Virtustant, a US-based remote staffing agency headquartered in St. Petersburg, Florida, has been named Best Remote Staffing & Talent Solutions Company of the Year 2026 by Business Fortune. The company started in 2021 at a kitchen table in Connecticut. Erik Reid and Kevin Wright are brothers-in-law and they were each running a small business on a tight budget. Both needed help, but every option they found abroad was either overpriced or difficult to trust. Kevin had just made his first hire abroad and walked Erik through the process. Together, they saw an opportunity to bridge the gap between US businesses and international talent.

Remote work had become normal almost overnight, but international talent was still priced as if location mattered. The two founders built Virtustant without outside investors to close that gap. What began with virtual assistants has grown to cover the whole org chart, including sales, finance, operations, marketing and software development. Since 2021, Virtustant has made more than 2,000 placements for over 1,000 US companies, working with professionals from 20 countries.

The company’s journey has also been shaped by the support of people who believed in its potential. One of its first major clients was Olivia Quido-Co, known to many as Miss O, who founded O Skin Med Spa in Southern California from a rented spare room in 2003 and later built Olivia Quido Clinical Skincare. She gave the two young founders an opportunity to prove themselves and mentored them on strategic thinking and giving back. Many of Virtustant’s values and business practices can be traced to those conversations.

Virtustant’s story reflects how a practical business challenge can become an opportunity to rethink how companies access global talent. By connecting US businesses with skilled professionals worldwide, the company aims to make international hiring more accessible and reliable.

In this exclusive interview with Business Fortune, Erik Reid and Kevin Wright, Co-founders and Co-CEOs of Virtustant, discuss how the company began, the gap it set out to address, its growth across industries and the experiences and relationships that continue to shape its approach to global hiring.

What have been some of the most significant obstacles Virtustant has encountered and how have these experiences shaped your approach to the business?

Erik Reid: For a long time, recruiting was our bottleneck. Demand grew faster than our ability to vet people well. In 2025 we rebuilt recruiting on our own platform, which runs screening, English and skills testing, AI-ranked shortlists and structured interviews in one place. Today more than 10,000 people apply every month and hiring became our engine instead of our constraint.

Kevin Wright: The other obstacle was trust. When we started we were young and inexperienced and buyers had been burned by fees and vague promises. That shaped everything: we publish our rates, we measure our vetting and we put the risk on our side of the table.

Could you walk us through Virtustant’s core services and explain how your staffing solutions help businesses find, hire and work effectively with remote professionals? What does the process look like for a client from the initial conversation to building a successful working relationship with a candidate?

Erik Reid: It starts with a discovery call where we learn the role: hours, tools, budget and what a great first 90 days looks like. Within 48 hours for most roles, the client receives three to five vetted candidates, each with a CV, test results and a video introduction. The client interviews and chooses and the new hire can start within 72 hours.

Kevin Wright: From there we handle the contract, payroll and paperwork and the client gets one invoice in dollars. Only the top 1% of applicants are hired: of every 100, 22 pass a recruiter screen with a live English conversation, 9 pass our cognitive, English and skills tests, 3 reach a live interview and 1 is hired.

Who are Virtustant’s primary clients, what workforce challenges do they typically bring to you and how do you tailor your solutions to address their specific needs?

Erik Reid: Most of our clients are small and mid-sized US companies, from founders hiring their first assistant to firms with dozens of people with us. We are going deeper by industry, starting with legal, real estate, healthcare and accounting, where clients need people who already know the workflows and the software. In legal alone we have placed 47 remote professionals with US law firms and Clutch recognized us in 2026 for Legal and Real Estate.

Kevin Wright: The challenge is usually the same: they need someone capable who works their hours, inside their tools, without paying US rates. Clients can save up to 70% compared with an equivalent US hire. We tailor the search to the exact stack the person will live in, whether that is HubSpot or Salesforce, QuickBooks or NetSuite, React or .NET and test for it before anyone is presented.

Are there any additional services, resources or forms of ongoing support that Virtustant provides but clients may not immediately associate with your brand? How do these offerings help clients get more value from their partnership with your team?

