Building Trust in Mental Health Treatment: A Conversation With Daymond John

Introduction

[00:00]

Jaime: Long story short, I ended up in my fourth treatment when I was 21, and that’s where I met my co-founder. Ironically, he kicked me out of treatment.

Daymond John: We are a testament to people who can overcome adversity sometimes.

Jaime: Entrepreneurship for me in the last five years has felt like just getting my ass kicked regularly.

Daymond John: Yeah, the ones who get their ass kicked and don’t get back up, they go home. That’s it. Game over.

[00:23]

Jaime: Hey, Daymond.

Daymond John: Hey, what’s up, Jaime? How are you doing?

Jaime: Pleasure to meet you.

Daymond John: Yeah, you as well.

Jaime: Thank you. Really grateful for the opportunity to connect.

Daymond John: I’m glad you’re here.

Jaime: Yeah.

Daymond John: All right. Why don’t you tell me about your business?

Jaime: Yeah, absolutely. So I own and operate mental health treatment centers.

Building Sylvia Brafman: From One Location to Three States

[00:39]

Jaime: Kicked off about five years ago with the first location in Florida. Really wanted to get better before getting bigger. Opened our second in Georgia about a year ago, and now looking at a third state.

Daymond John: Oh, congratulations. Well, first of all, wow. Why would you locate them so far apart from each other?

Jaime: It’s a great question. Do you mind if I just kind of tell you the genesis of how it came to be? Because I think it’s related.

Daymond John: Yeah, yeah.

Jaime: So I’m not going to tell my whole personal story, but essentially, I grew up in New Jersey. Really good kid growing up. No major issues. Went to college. Things got very bad very quickly for me.

Jaime’s Personal Story: From Addiction to Advocacy

[01:18]

Jaime: Primarily substance abuse related. And that led to a seven-year nightmare of treatment centers and rehabs and overdoses and arrests and all of the insanity associated with addiction.

Long story short, I ended up in my fourth treatment when I was 21, and that’s where I met my co-founder.

So my co-founder is the clinical mind. I’m the business mind. He was the owner of a center that he founded in 2007 that was more substance abuse related.

Ironically, he kicked me out of treatment. I was a very bad boy and not able to follow the rules, but he did plant some seeds.

And a couple of years later, when I was 24, I truly surrendered and got really into mental wellness, all sorts of modalities, recovery in my personal life.

Meeting His Co-Founder & Building the Partnership

[02:14]

Jaime: Never thought I would be in this space professionally. Decided to go a more traditional route. Went to business school, got my MBA at Duke, went to Wall Street.

And then about five years ago, he reached out to me and he said, “Hey, I sold that treatment center. I really want to do something that’s truly primary mental health, not primary substance abuse, but primary mental health. Do you want to be involved?”

I didn’t really know why he was reaching out to me. I mean, our only real interaction is, you know, he kicked me out of treatment when I was 21.

But long story short, I dug into it and I recognized that he is a brilliant clinical mind and a terrible business person. I would say that in front of him.

Daymond John: Sure.

Jaime: And I’m sort of the inverse of that. I wouldn’t say I’m brilliant business-wise, but I knew something about business and could be a patient advocate just based on my own journey.

And so we felt like a perfect match. I was looking to do something a bit more entrepreneurial and altruistic, and so we kicked off together.

Choosing Where to Grow: Florida to Georgia

[03:17]

Jaime: So getting back to your question, I was in investment banking, working from home. COVID happens. I’m spending a lot of time in Miami. He happens to live in Florida. I was okay with staying down here and not going back to New York.

I wanted to leverage his reputation clinically by doing it in his backyard. So that was the original location.

A couple of years later, why a different location?

I don’t think I need to go into a full breakdown of the continuum of care, but there are higher levels of care and lower levels of care.

I didn’t want to cannibalize the existing business in Florida. Essentially, we benefit from a lot of folks that maybe end up in a hospital and then need to step down to a lower level of care, which is what I offer.

And so to now go compete with our referral sources didn’t seem right. And I felt like Florida was extremely saturated. And it was.

And so going to Georgia was absolutely the right move. In fact, by month four, Georgia completely overtook Florida, which was three and a half years old at that point.

Daymond John: Well, personally, a testament to people who can overcome adversity. I think that to be somebody who has experienced a lot of things, and now you can bring that value to other people, I applaud you for that, for sure.

And that is the truth. A lot of people who are scientists, doctors, engineers, that’s what they’re good at. And they do need that kind of partner who can take the business elsewhere.

So now I understand why you moved, because you got proof of concept in one place with a really great co-founder, and then you found a blue ocean someplace else, right?

Jaime: Absolutely. And that is, I think, the framework for the strategy moving forward.

We’re looking at a third state. I don’t want to say it publicly right now, but basically recognize where there’s a supply-demand imbalance.

Look at data on one hand, but then go up there and meet with the various folks that are doing what you’re doing and find out, is the need being met?

