Good Neighbor Podcast for the Greater Chattanooga Region

Roberto Infante of TyGrig Garage Doors: A Story of Faith, Resilience, and Community

August 22, 2024 • Scott Howell

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Have you ever wondered how a journey of faith, resilience, and love could shape a successful business? Roberto Infante, the dynamic entrepreneur behind TyGrig Garage Doors, joins us to share his remarkable story. From his roots in Ukraine, a marriage to his Colombian wife Vanessa, and a memorable trip to Chattanooga that changed his life, Roberto’s path is anything but ordinary. His journey through various countries and states eventually led him to establish a thriving garage door company in Jacksonville, Florida. Now settled in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Roberto opens up about the incredible support from his family, including his father and in-laws, as they adapt to their vibrant new community.

In this heartfelt episode, Roberto delves into the life-altering moments that shaped him, including the deeply personal loss of his first son during the second trimester. This tragedy propelled him and his wife into a year of dedicated ministry work in Chattanooga, fostering a profound connection to faith and community. Discover how this period of healing and reflection inspired them to launch TyGrig Garage Doors, an acronym for "Thank You God," underscoring their gratitude and belief in divine support. Roberto's commitment to excellence is evident in the services his company provides, from installations to urgent repairs, all while emphasizing the importance of supporting local businesses. Listen in and be inspired by a story of resilience, faith, and unwavering pursuit of dreams.

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Speaker 1:

This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Scott Howell.

Speaker 2:

Hello Good Neighbors. Welcome to the Good Neighbor Podcast of the greater Chattanooga area. My name is Scott Howell. I'm with the Friends and Neighbors Group who host this program. You know a lot of people ask us what is the theme of the Good Neighbor podcast? Well, the theme is that we want to bring awareness to the residents living in our communities regarding the locally owned and operated businesses in those same communities in the entire region. You know, small businesses are the backbone of our communities. Our communities were built on the backs of these small businesses and we don't want to forget them. They need our support and you know, every local business has a story to tell and at the Good Neighbor Podcast we just want to help them, shout it loud and proud to all you neighbors out there so you can know who's available to help you when you have these needs. And today we've got one of our good neighbors with us, mr Roberto Infante at Tigrig Garage Doors. Roberto, thanks for being on the show with us, buddy.

Speaker 3:

It's an honor to be here, scott. I very much appreciate what you do. I have listened to a couple of the shows and I've seen actually a lot of friends up there. I just finished listening to the Harley Green episode that you had a couple days ago with him and it's a blessing to be a part of it. Thank you, you know Harley, I know Harley. We were actually in Columbia at the same time two weeks ago. He was down in one town and I was just three hours away and we missed each other by one day.

Speaker 2:

That's what he was telling me. Yeah, he was telling me they're in Columbia right now, living abroad. He called it, so congratulations to him. I'm glad he can do that, yeah.

Speaker 3:

Hey, you can do podcasts from Columbia too. I'll set you up up there. Is that where you're from? My wife is from over there. I was born in Ukraine and my family mostly comes from Ukraine and Cuba, but I'm married into the Colombian country, I guess.

Speaker 2:

Colombian country. All right, well, roberto, since we're both here in the United States right now, we're here to talk about garage doors, and but before we jump into talking about the business, I wanted to give you an opportunity, if you'd like to, to talk about yourself and your family. Just kind of tell us about yourself.

Speaker 3:

I think I'm a pretty boring guy, but I do, however, think that God has used me to do some pretty cool things. I think he's placed me in different situations where not a lot of people have been in them and, if nothing else, I have gotten a lot of knowledge and learned a lot of things the hard way. But I have experiences under my belt and, yeah, I do praise God for that. But we can start with my family. They're in ministry. My dad was a pastor, is a pastor in Florida, so that means we moved around about every five years, and I'm talking about from Ukraine to Argentina, from Argentina to Miami. We've been in Texas, california, so that kept things interesting. Yeah, there's nothing else.

Speaker 2:

And you said you married a girl from Columbia. So what's your wife's name?

Speaker 3:

There's nothing else.

Speaker 2:

And you said you married a girl from Columbia.

