EP #256: Kayla Fried and Johanna Marish with Rally Now Restoration
Jul 08, 2024
Jeremy Wolf
Ever wondered how two women can shake up a male-dominated industry? Meet Kayla Fried and Johanna Marish, the powerhouse behind Rally Now Restoration. This episode promises a deep dive into their inspiring journey, blending Johanna’s real estate and construction knack with Kayla’s customer service expertise to redefine quality and ethics in water restoration and mold remediation. Discover how their unique approach, combining personalized service with unmatched dedication, is setting new standards in South Florida’s tri-county area.
But that’s not all—Kayla and Johanna also share vital insights on preventing mold growth in humid climates like South Florida. Learn practical tips to safeguard your home and health, especially before hurricane season strikes. Plus, get an insider look at how these friends balance business and personal life, even conducting meetings on horseback. This episode is a treasure trove for homeowners and aspiring entrepreneurs, offering valuable lessons and heartfelt stories from two women breaking barriers and building a thriving business together.
Ever wondered how two women can shake up a male-dominated industry? Meet Kayla Fried and Johanna Marish, the powerhouse behind Rally Now Restoration. This episode promises a deep dive into their inspiring journey, blending Johanna’s real estate and construction knack with Kayla’s customer service expertise to redefine quality and ethics in water restoration and mold remediation. Discover how their unique approach, combining personalized service with unmatched dedication, is setting new standards in South Florida’s tri-county area.
But that’s not all—Kayla and Johanna also share vital insights on preventing mold growth in humid climates like South Florida. Learn practical tips to safeguard your home and health, especially before hurricane season strikes. Plus, get an insider look at how these friends balance business and personal life, even conducting meetings on horseback. This episode is a treasure trove for homeowners and aspiring entrepreneurs, offering valuable lessons and heartfelt stories from two women breaking barriers and building a thriving business together.
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Jeremy Wolf.
Speaker 2:
Hello, hello everyone, and welcome back to another episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast. I'm your host, jeremy Wolf, and today I'm joined by two lovely ladies and there seems to be a theme developing here on the show. I've done a lot of interviews and I've now interviewed quite a few women-owned businesses in trades that are, I guess, predominantly male. I've had Tamara Chase with Chase Roofing On, priscilla Fletcher with Priscilla's Plumbing, the Lady Plumber. Most recently I had Angelica Negrete with Royal Gardens Landscaping and Design, and our guests today, kayla Freed and Joanna Marish. They own Rally Now Restoration. So it's pretty cool to get a chance to speak to women entrepreneurs in, again, predominantly male-dominated fields. So, ladies, welcome to the show, thanks for joining us.
Speaker 3:
Thank you for having us Good morning.
Speaker 2:
Thank you, yeah welcome to the show. Thanks for joining us, thank you for having us. Good morning, thank you, yeah, it's our pleasure. And thanks, as always, to our listeners for tuning in to learn more about our great community and the businesses that serve us. So, without further ado, why don't you start off by telling us a little bit about what you do at Rally? Now Restoration.
Speaker 3:
So for the company I mean, we're, you know, a water restoration company. We do mold remediation. We are, you know, woman owned and operated and we service the tri-county area. So Broward, west Palm, miami-dade, we also do tend to go outside those areas as well. Sometimes we do get, you know, some homeowners that call us from outside of our localized zone here, but you know what, we'll work with them. You know some homeowners that call us from outside of our localized zone here, but you know what. We'll work with them. You know the best that we can and see if we can take care of it for them.
Speaker 2:
Now, do you also do the inspection part of the process or only the remediation side?
Speaker 3:
Yes, we do the inspection part as well.
Speaker 4:
Well, we don't do the test and we will come out and look for visible mold and damage and things like that, but we don't test the actual mold.
Speaker 2:
Okay.
Speaker 4:
So we do have great referral partners.
Speaker 2:
And how long have you been in business for?
Speaker 3:
So we're new in this area. We've been open since March. Congratulations, yeah, thank you. So new business, new adventures, it's very exciting. Congratulations, yeah, thank you. So new business, new adventures, it's very exciting. But yeah, so I mean we're new, but we're definitely, you know, putting in the effort and, you know, making a name for ourselves down here.
Speaker 2:
So I got to know what's the background here, Because, again, this isn't the typical career path or trajectory for women entrepreneurs. How did you well, first, how did you both get involved with this business and what's the background leading up to this?
Speaker 4:
So I've been in the industry for a while now. I originally was in real estate and flipping homes, so I knew construction and then when I was kind of done with that, I just gravitated and found my way towards the restoration world and through the years eventually went and partnered up, opened another company and then wanted to do South Florida. And I've known Kayla for a while and I know she had great work ethic and I knew she would be an asset to not only myself, the company, the industry as a whole.