I mean, as I’m sure you know, people are not well right now. Society, right? Not to generalize.

And so there are a lot of areas that really lack resources, and I really want to bring solutions to those areas.

Resilience and the Reality of Entrepreneurship

[05:42]

Jaime: I made a comment that sometimes entrepreneurship for me in the last five years has felt like just getting my ass kicked regularly.

And just getting it kicked enough, but bouncing back, moving my feet, and showing up the next day.

And recognizing over time, you turn around and it’s like, I can’t believe we’ve gotten here.

It has not felt up and to the right. It’s felt super volatile.

Is that something that you’ve experienced in terms of resilience being a huge factor and just bouncing back? But it’s not always feeling as good as maybe the books show on paper.

Daymond John: You mean like Steve Jobs getting fired from Apple? That’s a great comeback.

That’s what entrepreneurs do. The ones who get their ass kicked and don’t get back up, they go home. That’s it. Game over.

Most entrepreneurs that are successful are usually on their third or fourth business. It’s not their first one.

The first one, they got their butt handed to them because they didn’t have funding.

The second one, they had funding, but they didn’t have great partners.

The third one, finding great partners, but not in the legal.

And before you know it, they come back and then they start really getting narrow and deep on the business.

But that’s true business. You act, you learn, and then you repeat.

Whatever the business is, it could be a corner store. It could be the president of Ford.

Every single one of those people or companies, if they’ve been in business ten years, you’ve dealt with inflation, you’ve dealt with loss of staff, you’ve dealt with tariffs today, finance tomorrow, high gas prices, materials.

Solving Problems, Creating New Ones

[07:07]

Daymond John: And that’s what you have to do.

A true entrepreneur, at the end of the day, has two jobs: the vision and clearing the bottlenecks.

Because I always say every time you solve a problem, you create another problem. It’s whack-a-mole, right?

You’re doing really good in Florida, but let’s go to Georgia.

Okay, we’re doing really great in Georgia. How do we build up Florida and then do another place?

Do we get rid of Florida? Do we do five more places in Georgia? Where do we get the staff?

In some ways, what we do is solve the problem of the day.

Jaime: And that’s actually a good example. That’s what happened.

End of ’25, Georgia was ripping, Florida was struggling, and then it flipped.

So, a question on something you just said, though. You said there are two jobs that an entrepreneur has.

And one of the areas I feel I really fall short is people management.

I really like the strategy and the analysis and the execution and the dealmaking.

The Hardest Part: People Management

[07:59]

Jaime: I think I’m a good manager of people if they’re good at their job, and I think I’m a very poor manager if they’re not so good and therefore need mentorship and attention.

How have you evolved in that sense? And do you think that’s super important for an entrepreneur?

Daymond John: Well, I think people management is very, very important.

I like to say that as an entrepreneur myself, nobody will ever, ever, ever outwork me. However, I can’t do it by myself.

And people are the bloodline of the company.

And it is hard. I had at one time 400 people internally and 2,000 people externally, and I felt that everybody wasn’t getting a fair shake. And I didn’t like that.

But I was young. I was 30 years old, and I didn’t know you needed an HR person for probably every 50 people.

Because at the end of the day, if your team is happy, you’ll be happy.

But you need to bring in people that can handle that, who are built for that.

Because as a boss, often you just want to go, “I’m working this hard. You should work that hard.”

But that person, it’s not their business.

That person can be at your business for long-term growth. They could be at your business because they’re getting from here to there in college.

They could be in your business because they’re about to retire.

They could be in your business because they love the messaging or the thing that you’re doing for people.

But it doesn’t mean they have to work that hard, because if not, then they should have their own business.

And if they’re not incentivized to, then why expect them to?

Jaime: Yeah. Just on a personal level with entrepreneurship, I find you have to have a motor, as you know, and keep it moving and on to the next thing.

And I find that I have a hard time sometimes taking a pause and looking at what has happened and being grateful for it.

And in the moment, really reflecting on all of the great that has happened, largely due to others and some due to myself.

Do you find that too, that you’re always looking at the next thing?

Staying Grateful While Scaling

[10:03]

Daymond John: Well, that’s two different things, right?

I’m always looking at the next thing and slowly putting a seed in the ground to have that next thing, because it’s all about growth.

If you don’t grow, you die.

How are we to be appreciative in your business?

They say that you cannot be appreciative and selfish at the same time.

So I wake up with gratitude. And there’s no way in the world to wake up with gratitude for what you have and feel bad for yourself that you’re not getting enough.

So it’s just really a mindset.

And I think you probably wake up thinking about how you can build more so you can employ more people, so you can change more lives in a positive way.

But yeah, you do have to take a moment to realize where you’re at because you’ve been in the bad place already.

So maybe sometimes you should think about how far you’ve come.

Jaime: Yeah, and it’s a very odd combination of business and altruism that I’m in.

And I truly believe you can do both. You can help a lot of people and make money, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Business and Altruism: Can You Do Both?

