Rick Chorney
“I build the AI and custom software at Callout, and I still run a cleaning company with my best friend, so I know what it’s like when the phone never stops. I look for fixes that hold up for the long term, so owners can have a life that doesn’t feel so interrupted.”
I learned this in the seats my clients sit in.
My parents adopted me at five and moved me from Ontario to Pouce Coupe, just outside Dawson Creek, where I grew up. My teens were rocky, with substance use, and that’s how I ended up in group homes. The ministry paid my rent on a youth agreement until I turned 19. I knew aging out was coming, so I left school in grade 11 to work and cover my own rent.
I walked into the Greyhound office and told the boss straight up that I needed to pay rent. He tried to talk me into staying in school and then hired me anyway. I drove packages to businesses and houses and loved it. That deadline taught me that bills come first and the things you want to do come after, and I still run on that.
A couple of managers at Walmart believed in me early on. Then came Vivint, knocking doors in a new city every four months and living in company housing. Between cities I didn’t have a home of my own to go back to, so I stayed with my parents. Hearing no all day taught me to keep going when it doesn’t feel like there’s anything there for you. Two years after leaving school I rented a three bedroom townhouse, and it was the first proper home I’d had.
My parents mean the world to me. They gave up a huge chunk of their lives to care for me when I needed someone to, and as rocky as things got when I was a teenager, I’ve loved them through it all. My life wouldn’t be what it is today without their guidance, their support and their encouragement, and I appreciate everything they’ve sacrificed for me.
My first cleaning company, Clean Force, started because a man believed in me enough to offer me the business. He left when it wasn’t growing fast enough for him, and I took it over and grew it. But I was young, I had too many staff and I didn’t manage the money well. When there weren’t enough people to do the work and I didn’t want to do it myself, the work went away.
I moved to Abbotsford in 2022 and started Echo Janitorial in 2023 with Adrian. We met at 13 or 14 in the school computer lab, in separate classes, sitting beside each other and talking. He’s the organized, consistent one. I’m ADHD and all over the place, and I think that’s a superpower, so we fit.
That first year I didn’t take a single day off. I was in the field by seven, home by eight and on the laptop until one, and it cost me my health, my mental health, my friendships and my time with family and my animals. With no weekend there’s nothing to reset you. One morning I woke up absolutely done, so I looked at Adrian and said “We’re leaving.” I didn’t know how yet, but I was going to make it work.
I put in an AI receptionist and some basic processes and checklists. It was rookie stuff, and it still changed the business overnight. Adrian and I drove across Canada to a UFC event in Montreal and took a month and a half doing it, getting up when we got up and sleeping wherever we ended up, and it reset my head. The next year Echo went from $242K to just under a million, and Fortune went through the records to check.
Since starting Callout I’ve built Echo its own AI system, shaped to the way we actually run, and it handles nearly all of our admin. Past due invoices dropped from $80K to $60K in three days. That system is also why we could take the crew down to six or seven people and keep the same workload, 46 accounts across the Lower Mainland and the Okanagan. The work still gets done, and I got my balance back.
Hard work still matters, because you don’t get anywhere in life without it. I still go out and clean four or five nights a week because I want to, and I take a day or two off every week and look after myself. When I catch myself at work wishing I could be doing the things I love all the time, I know something needs a look.
Why I started Callout
I built my own site after a $99 hosting payment declined and my host threatened to shut the whole thing down. Then friends started asking me for help. They’d worked with multiple agencies and had no luck. I realized I could market them well and make it make sense, for a better price than agencies doing poor work, so I jumped in. Our clients own 100% of their work even if they stop paying.
Then we pivoted. Once the leads were flowing, most trades owners couldn’t keep up with them, and I could relate because I’d been there with Echo. So now we build the AI agent and the custom software that handle those leads too.
I stuck with it because other people’s problems are easier to see when you’re not buried in them. I like fixing a problem so it doesn’t come back, and I love hearing from an owner that we made them money or made something easy. Marcos and Simon came from Actualize, a builders community, and I think the three of us can do great things together for a long time.
My people
I reward independence, real effort and communication. What I won’t tolerate is hearing about a problem from the client first, because all it would have taken was a text. Ownership has to be earned. Someone who believes in what we’re building might not have money to put in, but they can put in their time and earn their way to a share, and an asset like that can move a person’s whole life forward. I want my crew to say the work is flexible, it pays well and it adds to their life.
