Entrepreneur Files with Andrew Ellenberg
Entrepreneur Files with Andrew Ellenberg
How One Woman Broke Into A Male Dominated Industry to Launch A Multimillion Dollar Home Improvement Business From Scratch
Hop on board for a wild ride through the trials and tribulations of a risktaker who decided out of the gate that failure wasn't an option. Is she a genius or just too stubborn to give up? Brilliant, bold, and brimming with optimism, Stephanie Sage is gunning for eight figures at Sage Restoration. Be a fly on the wall as she walks on a highwire in the disaster restoration business. Discover how this local mogul changed the engine in her airplane in the air without breaking a sweat.
Andrew Ellenberg is President & Managing Partner Of Rise Integrated, an innovative studio that creates, produces, and distributes original multimedia content across digital touchpoints. Email andrewe@riseintegrated.com or call 816-506-1257.
tech entrepreneur files inspiration inside. These are their stories. We're back in the studio with another thought provoking episode of entrepreneur files. When business owners discovered new meaning in their businesses, they feel more connected to people around them. Executive producer Andrew Ellenberg created this fast paced 30 minute podcast to inspire business owners creating deeper And we're back I have been so positive about this conversation. I am sitting here in the studio live with Stephanie sage, the founder and owner of sage restoration, one of the most successful home improvement companies in Kansas City, but first we're going to kind of drill down into how it all started, and the salad days so tell me about your first customer. Well, I'll tell you, when Alan I decided to go into this business. We went away for training, which was about three weeks long. And while we were gone, it rained the entire time and back then with us to the business and we didn't really say too much about it. So we came back home and I started hitting the road making sales calls. And then all of a sudden our phones just blew up with water calls I guess I'll just so what did you have to say? Turkey So bravo channel partners to give you brand new and unproven point because I really had a huge learning curve in front of me to say the least I had never had restoration. I had been in mortgages. So I was just working with homeowners which is one of the reasons we liked this business. But you know, I just had to go out and myself and just convince people to give me a shot. Sometimes that's what it takes is just you know, and convincing people that you're Do you think of being in Kansas City, that people are more than likely to embrace somebody starting a business because of the entrepreneurial spirit in this area? I think most definitely. I think Kansas City is one of the most supportive entrepreneurial markets that I found in the nation. I just think that we have a huge support base here. And overall, people are friendly, and we'll do what they can to help other people. It'll work. So yeah, they definitely had huge support base from the command people through the years now obviously you're a risk taker Yes for sure. kind of flew the energy in the air was the plane was in the air your time and all right. You fucking must have had only when you entered when you're trying to say she's got what what was that all about to do as? Well? I think it you know, since I was so new to the industry, and I'm a huge learning curve. I jokingly call myself pioneer woman because I generally get the job done. And I had to work in the beginning. So I had to prove myself. In fact, one of my first male supporters who referred work my way was the guy who was training me on a mobile product. And so he later told me we were getting up That's a common theme here and then we hear that over and over I know you're seem to see that theme and consistently, I guess, no matter how anywhere What's the biggest risk ever took? Well, let me starting this business is one of the biggest risks. But I look back now and it's one of the most exciting rides I've ever had in my entire life and I have met more fascinating and successful people than I ever dreamed I would meet. So it's well worth the risk and getting over the fear of failure because when you fear failing, you know, that's going to take you nowhere, you have So always a catch 22 predicted demand and building up for it so you're ready to serve it. Yes, for sure. So you know we have to outlay that capital that we know we're just confident you know, whatever we put our minds to we we just get the job done. That's the way we roll it sage. Excellent. You are rolling, huge company people. Nothing from scratch. It's amazing. really inspirational to everybody listening. So what's next? What do you go from here? I know you're very ambitious. Do you have an exit strategy? We do have an exit strategy. Several years ago our son Connor came on board with us he had been going to K u and after a couple of years he decided that gee, I just don't know if I want to rack up these student loans and he's never really been into the school thing. So he said you know what, I want to come learn the family business and thank goodness he made that decision. Because he is a absolutely are good tips. Thank you, you clearly have a philosophy with your perspective on the business well I'll tell you what, you know, I feel like I have done a great job in branding sage, but I will give some kudos to we talked