228 – He’s been saving lives for 35 years: Tom interviews Alain Burrese

Episode 228 – Alain Burrese
[00:00:09] Welcome to Screw the Commute. The entrepreneurial podcast dedicated to getting you out of the car and into the money, with your host, lifelong entrepreneur and multimillionaire, Tom Antion.

[00:00:24] Hey, everybody, it's Tom here with Episode 228 of Screw the Commute podcast. We're here with our first time ever third time guest. My good buddy Alain Burrese is here with us. And this guy has a passion to teach practical street application of self-defense stuff. I mean, he'd been doing it most of his his life, 35 years of martial arts experience and in the Korean art of hapkido. And he holds a fifth degree black belt. And I'm going to tell you a lot more about him. And one of the reasons I'm really happy to have him on in the New Year is because there's been just so many of these incidents with active shooters and active machetes and active idiots causing all kinds of havoc. You know, it's time to get your head out of the sand and protect yourself, kind of like that church in Texas. They planned ahead and they of course, they couldn't solve all the problems they had there when two people did get killed. But it could have been 20. It could have been. Who knows how many. So. Well, he talks about all of those kinds of things, active shooter things, what you could do to defend yourself. So we'll bring him on in a minute. Now, I hope you didn't miss or if you did go back and listen later to episode 227. It's a totally different from what we're used to around here. But we did a heartfelt talk with Roberto Candelaria. He was the sponsorship expert who lost his father after a long bout of Parkinson's disease. And because of his lifestyle business, which we're all about on this podcast, he was able to help his mother and father all the time through when the sickness progressed and keep his bills paid while going through an eight month depression after his father passed. And so this is quite a bit different than our standard fare of rah rah, let's sell stuff, but hope you make sure you listen to it and decide if you're going to take steps now to prepare for when life gets in the way. And we're in a new year here. So perfect time to do it. All right. So make sure you grab a copy of our freebie, the How to Automate Your Business e-book. It's at screwthecommute.com/automatefree. And it's all the tips and tricks I use to handle up to a hundred fifty thousand subscribers and forty thousand customers without pulling my hair out. Now our podcast app is also in the app store. You can do lots of cool stuff right from your cell phone or tablet and you can grab a copy of that. And plus we have complete instructions on how to use it with screen captures and this and that at screwthecommute.com/app. Our sponsor's the Internet Marketing Training Center of Virginia, a distance learning school which teaches legitimate techniques to make a great living, either working for someone else or starting your own online business or both. So you can check that out at IMTCVA.org. And of course, as always, all the stuff that we talk about and all the links will be in our show notes. This is episode two twenty eight. So when you want to find a specific episode, you go to screwthecommute.com and then slash in this case 228. Now we also have a really cool thing. You know, we're we're really upset about the things that's going on in colleges nowadays, how they're ripping people off and and that might sound a little brash. But if you go to IMTCVA.org/quiz, we have a brand new quiz to see if you know all the ways colleges are ripping off students and parents. So check that out at IMTCVA.org/quiz because I don't want you or your family getting robbed when you're shooting for higher education for either you or your children, nephews, nieces, grandchildren, whoever. All right. Check that out.

[00:04:28] All right. Let's get to the main event. Alain Burrese is an active shooter response instructor. He served in the U.S. Army with the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg, North Carolina and with the 2nd Infantry Division as a sniper and sniper instructor in South Korea. He's currently the director of Active Defense Training for Reflex Protect. We'll talk more about that later. He's trained more than 6000 individuals, including teachers, school administrators, doctors, nurses and staff on basic and effective strategies of surviving active threats. And he does not want people to be scared or paranoid, so he teaches you how to enjoy life safely and, I'll throw this in again, like I did on the previous episodes. He's one of the few people in the world I would trust my life to. So, Alain, are you ready to screw for the new year? The commute. So how are you doing?

[00:05:32] I'm doing wonderful. How about yourself?

[00:05:34] Oh, I'm just peachy. Looking forward to a great 2020 and looking forward to stay and safe like we always do. So tell everybody that's a new listener what you've been doing for the past year and past thirty five years. But specifically in the past year or so, to help keep people safe.

