Editor’s note: DeLane Patterson has spent nearly 15 years building Open Range Pest Control, a family operation his father, Dennis Patterson, started in 2002 in Sun City, Ariz. Over the past year, Patterson has made changes that have him pointed at a different ceiling than the one he'd been living under — new software, new automations, a new way of thinking about revenue, and a personal decision that made all of it possible.
First in a series.
DeLane Patterson had run the same pest control software for years. When he decided it wasn't keeping up with where he wanted to go, he didn't call a salesperson first.
He opened his AI tool of choice and asked it to interview him.
Fifty questions. What did he like about his current platform? What frustrated him? Where did he want Open Range Pest Control, his family's company in suburban Phoenix, to be in three years?
From those answers, the AI ran a deep research project and returned with a recommendation.
"An exceedingly detailed report,"he says. "And it came down to FieldRoutes. Hands-down."
The research flagged one other option, one it said was better-suited for operators who planned to stay small.
But Patterson, 47, wasn't planning to stay small. He has a goal of $1.5 million in revenue by age 50. He needed a platform built to grow with him.
"FieldRoutes was going to be the one ready for me and able to grow with me as I achieve those goals," he said of his research findings.
Within two weeks late in 2025, he'd spoken with a FieldRoutes salesperson and made his decision. Open Range went live March 1, although Patterson is still paying his previous provider's monthly fees through November.
"That's how much I wanted to switch to you guys," he says.
How that decision is paying off on the platform — in automation, reporting, and a business model shift that's already generating new recurring revenue — is the rest of the story. But even that’s not all of it.
Coming in Part 2: The Field Routes capability that changed everything.
