An Interview With Adam Yaras From Elite 2A Pay: a Freedom-Friendly Credit Processing Co

I was introduced to Mr. Adam Yaras while waiting in line to get into the Gundies at SHOT Show in January. Yaras is the director of sales at a company called Elite 2A Pay.

Elite 2A Pay is a credit card processing company that doesn’t label Second Amendment-connected businesses as “high risk.” Rather than punishing companies with high interest rates and wondering if they’ll have their services canceled overnight, Elite 2A Pay caters to them. Their clients include FFLs, firearm instructors, and pretty much anyone involved in the shooting and firearm arena.

We had a chance to talk to Yaras about the company, their offerings, and why you might want to check them out. 

Portions of this interview have been edited for clarity and readability.

Petrolino: Hello and today I’m with Adam Yaris, from Elite 2A Pay and we’re going to be talking about some of his company’s offerings and what they have going on. Adam, how are you today? 

Yaras: I’m doing well, sir, how about you? 

Petrolino: I’m doing great. So tell me a little bit about Elite 2A Pay, your history. I know you guys have been around, actually, for over 20 years. Is that right?

Yaras: Yeah, 22 to be exact. Elite 2A Pay wasn’t around then and I’ll kind of give you the origins of everything.

Elite Merchant Solutions is our parent company that was started in California about 22 almost 23 years ago, and back then, it was whatever we could sign up, we’re going to bring on. Whether it’s hotels, restaurants, you name it, we’re going to try and work on it.

Within the last four years is when we really honed in on the 2A space. I myself am pretty passionate when it comes to firearms – is probably a bit of an understatement. I was looking at some verticals within things that we like and things that actually have hard times with – and we’ll get into this, I’m sure – of having issues, whether it’s high pricing or getting dropped or not even getting set up for an account at all. [What] we looked at is, we can board these accounts, so let’s go full force. That was kind of the origins of when Elite stemmed off with this separate kind of bucket, so to speak, of Elite 2A Pay.

Petrolino: It’s kind of interesting, because you already were a company that were established or establishing, and then you saw the need – because there was, is a need – for people and businesses to be friendly towards what the banking industries refer to as “high risk” businesses, right? 

Yaras: You got it. 

Petrolino: You guys kind of stepped up to the plate and said, “Well, wait a second. We should be servicing, more or less, ‘our people.’” Right?

Yaras: 100 percent correct. 

The high risk world, and to people listening and to anyone you know that’s going to actually read, — and they kind of know a little bit of it, because we talk about it a lot, but high risk is designated for accounts that really need to pay more in order to have an account set up. What I mean by that is you’re talking about the adult entertainment world, right? Strip clubs, pornography, medicinal marijuana, CBD, vape, gambling, travel, online supplements, all that stuff is high risk. There’s so many different reasons why, but the biggest one is the probability of someone calling their bank and saying, “Hey, I didn’t make that charge.” Right? And that’s something called a chargeback.

Firearms, we – you have guns. I have guns. When we go and buy a gun the proper way, we do a 4473, we go through the channels where we’re literally having the government look at if we’re able to leave that store with that gun. The likelihood of me calling my credit card company saying, “Hey, I didn’t buy that Glock 19x,” is extremely low.

To have a gun [shop] or a gunsmith or a range in the same category as one of those other ones I just labeled is completely unfair. Our Constitution says this is our right, and for it to be looked at as an evil and saying, “Hey, you have to pay more for something that is our God-given, right,” is just completely asinine to tell you the truth. So…

Petrolino: Yeah. 

Yaras: We looked at this as our back end, our bank allows us to offer pricing that will allow them not to have to pay double, triple, even quadruple, sometimes of what our competition may or may not offer them. 

Petrolino: You guys are doing basically credit card processing, and that’s your whole shtick, right?

Yaras: That is it. 

That’s the way of the world right now. Everything’s digital. I don’t know about you, but anytime I go somewhere, I’m either going to use my card or my phone – that now has the ability –  that’s whether I go to the range, which I’m going to do today, or if I take my family to a movie. It’s all done via credit card. A lot of these businesses they rely on that income, that money, to sell their product.

Petrolino: I looked online, and you have a lot of things that you offer. Point of sale systems, so you have the hardware, but you also have the software.

Now you sign people up at a brick and mortar location, I think that’s great. You have that credit card processing capability. So talk a little bit about those terminals, and then we’ll get into some of the other stuff that I think makes you kind of unique as well.

Yaras: So John, we actually, unlike a lot of our competition out there, we will take on new business, but we primarily focus on existing. There’s many reasons why, but the main one is, is we know if they’ve been in business for 10, 15, 20 years, that they’re in good standing. We don’t have to worry about what their volume is going to be. If they’re going to last a few months. When a business, let’s say a gun range or a gun store – sometimes they’re both – has existing equipment, nine times out of 10, we don’t even have to replace it. We just get in there through technology and re-download what they have. 

We’re not ripping and replacing much. We’re saying, “Hey, keep what you have on the front end, but on the back end, that money that you’re paying that’s 4, 5, 6, percent, we’re going to cut that down in half, or, if not more.”