[00:05:54] You know, in the past year and just about a year ago, it was January of last year. Then I teamed up with a company that I had met, you know, six months prior to that. And I liked what they were doing. Joe Anderson, the CEO, liked what I was doing, you know, teaching people how to what they can do in active shooter situations. And, you know, I wrote the book Survive the Shooting, which, you know, I gave to Joe. And he's like, you know, you you know this topic. And, you know, last Christmas we started talking and in January, we decided to work together. And so I'm teaching the survivors shooting programs through reflex protect. And I'm teaching reflex protect training, which is a defensive spray, which, you know, you could go online by one and it's easy to figure out. However, with institutions, schools, hospitals, government organizations, they need to have it in the policy. So they have to have policy language, which we help them with. And they need the training component that we it's all and I's are dotted and the T's are crossed. So we go in and we train those individuals how to use the product effectively and when and when not to use it. So those organizations, their insurance companies are really happy with this and happy. And it's one of the things that we really are proud of his insurance companies like us.

[00:07:21] Yeah. Yeah. And you know what? That's the that's the downside of all of this stuff. I mean, I was just telling you before we started recording about, I got a call for our protection dog company that this guy was doing a home invasion. And the family dog that was only 10 months old, Rottweiler tore the guy to pieces. Three hundred stitches. The guy had to have. And we're just waiting to hear about all the lawsuits that the criminal that was trying to rape and murder the wife is going to file against the guy because the dog tore up. You know, so unfortunately, we have to deal with these kinds of things just to protect ourselves when the bad guys don't care. And one of my instructors came from France. He said that nobody sues in France. He says that he says that they teach the dogs, buy them anywhere, bite their face off. Nobody gets sued. But here in the US that it's a little bit different than one other comment I want to make about your book. Yeah, there was a famous TV commercial and catch phrase from Jeep. It was Jeep. We wrote the book on four-wheel-drive. Well, I got a new one. Alain Burrese, he wrote the book on active shooters because the book is the best, most thorough thing ever created in this particular field and needed more than ever right now. Tell me a little bit about the book.

[00:08:44] It's the book that I wanted. Years ago when I first got into, you know, what do we do to help people with these active shooter situations? What strategies can we provide to help keep people alive? And there wasn't a good book. So I took the teaching I was doing and I became certified with Safari Land and was teaching with a team of those trainers. Got a lot of experience and knowledge from the officers and others I was teaching with, read everything I could read on the topic, researched what went to different courses and then put together the book that I wish would have been available when I started. You know, some people know they sing about big butts. I like big books. Yeah.

[00:09:31] But it's understandable by the average person. That's a good thing.

[00:09:36] Yeah. You know, it's like a textbook that young has everything you can want and you can go to the chapters that you need. You know, it's not a book you have to read cover to cover. You know, I recommend it the first time. But then it's just it's a great reference for when you need certain things to go to that chapter and and tighten up your defenses or work on the things that you need to do to be better prepared.

[00:10:00] Tell them about the reflex protect. Because, you know, everybody's heard a pepper spray and the old days mace. Tell her about this product and why you got behind this got on this bandwagon.

[00:10:12] The reason I jumped on the bandwagon for reflex protect, it was the missing piece myself. And just about anybody else out there teaching active shooter response to teachers, nurses, people that aren't allowed to use a firearm. We were teaching improvised weapons. Well, why improvise if you can have a tool for the job? And you know, we were asked about pepper spray all the time, but you don't want to spray pepper spray in a school that's going to affect all the kids and everything. Same with the hospital reflex protect. It created a brand new CS based gel called Presidia gel.

[00:10:55] CS stands for.

[00:10:58] It's a big, long word. It's the same and it's the same stuff that's in Teargas. It's being used in Teargas for the military and law enforcement for decades. But we have a special formulated gel comes out of a company out of New Jersey, the D.O.D. approved company that creates this gel, Presidia gel, specifically for reflex protect with a C S base. So it doesn't cross-contaminate. I could put my arm around your shoulders. You could get sprayed in the face. You'd be in a lot of pain. I'd be fine. Okay. And actually, we're finding every law enforcement officer that has tested it, who is comparing it to the pepper spray that they have to do in the academy has said it works faster.

