Today we’d like to introduce you to Randy Chipman.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
My story isn’t a straight line, and looking back, I’m glad it wasn’t.
Before CarePatrol, I was already a business owner running a non-franchise business of my own. I knew the entrepreneur life well — the freedom, the responsibility, and the part where you wear every hat and learn everything the hard way, by yourself. Then my wife Keri started talking with a franchise broker about a completely different opportunity, and CarePatrol came up almost in passing. I knew nothing about senior placement services at the time. What I did know was supply and demand, and the demographics were impossible to argue with: 10,000 people turn 65 in this country every single day. The need wasn’t going away — it was accelerating.
We sold the other business, and in October 2014 we officially opened CarePatrol of Utah. Those early years were humbling. I came in as a seasoned operator but a complete beginner in the senior care world, and most of the families who call us are reaching out on one of the hardest days of their lives — a parent has fallen, a stroke just happened, a memory diagnosis came back, and a decision has to be made in days, not months. You can’t fake your way through those conversations. You have to actually know the communities, the staff, the costs, the care levels, and you have to genuinely care about getting it right. So we put our heads down and built the relationships — with hospitals, doctors, social workers, senior living communities — one family at a time.
Today, Keri and I have six full-time employees, we have been to every senior living community in Utah personally, and we’ve had the privilege of guiding a growing number of Utah families through the assisted living, memory care, and in-home care decision. Along the way, the work has earned us some recognition I never expected. In 2023 we were named CarePatrol’s Franchisee of the Year, and in 2024 we were honored as an IFA Franchisee of the Year at the International Franchise Association’s national convention. Honestly, there’s a little imposter syndrome that comes with that — I never set out to be an expert in this field. But once a month I’m now flying somewhere in the country to train a brand-new franchisee on how to do this work, and we just renewed our franchise agreement for another 15 years.
There’s a quote I find myself coming back to: “Everyone overestimates what they can accomplish in one year and everybody underestimates what they can accomplish in 10.” That’s our whole story in one sentence. I didn’t expect senior care to become my life’s work. But going from making a living to making a difference turned out to be the best pivot I’ve ever made, and it’s the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It hasn’t been smooth, and I’d be doing a disservice to anyone reading this if I pretended otherwise.
The first real challenge was simply how much I didn’t know. I came into this as an experienced business owner, which I thought would carry me further than it did. Running a business is one skill set — being trusted by families to help them make a life-altering decision for their mom or dad is a completely different one. I had to learn the senior care world from the ground up: the licensing differences between assisted living and memory care, what a good community actually looks like behind the marketing brochure, which red flags matter and which ones don’t, how to read a care assessment, how Medicaid and the VA Aid & Attendance benefit interact with private pay. Years of homework before I felt like I really knew what I was doing.
The second challenge was building a referral network from zero. Hospitals, social workers, doctors’ offices, elder law attorneys, senior living communities — none of them know you on day one, and none of them are going to send a family your way until you’ve earned it. That trust gets built one case at a time, and there’s no shortcut. Some weeks early on, the phone just didn’t ring, and you start to wonder if you’ve made a serious mistake. You keep showing up anyway.
Then there’s the emotional weight of the work itself, which I didn’t fully appreciate going in. Almost every family who calls us is in some version of crisis. A stroke, a fall, a memory diagnosis, a hospital discharge with nowhere safe to send Dad. We meet people on what might be the worst day of their year, and we’re asking them to trust a stranger with one of the biggest decisions of their lives. You can’t unsee that. You carry pieces of those stories with you. Our team has learned to hold that weight with care, but it takes a toll, and it has to be talked about openly inside our business.
And then COVID. Senior living was at the absolute center of the pandemic. Communities locked down. We couldn’t tour. Families couldn’t visit. Some of the people we’d placed lost their lives, and we couldn’t even attend a funeral. It was the hardest stretch we’ve had, and it forced us to rebuild parts of how we work — virtual tours, longer phone conversations, more handholding from a distance.
Looking back, every one of those struggles is what eventually became our edge. We know this market because we had to learn it the hard way, and we built a team and a reputation that didn’t exist when we started. But anyone who tells you the path was smooth either has a short memory or they haven’t started yet.
As you know, we’re big fans of CarePatrol of Utah. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about the brand?
