Key Takeaways<\/h2>\n\n- Vega used vet relief platform Roo to earn extra money and fund his own mobile practice. <\/li>\n
- He officially launched Concierge Companions Vet Med in October 2025. <\/li>\n
- Now, Vega has plans to roll out a retainer model and build up a fleet of mobile units.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n
This as-told-to story is based on a conversation with Dr. Tom Vega, founder and chief medical officer of <\/em>Concierge Companions Vet Med<\/em><\/a> and DVM Ambassador at <\/em>Roo<\/em><\/a>, a platform that connects veterinary professionals with flexible relief work opportunities.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\nImage Credit: Concierge Companions Vet Med. Dr. Tom Vega. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\nThe Chicago, Illinois-based entrepreneur<\/em> <\/em><\/strong>Dr. Tom Vega launched his career in corporate telecommunications with U.S. Cellular, and helped build call centers for the Affordable Care Act. Although he enjoyed the leadership aspects of the job, having to lay employees off burned him out and inspired him to pursue a longtime dream: to open a veterinary practice. <\/em><\/p>\nSo, after completing veterinary school, he began working at a clinic. Soon after, in October 2025, he opened his mobile veterinary practice, Concierge Companions Vet Med. The business is tracking toward approximately $284,660 in 2026 gross business deposits at the current run rate.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\nHere, Vega shares his story in his own words. This piece has been edited for length and clarity.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\nI started working shifts with Roo in April 2025<\/h2>\n
I graduated vet school in 2020 and started at a general practice where I received six months of mentorship. In the last two months, I discovered veterinary relief work \u2014 filling in for other vets. Sometimes veterinarians are told, \u201cWell, you can\u2019t go out into the wild or onto your own until you\u2019ve been in practice for two years or three years,\u201d or things like that. But after deep thought and talking to my mentor, I decided to try Roo, a platform that connects veterinary professionals with relief work opportunities. From there, in April 2025, I began working relief shifts just to test it out.<\/p>\n
I made a lot more money and had better work-life balance, so by May 2025, I fully left corporate to go with veterinary relief work. Roo gave me flexibility, but also guardrails. I can\u2019t work past a certain amount of time, or if I do, then I\u2019m required to be compensated appropriately for that. Once I saw how much money I was making and how quickly, the mobile unit I\u2019d envisioned for my own veterinary practice went from two years out to two months out. In August of last year, I worked 18 shifts in a row with Roo and earned $23,000 \u2014 essentially the seed money I needed to get my business off the ground.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Vets must be licensed for two years before getting a business loan<\/h2>\n
It\u2019s important to note that for veterinarians, you cannot get any type of business loan to build out or buy a practice unless you have been licensed for two years. It doesn\u2019t matter if you have everything in order: finances, credit, etc. \u2014 which I had. So that\u2019s where Roo has come in for me. With Roo, it\u2019s like my business has an investor without having an investor.\u00a0I officially launched the mobile business in October 2025.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.entrepreneur.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/05\/IMG_6087.jpeg?w=768\")
Image Credit: Concierge Companions Vet Med<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nI planned out the months ahead and considered cash flow. I used the cash flow analyzers through my bank. I\u2019d been a Roo relief veterinarian from May 2025 to December 2025, finishing the year at about $103,000 in income from the platform. Q1 of this year on the platform has also been amazing. That\u2019s how I\u2019m able to ensure my mobile practice has cash flow.\u00a0<\/p>\n
My business\u2019s overhead is fairly low. I have a technician at $22 an hour for 30 hours. The mobile unit payment is $4,400 a month. That\u2019s pretty much it. Then gas, which is really high right now. Plus supplies, but supplies I can order at a lower level. I don\u2019t need to order in a bulk amount that would support a huge hospital operation.<\/p>\n
My business expertise is self-taught; I don\u2019t have an MBA<\/h2>\n
All of my business acumen is self-taught. I do not have an MBA. My husband has an MBA. I was thinking about going to get an MBA, and he said, \u201cTom, you already got an MBA by doing this.\u201d All of this is self-taught. I picked up books. I used Google too. What is cash flowing? What is a key performance indicator? I know what that looks like in a call center, but what does that look like in vet med? What does ordering look like? What does payroll look like? I had to learn all of these things that I wasn\u2019t responsible for in the past.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I just ran the numbers of Concierge Companions\u2019s Q1, and I\u2019m at $91,000 in gross revenue for the year so far \u2014 January to April. When I factor the model in and times it by three, assuming that revenue stays at minimum constant and not above, that brings me to about $280,000 for when we close out Q4 at the end of 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n
