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In recognition of Black Business Month, the Business Journal is telling the story of successful Black business owners and entrepreneurs in the San Antonio area.
Following a 22-year career in the U.S. Army, Donald Mooney had a solid job as dean of boys and commandant of cadets at the San Marcos Baptist Academy when he walked away to launch his own business.
With three kids, a wife and a mortgage, it was a risky move. Nonetheless, Mooney said he exhausted all the family’s retirement funds, sold their home, maxed out credit cards and borrowed $25,000 from a friend to launch Nurse’s Etc. Staffing in 2000. From those humble beginnings, Mooney expanded, opening several other staffing agencies, now all under the DMooney Enterprises LLC umbrella. The organization made about $52 million last year.
“But that’s not where we want to stay,” Mooney said, adding his goal is to hit the $200 million mark.
For Mooney, who operates out of his home and a 5,000-square-foot office at Loop 1604 and Nacogdoches Road, it’s a long way from his childhood in Houston. Growing up, Mooney said he didn’t know his father, and his mother was mostly confined to a mental hospital. Mooney and his brother were raised by their grandfather. From a young age, Mooney said he wanted to be a soldier, husband, father and business owner.
His first milestone toward achieving those goals happened when he graduated from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 1975. He next joined the Army, where he served 22 years, retiring as a lieutenant colonel. Even when he was in the military, Mooney said he always had a side hustle, including Amway, selling insurance and even opening a coffee shop.
After he retired from the Army in 1997, he started as dean of boys and commandant of cadets at the San Marcos Baptist Academy, where he had gone as a young man.
But a chance encounter would soon set him on a whole new career path. His brother introduced him to a friend he was helping move out of Houston. Mae Nelson had a fledgling staffing agency, and Mooney spent the afternoon in her office. "I watched her running the operation and thought, I can do that.”
He was impressed that she was a Black woman with just a high school education who nonetheless had a successful business. He watched as she grew the staffing agency to a $6 million operation and bought a nice house on a golf course.
With her mentorship and his wife’s reluctant blessing, Mooney put together a plan for starting his own staffing agency. He said he invested about $100,000 to launch Nurse’s Etc. Staffing in 2000.
“I wanted to create something for my grandkids,” he said.
Mooney threw himself into his new company. He met with health care companies, recruited nurses and nursing assistants and matched his customers with the staff he selected. He sometimes even drove nurses to job sites in rural areas in New Braunfels, San Marcos and Floresville.
“I vowed no one was going to outwork me,” he said. “Sometimes you have to work 18- and 24-hour days. You do whatever it takes to keep it going.”
And Mooney said his military training came in handy during this time, as he used many of the same skills.
“Preparing a person to go to work for a hospital, nursing home or medical facility is like preparing a soldier to go out and do his duties,” he said. “It requires a similar operational skillset and the ability to work well with people.”
But those first few years were lean. There were some growing pains and missteps, including having to deal with clients who refused to pay. Moreover, Mooney said his wife, Narcissa, wasn’t thrilled with the way his grand plan was unfolding.
“Building a small business is hard on a family,” Mooney said. To help ends meet, Mooney said his wife got a job as a salesperson at a retail store, working upwards of 60 hours or more a week.
“My wife’s a trooper,” said Mooney, adding they just celebrated their 47th anniversary. “She worked really hard to keep the family going.”
Finally, all the hard work started to pay off, and the staffing agency made about $1 million in 2005 — the first year Mooney paid himself any money, he said. The company’s revenue doubled the following year, then hit $3.5 million in 2007. Revenue flattened out during the Great Recession but then rebounded to $13.4 million in 2010 and has continued to climb, Mooney said.
Over the years, Mooney has launched other staffing agency affiliates under the DMooney Enterprises umbrella. These include PrimaCore Solutions, which specializes in logistical and light industrial staffing, as well as Virtus Executive and Healthcare Placement, a service provider of direct-hire medical and non-medical professionals. Mooney also opened a Houston office in 2016.
Today, he has about 50 clients and employs approximately 50 people. And DMooney Enterprises has roughly 1,000 contract and temporary workers. Mooney said he’s exploring acquisitions to further expand his business and has his sights set on continuing to grow revenue.
“My goal has always been to build a brand and infrastructure and employ people who are smarter than me to help run it,” he said. “Having mentors and modeling yourself after other companies has helped me achieve that. It’s amazing we’re a $52 million company, but I think we’re just getting started.”
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