Speaker 2:
Back up a second there. So you said you gradually just found your way to the restoration side. Was this something that along the way in your real estate journey?
Speaker 4:
Well, because I had the real estate and construction knowledge. When I was looking for a more consistent clock in, clock out and I was, you know, obviously looking on job posts and things like that and I found the restoration post because I had construction knowledge I thought, okay, this let me apply and go from there. And I, you know, went from there and never left.
Speaker 2:
So you were in real estate, shifted into the restoration side, and I'm just thinking out loud here, you're working at another company and you're thinking to yourself man, I could do this. I think I could do this at least as good or better from a woman's perspective.
Speaker 4:
Right, I actually loved the industry for a while because I didn't agree with certain things and you know homeowners have certain feelings about restoration companies and insurances. And then, after you know, talking to people, you know I decided to come back to do the right thing, to not put homeowners in the bad position and to give them the quality work that they deserve.
Speaker 2:
Very cool. Yeah, I can't disagree with any of that because I know that on my end, my wife does like 99% of things better than me. So so what about you, kayla? What was your background? What did you do before the restoration side? And then, how did you ultimately find your way of linking up with Joanna to start the business?
Speaker 3:
Yeah. So I mean, I've known Joanna for years and so she knew that I had always had customer service and managing positions where I am really good with people and different kinds of people as well. So it's like maybe to some people their difficult clients might actually be my favorite clients, because it's a nice challenge for me that I feel like I'm up to the task where you may have, you know, a client who may be upset.
Speaker 3:
She may, he or she, you know, may have a lot of questions and it may just be someone that people naturally just kind of brush off and they never get good customer service from anybody because they just get.
Speaker 3:
You know, people get tired of them, whatever, and I take that as a challenge and I like it. And they're usually the people that call me on a daily or, you know, a regular basis at whatever job I've had. You know that they know that they can talk to me, they feel safe, they understand, they trust and you know it's a good relationship that was built where they have not had that opportunity to build a good relationship. So, joanna, you know she's known this about me, she's known me for years and she thought that it would be a good asset for what this industry was lacking, which is the communication, the trust and, you know, just building relationships. Because with this field a lot of people it's just, you know, for maybe a lot of other companies it's just it's a job, a payment and goodbye. You know, for me it's like I want that, you know, personal touch.
Speaker 4:
You can teach somebody restoration, but you can't teach them to care yeah.
Speaker 3:
I care.
Speaker 3:
That's why she had gotten me involved in this industry and you know the clients that I've met and the relationships, even you know, with other trades who you know the clients that I've met and the relationships even you know with other trades who you know like to refer our company because you know they take care of one part of the problem and we take care of the other part. They really do appreciate that because you know I treat their clients if it's, you know, a trade that's referring to us, I treat them like, you know, the same way that these other companies would treat their clients. You know like there's no, you know there's no lapse. You know from one company to the other it's just a continuous, you know great treatment that's being given.
Speaker 2:
I love that perspective, that mindset that you take into the customer service and dealing with quote, unquote, problem customers or problem clients. One of the things that I've learned is that you get this almost an inherent resistance when you get a problem like a person, whether it's a client or a customer that's complaining. But oftentimes when you kind of put yourself in their shoes and suspend your own thoughts, there's a great learning experience for me. I've noticed oftentimes when I lean into those situations, I end up getting a lot out of it on my end as well, when I embrace it, and I learn a lot about myself and how I can be better. And, like you said, yeah, a lot of those interactions lead to stronger relationships, because people don't normally get that type of interaction when they're being difficult and when you really really settle in and make them feel at ease, they appreciate it that much more. It helps change their perspective in dealing with people in the future too, I think.
Speaker 3:
Absolutely. You know. Nobody wakes up and they decide you know what? I'm going to be a pain. I'm going to get on the phone and I'm going to give this person a hard time.
Speaker 2:
No-transcript take care of for you and sometimes just that one act of kindness and helping them with that will again have implications on other aspects of their life and hopefully help them do better. Because, yeah, you said it, I say that all the time. Right, Most people aren't out there trying to mess with people, right? They're just going through their own life having problems, and sometimes they inadvertently take it out on others. So it's always important to come from a place of patience and understanding. That's what I've learned in my journey, so I think a lot of people, I guess, in the restoration business. What are some of the most common misunderstandings or myths or misconceptions that people typically have surrounding your industry?
Speaker 3:
I think that you know when people are calling us and they want an inspection for their home, I think a big misconception is that, oh, this is it's not really an issue. You know, like we're we're not in the field that people are casually calling us. It's being we're being called out of an emergency or some kind of you know fear that's in their mind that something is happening. So I mean, you know, when it comes to water damage or mold damage, that's all stuff that you know, like this is not planned for. Nobody plans to have water damage or mold damage. That's all stuff that you know, like this is not planned for. Nobody plans to have water damage, nobody plans to find mold.