[00:11:50] Yeah. And some people have told me some of my cop friends have told me that like some people don't react at all to pepper spray. So is there is there ever any testing on reflex on what percentage of people it might not affect at all?

[00:12:08] I don't know the percentage, but I do know that in the military, when you go through the C.S. gas chamber, like all of us had to do, there are some people that aren't affected as much with that. So I wouldn't say that Presidia gel will affect everyone the same. One hundred percent. I don't think we can say that about anything. But I do believe it is superior to pepper spray, that it works quicker and it doesn't cross contaminate.

[00:12:36] That's a that's a big thing because I can imagine because I mean, even though we're getting calls for protection dogs and in emergency rooms, because people just get crazy in those places, you imagine spraying pepper spray and an emergency room. Oh, thank God.

[00:12:52] They couldn't do it. Yeah. Reflex protect they can. And actually did the actual uses of the product. So far have been in hospital settings and it has kept nurses from getting hurt. It's been sprayed and it's just been brandished by a couple of nurses that controlled and stopped the person.

[00:13:13] Wow. That's that's powerful stuff. Is it available? Somebody go on Amazon to buy this for what is this kind of controlled or what not?

[00:13:23] We do have a two point five ounce version available on Amazon. It's also available at ReflexProtect.com. Most of the institutions, schools, hospitals and stuff are using a five ounce. You can only buy through us directly right now.

[00:13:40] Does it work on animals?

[00:13:43] We haven't tested on animals, I mean, we don't want to do that, but we have had one lady tell us that she sprayed a dog that came after her and it worked.

[00:13:54] Yeah. Because Kay was walking our little tiny, tiny mini and some lady let up a pit bull out there was not happy. Scared the hell hell out of her. And I said, well, you know, you got to do something to prepare if you're gonna walk along a road like that with the dog.

[00:14:12] Sometimes the pepper spray is better for the animals, especially we tell people for bears, because when you want that big mist, because with our product, you know, it shoots out like wasp spray in a direct stream shooting a person in the face and getting their eyes. But I wouldn't want to be trying to shoot it directly into that bears eye if he's charging you.

[00:14:37] And just this darn thing outside with what the all the other stuff is, that depends on the wind. Because you can shoot yourself easily. If you're not, you know if you're all whacked out is afraid and you spray it in the wrong direction, you're going to incapacitate yourself and the bad guy or dog is gonna be laughing at you.

[00:14:58] We will have a bear spray hopefully a year from now. We're going through the EPA staff and we're teaming up with another company to co do a bear spray and get that out in the market.

[00:15:08] Yeah. Can you imagine I was reading about that yesterday about the EPA has to worry about bear spray. I know how many you know, how much damage is that going to do to the environment to shoot a bear as opposed to having a big funeral for three or four hikers that just got malled.

[00:15:26] It's okay to shoot a person tomorrow. We have to wait. I can't get into the bear spray markets.

[00:15:38] Tell him about the active shooter training. You're doing so. So I imagine that reflex is part of it, but it's not the only part.

[00:15:46] No, it's you know, the course that I started teaching even before Reflex Protect was born. It's a big part of that course. We're teaching people, you know, strategies on how to harden their targets in the first place and how to recognize signs. I mean, things if we can recognize signs and get these people help before something happens, that's the ideal. A couple of years ago, the guy found his daughter's diary and she was gonna be the first female killer, which she wouldn't have been. And she was going to outdo certain other killers. He turned her in, got her the help that she needed. And there's a lot of cases where people have reported and got to either law enforcement or mental health professionals or whoever was needed to help these people before something happens. So we cover stuff like that in the course to be covering things on how to deal with the stress and the fear that goes on. And then we, you know, cover some medical stuff. And I always encourage people to get more medical training. We cover what to do when law enforcement shows up so you don't become a victim. And that includes if you have your own firearm or if you take the bad guys firearm, you don't want to be waving it around.

[00:17:04] Oh, yeah, good idea.