Equipment is a very small portion of what we do. If an account needs something like a new terminal, something mobile, or a point of sale, we have that ability to offer it, but anyone who’s switching over, we try and keep what they have intact, so you don’t have to have that whole craziness of change, because, let’s face it, not a lot of us like change, right? We’re trying to simplify it and make it as fluid as possible. Keep your front end. We’re going to just change the back end.

Petrolino: You also offer quite a bit of integration with e-commerce as well?

Yaras: 100 percent. A lot of these gun stores have now added their gun store on the internet as well as GunBroker. All of those components, we’re able to integrate into, and actually, those are the easiest ones to turn over. It’s funny to think that – sometimes people think, “Oh, it’s all this headache.” It’s really a flip of the switch. We reuse their gateway, and things really don’t change other than the service, and the cost is going to go down.

Petrolino: Now I’m going to ask a question – I didn’t really read anything about this, you and I didn’t discuss this. We didn’t discuss this in Vegas – But where my mind goes is, what about instructors? 

I know there in your FAQs, you talk about FFLs, and yes, if you’re selling firearms, you need an FFL. You need to be licensed if you’re dealing with some of these items. But what about your Mom and Pop firearm instructor, they don’t have a brick and mortar location, but they’re getting started. Do you do some processing for them? Because I see this as being a huge way to bring in revenue, honestly.

Yaras: Yeah, 100 percent instructors all day long. They don’t have FFLs for the most part because [they’re] not selling a serialized item. However, when they do brand or publish their their names, their site, what’s going to be on their banners? On their website? Guns, rifles – people actually putting rounds down range.

That, in the eyes of a lot of these and I say processors, they’re more technology processors. And I’ll just say the names PayPal, Stripe, Square Up. Those guys, even if you’re not selling an actual serialized item, they don’t like that. They will, possibly – might take you on, but at any moment in time, they can drop you. I’ve seen it, I’ve heard it. I’ve lived it. Where we’ve had plenty of accounts where we’ve called [potential clients and they say], “Hey, I’m doing alright. I’ll be alright.” Boom, they call us a month or two later, “Hey, I got shut down by Square.” 

To answer your question, 100 percent instructors fall into this category because they are dealing with firearms. They’re not FFLs, per se, but they are still affiliated with that. Our world. Our 2A space. We take those guys on all day long.

Petrolino: When Bob Smith instructor is like, “Hey, what kind of solutions do you have for me?” You could do a simple package that’s just e-commerce based basically, where they’re emailing invoices or texting those invoices? A lot of the same things that you would see with some of the other options that are out there. But you don’t have to have hardware right?

Yaras: Correct. Instructors, you know – I’ve been a part of the student side, right? I’ve done plenty of courses where some you pay on site and they have a reader that attaches to their phone. Or I pay ahead of time, or a mixture of both. 

But yes, we have systems that can send out text-to-pay, email-to-pay. You can go on their site, they’ll have a shopping cart, or they want to have that mobile reader for… you know, I had a guy that, when I got my LTC in Texas, coming from California, was a whole different ball game, it was actually incredible. I got my license in a couple weeks, but the instructor was selling 22 cal for the test. And it’s not expensive, but people needed rounds because they didn’t bring a 22 with them. He had a mobile reader and after the class I talked to him about switching over, which he did. There’s ways where you can pay in person as well. So whatever it is they need, where we can make it happen.

Petrolino: I think that’s great. And since you’re now Elite 2A Pay, which was built upon this former business, you’re not saying, “Oh, you have to be in the firearms industry,” either. You’ll process for whomever, right?

Yaras: 100 percent. Yeah, I have anyone. Through the years of doing this John, about 16 years, everyone that I’ve ever come across that I do business with, whether it’s a dry cleaner, a restaurant, a trophy company, uniforms for my kids sports, I always look for the opportunity to try and help them. Because, why not? Yeah, firearms are my number one, and that’s our passion. But anything that accepts credit card, any business we can take on, for sure.

Petrolino: Perfect. And then those fees, because that’s really a big thing here, toss me some comparisons here. Why do we want to do Elite 2A Pay rather than some of those – other than the fact that you can get canceled, at a drop of a hat – let’s talk about the money.

Yaras: The money is, it’s all customized. And the reason I say that is we don’t blanket our rates, like a lot of those technology processors do. You go to Square and they say your card present rate is 2.6 plus 30 cents, and your card not present, 3.5. We have a plan where it’s basically – we’re passing on the cost of the card brands, right where we have costs through them, and then we have a small markup.

To kind of just put it in a high level, our effective cost is in the mid to high 2’s versus our competitors [who] are 3, 4, sometimes even 5 or 6 percent. Sure we’re steady in the 2’s. Sometimes it could be even lower, but it depends on the product as what they sell. A range that is doing a lot of rentals and ammo sales, people are more inclined to use their debit card. And then you have those high end gun stores where, hey, you’re selling Scars and Staccatos and Nighthawks. I’m going to use probably a card that’s going to get me miles or points, and that card’s a little bit more expensive. 

It’s a safe bet to say we’re in the 2’s. It’s just a matter of what side of that 2.

