
in the bottom of a pocket or something like that.
And then there was another one where it was a
state legislator from Oregon or Washington, I
think it was, who was going to, I think it was
Japan or China or some Asian country. I think
it was China, actually. And he had a firearm
in his briefcase, and it went right through T.
TSA, no problem. And he landed in China, I think
it was. And it's like, ooh, no. And he actually
discovered it about halfway across the ocean.
And you're like, ooh, no, no, this is not. To
be fair, we can't help you on the overseas. So
that's an international incident. But there have
been those high profile ones where TSA doesn't
catch it. We had a member. I don't remember the
city. So I'll just use a pair as an example.
This is close. They flew from. Boise to LA, no
problem. And same pack, same, maybe even the
same day trip popped down, went to a meeting,
go to LAX to come back. And lo and behold, that
TSA sees the magazine, but Boise TSA didn't even
see it. So not only does he have to deal with
that, he's got to deal with it in another state.
So we have a provision, you know, for a couple
of things like that, where we just members. It
was happening to them. And so it's a nice added
benefit on a couple of our plans. But again,
the core is a self -defense incident. The one
question we get asked regularly, or not regularly,
but periodically, is do we cover negligent discharge?
And we do not. There's nothing self -defense
about a negligent discharge. And so that is something
we don't do. That's outside the scope of our
coverage. And so, but most of the things our
members get into do fall inside the scope of
the coverage. And you mentioned, I think this
was in the pre, you know, when we were talking
about getting ready for the show, that there
are certain states that you would not cover in,
even if a person did hold a valid membership
from another state. um is that should we like
have a map in front of us that has you know big
red x's like don't go to new jersey or something
like that uh or washington state or something
along those lines because i i think that it'd
be easy in fact i would have made this mistake
honestly i would have think well i am my coverage
is is valid in in my home state and therefore
it is valid in all 50 states but perhaps that's
not the reality no it's not i mean we we are
It's listed multiple times on the website. It's
in the terms of service. So all of our plans
do include multi -state coverage. And for us,
multi -state means 47 states with one minor exception,
which I'll get to, but it's 47 states. And so
there's some other providers out there. You buy
a plan and it's just their state. And they're
like, oh, you want to be covered when you go
to other states and you got to add that on and
pay some more. And so we don't do that. All of
our plans include multi -state coverage. Washington,
New Jersey. No matter where your home base is,
if you get into an incident in those states,
I cannot provide you benefits. They just there
was an executive order in New Jersey that prevents
anybody from doing anything there. So no one
really in the industry is covering that. Washington
is just about devoid of any coverage. You know,
I had a member in Idaho and he's like, oh, you
know, I go into Washington state twice a week.
I'm good there. I'm like, no, you're not good
there. Unfortunately, they don't allow it. New
York state. I can help you if you're law enforcement
or retired law enforcement. And so it really
falls under what some people know as H .R. 218
or Leosa. Right. Yes. So I can help you in New
York if you fall under that. But everyday citizens,
I cannot. So, Kent, I think probably one of the
most critical things that our listeners are going
to want to know, because. We talked about the
fact that people don't train enough, and they
probably go to the range, and they're probably
proficient shots, but they probably haven't got
a lot of professional training. Probably the
thing they have not thought about is when you're
under stress, your heart rate is up, your adrenaline
is flowing, you don't remember how many rounds
you shot, you probably never saw your front sights.
All those things that they say happen in real
shooting incidents. What is the first thing that
a person should do after an incident? And to
follow that, maybe the second and third things
that a person should do. And then we'll get into
the opposite, what we do not want to do. Yes,
I can. The first thing I would say is I'm going
to give you my answers, but I would tell your
listeners, if they go to our resources section
on our website and search for podcast number
69, there's a great podcast that has... Two retired
law enforcement officers on there. It was our
critical response team at the time that that
broadcast was done. Gary's still on our critical
response team. But those two guys you're talking
about 50 or 60 years of law enforcement experience
talking about exactly this topic. So they'll
give you some really good details and examples.
