Justin Gilmore, who grew up having to heat water on a stove and shared a bathroom with his siblings, has revealed how he became a self-made millionaire supporting his entire family.
The self-proclaimed “ATM king” who makes more than $240,000 a month running ATMs across the country has now set his sights on the controversial bitcoin market.
Gilmore, 38, was raised in Atlanta by his single mother and his two siblings.
He remembers the night the power went out, his family lived on cereal and sandwiches, and visited their grandparents for feedings as his mom Sandra (who died in 2019) struggled to keep up with the bills.
“Don’t get me wrong, my mom was a saint — but times were tough,” Gilmore told Jam Press. “One of the things that stood out to me was that my mom used a portable stove to heat the water during a power outage and we poured it into the tub. Then I would go first to the tub because I was the eldest, followed by my brother and sister. ”
“As a kid, I just thought it was amazing,” he said.
But he remembers watching his mother carry the bills in his childhood, and his school life wasn’t an escape. He felt like he was “killed” by his teachers when he was expelled at 15, but that pushed him to build wealth from an early age.
“It was a really tough time, but it definitely inspired me to do well in life,” Gilmore noted.
After being expelled from school, Justin found a $4.75 an hour job at a local grocery store and was promoted to night manager just two years later.
He eventually left his job at the grocery store and embarked on his first entrepreneurial adventure, bartering pizza in the back seat of his car. The barter business was so successful that he sometimes sold as many as 100 pizzas a day.
Gilmore became a parent in 2004 when his first son, Justin Jr., was born. The birth of his son prompted him to seek more lucrative endeavors.
Like when he needed some cash, Gilmore turned to the ATM.
He started looking for locations that needed ATMs, offered free installations, and then negotiated splits and terms based on contracts with merchants.
“In the simplest terms, we process transactions for the company that owns the ATM, connect customers who use it to their bank, and we earn ‘interchange fees’ by providing this service,” explains Gilmore.
“This fee will never come out of our customers’ pockets – their banks will pay us.”
The entrepreneur now owns 600 ATMs and handles more than 2,000 ATMs for customers across the country, but he’s not done yet.
Gilmore is looking to the future and has plans to continue his business with Bitcoin ATMs.He started investing in ISO20022 tokens in 2017, aiming to become a leader in converting real cash into cryptocurrency and vice versa through his website BTMmachines.com.
“There are no two ways, cryptocurrencies are the future,” he said. “Through my business, people will reduce the cost of taking bitcoins off the blockchain and transacting them.”
ATM King worked hard to acquire multiple mansions, a garage full of sports cars and tons of fun tech toys, but he’s most proud of the simple act of providing the family.
“I’m really proud of what I’ve accomplished, but I’m also lucky to have been able to take care of my mom financially from 2011 until her death,” Gilmore said.
“My uncle and brother both work for me full-time, and my brother has his own ATM line. Not only was my family involved in making it happen, but it’s now a part of their lives.”
“They don’t have to worry about heating or food anymore,” he continued.
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