Speaker 3:
But when you do, you know you want to call someone, you want to have them come out. So when it comes to water that has to be dried up immediately, I mean in the state that we're in you know we're in South Florida it's, you know, a constant 90 plus degrees. You know, for three, fourths of the year, you know. So I mean it takes a day for that water damage to start causing mold. And that's not just stuff that can you know, like, that's not just stuff you can spray Windex on clean it up and then all of a sudden it's like serious health implications for untreated mold.
Speaker 2:
Obviously so, Absolutely, I mean people.
Speaker 3:
If people knew how many calls we got from people who you know, their whole family in the house. They've been sick, they've been coughing, they've had, you know, breathing problems and all to find out. It's, you know, they have mold everywhere, you know. And it's not where you can see it either. It's within the walls, the floorboards, you know. I mean, we're able to find that out for you. We have moisture readers that we take out to the inspection. We're able to find the areas that you didn't necessarily think had moisture, you know, and we're able to also see if those areas contain mold, you know, and if it does, we're able to get you a better understanding of where it is. You know, often enough, when we do our, when we use our moisture readers, we're finding more areas in walls, ceilings, baseboards that have moisture that people had no idea. You know. There was moisture behind, you know, and if there's moisture and that moisture is, you know, gone unnoticed for a long time, more than likely you will find mold.
Speaker 2:
That was going to be kind of my next question. No-transcript. What kind of tips and advice could you offer homeowners to ensure that they could curb these issues from getting worse?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I mean, a big part is if you have someone who thinks that you know, all of a sudden they've developed these onset allergy issues and they're, they're, you know, feeling sickly, they're, you know, wondering if it's something in the air, you know, then there might be a good chance that it's in your home, you know. So I mean that's a good reason to you know, have someone come out as well. As you know, when you're in this industry, you start to notice water stains a lot more than you would if you weren't in this industry, like all these things that you pass on a daily basis in your home. Now, all of a sudden, you're looking and you're like you know what I am going to. You know, take out my moisture, I'm just going to check for good measure, you know. So I mean, and you could find, you know, water stains and it could be from some old issue that's been resolved.
Speaker 3:
You know, maybe you had a leak, you had your roof fixed and you know those are just remnants that just need to be painted over. It's all dried out and fine now. But you know, I think, just keeping in mind, you know, if you have an older house or a house that's due for a roof or you know you start to hear some droplets. You know during a rain is okay, start to assess the problem now, before you know we get into deeper into hurricane season here, where we're going to get all these calls for the flood side or even for the you know water damage from roofs that needed to be repaired before this season. Yeah, so good for it's, it's good to you know, have someone come out and just do some inspections just for maintenance. Um, but if you have a feeling, usually there's a reason why you're having a gut feeling.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, because that's one of those things where I can imagine you could live in your house for 10, 15, 20. If you're not selling the house, in your mind you're thinking well, what do I need to get an inspection for If there's no visible problem or you're not noticing anything or you're not? Maybe you are having that. I got to imagine if you came out to do an inspection for a property and then there turns out to be an issue, then the inspection costs is like once you do the work, it's covered for the inspection. That kind of thing. Does that make sense?
Speaker 4:
So we don't charge for the inspection. Okay, got it. Got it yeah, we don't even charge, and then take it out and back and it's we're, we're there to help, and then if, if we could help, that's.
Speaker 2:
you know, obviously where the costs come, but we don't charge for the inspection at all. Got it, got it, got it. So okay, how long have you known each other prior to that? You mentioned you've been friends for a long time. How long have you known each other?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, well, I think for the last five years we've known each other. We actually met each other through the barn that we were at, because we both have horses, so I mean we've known each other for a good five years now.
Speaker 2:
So what would you say? So obviously you're very close friends. What would you say is one of the one of the biggest challenges, if any, working with a close friend, running a business with a close friend and, on the other side of that, maybe one of the biggest rewards about being in business with a close friend?
Speaker 3:
I think that you know, obviously, when you work with friends, the biggest challenge that people should look out for is, obviously, you know, the balance between professional and and personal you know, and so she and I do a great job.
Speaker 3:
We don't, you know, we we've never had the instance where we've had to mix those. You know, like we've we've had a. We've never had an issue. Yeah, because we knew going into, you know, into business together, that obviously our business is is what's coming first and you know it's. It's always been a priority on our minds to make sure that you know, this business, which is our baby, you know, is able to to grow and thrive and it doesn't, you know, get muddled with.
Speaker 3:
You know issues from you. Know maybe a personal standpoint, know maybe a personal standpoint Very cool.
Speaker 2:
Anything, Joanna, any thoughts you want to give to that?
Speaker 4:
No, I don't think, knock on wood. We've never really had a problem. We know, you know when to talk about friend stuff, when to talk about business.
