There’s no shortage of consulting firms, particularly in the densely populated Delaware Valley, that businesses can turn to for support with executing their strategic initiatives.

There is, however, only one — Malvern-based Greencastle Consulting — that can provide its clients solutions with a level of precision and discipline that can only be honed in the military.

Greencastle is owned by former Navy SEAL Joe Crandall, staffed by 110 former military members, and believed to be the nation’s largest all-veteran company. With expertise in strategy execution, operations consulting, and data and analytics, Greencastle offers a wide breadth of experience to clients in a variety of industries, particularly utilities and life sciences.

Whether managing complex projects or implementing large-scale change initiatives, Greencastle’s consultants are adept at turning challenges into opportunities.

“Our military backgrounds really help,” said Crandall. “We create order from chaos. The people we’re hiring are accustomed to being given ambiguous orders and having to figure things out and provide guidance in order to get things done. A lot of our clients don’t have the governance and decision-making matrices to get where they want to go, so we lend them a lot of structure.”

This week is National Veterans Small Business Week, a time to celebrate veteran-owned businesses across the country. NVSBW honors the entrepreneurial spirit of veterans and shines a spotlight on the contributions of veteran-owned small businesses to the economy.

Under Crandall’s leadership, Greencastle has flourished, having grown to become a premier strategy execution consultancy that delivers tailored, impactful solutions. Crandall credits Firstrust Bank with being a trusted partner in facilitating that growth.

“Prior to our engagement with Firstrust, we were using a big national bank, and there wasn’t any sort of relationship with them — we were just another customer,” he said, even though his company was generating $10 million to $15 million in annual revenue.  “In 2021, we switched to Firstrust, and that’s when we learned that we could actually have a relationship with our bank, instead of just being a number.”

Crandall praised Matt Hein, Executive Vice President and Chief Banking Officer at Firstrust, for his genuine interest in Greencastle.

“Matt is always around and takes pride in knowing us and our people,” said Crandall. “I know when he talks about a new product or service from the bank, he’s doing so because he believes it’s something that’s going to help our business. Our previous banks only called us when they needed something.”

Greencastle was founded by U.S. Army Rangers in 1997, but Crandall — who grew up in Incline Village, Nevada, on the north shore of Lake Tahoe — didn’t join the firm until 2012. (He graduated from the Navy and turned to healthcare sales after a bout with cancer forced an abrupt end to his military career in 2003.) He first learned about Greencastle while working for GetWellNetwork.

“I was a sales guy for the Northeast, selling interactive patient care systems,” said Crandall. “We sold one to a local hospital that had Greencastle on retainer. The CEO of the hospital said that these military guys would take care of the implementation and that they could handle any problems that came their way. I had never heard of Greencastle at that point, and I wanted to learn more.”

He did, and a few years later, he was hired as Director of Client Engagement Solutions. He became a partner in 2015, then owner in 2019.

Crandall takes pride in Greencastle being a 100-percent-veteran operation.

“A lot of businesses start off as veteran-owned and operated, but they usually have to branch off with nonveterans to fuel their growth,” he said. “But that’s not the direction we want to go in. A lot of veterans come to us through word of mouth and our reputation. All the stuff we do — decision-making models, planning methods — is stuff they’ve done in the military. They’re just taking off the uniform and putting on a civilian suit.”

Greencastle boasts a 99 percent employee retention rate.

“I think that speaks volumes about how we take care of our employees,” said Crandall, who also sits on the board of Stronghold Leadership, an organization that supports the professional development of the veteran community.

Every year in September, Greencastle hosts VetFest at its headquarters in Malvern. The family-friendly event, which is open to the general public, draws thousands of people and features food trucks, breweries, craft vendors, veteran service organizations, live music, and children’s activities.

As this week salutes the significant impact that veteran entrepreneurs have on their communities, Joe Crandall and Greencastle Consulting exemplify the best of what veteran-led businesses can achieve.

Learn more about how Firstrust Bank is helping people and businesses achieve success in the very region it calls home.