But generally speaking, you want to let the officer
know that you're going to cooperate. You tell
them it was a self -defense. incident i was attacked
i had to defend myself i'm going to cooperate
with you completely i do want to get contact
my attorney and have them for it but i'm absolutely
going to cooperate that's really the right way
to start it and most of the officers are going
to honor that's not going to be any problem doesn't
mean they're not going to ask you a couple questions
here and there but broadly speaking you want
to stick to that level of detail at that point
and hopefully you've talked to us before you
get to that point but it's okay if you haven't
and you you're going to call us later because
they are going to allow you to call for an attorney
when you call us that qualifies as seeking for
an attorney which is important for a couple reasons
but but that would be the right way to do it
you were attacked you had to defend yourself
i'm going to cooperate with you completely that's
the advice i would offer people other people
would say don't say anything just tell them you
have to have an attorney You know, it's good
to establish that you were attacked and you had
to defend yourself. I was afraid I was going
to be beaten severely or die. Or if you were
somebody else, you can say that too. I think
that's great. You need to let them know that
level. And then you can start to move into being
just cooperative but not details. And the one
thing I'd add is if this happens in a crowd of
people. to point to the officer shows up say
that person over there saw what happened that
person over there saw what happened and and on
the ground there might be shell casings or whatever
it might be and those things get stuck in shoes
and they disappear like unbelievable so if there's
any evidence that's that's around or people who
are witnesses point them out and then shut up
that's great absolutely you absolutely want to
do that for sure that's wonderful advice I think
the question sometimes is, well, what do you
not want to say? And again, I would refer people
to that podcast because you're going to get a
ton of detail. But once you've provided that
initial information, you've sort of identified
to your point who the players are, you've let
them know about any injuries, whether you have
some or not. There's a few basic things. But
again, you're the victim. So just let them know
I was the victim. And then. you're really just
going to kind of get to waiting for the attorney.
You know, what people shouldn't, what happens,
and you brought this up, Craig, right? The adrenaline
is going, your heart rate is up, and you may
be in the early stages of PTSD. I mean, you're
in shock, right? You've just done this horrific
thing that you never thought would happen. You
don't remember how many times you fired. Don't
talk about any of that because you're not going
to get it right. Police officers. They get two
sleep cycles before they have to answer those
kind of questions in an officer -involved shooting.
That's the deal that the unions have with them.
You know, we don't have that luxury, but we have
the luxury of saying we're going to wait for
the attorney. So saying too much really is the
thing that happens. people need to be wary of.
Because maybe they want to justify to themselves
and to others what they've done. They want to
help. They think that that's going to enhance
their probability of success. They just want
to get home to their family, probably any number
of things. 100%. Yeah, it's just human nature.
You know, your mind is racing. You're under stress.
It's human nature to want to justify, particularly
where you've feel really self -justified like
this is so obvious that i'm just going to tell
them everything and you and at some point you
will but you don't need to do it right you don't
need to do it right at that point now they may
ask you things like hey i need your full name
i need your date of birth i need your address
of course give them that information right but
beyond that you just say hey i'm going to cooperate
i'm just waiting for the attorney when someone
calls who are they talking to So the line is
answered 24 -7, 365. When you call, there is
an operator who answers. There's about a 30 -second
screening process up front. And then you're connected
immediately to our National Trial Counsel, Don
West. So within a minute, you usually have Don
on the phone. And people always ask, well, what
are the screeners there for? Why do you do that?
That doesn't make any sense. Sometimes people
call that line. I'll explain the process in a
minor level of detail, but sometimes people call
that number by mistake. And they're members,
but they're calling to update their credit card
number. Well, that's not what that line is for.
