To hear Dr. Robert Flood talk about his career, you hear someone appreciative, excited, and still amazed at the journey. As a doctor of optometry, Flood has been practicing in Southwest Michigan for the past 40 years and traveled the world helping people with their eye care. Friday, August 16, is Flood’s last day in the office. He’s retiring and taking with him enough memories to last several lifetimes.
Early life
Born in Chicago, Robert Flood was raised in South Haven. Coming from modest beginnings, working from a young age in the same factory where his father worked, Flood said he did the work no one else wanted to do, including cleaning the floors and groundskeeping on the hottest days.
“I worked there with Mexican immigrants… and I was a gringo, and they loved me. I had to clean the floors (and) cut the grass. Nobody wanted to go outside in the hot weather but me, the gringo.”
Flood described the day he was mowing the grass when someone from a neighboring business approached him about cutting their lawn, too. Because he didn’t want to use his employer’s equipment for the new job, Flood ended up buying his own lawnmower to do the work.
“That was the beginning of my entrepreneur stuff. That got me to aspire to do better. So, I did that. What really got me going is I got beat up, one time, by a bully as a (high school) freshman. That changed my life. I dropped all sports (and) I went into karate because that wasn’t going to happen to me again. I became a black belt.”
Flood recalls a series of unique life events as a youth. He was a lifeguard and was recognized by the mayor for saving a man’s life. He was a lifter in the Van Buren County folk dance group and that led him to a traveling stint in a professional ballet company. He also used his skill as a black belt to teach karate at Kalamazoo Valley Community College.
“Any way to get money. (There was) no time for anything bad. I was too busy. Then I was contracted to dance in a professional ballet company, and then I toured Europe. So, I was a professional dancer. And it was very cool, but it’s not that glamorous. Okay, we went to Paris, Germany, Amsterdam, and then back to Paris. When I came home, they said, ‘Will you dance for us?’ I said, ‘No way,’ because we lived on buses. When you get on stage, it’s perfect. After that, you’re nobody.”
That intense drive where a single moment changed Flood’s focus to become the best-equipped to undertake a new challenge is well reflected throughout both his personal life and professional career.
Focus on college and career
In 1974, with the factory worker job and ballet behind him, Flood made the decision to focus on his higher education at Western Michigan University.
“When I first went in there, I didn’t know what I was going to do. So, I started taking chemistry and biology. I thought maybe I’d do forestry. Then I got into medicine. I applied to the Eye Institute in Chicago, and that’s what I did.”
He earned his Bachelor of Science from WMU and attended the prestigious Illinois College of Optometry. He was also the first doctor of optometry to earn reciprocity as a physician from the University of Virginia, allowing him to practice in both Virginia and Michigan.
His medical training would one day lead to him being named one of America’s Top Optometrists, a Keyperson by the Michigan Optometric Association, and recognized by peers and the eye care industry alike as an outstanding businessperson.
Flood said it wasn’t easy at the outset. In the early 1990s, he built his first office on Napier Avenue near the Orchards Mall.
“I started from the ground up and built my own building. Success breeds success. And I wasn’t looking good.”
Flood recalled business was slow to start so he decided to redo the exterior of his office to see if that might drive more attention and business his way.
“I started cedar-siding the building and I was getting some attention because it’s very expensive. So, I cedar-sided it and from there on everything I made I put back into the building. I invested in myself, then just kept expanding the building as it grew.”
Flood said he experienced great success at his Benton Harbor location because it was a convenient option for locals and people from the surrounding communities of Coloma, Watervliet, Paw Paw, Kalamazoo, South Haven, and Covert. He also made his office a fun place where you might see a motorcycle or a jet ski in the lobby – displays designed to attract people and keep them talking about the business.
An Olympics experience
Becoming well known for both his work as a physician and as a businessperson, Flood was invited to present various lectures to peer groups. The ongoing recognition put him on the radar of vision care company Bausch + Lomb, a worldwide sponsor of the 1996 Olympics. That’s when the company invited Flood and 19 others to dinner in Chicago. At the end of the dinner, Flood was among those asked to provide eye care at the Olympic games.
“So, I went to the Olympics, and my job was to do anything optically. They could come from Switzerland, they could come from Germany, they come from Japan, and they wear contact lenses. Now if the person on the track team lost their contact lens or had an eye infection, somebody had to look after all that stuff. For me it’s simple stuff, but they needed somebody… and so I was on the team.”
Giving back to community
Back home in Michigan, Flood said he has been pleased to be involved in a number of community causes.
“I’m all over the place supporting the community. That was my big thing. Why is that important? That’s what I like to do. I like to get in with the kids and make them better and make them aspire to do better, keep them off the streets and drugs and stuff like that. So that’s what I did. I was focused on that.”
In addition to donating to local schools for their music, sports, and other programs, his office has participated in free vision clinics in Benton Harbor, Watervliet, and Coloma. They also offer scholarships to employees, contribute to the Southwest Michigan Steelheaders, and work with the Children’s Advocacy Center and area Fraternal Order of Police lodges.
Retirement and advice
Forty years of success with patients and within the industry, Flood is looking forward to continuing his interests. He used to collect motorcycles but now he has some impressive automobiles. He has an instrument-rated pilot’s license and a plane. He’s also been known to scuba dive. Flood spoke about his recollections in terms of chapters, begging the question if he’s thinking of writing a book about his experiences.
“I have a house in Florida, I’m going to go down there, I have a fishing boat, and I fly. One of my best friends flies for a (client) and I do right seat, I fly with him. So fly, basically fish, you know, that kind of stuff.”
Flood is turning the keys to his business over to Dr. Joshua S. Byers, OD, and his wife, Krista Byers. After the 16th, Flood says he’ll help in an emergency, but otherwise, “Josh is top notch.”
Asked about the new owners of the center, Flood says they’re great and will do amazing things. “Everything here I built. So, if you meet the staff, I hand-picked (them). It can’t be better.”
Asked about parting advice for others hoping to emulate Flood’s success:
“Get out and meet people better than you. That’s when I found out that everybody’s better than me. Everybody’s smarter than me, and so I always aspired to do better like these people. Once you get to people like that, I said, ‘I’m going to do some of this stuff.’ That really put fire on my focus in what I do. So, I did that.”
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Dr. Robert Flood is a therapeutically certified eye doctor providing vision examination, corrective spectacle and contact lenses, therapeutic eye care and medical management and referral services for various ocular conditions, and surgical care.