about that entrepreneurial support in Kansas City. And in 2014 I was lucky enough to get into the scale of ours round like that and I we talked during the first class it was really exciting and I started that program to number one how to be a better business owner and Absolutely. Well, you've done a very good job because everybody knows you in Kansas City. Anyway, your household name. Oh, thank you and he plans for expansion beyond our backyard here. Actually we are right now. Looking at an endeavor of going up into the Iowa Nebraska areas right now we're taking a look at that because we do do work regionally. We'll go down you know into Oklahoma. lower parts of Missouri we have gone up to Iowa Nebraska before so we are entertain that right now. Connors big dream is to be a storm chaser. I don't know if you're familiar in our history, but those you're big on vertical integration. I say Chase from the hurricane fixing the house. I like you but you have done quite a bit of that where you're kind of owning the whole supply chain. That's really powerful strategy with a lot of leverage. So how long did that take to pull off? Well, I mean, that's taken us what 12 years and he started in business, you know, 12 years ago. But yeah, that's an excellent point because I've been really marketing pretty heavy on that lately. That with us adding on the wall expanding our contents division plus adding on textiles and electronics plus reconstruction we are totally a full service, turnkey restoration contractor in Kansas City. So category killer here. Category, whatever it is, or again common and there'll be right there to fix it. Don't worry. So I this is a phenomenal story. I love it. What made you decide to be an entrepreneur in the first place? Were you always an entrepreneur just born that way or, you know, I look back you know, when I was younger I think I it's always been in me. I'm a rural I'm a free spirit. I'm very independent. I've always kind of been a lone wolf. I don't always follow the crowd. That's just me. But when I got into the mortgage industry, which I loved I was selling loan products to brokers through different six different states and I started from scratch it was all saying out at the same time. Yeah, so it was a big Ouch. But long story short you know, I kind of went to different brokers for while people were closing up shop, and then I ended up selling high interest title loans out in Gardner for a company and that was just not my thing, you know, and I thought I've got to we've got to do something different here and Alan worked for a big corporation here in town. And I said, You know what, we absolutely must be nice. I'm maybe in the wrong place. Maybe I should go work for you. But interesting story really compelling. So what is most rewarding for you, in terms of helping a homeowner address these issues? Well, you know, and this kind of ties in with our company culture to like we've really started hiring for you really have to be in this industry. Number one, you have to get a little gritty I think because it's really physically demanding work and you work in a lot of different hot and cold conditions and dirty conditions. But you have to really love helping people you know, I've had people say, I can only imagine Yeah. I know what to call it. It does. Yeah, for sure. Interesting is how independently all the franchise not part of a huge portion of that how you were able to all this time build market share compete with these giant restoration companies. Can you tell us about that? I think everybody we really enjoy that. Yeah, I mean, that was definitely an uphill battle. I mean, they were so against me. And Alan, I mean, we like I said, we bought into this business. We literally had no experience in it. No construction background. I had a sales background and you know, all commissioned type sells. Yeah. And then Alan he kept working at his corporate jobs who had some money coming in the door. Yeah, yeah. Thank God. goes with it. But it took us we were on a code blue which is TPA was one of our first TPAs which taught us a lot of water work coming in. So that was advantageous, but it took us about seven years to get on the alacrity program. So that's a lot of years because you have to you have to have a certain revenue size they come in and check out your offices to make sure you have the equipment. You have You know rolls on wheels. Yeah be in a van. Yeah, literally but you know, but last year we you know, we did 2.4 million. So you know, it's amazing what you can accomplish. Thank you. Yeah, that is rarefied air, especially from scratch like you did in a local market and you're just moving into expanding. What is getting warmed up? Yeah, that's incredible what it ramped. So if somebody does want to buy you and these big guys which are probably disrupting and annoying the heck out maybe I don't know. That'd be the right multiple right and pay my dues. I didn't get a lot of I got beat out a lot of work for a lot of years stuff. So what would your advice be to a woman that wants to get into business for herself in particular since your community so heavily with women leaders? What would you say to them when they're saying they're waiting for the right time to make the move? Well, I think that's like anything in life like there's no right time to have kids because nobody can prepare you right? For that moment. You have that newborn baby in your hands and then you're bracing them