Kevin Wright: Every client has an account manager for as long as they work with us and our HR team stays close to the professional, so there is someone accountable on both sides. We also publish first-party hiring data. Our LATAM Remote Salary Expectations 2026 study, built from about 30,000 applications across 17 countries, helps clients budget a role before they open it.

Erik Reid: And we track every placement at 30, 60, 90 and 180 days, so we can spot problems early instead of waiting for a resignation.

Among Virtustant’s services, which offering would you consider your flagship or signature solution and what makes it particularly valuable to clients? We would be interested to hear how it differs from competing staffing options, along with a real-world example of the impact it has made for a client.

Erik Reid: Our flagship is the dedicated remote professional with no placement fee and a lifetime replacement guarantee. A traditional recruiter charges 15 to 35% of first-year salary just to make an introduction. We charge nothing to introduce someone, rates start around $7 an hour all-in and if a placement ends in month 14, we recruit again at no cost. No single piece of that is unique on its own; the combination is.

Kevin Wright: Contractor Independence is a good example. They had tested more than a dozen recruiters over about three years. They started with us on admin roles and within about a year we placed what their CEO called one of the most important hires in the company's history: a Head of Customer Success.

How does Virtustant build strong relationships with clients, respond to feedback or concerns and ensure that partnerships continue to deliver value over time?

Kevin Wright: By making sure our incentives point the same way as our clients'. There are no deposits, no retainers and no lock-in. Engagements are month to month and we only earn while the professional is working. Even our recruiters' commissions are tied to how long their placements last.

Erik Reid: When feedback comes in, the account manager owns it and acts quickly, whether that means coaching, adjusting the role or running a new search. I still take discovery calls with new clients every week, because staying close to clients is how we keep improving. That shows in our reviews: we are rated 4.9 out of 5 on G2.

How does Virtustant plan to adapt, innovate and grow over the coming years and what key goals are you working toward as part of that vision?

Kevin Wright: Latin America remains our core and in 2026 we opened South Africa as a second talent corridor, adding native English speakers for client-facing roles. On technology, we are building an AI matchmaker that learns from our own history of who was hired and who stayed, plus screening tools that review video introductions for English fluency and professionalism at scale.

Erik Reid: Hiring fast got us here. The next stage is retention on both sides: keeping great people and great clients together for years. We want hiring a remote professional to feel as safe as hiring locally: the price published, the vetting measured and a guarantee that doesn't expire. For the professionals we place, it means steady work with US companies without having to relocate. Talent is everywhere. Trust is what has been missing and that's what we're building.

About | Erik Reid and Kevin Wright

Erik Reid and Kevin Wright are the Co-founders and Co-CEOs of Virtustant, which they started together in 2021 without outside investors. Virtustant ranked No. 661 on the 2026 Inc. 5000 with 517% three-year growth, its second consecutive year on the list.

Erik studied economics at the University of Connecticut and worked in finance before leaving at 24 to build the company. He leads recruitment, sales, product and data.

Kevin studied finance at Fordham's Gabelli School of Business and speaks five languages. Before Virtustant he built an international education business with a teaching operation in the Philippines. He leads marketing and HR, including where and how Virtustant recruits and still lectures at Fordham when he can.

“Today more than 10,000 people apply every month and hiring became our engine instead of our constraint.”

FAQs

1. What is Virtustant?

Virtustant is a US-based remote staffing agency headquartered in St. Petersburg, Florida. It places vetted remote professionals, primarily from Latin America, with US businesses across roles such as virtual assistance, sales, finance, operations, marketing and software development.

2. When was Virtustant founded?

Virtustant was founded in 2021 by brothers-in-law Erik Reid and Kevin Wright in Connecticut.

3. Who are the Co-founders and Co-CEOs of Virtustant?

Erik Reid and Kevin Wright are the Co-founders and Co-CEOs of Virtustant.

4. How many placements has Virtustant made?

Since its founding in 2021, Virtustant has made more than 2,000 placements for over 1,000 US companies, with professionals from 20 countries.

5. What services does Virtustant provide?

Virtustant provides access to international talent across several business functions, including virtual assistance, sales, finance, operations, marketing and software development. Clients pay zero placement fees, work month to month and every placement is backed by a lifetime replacement guarantee.