About Us
better Protection
About Us
Better Protection was founded in 2022 by combining Assurant Fire Protection and Xtreme Fire Protection, creating a full service fire protection company. Better Protection has grown and is now built from nine complementary companies, establishing their platform as a leading fire and life safety business in the Chicagoland and Dallas Fort-Worth areas with a full range of installation, inspection, maintenance, and repair capabilities. Better Protection leverages the combined scale, resources, and technology of their businesses to grow into the convenient single source of service for their clients, nationwide.
Check out our latest news!
Better Protection Strengthens Southwest Presence with Acquisition of DFS Fire Systems
Our executive team
Team
Don Mershon
CEO
Don brings the entrepreneurial spirit, creativity and drive that comes from founding, operating, managing and growing a leading energy industry specialty engineering firm. His 30 plus years of industry experience and vision helped form the concept of Better Protection.
In his previous roles Don, founded Nexus Engineering, a leading fire protection engineering firm. Don, with the help of his partners and employees grew Nexus into the leading nuclear power fire protection and operations engineering company. In 2015 Don and his partners merged Nexus with other companies to form the largest specialty engineering firm in the world. Don was in charge of sales and commercial operations for the company through 2018.
In 2018 Don left his position at the specialty engineering firm and developed the concept to build a fire protection installation, testing, and maintenance company. He and his selected team formed in early 2019. Now Don and the team work closely with clients and owners to help them optimize their fire protection companies and bring them into the Better Protection family.
Don has a BS degree in Fire Protection Engineering from Oklahoma State University.
Matt Riordan
COO
Matt started his career after college working for his father’s plumbing business. Over 20 years, he progressively expanded his role to include estimating, managing, and leading project teams in delivering mechanical projects.
Matt owned and operated a plumbing and real estate development firm in the City of Chicago for a number of years, transforming his business model to adapt through challenging times. He delivered numerous complex, large-scale, multimillion-dollar mechanical projects – each coming in on time, on budget, and to client’s expectations.
With his extensive hands-on field experience, Matt provides innovative and thoughtful solutions to complex problems, while always maintaining a high level of quality and safety standards. Matt works closely with clients and subcontractors, to ensure that Better Protection work delivers solutions that meet or exceed expectations.
Matt is a journeyman plumber, with a B.A. in Political Science from Western Michigan University.
Darin Aprati
CFO
Darin has 30 years of experience improving operational processes, implementing business systems, and driving profitability growth at private equity-owned portfolio companies, privately held manufacturing firms, early-stage technology startups and publicly traded corporations.
Prior to joining Better Protection, Darin served as Chief Financial Officer of Rose Paving, a private equity-owned provider of commercial parking lot maintenance services, where he led accounting, financial planning and analysis, reporting, acquisition integration, tax, legal, human resources, and business systems.
Having been CFO at multiple high-growth organizations, Darin built and led world-class teams in complex business environments. He has held senior leadership roles at McDonald’s Corporation, Kraft Foods Group, Modelez International and MAT Holdings where he designed and executed domestic and international strategies.
Darin began his career in public accounting at PwC, providing audit, acquisition, bankruptcy, and litigation consulting services for multinational clients. Among his accomplishments, Darin earned his BBA and his MBA from the University of Michigan Stephen M. Ross School of Business and is a Certified Public Accountant.
He is a volunteer Board Member and Treasurer of a not-for-profit youth organization that coordina