through all the years. And it's kind of the same with a business. I think if you have a dream, or you have a gut feeling, saying this is what you know, I always I'm a big believer and Awesome. That's inspiring to everyone listening I'm sure so if you're thinking about throwing in the towel, stop it. Take a break. Right, exactly. I'll talk you off the ledge. You can be an entrepreneur. So say I've been there done that I got through it, you'll get there. So who's been the biggest influence in your life and business would you say you know, I have to say I just the beginning. I mean I I relied on myself just my own, you know, as far as myself to get out there and do it. But I will say that a lot of the women groups that I belong to, were very helpful. Looking back if we had joined a BNI group, and one group in particular Yeah, that was very, they were very supportive of me and Alan to because what happens is when I've been hearing quite a bit about the attracting talent out there right now. In the home improvement industry. Yeah, yeah. So how do you address that is the lack of man with with golden handcuffs, replaced or with? Well, you know, I would say a few months ago, it was pretty touching go But about a year ago, we decided that instead of just hiring based on skills, because you can hire people away from other companies, but they may have bad habits, or they aren't going to work according to your company culture. We call it the sage way. So we started hiring really, more for I mean personality in some Absolutely, especially being a smaller firm. They have to have a compelling reason to choose you over a larger company. Right? And I would imagine the soul in the company is a big differentiator. Yeah. Or just the fact to you and in our industry, you know your if you don't want to be sitting in a cubicle somewhere you're definitely not going to be doing that at Sage because you're out every day and probably a different home a different business your everyday is different. And you never know what phone call is going to come our way and in our industry. So I always joke there's never a You picked an interesting profession. Yes, for sure, for sure. And it's very complex, and it sounds like you've taken a lot of the friction out of it. He tried to be innovative I mean, innovation is just better, faster, cheaper. One or all three, right? Yeah. Sounds like you kind of all three maybe maybe not cheaper. Well, definitely not cheaper. I maybe back in the day I had that, you know, going a little low but you know, even when I was in mortgage sales I you know, cheaper isn't always better. You get what you pay for so yeah, we definitely I would say are middle of the road. I've got one bus insurance base. So we all charge the same thing. If it's an insurance based job. Now with what we call non emergency Absolutely. Makes a lot of sense. If the customer experience alone is worth paying a little more. Yeah, no one is gonna get that. Right. Right. Well, and then we're really big on showing up and we said we're going to show up doing what we say we're going to do and we stand behind our work. Because I learned early on that a lot of contractors can't follow those simple little rules. And to me it's just really disrespectful to your customer. When you say you're going to be over a certain time. They've taken off work perhaps to Not to name any names. Yeah, no talking. Yeah, right. Exactly. So you really don't have a strategy for approaching consumers directly. And it's more through the channel to the insurance people and the real estate companies referrals and that sort of thing. Is there is there a change of heart going forward that maybe you do want to build more of a brand directly with consumers? Well, I wouldn't say I think we do have a brand with consultants. It's just that a lot of our work is referral based. So we have a lot of repeat customers that refer us out a lot of contractors that refer us we probably don't we don't spend a huge amount of money trying to get work off of the internet or Google we hate that. You do but that's not good for Rhys integrated at all. Okay, well, I mean, I don't know we just you know, so we get we get our share off off of the internet. But we are huge referral based company in addition to insurance with real owners and will be but I think that's what really saves us to why we stay busy, because we have a wide variety of referral sources that we that we use property management companies facility managers I mean we we try to be Yeah, what you are ubiquity achieved. Congratulations phenomenal achievements. Thanks so much for hopping on entrepreneur files with us today's Stephanie sage Stephanie restoration Sam restoration, but it is her and your husband and yeah Alan and then talk about Connor to Connor no to so his family business. It is a family business that has challenges. That's a woman that's a whole nother show. Absolutely. Well, we'll have you back. I would love that and thank you so much for having me. It's been so much fun. Have a newsworthy day. I well. Take care take care. We hope you're inside look into the entrepreneur file of today's industry titans like you inspired to bust through any walls between you and success. Not literally, entrepreneur files is not responsible. For any property damage caused by uncontrollables do well our job here is done. You could be the next entrepreneur we feature on podcast Call 816-506-1257 or visit rise integrated.com To