[00:17:06] And then we cover, you know, my triangle, which is ways to escape the situation. Ways to deny the killer access to kill you, which could be getting behind cover. It could be barricading in a room. And we deal with ways and attacking back and stopping the killer, whether it's tackling them at a doorway, using a fire extinguisher, or if you have reflex protect ambushing him and spraying with reflex protect. I do want to point out, because I had a guy asked me other day, said, I just don't think you'd be wanting to take a spray to a gunfight. And I don't see somebody going down the hall after these killers. No, no. Protect is an alternative to throwing the stapler at him. Not that we're gonna turn people into police officers with reflex protect. They're gonna go hunt down the killer. This gives you something so you don't have to improvise. You can have an easy to use tool as a last ditch way to keep you and your others safe.

[00:18:14] All right. So let's talk about the business. So ever since I've known you, you have made a living using the skills that you have. So you did security, big security for a big arena events. And and you did active shooter. You spoke and you are an attorney. But I don't think you've done any legal work since I've known you.

[00:18:35] When we first met only through Internet. I might have still been being a lawyer, but since I've been in your house. We've gotten together in your place, California and stuff I haven't been.

[00:18:46] Yes. And then you've created a line of products for people that could never, you know, have an active shooter training from you. You wrote a novel. You hooked up with the reflex protect people. And now I understand your reflex protect you were hooking up with the Safari Land again. So. So all of these things have kept you and beautiful family going for all these years. Right, without the dreaded J-O-B.

[00:19:14] They have. Although, you know, it's sort of a J O B now. And the nice thing is, you know, we say we're going to screw the commute. Fortunately and unfortunately for the title is I'm commuting a lot now, but it's because I'm traveling so much to teach people and which I enjoy.

[00:19:31] Well, I don't call that a commuter, the drudgery. You know, same route every day, sitting in the same traffic, making somebody else rich. You're getting on airplanes. You're the big shot. Every place you go, you're on radio and TV all over the country. And that's that's another part of the business that we kind of worked on. Are you still on Google Alerts?

[00:19:54] I am, but I haven't been keeping up with them like you do. And I was just talking with Joe Anderson, you know, the reflex protect CEO the other day. I mean, it really actively start doing the radio thing again, like you and I talked about years ago. And, you know, I've been on the radio 80, 90, some times all over the country. And I mean, start actively getting back on the radio both with the active shooter and reflex protect. You know, they go hand in hand in something else to do with safety, so I"m going to start doing that more.

[00:20:29] Yeah. Let me explain to everybody what we're talking about. So I got Alain to sign up for Google Alerts for any keywords that had to do with active shooters. And so he would get a immediate notice when anything with that would show up in the news. And then you call up the radio and TV stations in that area. This is basically called news jacking is the kind of word for it. And then offer yourself as an expert on that topic. So that's how that 80 or 90 radio things. And the nice thing about radio is you can have a bad hair day and you can do it from anywhere. You don't have to show up at a TV station where you kill yourself to get there and then you get bumped off some for our embassy gets attacked in Iraq. So that's the basic idea here. And. And I was like I said that again, if you revamped that, that would be great for your reflex protect thing.

[00:21:23] Yeah. I mean, like you said it, you can do it literally from anywhere. I was in South Korea for the Olympics, you know, two years ago when in that February, the Parkland shooting happened. And I actually got a phone call while I was in Korea to be on a radio show. So I've gotten to the point now where sometimes they call me.

[00:21:50] Yeah. When you do a good job podcast, I mean, another thing I would suggest is to just start doing a podcast tour. They actually have a longer life than the than the radio. The radio is all concentrated because some event happened in that city. But podcast, the people will listen to him for years and can can get in touch. So besides radio I would do podcast too is bound to be a bunch of maybe maybe reflex protect will start one. Who knows. So but but all of these different revenue streams. This is the kind of what they call multiple streams of revenue because you know, like I said, you got income from product sales, you got income from your deal with reflex. You've got active shooter things. And by the way, anybody that's in a company or organization, Alain is the man. He's the bomb. If you suggest that your company bring somebody in. So what? What length are the. Are they things? I know. Well, we did the brutal self-defense class together. We just did a portion of the whole your whole thing. But so how if a company wants to have you do this for them, what's entailed?