Or they call that line and they're not members.
members of our competitors get confused and call
that line we've had people call that line and
want to sign up and be a member and so we just
do some quick screening to get that cleared up
and then we want to get the current accurate
contact information because what we have in our
system may not be what's usable when you're in
an incident you may be separated from your phone
the police may have your phone It may be someone
calling on your behalf. Right. And so we're going
to need a phone number that in case for some
reason we become disconnected, that we can contact
you or contact someone who's representing you
as a family member or something. So it takes
about 30 seconds. We don't we have a very specific
instructions for the folks that answer that phone
that we're not talking about the incident. They
don't ask you, hey, what happened? That is not
part of the call at all. They ask you if it's
an emergency and you and if you say no, then
they probe a little. But if you say yes, then
we're off to the races. It gets connected to
Don. And then that is a privileged conversation
between Don and the member. And if Don doesn't
answer my second attorney, Jennifer, she answers.
We have a whole list and a protocol. So the phone
is going to be answered. But it takes about a
minute to get through to the attorney. longest
minute of someone's life but i'll bet you that
i mean it's good that you're not just sending
it to a call center and like we'll get back to
you because that would just cause yeah i mean
you're already talking about shock and you just
don't need additional stress at that point and
i will put in a plug i mean if you know listeners
i'm i'm advertising somebody else's podcast here
um listening to the ccw podcast is an absolute
you know, worthwhile endeavor. And Don West is
just fantastic. And, you know, he has other guys
on like Steve Moses and stuff, who, by the way,
I trained with at TACCON last year in Dallas.
And Steve is just a, you know, you have a lot
of fantastic people that are on your podcast.
And just, I can't do it justice here. We're just
really trying to introduce CCW Safe. And really
the idea of, even if they didn't choose your
company, getting some sort of coverage. for themselves
because to not do so is irresponsible. But, you
know, it's one of those things. Yeah, I'm going
to tell you something else. The ethics of our
show is if we're talking about a product, we're
not going to endorse that product and talk about
that product unless we have experience with it.
Well, it's a little different in this industry,
isn't it? Because I can't like I'm not going
to go out and get into, you know, a self -defense
incident so I can test out whether or not I like
CCW safe service or not. Because that, you know,
and then and then try that for all the other
companies. That's going to be expensive and unproductive.
So, you know, there has to be a certain degree
of trust here. Absolutely. And I'll say you just
have to you have to do a little bit of research.
And you have to prioritize the things that are
important to you. You know, I answered the question
earlier about some of the things that I think
are the table stakes, the minimum things that
you need from a provider. You know, one of the
things that we do, Ken and Craig, that nobody
else does is we have what I'll call is a real
critical response team. that we deploy boots
on the ground. So if it's a serious shooting
or a lethal shooting, like you've shot someone
and then we're going to deploy boots on the ground
to your location within 24 hours to start assisting
you in person. And my critical response team,
they're retired homicide investigators. Chris,
who's my lead on that now, she was 31 years Oklahoma
City PD. She was 17 years as a homicide investigator.
And she's coming to your location and she is
going to look you in the eye or your spouse in
the eye or whoever and get the process rolling.
She is not there to investigate the scene and
investigate whether you did the right thing or
the wrong thing. She is there for what the police
would call peer support. She's going to start
helping get things facilitated. She's going to
explain the process. This is what. What's going
to happen next is what the police are going to
do. She might take you to your first attorney's
appointment. She's going to be facilitating to
make sure that the bond gets paid. We'll be there
waiting for you when you come out. You know,
I can tell you a long story about a very serious
incident with a member, but we're going to be
there. She's going to make sure that you understand
the things that you need to do to take care of
yourself, the things that you need to do from
a communication standpoint and how to. keep the
information under control how to be healthy how
to deal with the stress she might be helping
coordinate counseling sessions which is something
we offer to our members particularly if you've
been in a shooting and god forbid a lethal shooting
you need to talk to someone about that well chris
is highly qualified to help select the right
counselor you don't need a marriage counselor
you need a trauma you know counselor you need
the right person if the incident was inside your
home Chris is going to be arranging someone in
to come up and clean that scene up once the police
release it back. And again, you know, that's
not a job for merrymates. I'm sure they're great
for your day to day cleaning, but you need biohazard
qualified folks to come in and deal with some
of that kind of stuff. And so Chris is going
to be there or Gary, and they're going to be
there working through. all these things with
you in person for a couple of days. And it really
just makes all the difference in the world. And
again, if you were in jail and you haven't had
a bond hearing yet, they're going to be there
talking to your family to get them prepped for
what's going on. And it makes a huge difference.