That\u2019s a fantastic projection for a new mobile practice. Currently, we have about 88 clients that are active, meaning we see them more than one time, and that we have regular recurring revenue from, whether it\u2019s through preventatives, medications, diagnostics, things like that, versus our one-time clients.\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.entrepreneur.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/05\/IMG_6158-rotated.jpeg?w=768\")
Image Credit: Concierge Companions Vet Med<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nLaunching a concierge retainer model in July<\/h2>\n
We are preparing to launch the actual concierge retainer model in July. The ultimate goal has always been a concierge retainer model, where no different than how you have a personal trainer or medical doctor on staff, you can have your veterinarian on staff. So if you want to call me at 10 a.m. and tell me that Fluffy is breathing weird, go ahead. I can look at Fluffy over Facetime and let you know that Fluffy is in REM sleep, and we all breathe like that when we\u2019re in REM sleep. I should be able to support 80 clients on that retainer model. Eventually, in another five to 10 years, the goal is to have a fleet of these mobile practices.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I want us to continue to grow sustainably. Some of my competitors have gone out of business because they scaled too quickly. I don\u2019t want this to collapse. I\u2019ve worked too hard. People are counting on me; patients are counting on me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
As a founder, you have to know your audience, but you also have to accept that sometimes the audience you intended isn\u2019t your audience. That\u2019s okay, as long as there\u2019s still an audience somewhere. My original target demographic was anybody who values convenience. I thought that would be a lot of millennials. It\u2019s actually the senior population.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Partnering with senior living facilities streamlines operations<\/h2>\n
So I\u2019ve started to pivot and partner with senior living facilities. Because I noticed I\u2019d make repeat visits to the same facilities. I approached the administrations of these facilities. I said, \u201cHey, you know, I\u2019m noticing a lot of visits here to your residents. How about we set up a partnership where the third Wednesday of every month, I\u2019m here? I\u2019m here the whole day, for whoever needs something.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.entrepreneur.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/05\/IMG_6661-rotated.jpeg?w=768\")
Image Credit: Concierge Companions Vet Med<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nThose partnerships also keep us from losing revenue traveling from place to place, house to house. That\u2019s helped me optimize the travel schedule. It\u2019s sort of similar to the trucking industry\u2019s focus on routes. We drew from that model a little bit to route everything appropriately: the least amount of mileage and time traveling.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The business\u2019s main revenue drivers will come from the retainer model launching in July and our partnerships with the resident facilities. Even if I see three to four seniors, it works, because my average client transactions are around $300. If I see four appointments five days a week, that puts us right where we need to be. Another great thing about the concierge model is that I can have a lower average client transaction, and because my overhead is so low, I\u2019ll still see returns.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Focus on why your business will succeed \u2014 not why it won\u2019t<\/h2>\n
Looking ahead, I\u2019m most excited about spreading the word. I want other veterinarians to graduate, and I want them to get a mobile unit, and I want them to go out there and run their own practice, if that\u2019s what they want to do. I want them to see that tenure doesn\u2019t mean anything. It\u2019s about the experience and your comfort level.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Also, I want other entrepreneurs to see, whether they\u2019re in veterinary medicine or not, that you can do this. Make sure you have someone who believes in you, but also knows when you\u2019re on the ledge. For me, that\u2019s my husband. He gave me the push to go to veterinary school and the push to see this business through. A lot of times, people don\u2019t see that \u2014 there\u2019s always someone supporting a founder, even if you don\u2019t see them on screen or in the reports.\u00a0<\/p>\n
There are a million reasons why we may not succeed as business owners or as founders, but I encourage and challenge everyone to rather than focus on all the reasons why your business is not going to work, focus on the one reason why it\u2019s going to take off.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
\n\nKey Takeaways<\/h2>\n\n- Vega used vet relief platform Roo to earn extra money and fund his own mobile practice. <\/li>\n
- He officially launched Concierge Companions Vet Med in October 2025. <\/li>\n
- Now, Vega has plans to roll out a retainer model and build up a fleet of mobile units.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n
This as-told-to story is based on a conversation with Dr. Tom Vega, founder and chief medical officer of <\/em>Concierge Companions Vet Med<\/em><\/a> and DVM Ambassador at <\/em>Roo<\/em><\/a>, a platform that connects veterinary professionals with flexible relief work opportunities.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.entrepreneur.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2026\/05\/image0-6.jpeg?w=768\")
