Celebrating Mike’s Legacy

“I want to leave this place better than I found it.”

Those words came from a branch manager at Smith Barney named Mike Catalano, who I met when I was a rookie portfolio manager in the office he was assigned. I became fast friends with this New Yorker who told me, “I got outta there as fast as I could!”

I showed him around Houston, and we ended up living a few streets apart. We realized we were the brothers that neither of us ever had. Always the last in the office of about 100 professionals, he and I would talk at the end of almost every day.

When I told him I was planning to escape Wall Street after ten years of learning every page in their playbook (most of it unnecessary and expensive confusion to rip out and not use), he said he wanted to join me. We hatched our plan under the bright lights of an IHOP at 5am, where we knew we wouldn’t run into anybody from that fancy office, across the street on Westheimer. I asked the hostess for permission to keep the menu from that meeting, because I had a very good feeling about this huge risk, we were about to take. It hangs in the entry hall of our headquarters building to this day.

There were no attorneys or consultants at that meeting, just trust and a desire to serve people in a better way. We knew we could deliver a better experience to the families who counted on us to treat them as partners, not as a brokerage firm’s clients. And they knew we loved this work.

We had fun sharing some of our research trips in letters I still enjoy writing. We were warned at this fresh produce plant that the jalapeño room had extra industrial ventilation to suck the fumes out. I ignorantly said not to worry. Less than a minute later, Mike and I were in tears and barely able to breathe. Those first few families who showed up in the pouring rain on day 1 of our new investment firm with $0 under management meant the world to us. They knew then, as they do now, that we would never let them down. Some of those partners have grown into two and three generations of the same families we are lucky to serve today. Mike and I made one simple promise to each of those families from the start. We explained how they would be taken care of here exactly as we take care of our own families.

We only changed one part of that original business formula that began as Krueger & Catalano Capital Partners. It was just the two of us, and we weren’t very creative. We changed the name to Freedom Day Solutions in 2021 for two reasons that were very important to make clearer going forward. One, we wanted to build a much bigger and better team of professionals to take even better care of those families for longer. Two, all the work we love doing is about those families we serve, not about Mike and me. It’s about their Freedom Days and solving any challenges through every season of life along the way with better solutions. Personally, I am even more excited about getting to do this incredible work for the next couple decades than I ever have been, because of the team we have built.

Now is the time Mike has reached his own Freedom Days. He is retiring to spend more time with his incredible family and focus on his health. And he is so excited to volunteer and give back to causes special to him. Mike always leaves every place he has ever been better than he found it. I love you brother,

Ryan