Anybody that's been through that with us, where
we've deployed the critical response team, they
tell us at some point later in the process that
that was the difference between massive unbearable
levels of stress and being able to at least be
as calm and relaxed as possible under the circumstances
because somebody is there with you explaining
what's going to happen preparing you and doing
things for you that you don't need to be doing
yourself that you don't you don't need your spouse
stressed out with how do i get this scene cleaned
up who's the best you know counselor how do i
make sure the bond is paid and you know all that
kind of stuff Is this the reason that you ranked
so high in the GunUniversity .com rankings? That's
one of the reasons. And again, nobody does that.
I always say, I guess maybe because we're very
proficient at it and we have such an amazing
expert staff, I always think, well, this is easy.
This is easy to do. Why wouldn't everybody do
it? But I really don't believe that other people
in this industry have. The founders that we have,
the base level of knowledge about what's going
to happen to someone who's been involved in these
shootings through firsthand knowledge, through
decades and decades as law enforcement or decades
and decades as defense attorney. You know, these
are all full time employees. They just don't
have that knowledge. So they don't understand
the value of it or they just don't want to do
it. Maybe they're not willing to pay retired
homicide investigators a full time salary to
just be available. for these intermittent incidents
because it's not super frequent. So there may
be reasons that they don't do it, but we would
never not do that. I mean, that is a key part
of what we do. So I think that's part of it.
I think that the legal expertise we have on staff
is part of the reason that we get ranked high.
You know, Don West, his credentials for people
who don't know, right? Don is 39 years, or actually
he's 40 years now of criminal defense experience.
He was one of the The co -lead attorneys on the
George Zimmerman case down in Florida 10 years
ago. He's done numerous death penalty cases.
I mean, there really is nobody better than Don.
And that's who you get connected to when you
call our hotline. He's the one primarily that's
selecting your attorney. And so, you know, people,
they just don't have these resources. Their critical
response team is kind of, I assume, is more like
people who are just going to process your paperwork.
They sort of know what's going on, but they're
not really. providing you valuable input they're
facilitating what they do and we always say you
know those other people pretty much most of the
time do what they say they're going to do they
just don't do the things that we do and so it
doesn't make them good or bad they just don't
do the things that we do and that i think that's
the reason that you see the high ratings and
of course we have you know unlimited funds but
you know all of our plants now have a minimum
Bond coverage of a million dollars. So we pay
the bond premium, which would be $100 ,000. Some
plans don't. There's a very popular attorney
who's out there trying to start a program and
his bond is $500 ,000. People say, well, that
should be enough. In fact, I've heard people
say, well, you're not going to get a million
dollar bond because your incident is so serious.
They're not going to give you anything. Well,
that is not true. I can tell you we've had them
and it happens. The we really bucket ourselves
in three categories, deep, deep expertise. Nobody
has what we have, the holistic coverage, all
of those elements I'm talking about, all the
things that the critical response team does,
the counseling, all those little things, plus
all the big things. And then it really is personal
care. Again, you get a critical response person
assigned to you. They're with you through the
whole incident and beyond. I mean, Gary will
tell you, there are people that went through
critical response five years ago, six years ago.
Even the guy I talked about earlier, the $400
,000 case, that murder case, it's 10 years later.
We talk to him all the time. Wow. He's a friend.
