I live and work in Bartlett. If the same tasks keep eating your week, I can usually tell you within 30 minutes whether AI can help, and where to start.
Charlie Riske runs AIMention from Bartlett, Illinois, and is a member of the Bartlett Area Chamber of Commerce. He helps local small businesses find where AI saves time, starting with a free 30 minute call. No tech background is needed, and he has no ties to any software vendor.
Search for an AI consultant and most of what comes up is built for bigger companies, with big retainers to match. I work with the opposite: an owner, a small team, and a week that keeps getting away from them. I am a member of the Bartlett Area Chamber of Commerce, and I would rather earn a good reputation with my neighbors than sell a package to strangers.
Being close also changes how the work goes. A lot of what slows a business down doesn’t come up on a call. It shows up when you watch a job move from the phone to the office to the truck. If you are in Bartlett, Streamwood, Hanover Park, or South Elgin, stopping by is easy.
I start with your week, not with AI. Who gets interrupted the most? Which questions get answered over and over? What falls through the cracks after a quote goes out? Those answers usually point to one or two fixes that matter, often using tools you already pay for.
The problem: The owner’s phone rang more than 20 times a day with crew questions about pricing and how to handle a job.
What I built: A private AI workspace loaded with the company’s pricing rules, parts list, job procedures, and a guide for when to call the owner. It answers in simple English, or in Spanish if a tech writes in Spanish.
What changed: Crew calls went from “what should I charge?” to “the system says X, is that OK?” The assessment mapped about 9 hours a week the owner can get back.
The problem: Pool, darts, and bags tournaments ran every week but were almost invisible. The details lived inside pictures that Google and AI tools can’t read.
What I built: A visibility review with free fixes, plus a weekly form. The manager fills in the lineup in about 5 minutes and an AI tool writes website text, a Google post, a rewards email, social captions, and a TV slide.
What changed: One weekly input turns into five pieces of content instead of someone rewriting the same lineup five times.
Client names are left out to protect their privacy. Time savings are estimates from each client’s assessment, not measured results.
The full details are on my AI consulting page. Want a rough number first? Try the AI hours saved calculator.
Bartlett is home, but I work across the area. See AI consulting in the Chicago suburbs for the full picture, or the page for businesses around O’Hare.
Yes. I run AIMention from Bartlett and I am a member of the Bartlett Area Chamber of Commerce. I work with small business owners here and across the nearby suburbs.
Yes, when it is useful. We usually start with a call by phone or video. If seeing how the work really happens would help, like watching how a job moves through your office, I can come by.
No. Most owners I talk to have tried ChatGPT a few times or not at all. Tell me what keeps eating your week and I will tell you, in plain English, whether AI can help with it.
You tell me what is slow or repetitive, and I give you a direct read on where AI could help. It takes 30 minutes. If nothing is worth doing, I will say so.
A free 30 minute call with a Bartlett business owner who knows AI. Tell me what’s slowing you down.
Book a free 30 minute callNo deck and no pressure. If nothing is worth doing, I will say so.