Image Credit: Concierge Companions Vet Med. Dr. Tom Vega. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\nThe Chicago, Illinois-based entrepreneur<\/em> <\/em><\/strong>Dr. Tom Vega launched his career in corporate telecommunications with U.S. Cellular, and helped build call centers for the Affordable Care Act. Although he enjoyed the leadership aspects of the job, having to lay employees off burned him out and inspired him to pursue a longtime dream: to open a veterinary practice. <\/em><\/p>\nSo, after completing veterinary school, he began working at a clinic. Soon after, in October 2025, he opened his mobile veterinary practice, Concierge Companions Vet Med. The business is tracking toward approximately $284,660 in 2026 gross business deposits at the current run rate.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
This as-told-to story is based on a conversation with Dr. Tom Vega, founder and chief medical officer of <\/em>Concierge Companions Vet Med<\/em><\/a> and DVM Ambassador at <\/em>Roo<\/em><\/a>, a platform that connects veterinary professionals with flexible relief work opportunities.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n The Chicago, Illinois-based entrepreneur<\/em> <\/em><\/strong>Dr. Tom Vega launched his career in corporate telecommunications with U.S. Cellular, and helped build call centers for the Affordable Care Act. Although he enjoyed the leadership aspects of the job, having to lay employees off burned him out and inspired him to pursue a longtime dream: to open a veterinary practice. <\/em><\/p>\n So, after completing veterinary school, he began working at a clinic. Soon after, in October 2025, he opened his mobile veterinary practice, Concierge Companions Vet Med. The business is tracking toward approximately $284,660 in 2026 gross business deposits at the current run rate.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n Here, Vega shares his story in his own words. This piece has been edited for length and clarity.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n I graduated vet school in 2020 and started at a general practice where I received six months of mentorship. In the last two months, I discovered veterinary relief work \u2014 filling in for other vets. Sometimes veterinarians are told, \u201cWell, you can\u2019t go out into the wild or onto your own until you\u2019ve been in practice for two years or three years,\u201d or things like that. But after deep thought and talking to my mentor, I decided to try Roo, a platform that connects veterinary professionals with relief work opportunities. From there, in April 2025, I began working relief shifts just to test it out.<\/p>\n I made a lot more money and had better work-life balance, so by May 2025, I fully left corporate to go with veterinary relief work. Roo gave me flexibility, but also guardrails. I can\u2019t work past a certain amount of time, or if I do, then I\u2019m required to be compensated appropriately for that. Once I saw how much money I was making and how quickly, the mobile unit I\u2019d envisioned for my own veterinary practice went from two years out to two months out. In August of last year, I worked 18 shifts in a row with Roo and earned $23,000 \u2014 essentially the seed money I needed to get my business off the ground.\u00a0<\/p>\n It\u2019s important to note that for veterinarians, you cannot get any type of business loan to build out or buy a practice unless you have been licensed for two years. It doesn\u2019t matter if you have everything in order: finances, credit, etc. \u2014 which I had. So that\u2019s where Roo has come in for me. With Roo, it\u2019s like my business has an investor without having an investor.\u00a0I officially launched the mobile business in October 2025.<\/p>\n I planned out the months ahead and considered cash flow. I used the cash flow analyzers through my bank. I\u2019d been a Roo relief veterinarian from May 2025 to December 2025, finishing the year at about $103,000 in income from the platform. Q1 of this year on the platform has also been amazing. That\u2019s how I\u2019m able to ensure my mobile practice has cash flow.\u00a0<\/p>\n My business\u2019s overhead is fairly low. I have a technician at $22 an hour for 30 hours. The mobile unit payment is $4,400 a month. That\u2019s pretty much it. Then gas, which is really high right now. Plus supplies, but supplies I can order at a lower level. I don\u2019t need to order in a bulk amount that would support a huge hospital operation.<\/p>\n All of my business acumen is self-taught. I do not have an MBA. My husband has an MBA. I was thinking about going to get an MBA, and he said, \u201cTom, you already got an MBA by doing this.\u201d All of this is self-taught. I picked up books. I used Google too. What is cash flowing? What is a key performance indicator? I know what that looks like in a call center, but what does that look like in vet med? What does ordering look like? What does payroll look like? I had to learn all of these things that I wasn\u2019t responsible for in the past.\u00a0<\/p>\n I just ran the numbers of Concierge Companions\u2019s Q1, and I\u2019m at $91,000 in gross revenue for the year so far \u2014 January to April. When I factor the model in and times it by three, assuming that revenue stays at minimum constant and not above, that brings me to about $280,000 for when we close out Q4 at the end of 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n That\u2019s a fantastic projection for a new mobile practice. Currently, we have about 88 clients that are active, meaning we see them more than one time, and that we have regular recurring revenue from, whether it\u2019s through preventatives, medications, diagnostics, things like that, versus our one-time clients.