[00:23:02] You know, it can be customized. So it depends. The most common training that I'm doing right now fits in a six to six and a half hour block. And so it's often 10, 4 or 10 to 4:30. And we'll put a half an hour in some places. Need to use an hour. You know, especially if it's a union. And they have to give people an hour lunch. I've done hour lunches. I've done half hour lunches in that six to six and a half hour period. And that entails PowerPoint lecture, it entails hands on stuff. And that includes going outside and spraying reflex protect. But then I customized things I do a lot of 1 hour and 2 hour just presentations for groups when they bring me. So I is doing in California a couple of months ago, so I did in Wyoming last month. You know, I'll just go in and do like a keynote type presentation or a breakout sessions. Usually those have less hands on stuff when it's a short one.

[00:24:03] In the full training. How many can you do by yourself?

[00:24:08] Usually I will try to go 30 to 40, but I've had groups of 60 getting much over 60. It gets difficult to give everybody the attention, the right hands on stuff.

[00:24:23] Well, you know, plenty of people. If you needed to pull somebody in to help.

[00:24:28] And we can. And I you know, I got a co-worker with reflex protect Ben Gladwin that he and I do sometimes teach together. Often, though, we're off in different directions. He's teach in one place. I'm teaching somewhere else. But we do coast teach sometimes together.

[00:24:45] Yeah, I know you said the word here. I want to bring it to the forefront. You have an inert one. Tell people about, you know, if they do any of this stuff. They should also in the beginning, for sure, you know, practice.

[00:24:59] Yes, reflex protect has an inert training unit that has a soy oil mixture stuff in there, so it sprays similar to the real stuff.

[00:25:07] You can spray your salad.

[00:25:12] A lot of pepper sprays have inert trainers too. If your carry, you should be practicing with it first. You don't ever want the first time you use any weapon to be the real situation. You have wanted to practice with it for first.

[00:25:27] Yeah, I can just just picture that somebody. I don't know how to do this. They point it out of their own face to look at and spray themselves in the face.

[00:25:39] The larger reflex protect has a trigger like a handgun. It's really intuitive and easy. Next month, we're coming out with a smaller pocket size because people really wanted a smaller one. And it has the more traditional like the pepper spray you press with your thumb. But we'll have that one. But it has the Presidia gel that you can use inside without the cross-contamination and such. So we'll have that new product in February.

[00:26:06] We'll give some people some tips about actually carrying and deploying these, because I remember hearing you talk about some lady said, well, you know, I got my pink pepper spray and it's in my purse. And then like by the time she could get it out, you know, she had you know, somebody would've raped her and killed her three times. Yeah.

[00:26:26] And that's with any defensive weapon, whether it's a firearm, pepper spray, a baton. If you don't have access to it when you need it, it will do you no good. If you, you know, if you think there could be a danger, have in your hand. If you're a lady walking to your car at night and you don't trust the parking lot, don't have it in the bottom of your purse, have it in your hand ready to go.

[00:26:50] Or go, go, go find somebody to walk out there with you.

[00:26:53] Yeah. Yeah, definitely. I agree. But, you know, and when we have it, you know, we tell people when they're mounting the larger reflex protect, you want it accessible. And so you don't want it all hidden away where it takes you forever to get it that you want to be able to grab it. And if for most teachers, let's say schools, if something happens, most people are not right there in the vicinity. They can lock their doors locked down and then they get their reflex protect. And it's just in case a bad person gets through that lock down so that something some way to fight back rather than throwing their stapler. So you want to have it when you think there might be that threat.

[00:27:40] Now, can you travel with this? I mean, what can you put in your luggage.

[00:27:44] The small one that's coming out, the 1.9 and the 2.5 ounce. You can have one in your checked bag. The five ounce cans are too big for your checked bag.

[00:27:59] But they're there normally for institutions anyway.

[00:28:02] Right. And the 2.5 and the five ounce are actually the same size can. There's just different amounts in it specifically. So people can take that can on the plane or there are some states like California has a 2.5 ounce restrictions. We only can sell the 2.5 in certain situations.

[00:28:23] Do you know if if it's one one of them per checked bag or one total for your or all of your luggage?