Really? Christmas cards every year. He does videos
for us. He loves evangelizing our service. But,
you know, Mike, who's the founder, you know,
Mike answered his call when he called in nine
or 10 years ago, whatever that was. You know,
they talked several times a year just talking
about how's everything going, what's doing. You
know, he went through, I can't even describe
all the things that he went through. But you
mentioned it maybe really early in this call,
right, the stress. So he ended up getting divorced
in his process. He lost his job. You know, he
had taken someone's life. So he all this stuff
that he went through, I was with him in November
last year. We were shooting some video and we
were having a beer at the hotel afterwards. And
I asked him, I said, you know, after all these
years, how is like. How do you do you still deal
with it? If you do, what does that look like?
And he said. And he said, well, you know, it
was a point where it was every single day I would
think about for years and years and years that
I took somebody's life. He said, it's a little
less frequent, but he said, it's certainly every
week I realized that I ended somebody's life.
And that person had a spouse. That person had
kids. He said, now I'm 100 percent confident
I'd be dead if I didn't do what I had to do.
He goes, but you still deal with that, that you
don't just counsel that away and forget it. He
said, so it's it probably will never leave me.
And the interesting thing he said in that conversation,
too, is that he actually carries less after that
incident, not more. And I think the weight of
what he had to do affects that. He said, now,
look, it's circumstantial. You know, I used to
carry all the time. Now I'm just selecting the
places that I think, you know, are maybe more
dangerous. And I don't need to carry when I just
go to the grocery store or pick up the kids or
whatever it might be. It was a really interesting
conversation, but he's a friend of the business.
And so I think there's a lot of reasons that
the gun university would rank us number one,
but you know, the Ryan Kleckner over there who
writes their articles and reviews, you know,
he's a firearms attorney, he's a former special
forces, and he has a really good understanding
of the kinds of things that, that companies in
our industry do. And so we're, we're proud that
he ranks us number one. I'll give you a little
bit of credit here, too. Your website is easy
to navigate in terms of picking the plans. I
did find it interesting, though, that in my case,
it recommended the one that I have, which is
the Defender plan. I thought, well, what if I
want something more? Can't I have more stuff,
you know, and maybe have the protector plan?
It looks like you can do those things, but it's
trying to maybe balance, you know, getting back
to the frugal aspect of this is trying to balance
the best plan for the circumstances that you
largely find yourself in. I'm a citizen. My situation
would only be home defense or, you know, perhaps
carrying in public, you know. the Walmart or
whatever the case might be. And it does a good
job in that. But if someone does want more, the
options, the add -ons are there. They are, right?
And the Defender is the core plan, right? And
the core benefits, like those table stakes things
that I talked about earlier, right? Unlimited
funds, no caps, critical response, you know,
ability to pay. That's in all of our plans. You
don't have to upgrade anything to get. the critical
response team. You don't have to be in an upgrade
to get unlimited funds for their defense costs.
So that's the core plan. That's where you start.
And if your spouse is going to carry outside
the home, you can add them to the plan, right?
If your spouse is just, she's covered as a courtesy
as our non -adult children inside the home. So
you don't have to do anything for that. That's
a courtesy in all the plans. Well, that's important
to know. I don't think people would. I didn't
know that, that my wife was covered. Inside the
home, she is. Absolutely. Yeah. No, I didn't
know that at all. Yeah, but if she's going to
carry outside the home, we want to add her to
the. She's not doing that. That's not going to
happen. That's pretty normal. That's right. Very,
very normal. And, you know, actually. it's a
little harder to find on the website but let's
say you and your wife were out to the movies
or dinner or shopping or whatever you were carrying
and you guys got attacked and you became incapacitated
for some reason and she had took the firearm
and stepped in we would cover that too okay yeah
so it's a little harder to get that one described
correctly but sure But we would cover that too.
But it's important, but it's an important consideration.