- Echo, $242K to just under a million in a year, and now nearly all of its admin runs on an AI system I built
- Callout, and the direction it’s heading
- Drew’s Seasonal Services. We built Drew a system that proved we can take a business that needs systems and needs leads, systemize it and bring the leads in, and have it running sustainably in a month or two. Now his business thrives.
I spent months getting my own site to rank, and then I published a site I’d coded myself right over the top of it. The rankings were gone and it took weeks to climb back. So every site change we make now gets treated as load bearing. The redirects get mapped and the SEO that’s already working gets protected before anything goes live, and someone checks the work even when AI built it.
It’s a way of life now, and if you can’t accept that you’ll fall behind. I’ll argue that until I’m blue in the face. AI has taken admin off my team, but it creates work too, because one person using it can get through three times as much in the same eight hours. So train your people on it and get out of their way.
Money shouldn’t stand in the way of the choices you want to make in life, and if it does, there isn’t enough. If there’s a death in my family somewhere far from home, I don’t want to be wondering whether I can afford the time off. That’s the freedom I want for the people at home and for the owners we work with.
People look at a plumber or a cleaner and see the trade. There’s a person there with other talents and other plans, and if you can reach that person and show them a better way, it can change how they see everything.
It teaches you to work on a schedule and buy into the life you’re told to live. I believe in freedom and in building something that lasts, so the people you care about are looked after by what you built.
The questions I actually like answering.
“Admin. I do almost no admin now. Some clients won’t like that you switched to AI, and that’s part of doing business. The sooner you accept it, the sooner you stop being the bottleneck in your own company.”
“Give it the right rules and keep teaching it until it gets the task right multiple times in a row. Even then you keep double checking its work.”
“Be very specific about what you want and give it your voice. I let Claude dig through all my emails before it sends anything, so it knows how I talk.”
Short, for an intro
Rick Chorney is a partner at Callout Digital, an AI first software and automation company for Canadian trades and service businesses, and the president and co founder of Echo Janitorial in Abbotsford, BC. He grew up in Pouce Coupe, just outside Dawson Creek, and knowing he would age out of care at 19, he left school in grade 11 to work so he could cover his rent. Fortune featured him in March 2026 for using AI to grow Echo from $242K to just under a million dollars in a year.
Long, for show notes and articles
Rick Chorney is a partner at Callout Digital, an AI first software and automation company that takes the chaos out of how Canadian trades and service businesses capture, communicate and close. He’s also the president and co founder of Echo Janitorial, the commercial cleaning company he runs with his best friend Adrian across the Lower Mainland and the Okanagan.
Rick was adopted at five and grew up in Pouce Coupe, BC, just outside Dawson Creek. His teens were rocky and he spent time in group homes, and knowing he would age out of care at 19, he left school in grade 11 to work so he could cover his rent. Along the way he drove for Greyhound, knocked doors for Vivint in a new city every four months, sold newspaper ads, worked in a dealership service department and ran pest control routes for Orkin. His first cleaning company, Clean Force, taught him the hard lessons about money and staffing.
He started Echo in 2023 and spent the first year working seven days a week, in the field by seven and on the laptop until one in the morning. It cost him his health and his relationships, so he spent four hours learning how AI could take work off his plate. Echo went from $242K to just under a million dollars the next year, and Fortune featured the story in March 2026. Since then Rick has built Echo its own AI system, and it runs nearly all of the company’s admin.
At Callout he builds AI agents and custom software for owners who are buried in calls, quotes and invoices. He believes in hard work and in balance, he thinks life is hard enough without money making your decisions, and he still cleans four or five nights a week. When he needs to reset he’s on a mountain, in the woods or at a campsite.
- Burning out in Echo’s first year, and the four hours with AI that turned it around
- Handing a business’s admin to AI, and what you have to accept when you do
- Building custom AI software around the way a business actually runs
- Aging out of care and leaving school in grade 11 to pay rent
- Hard work, balance, and the signs that growth is starting to cost you your life
- Running two companies, one of them with his best friend since they were 13
Book fifteen minutes with Rick.
Bring whatever keeps interrupting your day, whether it’s the phone, the quotes or the invoices. I’ll tell you what I’d hand to AI first and whether it’s worth doing with us.
Rather email? rick@calloutdigital.com · LinkedIn · Facebook · Instagram