[11:02]

Jaime: That actually leads me to something I wanted to ask you.

You’re one of the GOATs of branding.

Daymond John: I don’t know about that, because I will say, if I was that, then FUBU would be Nike.

Jaime: Fair enough. One of, let’s say.

It’s odd to brand in my space in some ways, or at least conventional, traditional branding.

Branding in Mental Health Care

[11:22]

Jaime: It can be viewed as distasteful to advertise.

It’s not consumer retail or health and wellness where it’s a trend and you’re scrolling on Instagram and it’s like, “Oh, I got a hot one. Buy this shirt.”

People, when they need help, are either talking to somebody that they trust to get a referral, or they are Googling in a time of crisis.

And so I want to be tasteful about it.

And I think you can have a good brand ethos, obviously, on the website and whatever you put out there.

How might you think about branding in my space?

And the second thing I’ll say is, I made a decision to really double down on premium-quality service.

Pay the best doctors, pay the best therapists, knowing that my costs are $1.4 million a month right now.

I could easily do that for one.

But I really want to deliver a quality service.

And I know that over time, if we just keep doing the right thing and delivering quality service, it’s going to get out in the market.

People are going to recognize us as a premier program, and it will come back in revenue.

Daymond John: It will.

But at the end of the day, there’s a lot of noise out there. They’re not making any more attention in the world.

And you definitely want to be tasteful, but you’re coming from a true place, right?

I donate to Shriners, I donate to the ASPCA, I donate to a lot of places.

These people have to pay the bills to pay the doctors and things of that nature.

As long as it’s coming from a true place, that is an angle in branding as well.

“We pay our doctors the best so they can give you the best and be here for you.”

So no, you should not feel guilty about having a great service for people.

Because at the end of the day, once you brand it and you get it out there, the testimonies will be there.

“Yes, I went, and guess what? This is by far better than this.”

Or, “A solution I’ve been missing.”

From $2.5M to $25M: What Growth Actually Took

[13:34]

Daymond John: So I believe you said that you went from $2.5 million to hopefully a projection of $25 million.

And what did it take to go from that $2.5 million to $10 million?

Jaime: Yeah. For me, I was new to behavioral health.

I was an outsider, which I actually think was a good thing because people get caught and jaded.

That’s what my partner called me. He was like, “I need somebody outside of behavioral health because I don’t like this, ‘Well, this is just the way we do things.’”

Well, why do you do things that way?

So I think I was able to dig into the why behind a lot of practices within the space.

But I think to summarize, we really wanted to get better before getting bigger.

So I could have opened Georgia a couple of years earlier, but I really wanted to refine the team, the operational flow, the clinical quality.

And like you said, proof of concept.

And then stack cash, raise capital, get investors a little bit of money back.

But once we felt ready, it was go time.

And doing the diligence upfront on the market and on the rates and all the different things, I think, was huge.

And so a lot of that operational know-how was developed through trial and error for those first couple of years.

It was 13 months before we were cash-flowing with Florida.

With Georgia, it was month four.

So I think that gap is purely the learning that occurred.

Daymond John: You know, they say that in business, a mentor is only going to tell you to do three things, period.

Don’t take in money too soon. Don’t spread yourself too thin. And don’t grow too fast.

Advice for Founders: Don’t Grow Too Fast

[15:16]

Daymond John: And I think something you said there, I don’t believe I’ve ever heard that said in any form of any of these interviews I’ve done, and I’ve probably done 100 of them.

You said, “Get back the investors a little bit of cash.”

People don’t understand the value of that statement.

It’s almost like you go into the bank and you borrow $10,000 over two years, and you give it back in four months.

You may not even use it.

The bank goes, “Well, can I give you some more?”

And that’s exactly the same thing with investors.

There are so many investors out there. They invest in the business, then you’re like, “Well, I’ve got these big dreams.”

You keep moving on and moving on and growing it.

Remember, they’re an investor. You don’t know why they invested.

They may want a return on their capital.

They may have loved what you were doing.

Maybe they wanted their significant other to work in the business instead of creating a new one.

The minute you give back capital, they want to give you more.

Because a lot of entrepreneurs say, “Oh, we’re going to build this huge thing.”

I may not even be here in ten years when you’re going to get that exit.

So that’s very important. I think a lot of people can learn from that.

Jaime: That’s super validating for you to say.

Everyone’s got their money back as of a quarter ago.

And at a certain point, the decision I have to make is, is the ROI on this cash better in the market earning 10%, or is it better for growth?

And everyone agrees it’s better within the company.

But just the fact that in that first year I didn’t have a defined growth plan, so what am I to do with that cash?

We didn’t necessarily need it, so I paid some nice dividends to them. Then we started stacking.

Daymond John: Well, you also now have a bunch of ambassadors at dinner bragging about you as an operator.

And now every one of them has three friends that say, “When can I get in on the next round?”

Did that happen?

Jaime: They all say it was the best investment they ever made.