I mean, I think that some of the larger companies
have fallen. I'm not going to name them because
we don't disparage other companies by name on
this show. But some of the other companies have
run into trouble because they have, you know,
the fine print that probably most people don't
read has caused gaps in coverage where people
thought, well, logically, I should be covered
for this. And I wasn't. Ooh, big surprise at
the wrong time. And I'm going to kind of tag
onto that idea. And I appreciate we are frugal
firearms. So we're always looking for the deal.
I mean, the value, because we're not necessarily
wealthy people. And I like the way that your
price point comes in at this. I have a question.
Do you ever find or have you ever had an incident
where a person carried, say, both your defender
plan and then an alternate company's plan as
well, where you had they carry two different
plans? And in that situation, you know, what
happens? Yes, that is. It's rare, but there are
people that belong to more than one organization.
And we actually have that in our terms of service.
So we have a cooperation clause in there. We
will work with the other provider however is
necessary. Sometimes it's a function of who did
they call first. So if they've called us first
and we already have the attorney, there's not
much else the other guys really ever have to
add because they don't do all the things that
we do. But if they did. we would cooperate with
them and take advantage of that. We've had some
where they've called the other guys first and
they've already located the attorney. And then
sort of some of the extras that we do that they
don't, we filled in the gaps where maybe our
plan was a little superior to theirs in some
of the areas. So we absolutely cooperate and
we've had calls. I mean, I'm gonna try not to
go into a long story, but our most famous multi
-member call, again, was years and years ago,
was on Thanksgiving day. It was in Las Vegas,
and the guy was a member of CCW Safe. Okay, we're
not mentioning the other names, so I'm not going
to do that. Well, you can. Just don't disparage
them in the process. You can mention other companies.
Their response would be disparaging, but I won't
name them because we don't do that. Again, we
always say they pretty much do what they're going
to say they're going to do. We just do more than
they do. So there was one of the bigger ones.
So for anybody who's knowing, one of the bigger
ones. And then one. that isn't even around anymore.
And they called all three on Thanksgiving night,
Thanksgiving evening. And in those days, I think
this was, again, probably 2015, we didn't have
a hotline. The hotline was Mike's cell phone.
And so he answered. And we had boots on the ground
the next day, had the attorney, everything. We
just had it rocking and rolling. So the other
two did not answer. and one of them i'm talking
about one of the really big ones they did not
answer the phone on thanksgiving day so they
left messages of both of these places one of
them called him back i believe on saturday and
he said well ccw safe's already been here and
i got an attorney and they're like okay cool
if you need anything let us know um and then
the other one called him back on monday and said
oh you should call your homeowner's insurance
That's a true story. Excuse me. I can tell that
better than I can, but I've heard it so many
times. I'm trying to paraphrase what he said,
but yeah. And so that, you know, that was a long
time ago. We would not expect that of our competitors
these days that they would, they of course should
be answering the phone. They should be trying
to respond to you, but we will cooperate. That's
no problem at all. We would love, they called
us first because we just feel like that we're
going to give you. The best odds of the best
outcome for you based on the circumstances or
facts of your incident that when you work with
us or remember with us, you will get the best
possible outcome. Can't change the facts, but
we can do everything else at a high level of
excellence that will get you the best possible
outcome. That was a great quote right there.
I probably. use that, you know, maybe in the
front end of the show is sometimes I clip, you
know, important things out and kind of highlight
them that way. Any funny anecdotal stories, things
like that, that our listeners would like to hear?