[00:28:32] That I'm not sure I'd have to go back to the TSA and read your instructions more.

[00:28:38] I want one for each hand. I walk down the street ready to go. So. Well, how do people get a hold of you if they want to check the reflex protect product out, but more, more so that if they need the training

[00:28:53] You can go to surviveashooting.com or reflexprotect.com.

[00:29:01] You still have your newsletter to right?

[00:29:04] I do. And that's at surviveanddefend.com.

[00:29:08] Okay. We'll have all these in the show notes, folks. But just say it one more time.

[00:29:12] surviveanddefend.com. Sign up for my weekly newsletter and check out that membership site. There's like 800 pages now of information to keep you safe on that site now.

[00:29:23] Beautiful. And if you're looking up, Alain, you know, you would think he was a man, wouldn't you? Because he sounds kind of like a man, but he's really a girl. So at least I thought he was her first couple years I knew him. Tell them about that.

[00:29:41] Well, I spell my name Alain, which is a French spelling. And you know, Tom, when we first met, it's just email. And then that first phone call happened. Wait a second.

[00:29:59] Yeah, I had a I would tell you about the opposite thing that had had happened to me when, so. So, you know, in my in my consumer advocate role of going after bad people, you know, scammers and stuff with scam brigade. I was experimenting with this online voice changing. You know, the voice changes are usually physical products that you'd hold your phone and would change your voice to other things. But now they have them online. So I'm experiment with it. And then I kind of forget about it. And then I'm doing a first time Skype consultation with a new student. And every time I say something, she just kind of giggles. You know, we're looking at each other and she's kind of giggling. And I thought something in her home was funny, something that I couldn't see. And it's kept going on. And finally I said, what are you laughing about? And she said, Well, Mr. Antion, you don't quite sound like you did when I first met you. I had accidentally left on this voice changing thing every time I said stuff that I sound like a girl. So anyway, it's spelled go ahead and your whole name for them.

[00:31:13] It's Alain Burrese.

[00:31:21] Right. Great.

[00:31:22] So so again, it's funny telling to Windemere. Great martial artist has a podcast. Books DVD is highly recommended and we've been friends for years. He's from Belgium. And he speaks French, one of the languages. We knew each other only through email at the beginning. And so he just knew Alain, which is the French. So when a mutual friend, Mark Mick Young, was over there doing some teaching in Belgium. Wind stopped him once, Seattle. You keep talking about this Alain guy like I know him. Who are you talking about? You know, Alain hapkido sniper guy in Montana. He's. Oh, Alain. When we finally met face to face, he told me that story.

[00:32:12] So. So, anyway, I want to

[00:32:14] again, thank you for all the good you do you're saving lives that you don't even know about. Absolutely. There's no question in my mind. And. And you're taken skills from the business standpoint. You're taking skills and doing good in the world and making a living for you and your beautiful family. So. So it's a perfect lifestyle business and really excited for the 2020 as it really expands for you.

[00:32:44] Well, I appreciate Tom and I you know, I appreciate all the help you've given me throughout the years on the business advice and things, you've given me a tremendous amount of knowledge of your experience and knowledge in the business area, which has helped me. And so I treasure our friendship. It's really been an awesome friendship all these years.

[00:33:05] My pleasure. And now you say you're going to end up at the shot show in Vegas.

[00:33:11] Yes. I'll be at the shot show here in a couple weeks. It's in Vegas.

[00:33:15] What's the dates on that?

[00:33:18] I want to say the 21st through the 24th.

[00:33:21] That's the big deal, folks. Shot show is a big deal. Yearly event in Vegas.

[00:33:27] You know, it's it's huge. I think last year they had like fifty eight thousand people. So I'm going to be down there with some safari land folks and with some of the safari land trainers and things because, you know, we work in reflex protect safari land or developing a relationship and seeing just where else we can go to help everybody. Because we have the same goals. To keep people safe.

[00:33:51] That's for sure. All right, man. So say hello to the wife and your beautiful daughter for me, and we will catch you on the next episode.

[00:33:59] Sounds great. Thank you much for having me on. And let's make twenty twenty. Awesome.

[00:34:04] Sounds good to me. Catch you later, everybody.

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