Barrett Earney established Earney IT to support local businesses with their tech and IT needs.

“Earney IT was founded in 2001, originally as a small, relationship-driven IT support company,” the founder and CEO said. “For many years, it operated more as a ‘lifestyle business’ serving a loyal client base without a real focus on scale or growth.”

But in 2020, the company shifted its strategy to focus on the right clients and team, and to sustain a disciplined, process-driven approach to delivering a high-level customer experience, Earney said.

Earney IT is a managed services provider that essentially functions as an outsourced IT department for small- and mid-sized businesses, he said. The company mainly operates in Wilmington, but it also serves clients in Leland, Hampstead, Carolina Beach, Southport and Jacksonville.

Its services include managed IT support and help desk support; cybersecurity and compliance solutions; cloud infrastructure and Microsoft 365 management; data backup and disaster recovery; and strategic IT consulting and vCIO services.

In addition, it primarily serves the health care, dental, legal and accounting industries.

“These industries speak to the core of who we are,” he said. “They are highly regulated, data-sensitive and rely heavily on technology to operate. While we can serve businesses broadly, these sectors require a higher level of discipline around security, compliance and reliability.”

Since rebuilding in 2020, Earney IT has focused strongly on intentional growth.

“We rewrote our sales and marketing playbooks, rebuilt our service model and invested heavily in people and process,” he said.

Those efforts produced 36% growth in 2023, 67% growth in 2024 and nearly 37.6% growth in 2025, with a 46% increase in monthly recurring revenue.

But as for what sets Earney IT apart from other providers, he pointed to several things: customer experience; process and discipline; and people and culture.

“We have a driven, accountable team that takes ownership of outcomes,” he said.

In addition, Earney said he’s proud of the company having been nominated in the MSP Titans of the Industry Awards both in 2024 and 2025. Earney IT also won the ClearlyRated Best of IT Services Award in both 2025 and 2026.

But the company isn’t slowing down anytime soon.

“Our core market is Southeastern North Carolina, with a strong presence in Wilmington,” Earney said. “At the same time, we support clients nationally, and our service model allows for efficient expansion. We’re actively evaluating both local acquisition opportunities and potential footprint expansion across the Southeast.”

He said the company is also expanding its current office’s footprint by an additional 2,000 square feet to support team growth, and he added that Earney IT’s long-term plan is to grow to a team of 20 to 25 employees in its Wilmington headquarters.

The company, he added, will use Wilmington as its base while expanding into additional markets. Another goal he has for the future is to continue scaling the business while maintaining its high standards of service quality and margins, he said.

Earney said, “The goal is controlled, intentional growth.”