CarePatrol of Utah is a senior care advisory service. When a family is trying to figure out the next step in care for an aging loved one — whether that’s assisted living, memory care, independent living, or in-home care — we’re the advisor in their corner. Our service is completely free to families. We’re compensated by the communities and providers when a family chooses to move forward, similar to how a buyer’s agent works in real estate. The family gets an experienced, local advocate at no cost to them.
What we specialize in is the part most families don’t realize they need help with until they’re in the middle of it: assessing what level of care a loved one actually requires, understanding what they can realistically afford, and matching them to the right community or care option for their specific situation. There are over 200 senior living communities along the Wasatch Front. They are not interchangeable. They differ enormously in care levels, staffing stability, cost structure, culture, and quality. We know them — personally — because we walk them, we know the leadership teams, and we keep current on what’s actually happening inside each one. That depth of local knowledge is something a family can’t replicate with a Google search, and it’s something a national 800-number can’t match either.
What sets us apart starts with the fact that we’re a local, family-owned business. Keri and I have lived in Utah a long time, and we built CarePatrol of Utah by being on the ground here — touring communities ourselves, attending the discharge meetings at hospitals, getting to know the social workers and elder law attorneys and home health teams who serve Utah seniors. Our advisors are experienced professionals, and we treat every family’s situation as unique because it is. Beyond that, we don’t disappear after the first conversation. We tour with families. We help compare options. We stay involved through move-in day and after, because the first 30, 60, 90 days are often when challenges surface and a family needs an advocate the most.
The thing I’m most proud of brand-wise is the trust we’ve earned in this state. CarePatrol as a brand has been around nationally for decades, and we are the largest senior care advisory network in North America — but in Utah, what I’m proudest of is that hospitals, doctors’ offices, social workers, and senior care communities know us by name, send us their hardest cases, and trust us to do right by the people they’re discharging. That doesn’t come from a marketing campaign. It comes from eleven years of getting it right, one family at a time. Being recognized as CarePatrol’s Franchisee of the Year in 2023 and as an IFA Franchisee of the Year in 2024 was meaningful, but the recognition we value most is the family that calls us back five years later for the next loved one, or the social worker who tells a new family, “Call CarePatrol— they’ll take care of you.”
If there’s one thing I’d want your readers to know, it’s this: you don’t have to figure this out alone, and you don’t have to pay to get expert help. If you’re staring at a hospital discharge plan, a memory diagnosis, or a parent who is no longer safe at home, please call us before you start touring on your own. A 20-minute conversation with us can save weeks of confusion and prevent some very expensive mistakes. That’s what we’re here for.
Alright so before we go can you talk to us a bit about how people can work with you, collaborate with you or support you?
There are a few ways, depending on who you are and where you’re coming from.
If you or someone you love is facing a senior care decision, a parent who is no longer safe at home, a hospital discharge with nowhere to go, a memory diagnosis, or just the realization that “we need to start thinking about this, please reach out directly. Our service is free to families. The earlier in the process you involve us, the better we can help. You can call us, email, or start a conversation through our website, and you’ll get a real human being who lives in Utah, knows this state’s communities personally, and will treat your situation as unique. There’s no obligation, no pressure, and no cost.
If you’re a healthcare professional, a hospital case manager, a social worker, a discharge planner, a primary care physician, a home health or hospice team, an elder law attorney, or a financial planner working with senior clients, we’d love to be a resource. We collaborate with referral partners across the Wasatch Front every week, and we’re always looking to deepen those relationships with people and organizations who share our commitment to doing right by Utah seniors. We’re happy to meet for coffee, present to your team, or simply be on speed-dial the next time a family in your care needs guidance.
If you’re a senior living community, a memory care provider, or an in-home care agency in Utah and you’d like to be considered as part of the network we recommend to families, we’d love to talk. We’re selective about who we work with because the families we serve are trusting us with their parents, but we’re always evaluating quality providers who share our standards.
And if you’re someone who has worked with us before, the most meaningful way to support what we do is the way we’ve grown for the last eleven years: tell a friend, a coworker, or a family member who is in the thick of it that they don’t have to figure this out alone. Word of mouth is everything in this work. A single introduction at the right moment can change a family’s entire experience.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://utah.carepatrol.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carepatrolofutah
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CarePatrolofUtah/
- Other: https://localsenioradvisor.com