\u00a0<\/p>\n We are preparing to launch the actual concierge retainer model in July. The ultimate goal has always been a concierge retainer model, where no different than how you have a personal trainer or medical doctor on staff, you can have your veterinarian on staff. So if you want to call me at 10 a.m. and tell me that Fluffy is breathing weird, go ahead. I can look at Fluffy over Facetime and let you know that Fluffy is in REM sleep, and we all breathe like that when we\u2019re in REM sleep. I should be able to support 80 clients on that retainer model. Eventually, in another five to 10 years, the goal is to have a fleet of these mobile practices.\u00a0<\/p>\n I want us to continue to grow sustainably. Some of my competitors have gone out of business because they scaled too quickly. I don\u2019t want this to collapse. I\u2019ve worked too hard. People are counting on me; patients are counting on me.\u00a0<\/p>\n As a founder, you have to know your audience, but you also have to accept that sometimes the audience you intended isn\u2019t your audience. That\u2019s okay, as long as there\u2019s still an audience somewhere. My original target demographic was anybody who values convenience. I thought that would be a lot of millennials. It\u2019s actually the senior population.\u00a0<\/p>\n So I\u2019ve started to pivot and partner with senior living facilities. Because I noticed I\u2019d make repeat visits to the same facilities. I approached the administrations of these facilities. I said, \u201cHey, you know, I\u2019m noticing a lot of visits here to your residents. How about we set up a partnership where the third Wednesday of every month, I\u2019m here? I\u2019m here the whole day, for whoever needs something.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Those partnerships also keep us from losing revenue traveling from place to place, house to house. That\u2019s helped me optimize the travel schedule. It\u2019s sort of similar to the trucking industry\u2019s focus on routes. We drew from that model a little bit to route everything appropriately: the least amount of mileage and time traveling.\u00a0<\/p>\n The business\u2019s main revenue drivers will come from the retainer model launching in July and our partnerships with the resident facilities. Even if I see three to four seniors, it works, because my average client transactions are around $300. If I see four appointments five days a week, that puts us right where we need to be. Another great thing about the concierge model is that I can have a lower average client transaction, and because my overhead is so low, I\u2019ll still see returns.\u00a0<\/p>\n Looking ahead, I\u2019m most excited about spreading the word. I want other veterinarians to graduate, and I want them to get a mobile unit, and I want them to go out there and run their own practice, if that\u2019s what they want to do. I want them to see that tenure doesn\u2019t mean anything. It\u2019s about the experience and your comfort level.\u00a0<\/p>\n Also, I want other entrepreneurs to see, whether they\u2019re in veterinary medicine or not, that you can do this. Make sure you have someone who believes in you, but also knows when you\u2019re on the ledge. For me, that\u2019s my husband. He gave me the push to go to veterinary school and the push to see this business through. A lot of times, people don\u2019t see that \u2014 there\u2019s always someone supporting a founder, even if you don\u2019t see them on screen or in the reports.\u00a0<\/p>\n There are a million reasons why we may not succeed as business owners or as founders, but I encourage and challenge everyone to rather than focus on all the reasons why your business is not going to work, focus on the one reason why it\u2019s going to take off.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n This as-told-to story is based on a conversation with Dr. Tom Vega, founder and chief medical officer of <\/em>Concierge Companions Vet Med<\/em><\/a> and DVM Ambassador at <\/em>Roo<\/em><\/a>, a platform that connects veterinary professionals with flexible relief work opportunities.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n The Chicago, Illinois-based entrepreneur<\/em> <\/em><\/strong>Dr. Tom Vega launched his career in corporate telecommunications with U.S. Cellular, and helped build call centers for the Affordable Care Act. Although he enjoyed the leadership aspects of the job, having to lay employees off burned him out and inspired him to pursue a longtime dream: to open a veterinary practice. <\/em><\/p>\n So, after completing veterinary school, he began working at a clinic. Soon after, in October 2025, he opened his mobile veterinary practice, Concierge Companions Vet Med. The business is tracking toward approximately $284,660 in 2026 gross business deposits at the current run rate.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\nI started working shifts with Roo in April 2025<\/h2>\n
Vets must be licensed for two years before getting a business loan<\/h2>\n
My business expertise is self-taught; I don\u2019t have an MBA<\/h2>\n
Launching a concierge retainer model in July<\/h2>\n
Partnering with senior living facilities streamlines operations<\/h2>\n
Focus on why your business will succeed \u2014 not why it won\u2019t<\/h2>\n
Key Takeaways<\/h2>\n
\n