From the firehouse to a fleet of orange trucks

Jordan Thomas grew up in Clayton County and went to Jonesboro High. He knew early what he wanted to do. At fifteen he joined the fire department's Explorer program, riding along to see the job up close, and the day after he graduated he applied. He spent three years as a firefighter and earned his EMT-paramedic certification, running into burning buildings and treating people on their worst days.

In 2019 he stepped back from career firefighting for a steadier schedule and more nights at home, taking a job on a non-emergency ambulance. His wife, Carmen, was building her own career as a nurse. Two people from emergency work, used to staying calm when things go wrong.

COVID, a side hustle, and a $150 promise

When 2020 and COVID hit, Jordan wanted a little extra income, so he started a lawn care company on the side. The goal was small and specific: no matter what, bring $150 home at the end of the day. He did anything that paid. Cutting grass, trimming hedges, cleaning gutters, getting up on roofs, even running pickups from Home Depot for people.

The burn that changed the plan

That winter, cooking at home, he gave himself a bad second-degree burn on his hand. He could not lift the stretchers his ambulance job required, so for about two weeks he worked his own business instead, cutting grass one-handed and working the throttle with his thumb out of the way. In that stretch he did the math and realized he was earning about the same on his own. He never went back to the ambulance job.

The first job paid $175

A few weeks later, someone mentioned a guy who needed some things hauled off. Jordan and one other guy drove out, loaded a pile of stuff, and got paid $175. He was thrilled. At first he did not even have the right word for it and called it the wrong thing. When he looked it up, he found there was a whole industry behind it: junk removal, dumpster rentals, trucks and trailers and dump trucks. He watched videos for about a week, saw that the money was real, and decided to give it a real shot. That same week he chased down more jobs, even pulling up to houses with piles at the curb to ask if anyone was hauling it.

Two businesses, 175 clients, and one brutal year

For a while he ran both. He kept his roughly 175 lawn care clients through all of 2021, and when the grass stopped growing he let the lawn business go and used the wind-down to tell those customers he was switching to junk removal. Plenty of them became junk clients.

The operations side of 2021 was rough. He bought a diesel pickup and a dump trailer so the crew would not have to touch a load twice. Then one truck went into the shop and stayed there for seven months behind a mechanic who could not finish the job. To keep working, they rented a Home Depot truck for about twenty-six weeks at roughly $1,000 a week. They ordered their first real dump truck in April, took delivery in September, and lost it to an accident about two weeks later. It did not come back until the following March. Even the old lawn pickup blew its engine. The revenue was great and the operations were brutal, and the year taught two lessons that stuck: be resilient, and never put a truck on the road without a great mechanic behind it.

The orange brand, and steadier ground

In January 2022 the Southside Junk Removal brand finally came together, orange and hard to miss. A second truck followed, the crew grew, and the roads got smoother. The company has grown roughly 40% a year since, added a third truck, and shifted its attention to the quality of the team. The fire department had already taught Jordan that the right people in the right places decide everything, and he runs the business by it.

Still a family business

Through all of it, Carmen has been the backbone. She worked the medical field straight through COVID, and she will still climb on the truck when a job needs another set of hands. The goal Jordan talks about now is to build the company to where she can leave nursing and join Southside full time.

King of the south side

These days people recognize the orange trucks. More than once a stranger has told Jordan the brand is the reason they started their own company. One of them called Southside the king of the south side. The reviews back it up: more than 1,430 of them at a 5.0 average, with a BBB A+ rating since 2022. Pricing goes by the space a load takes up on the truck, so a heavy item and a bulky, light one that fill the same room cost the same. And the promise from that night at the stove still runs the company. Do the work right, show up when you say, and treat the customer's home like your own.