A St. Joe CEO handed him a franchise after graduation; two years later, the risk is paying off 

Spencer Engelman’s expectations for his post-college career were shredded by an offer he couldn’t refuse. The Northwest Missouri State University graduate was awarded a business of his own — minus the franchise fee — by a veteran entrepreneur who had visited one of his classes.

“It’s a crazy opportunity,” said Engelman, who now operates a DocuLock franchise in Blue Springs with his wife, Adriana. “I figured, if I’m going to take a risk and do something crazy, then I should do it while I’m young, with room to fall back on. And luckily for us, it’s just worked out really well.”

Spencer Engelman and Paul Janicek, founder and CEO of St. Joseph-based DocuLock, speak to Northwest Missouri State University students in 2024 about the Doculock franchise opportunity; photo courtesy NWMSU

His unconventional jump from business management student at the Maryville university to business owner came at the hands of Paul Janicek, founder and CEO of St. Joseph-based DocuLock. (The company now has a franchise selection partnership with NWMSU, with Engelman becoming the first recipient in 2023.)

Engelman hadn’t known exactly what he wanted to do after graduation, but when Janicek guest lectured in one of his classes and told the students about the franchise opportunity, Engelman took notice, he said. 

“He came in and shared his story, how he got started, his mission and values,” Engelman explained. “I thought that was pretty cool.”

He applied immediately, but didn’t hear anything back for a few months — until right before graduation, he shared. 

“I drove up to St. Joe, got to meet the team, got to learn more about what we actually do, how the process works, what it kind of takes to be successful,” he noted.

Engelman initially took a sales job in Kansas City as he waited to hear back about the interview. But as he was putting on his shoes to go to orientation, Engelman recalled, he got the call. 

He quit the sales job before he even started.

“I graduated, and then 10 days later, I was signing all the stuff,” he noted.

“It’s very serendipitous how the timing of everything happened,” Adriana added.

Spencer and Adriana Engelman, DocuLock; photo by Nikki Overfelt Chifalu, Startland News

Unexpected blessing

Entrepreneurship probably wouldn’t have been Engelman’s path if not for this opportunity, his wife noted.

“It gave him skills and confidence in himself that he might not have otherwise,” she explained. “He would love to own another business someday, and I don’t think that’s ever anything that would have been in his trajectory. He would have stuck more in the path of  managing other people’s businesses, rather than running his own.”

The Blue Springs DocuLock franchise — where the married duo provides document scanning, shredding, preservation, and utility solutions for individuals and businesses — allowed both to go full time within six months, hire their first employee in a year, and triple their sales in their second year.

“I’m a pretty risk-averse person,” Engelman added. “So this was a pretty crazy opportunity for me to go after, but it’s been a huge blessing.”

Locking in

The newly married couple celebrated two years as franchise owners in May, finding a niche in document preservation through digitizing, they shared.

“We’ve worked with both the commercial and residential side, just helping people protect truly whatever matters most,” Engelman explained. “People have photographs, VHS tapes, records, handwritten letters, and things.”

“For businesses, we’re just really helping them get organized with their document management,” he added.

The oldest document they’ve helped preserve is a handwritten letter from the 1920s, they said.

“Somebody had traveled overseas and was writing home about all the cool things that they were seeing and their experiences,” Engelman continued. “So it’s always cool to preserve a little piece of history.”

They also offer document shredding, he noted.

“We can do one-time bulk pickups,” he explained, “or if it’s like a medical office and they move through so much sensitive material that little small shredder isn’t going to work for their team any more, we put a shred bin in. And then once a month, we come and pick that up.”

DocuLock is a fully tailored service, Engelman said, but they really just want to be a resource for those in the community. 

“So if people have questions, we offer free walk throughs,” he continued. “We’re very low pressure, no obligation. We just truly want to help people, even if it’s just answering a few questions like, ‘What’s the best way to organize our files?’”