Down syndrome doesn't keep this business owner from success

Marsha (left) and Alexis Malloy set up a photo scanning project for a customer of A.J Special Services in which Alexis provides repetitive clerical services. Photo By C.T. Kruger

New Berlin - When Alexis Malloy was a child, her prognosis was grim.

"When Alexis was 1, they said she'd be non-social," her father, Ron Malloy, explained. "And when Alexis was 8, they said she'd be non-verbal."

Ron Malloy smiled and lowered his head.

"She's got plenty of friends and plenty of cell phone minutes to prove that wrong," he said. "Lexie is a very social person. She's actually really amazing."

She also has Down syndrome.

Now 21, and a recent New Berlin Eisenhower High School graduate, Alexis knows about 100 words by sight. She can tell time by the hour. She can count to 31.

"Because there are 31 days in a calendar month, right?" Ron Malloy offered with a shrug.

Alexis also is president and owner of A.J. Special Services, which offers repetitive clerical services including copying, scanning, shredding and stuffing envelopes. When she's not working eight to 15 hours a day on mailings, for instance, Alexis provides in-home child care, often lending a hand for mothers who are at home but want extra help watching the kids.

"I love it!" said Alexis, who lives in New Berlin. "I'll show you."

She slipped her hands into a cardboard box.

"I did all these today," she said as she ran her finger over dozens and dozens of crisp, white envelopes.

Alexis' business is possible, in part, with help from the Wisconsin Division of Vocational Rehabilitation, a job-training mecca for families of people with Down syndrome and other disabilities. DVR developed a customized self-employment toolkit, including an extensive business plan manual, to help people with Down syndrome and those who support them develop legitimate and viable business models.

"Here, I'll show her," Alexis said, already up and out of her chair.

That sort of show-and-tell attitude is actually a key part of Alexis' business experience.

"We use picture books so she can connect. It's part of her business strategy to be able to talk to customers," explained Ron Malloy, a former business executive and executive director of Down Syndrome Association of Wisconsin. He and his wife, Marsha, helped started the foundation nearly 20 years ago.

Work driven by passion

Developing Alexis' business started with focusing on her strengths and interests.

"We picked the two things she loves to do," Ron Malloy said.

With the Mom's Helper Service, Alexis works with children ages 2 to 8, playing with the kids or preparing meals while mom is home or a job coach is there to observe. Alexis uses a picture board to chart the day by half hours, so she knows when it's time to play, to eat, to take a nap.

"I love it! I love it!" Alexis said.

For clerical services, Alexis focuses on repetitive tasks, most recently stuffing envelopes for about 10 customers. Orders are often 600 or fewer pieces, the industry cutoff for having a machine process mail; with so few pieces, Ron Malloy explained, it's just not cost-effective.

"Opening the business was easy enough," he said.

The DVR manual outlines everything from identifying a business idea to financing and pricing to marketing. It even includes 12-month cash flow projections and three-year profit-loss statements.

Alexis enlisted a 10-person team, including a business consultant in Ohio and several retired business executives, to guide her upstart.

"We had some challenges opening a bank account," Ron Malloy said. "It took six weeks, 50 hours, 10 banks and six attorneys. … Insurance was a challenge, too. Insurance was probably 20 weeks, 50 hours, three underwriters and 10 insurance reps. We found one underwriter who would underwrite her in the entire state. Those were things I wasn't expecting. "

Much of the issue centered on how banks interpreted Alexis' legal rights.

With her parents as her legal guardians, Ron Malloy explained, the banks thought Alexis had given up her financial rights. But Alexis' parents only hold guardianship over her person.

As part of that process, Alexis kept certain rights, but gave up others. For instance, she kept the rights to vote and marry. But her parents have authority to decide if she should ever divorce.

Alexis did not waive any financial rights, or give up guardianship of her estate. That, her father argued, means she has every right to open a bank account.

"I talked to six different attorneys and got six different answers," Ron Malloy said.

Finally, a small local bank, with an employee familiar with Down syndrome, took Alexis as a customer.

Today, she can walk into the bank on her own and, with a little help from a banker, deposit checks that make it possible for her to pay company bills.

Building client trust key

For now, Alexis does 90 percent of her work on-site. It's her way of building trust with customers.

"Before customers let her take their work off-site, they want to see she can do it," Ron Malloy explained.

In many cases, those customers refer Alexis to other clients. So far, she has about 10.

"You don't go in and say, 'Help someone with Down syndrome,' " Ron Malloy said. "It doesn't work. They want someone who does quality work at a reasonable price. It's not charity. If they want to donate to a charity they can.

"A.J. Services focuses on quality and value for the customer, like any business."

And, state Rep. Mike Kuglitsch said, Alexis Malloy is like any other business owner.

"I didn't know what to expect," said Kuglitsch, who recently visited Alexis on the job as part of the Take Your Legislator to Work program.

Then he learned about Alexis' business, saw her home office, her first paycheck.

"I just think that Alexis Malloy is a success story," Kuglitsch said. "And not only for the community of New Berlin, but for her family and for other people with Down syndrome. Alexis is not going to let her situation with Down syndrome keep her from experiencing everything other people experience."

Working toward big goal

Which is really why she started A.J. Special Services in the first place.

"Alexis, why do you work?" her dad asked.

"I need a house," she said matter-of-factly.

It's a goal few might have believed Alexis could accomplish just a few years ago.

Now, Ron Malloy said, he's absolutely confident Alexis can build a life for herself, without solely relying on them or her younger sister, Melissa.

"It's so energizing because, as a parent, I can help her do what she wants to do," Ron Malloy said.

And, he said, Alexis can help herself.