Today we’d like to introduce you to Amanda Appi.
Hi Amanda, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, you could tell our readers some of your backstory.
2016, my life was tragically altered due to a very bad domestic violence incident. I was forced to relocate to South Carolina to be near my family, who had moved there the previous year. Practically overnight, I found myself as a single mother of a 4 and a 2-year-old with $ 1,500 in my checking account and whatever I could back into the back of my car. I landed in a foreign land without connections, resources, home, or money. Over the next several years, I began building my life, which has resulted in my private detective agency. I came into the profession by the grace of God and prior military police experience, which involved a deployment to Iraq from 2008-2009. The first thing I did when I landed in South Carolina was hit my knees and ask God what to do and how to start rebuilding. I was prompted to assess my gifts and talents and put them to good use, so I returned to my earliest memories and looked hard at my life until that point. I had done a lot. I had been to Iraq, been in law enforcement, owned my own mobile dog grooming business, been a stay-at-home mom, worked a federal grant to house homeless veterans, worked in the garden section of Home Depot, worked security, and had a bachelor’s degree in business. However, two things stood out to me.
- I saw things other people did not. You can call it divine assistance or good intuition, but from the time I was a child, I had a way of seeing and knowing the truth about situations that others did not.
- I was an entrepreneur at heart. I wouldn’t say I liked the times I worked for someone else. At first, I did not see how these two things went together until I remembered the time years prior when I had seen a documentary on a woman who was a private investigator, and it all clicked for me.
Over the next week, I went into a PI firm in Myrtle Beach and asked if they were hiring, to which they indicated they were hiring for security. I desperately needed a job and accepted the security position to get my foot on the PI side of the company. As divine intervention would have it, I was sitting in the front area of the office, waiting on paperwork to complete my drug test. The company owner walked in, saw me sitting there, asked if I was a new hire, and then asked if I wanted to be his PI, which I accepted, and the rest is history. I worked for him for a year, went out independently, and started my own company.
It wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Money has always been an obstacle. I started my business while living with my dad, sleeping on his floor, and Ubering to have the money to start my business. Eventually, I got off Dad’s floor and into low-income housing. I gave myself 1 year to get out of low-income housing and met this goal. I own my own home, and my children are in private school. Time is another obstacle. Figuring out how to do all the work yourself because you are too poor to hire anyone at first and raise my kids was a challenge that was met with frequent tears but a determination not to quit. Licensing was an obstacle because you need to work under someone full-time for 3 years to operate independently in South Carolina. I only had a year of experience but found a loophole in the regulations. I had another PI from out of state mentor me and hold my license for 2 years, and in exchange, I gave him a percentage of my gross income.
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Apex Detective Agency LLC is a private investigations firm specializing in domestic cases, background checks for litigation, and service of process as well as locates. What sets my company apart is persistence. Persistence is the key to all success. I am proud of the work I do in the domestic realm of my brand. Even though people pay me to document their family tragedies, I continually use my platform to advocate for marriage and the family and try to teach others how to not end up in my office, paying me a retainer to follow their cheating spouse around. I turn tragedies into learning experiences and opportunities to help others succeed.
Is there any advice you’d like to share with our readers who might just be starting?
Do not listen to the dream killers. Everyone thought I was crazy for my chosen route, but now I can work on my terms, which has given me the flexibility to raise my two beautiful children and be more present in their lives than most two-parent households. I wish I had known when starting out that perfectionism does more harm than good. Humility is the key to staying successful because you are not controlled by people’s opinions of you, whether good or bad. Initially, I would let praise or criticism get inside my head; now, I take everything with a grain of salt and try to create a positive outcome regardless of the situation. Another thing is authenticity. At first, I kept my business pretty whitewashed from my belief system, but then I realized that people value authenticity and are more likely to do business with you if they can connect with you.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.southcarolinadetectiveagency.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/investigatemyrtlebeach/
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/apexlegalsupportservices