Speaker 2:
Most of our one-on-one business meetings are on the back of a horse, so it's always a good time.
Speaker 2:
So I'm curious and I don't know from this I'm not in these industries, but in an industry such as this that are predominantly male-dominated industries I keep saying that is there. When you start a business in a field like that, do you get any pushback from other companies that are, you know, like more? I guess more what's the word. I'm looking for Companies that are have been around for a while, that are typically male owned. Do you get any resistance on that front?
Speaker 4:
I would say a more of a go like a more girl power thing, like good for you guys. I haven't really had like bad experiences per se personally all right.
Speaker 2:
So you mentioned horses. When you have some, when you have free time obviously, running a business doesn't doesn't warrant much free time, but when you do have some downtime, what do you, what do you like to do for fun? And talk a little bit about the? Uh, how'd you get into horses?
Speaker 3:
Uh well, so how we got into horses was basically, you know, we, we both kind of I don't want to say fell for the same thing, but uh, the same person who gave her her horse actually gave me my horse, and so it was kind of a uh like-minded drop kick into the horse world, you know. And so, and so her and I, when we're not working, you know we'll take them out, we'll go for a ride. We call them the kids, you know, because they're they're a little on the older side, but you know they're our kids and so we, we take them out, we do trail rides. They have had a lot of different types of adventures in the different parts of the state as well as the country. You, you know. So, and to what Joanna said, a lot of our meetings, you know it ends up tying into work too, so they're kind of our honorary employees for Rally.
Speaker 4:
Now.
Speaker 3:
Restoration, because some of our meetings end up being held on horseback. While we're on trails that you know, the conversation shifts and we end up talking about the business. And now, all of a sudden, she's with her horse, I with my horse and we're all in a meeting not your typical uh corporate boardroom meetings no, no, but that works for us. Yeah, non-typical. You know, it's some of our best conversations, I think. Have been on horseback very cool.
Speaker 2:
What, what would be, I guess, one one thing that you'd like to leave our listeners with about the business.
Speaker 3:
I would say that for this industry, bigger is not always better. So you know, we're a new company, we're your, you know, typical small size restoration company. However, what you, you know like when people are looking to you know, call a company and they're like I'm going to go with the one I've heard on TV, I've heard radio ads, for I've seen ads on my Facebook. For you know, like your go-to name brand, you know, big restoration company, what you're most likely going to lack in that is a personal connection with the person that's talking to you. Because we've developed our core values, we know what it is that we want our business to be and so we, within every interaction, when we get a phone call from the homeowner, or from a referring, you know, partner in another trade.
Speaker 3:
We take the time to make sure that you're comfortable, that you know all your questions are answered, that you're educated. We're not just, you know, an hourly or salary employee that's working for a bigger name company that's just clocking in, clocking out and they don't really care about the experience that you're having or the actual issue that you're having. So we treat everybody the same, no matter if it's you know a big you know commercial job or a small residential job.
Speaker 3:
We treat everybody as if you know they're an important client. Because they are, you know so for us, you know. That's why I say, like bigger is not always better, You're not always going to get the best service going to someone that has, you know, a big name brand.
Speaker 2:
Yes, very important to support local small, medium-sized businesses. It's obviously, the bigger you scale a business, they're doing something right to be able to scale. But, like you said, you lose that personal feel, and it's always great to have business owners on this platform. To I always like to say get a look under the hood and learn a little bit about not only what the business does but why they do what they do. And here are these different perspectives and I think that really does resonate with people. So for anyone out there that's listening that would like to learn more, maybe we just raise some awareness. Maybe somebody has been staring at their ceiling for the last three years and the big water spot. It just didn't occur to them that they might have an issue If they want to reach out. How could they do that? How could they reach you ladies? What's the best way to get ahold of you?
Speaker 3:
Absolutely. We have a Facebook page, we have a website. Obviously, the best way to get in contact with us we're a 24 hour service, so we answer the phone all the time Giving us a call directly to our number would be best and, like I said, you know we are a 24 hour business. It doesn't matter if it's an emergency that just happened or someone is working the night shift and they just you know it's 4am and they happen to, you know need some information about our services. We are able to answer, we are able to educate.
Speaker 2:
All right, Very cool. We will throw a link in the description below to all of your contact information, so if anybody wants to reach out they will know how to find you. Kayla Joanna, pleasure meeting you.
Speaker 4:
It's a pleasure meeting you as well. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2:
Thanks for coming on the show and thanks, as always, to our listeners for tuning in, and we will catch everyone next time, on the next episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast. Take care, have a wonderful day.
Speaker 3:
Have a good day, bye bye.
Speaker 1:
Thanks for listening to the good neighbor podcast cooper city. To nominate your favorite local business to be featured on the, that's GNPCooperCitycom, or call 954-231-3170.