And do you want to, you know, at this time, talk
about either I've already You know, said many
good things about your podcast, but your website,
you know, any membership discounts, things like
that, YouTube channels or anything that you want
to get people focused on so they could learn
more about about you and why you do it and what
you do. Well, you know, there's not really any
funny stories, you know, not I mean, it's a very
serious. industry there's a very serious service
that we offer now are we all funny individual
people on our own yes but you know we're very
serious we just exist to care for the members
in what happens to them and so we don't have
any funny anecdotes per se but i would tell you
in response to the rest of that question people
go to the website Even if you're a member somewhere
else or you're an existing member or maybe you
never intend to be a member of any of these things
because you don't think you need it. I would
encourage you to go and read. But if you just
want to access the educational and training resources,
go to our website at the top. It'll say resources
and you can go to education and training. I have
a thousand plus pieces of content on there that
you can search through by topic, author, you
know, their old podcast, their articles. There
are so many things in there that will help you
be better prepared for your self -defense incident
or will help you learn from somebody else's incident
or will help you learn how to train better. Do
that. We also have a state laws section on the
website that's relatively new. We've only had
that for about six months now. So if you're traveling
and you're going to Colorado and you want to
know what the firearms laws are there, you can
go on to that section of the site and it'll tell
you all the relevant laws. And that's a good
resource for people. That's all completely free.
So I would encourage them to do that. Our podcast,
you can get on all the major platforms, you know,
Apple, Spotify. You can find them on YouTube
as well. We do have a couple of bigger consumer
events that will be working this year. So if
you're an NRA member and you're coming to their
show in Atlanta next month, we'll have a booth
there and you can come and meet and talk to us
there. You know, like our critical response team
folks will be there. So if you really want to
see the person. that might show up and talk to
them about their credentials. You know, Chris
will be in the booth. And so that's a good place.
We'll be at the GOA show in August, I think,
which is in Knoxville again this year. They had
their first show last year. So if you're a GOA
member, come by and see us there. We're the first
booth right inside the door. But those are two
good opportunities to come and see the whole
team and hear about things if you're going to
go to those events anyway. And we saw you at
SHOT Show. SHOT Show was our first time we were
rolling out a partner program so that we're working
with ranges and firearms retailers and even firearms
trainers to help get our program in front of
consumers at more of the decision point. Right.
You're taking a concealed carry class. So we'll
train that firearms trainer to present our program
so you can sign up there or we might even in
some locations send a person in. to speak to
the class so that you can hear firsthand from
one of our folks and sign up as a member. I think
you, and talking about signing up as a member,
I think you had mentioned that there may be a
discount code for listeners that you. Yes, we'll
do that for your members. And we don't do a lot
of these. I'm sure everybody says that when they
get on this call on these things, but we really
don't. I have a code that I just set up for you
guys. And so it's frugal 10. Okay. One zero.
So F R U G A L one zero. And that'll be good
through the end of March. Okay, great. That's
10 % off of any of our annual plans. So you can
pay for our plans monthly if you want to. We
don't do any discounts on those. But so if you
sign up for the Defender plan, which is $209
a year, you're going to get $20 and change off
of that. And if you sign up for the ultimate
plan, which is $519, you're going to save some
big bucks, which is a bundle plan that includes
a bunch of other add -ons in it. Enough to take
the wife out for dinner, perhaps, or something
like that. That's right. It depends on your wife's
taste, but yes. Mine's very simple. She's great.
She'll go anywhere. Well, yeah, those are great.
We would love for people to use that code. It
will go down automatically at the end of March.
So if you call us on April 1st, my team is going
to say, no, it's not there. So just go and put
that. There's a place to put it in when you sign
up. And if you need help signing up or you want
to talk about the plans, we're here 8 to 5 Central
Time. The 800 number is on the website. I have
a highly trained and qualified group of people
who answer the phones and they really know what
they're doing. I'll give the number in case people
want to write it down and they don't want to
go to the website. It's 855. six, three, nine,
two, two, nine, seven. Very good. And that's
a CCW safe. That's it. Yep. We're right there.
And everything you want to know, we just, we
love helping people. You know, that's why we
exist. I say this all the time. People think
it's trite or, or overly used, but that's all
we exist for. We don't sell training programs.
We don't sell backpacks and range bags and t
-shirts. This is all we do. People want to buy
T -shirts. They're like, I want to buy a T -shirt
on the website. We just say, hey, you know what?