Petrolino: I’ve seen all kinds of different ranges with that. I think that’s really great. And obviously you’re pro Second Amendment, pro liberty, and you’ve got great customer service. That’s something that I’ve noticed from even just calling your office. You guys are on it. Myself calling you guys, just to get an audience.

What else do you guys have, I guess, coming down the line? Is there anything new that you’re releasing, or you’re going to release, or what else do we want to talk about before we wrap up?

Yaras: There’s a bunch of things we got going on. 

I won’t bore you with every little nook and cranny detail, but partnerships for softwares and point of sales are coming down the bend. A lot of these guys, when they have their point of sale, they want to connect to FastBound. They want their bound books to be dialed in with the point of sale. We’re currently working on that with a couple guys that actually own firearm e-com and stores. They know that side of it. And then we know our side. And we’re kind of working in the middle to make that work. 

Then we’re starting to do stuff like this…podcast shows. We’re meeting people. There’s the NRA coming up, end of April, we’ll be there, we’ll have our booth. And then GOA, we’re for sure locked and loaded for that in August, I went last year just to walk, and had a great time. I’ve been a member of GOA for a long time. Those are the kind of things that are coming down the bend. But nothing too special, but kind of exciting for us.

Petrolino: I noticed that too, on your site, you’re very above the fold. You’re like, “Hey, we support these groups.” And I’m sure it’s not exclusive, that it’s just those groups, but you do put that out there. “Hey, we support SAF. We support GOA. We support the NRA.”

Now we have a lot of different, you know, 501(c)(3)’s, 501(c)(4)’s, that are out there. Do you guys do anything special with those guys to kind of help them out? What do you do there?

Yaras: That’s a great question. We have done that even outside of the firearm world. But what we do is give back, right? Where we’ve been a part of a bunch of different associations. There’s been travel, there’s been actually funeral homes, restaurants. There’s associations all over the U.S. for these industries, including the ones you just described for the industry that we care about the most. 

What we do is we give back, right? And that could look as, here’s a percentage back to the association, or to the 501(c)(3). Or we pay for dues, or we have certain ways where we can customize it however we want. To answer your question with my long answer, yes, we can, 100 percent do that and customize it for sure.

Petrolino: I think that’s important to get out there, because all of these gun clubs, a lot of these civil rights organizations, they’re all C threes, they’re all C fours – that are all also, many of them running on a shoestring budget. Letting them know that this is a safe space to do processing, I think, is important. 

If you’re out there and you’re part of a member organization, definitely consider these guys. Because I think it sounds like you’ve got their backs.

Yaras: We do, man, and I shout from the rooftop. I’ve had a lot of conversations with some of the big names that some of the guys you’ve talked about just a few minutes ago, and then some ones that you haven’t, that you know very well, and sadly, and I’ll just say it is they’re connected with some of the ones that are not friendly to what we’re all about. Those big techs that literally give money to our opposition to the left side that wants to take away our rights. So, I’m screaming from the rooftop. That’s why I love that you’re able to let me on here, John, is that these big guys, they sometimes don’t even really realize it or understand it. 

We would love the opportunity for so many different reasons. But the big one for me, and again, I’m very freaking candid, man – I stopped one of my memberships for something because of their connection with one of those bigger guys, and they talked to me – but ghosted me, and I said, “You know what? I can’t stand by idly and just be okay with me giving you my money, knowing it goes to that opposition.” 

I’m passionate, man, I really am. But yeah, anyone out there – 501’s, anyone out there – those ones that you talked about, well, I’m a member of a bunch of them. We would love the opportunity.

Petrolino: Awesome. Well, Adam, thank you so much for your time. Where can people find you? Are you on socials? Let’s get everything out there. Give me the full alphabet of Elite 2A Pay. I want people to be able to know who to call? Let’s get people hooked up here.

Yaras: Elite2APay.com is our website. You can go there, and you can go to our contact page, and that would actually come to myself and a couple of the other owners. We have a full visual on that. If you want to contact me direct, I am at AdamY@Elite2A.com, that’s my email for me.

Our social media for Elite 2A Pay, is Elite2APay. I don’t think there’s any special characters or whatnot, but we’re starting to do some more with that.

Petrolino: Did I leave anything out? Did I leave anything on the table you want to let people know about? 

Yaras: The big thing, John, is a lot of times when we initiate this conversation, a lot of merchants have dealt with, even the a lot of the gun ones they deal with a lot of, I don’t want to say bad companies, but ones that do things way different than we do. They say, “Here’s a deal, you have to sign up.” And they jam it down their throat and they assume that they have to switch with us. I just want an opportunity to showcase what we can do. It just starts with what you just said – you called in, you got me within seconds. You didn’t go through a whole, you know, bounce around. The girl who answers the phone is a stone’s throw away from me. We’re just about opportunities. All I ask is to have a conversation. And if you like us, great. If not, you know, we’re going to still keep trucking, and so will they. But the opportunity is the biggest thing.

Petrolino: Adam, thank you so much. Elite 2A Pay, you guys want to check that out, and I appreciate your time.

Yaras: Likewise. Thank you, John.