Tell us what size you are. We'll just send it
to you for free. I don't want to hire people
who are experts at ordering T -shirts and shipping
T -shirts. I want all of our resources to be
something that serves the member after a self
-defense incident. Yes, we have some that just
operate in the business, accounting and marketing.
We're not going to get into any of this other
stuff. We're not distracted. This is all that
we do is self -defense legal services. That's
great. I love that. And by the way, thank you,
Kent. This has been an outstanding show. I mean,
all of our shows are great, honestly, but this
one is more important than most. Kent, any final
questions for Kent? No, I really appreciate the
opportunity to sit down and talk to you, Kent.
Very, very much. I think this is probably, as
I say, the single most important thing that anybody
carrying concealed, whether you're in a constitutional
carry state or in a state that requires a CCW
like California, like we're in. But definitely
you have to be covered. If not with CCW safe,
then with somebody. It is essential. And once
again, Kent, really appreciate your time. Thank
you so much. You've been very generous. My pleasure,
guys. I enjoyed it. It was happy to be here and
maybe I'll come back someday. Wow. What a lot
of information. That was incredible. And you
know what? We were talking to a guy who is the
CEO, which is important, but we weren't even
talking to the legal counsel. And perhaps that'll
be something that will feature in a future show.
And there are a lot of companies out there that
do this. And obviously some do it better than
others. Some of those stories were. I mean, can
you imagine, Ken, being on the side of that phone
call and hoping for salvation, and you get, like,
no answer? Or an answering service? That would
be horrific, yeah. You call your... other company,
for example, and they don't even bother to pick
up the phone or leave a message and they will
call you back during the most horrific time that
you're probably entire life. And expensive. So
I really like to, yeah, and expensive, exactly.
I really like the CCWCF. I think they fit very
well into our frugal firearms aspect. I like
the fact that they have, what, six or seven different
plans for almost anybody. So I would encourage
people to go out and take a look at this. Yeah,
and looking at their website, they have different
plans that are meant for permitted personnel
and non -permitted people. So it's a total of
that. I mean, there's an HR 218 plan, which doesn't
apply to too many people. Law enforcement for
retired law enforcement. Yeah, it doesn't apply
to a lot of people. And they have one that's
for House of Worship volunteer security teams.
Which sadly is more and more important these
days, yes. other than that yeah you're right
there's there's six other plans three in in permitted
and three and non -permitted personnel so there's
a lot of variety here and then you get to be
responsible for it isn't just i have insurance
but i i i'm saying the word insurance i shouldn't
be i have coverage coverage i've also tailored
it to my exact needs and and i'm not I'm not
going to mention the company, but I'm not paying
for what I don't need. And if you've seen the
commercials on TV, then you know which company
you're talking about. Okay, let's go ahead and
close this one out. Two excellent shows, both
of them very important. Hopefully the next show
will be maybe a product -based show, something
a little bit lighter, because this has been a
couple heavy topics, honestly. but important
ones. So thank you guys for listening. I want
to remind everybody of the importance of subscribing,
the importance of leaving positive comments,
the importance of passing the word on because
this show only exists for the listeners out there.
And as we grow the listener base, we get better
and better guests because those people do ask
questions about how many people are in your listening
audience. They care about that because they don't
want to spend their time talking to a small audience.
They want big audiences. So help us help you
get the show to be better. Good night, folks.
And I called Chris. I said, you want to go? You
got to go to the airport in like an hour. And
she's like, I'm in. And she went and it was very,
very, very serious incident. And she participated
with Gary. And it was a Friday, Saturday. They
came back on Sunday and she called me Monday
morning at like 730. And she goes, when can I
start? And I go, yeah. And she heard this was
her reasoning. She said, I spent decades going
to crime scenes with one perspective. Who did
it? How do I solve this? How do we hold someone
accountable? You know, the general law enforcement.
But sure. And she goes, now I get to show up
and help somebody. Yeah. Just got through this
horrible thing. And my job is to help them and
get them and their family through it. I'm in.
No more interviews needed for me. And so she
started the next week.