Speaker 3:

So what's your wife's name? Her name's Vanessa, vanessa, infante.

Speaker 2:

All right, you tell Vanessa that we're glad to have her here and glad to have you here on the show today. And so, now that you've told us a little about your family, would you dive in and tell us about Tigray Garage Doors, what you do for the public, what you offer. Tell us about yourray Garage Doors, what you do for the public, what you offer. Tell us about your journey, how you got involved in this business.

Speaker 3:

Long story short, we started the company in Jacksonville, florida, about three years back and we had a passing in the family and decided to change man, make a change in our life, be in in a new area, and one of the places we absolutely fell in love with while doing a 30 30 day cross-country trip was chattanooga. We actually got started one of those uh, blizzard, quote-unquote blizzards here. We were at the top of signal mountain, I think two, three years ago, and, uh, they shut everything down. We couldn't go down the mountain, we didn't have a hotel, so we just stayed at the top of the mountain at the parking lot of a Baptist church.

Speaker 3:

But for some reason we just absolutely fell in love with the whole everything that happened. You know, sleeping in the car, having the dog with us I think it snowed like two inches and the dog had never seen snow so he wouldn't go potty outside. It was a whole mess. But something about everything that happened made us fall in love with Chattanooga. So out of the 30 days we probably spent five to six days here. We should have just been driving through and once the time came to relocate, we we chose chattanooga as our, our place to call home oh, that's awesome man.

Speaker 2:

That's a good story. Sorry about you getting stuck in the blues, but the dog wouldn't. It wouldn't go outside and pee. But you know I've got one.

Speaker 3:

Sometimes he can be pretty finicky yeah I get it well, we'll get to get a new car after that trip, so I'll leave it at that, oh well all right, oh my goodness, well, uh, so what?

Speaker 2:

what is what brought you? You said you were in the business already, so you just transferred it up here. Uh, who all came with you?

Speaker 3:

so it started, just my wife and I uh, sadly she's with me, um, so she had to come up here and uh move with me and uh. But now my father and father-in-laws, uh, they came up here too, father and mother-in-law, and we're probably couldn't be expecting my parents and probably my sister soon. Little by little, I think they're trying to follow us, but we'll see. We'll see if they'll make it up.

Speaker 2:

Keep family together close. You know, it was nice to it was nice to be close to family during that pandemic time when everything shut down. So nothing wrong with that, as long as everybody just stays in their lane right.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, high fences make good family, oh something like that, oh my goodness.

Speaker 2:

Well, you know, when it comes to garage doors, you know we all think we pretty much kind of probably know what garage doors are all about. Right, if you got a garage, you got a door on it. But tell us about what's unique about your company. What do you offer and what do you do for folks that you feel like they need to know about?

Speaker 3:

One of my friends. She asked me and another garage store owner side by side, and she asked us that question in front of probably like 50 people and I was at a loss for words. I said, hey, I'm probably better looking than him and that's about it. But what makes us different? I think it's our customer service. We, we take pride in sitting down with the customer. It doesn't matter if it's two, three trips, we'll sit down.

Speaker 3:

The garage stores make a huge, is a huge percentage of what everyone sees from the road. It's a huge curb appeal and if it's something that looks bad, old, it's going to very much appreciate the look of the house. The whole neighborhood is going to look bad. So we take pride in not just replacing garage doors but replacing them with something unique, something that's different. Not is it just going to raise the value of the house, but it's going to be more efficient. We install insulated doors. We can install doors that have all the gadgets that you would need to be able to hook up to your security system, to your computer, your Wi-Fi network, whatever the client wants. We have made very strong partnerships with different manufacturers to supply that need, for the simple reason that we're not about garage doors. That's just a vehicle that we use. Our job is about customer service and providing that above all customer service to our customers here, specifically in Ottawa and Chattanooga, cleveland area.

Speaker 2:

You know, that's something that you just said is something that every business owner, that we all need to learn that what we do is just a product, but what we offer is good customer service, because if we don't offer good customer service, you won't be offering a product who we?

Speaker 2:

but what we offer is good customer service, because if we don't offer good customer service you won't be offered a product, but somewhere down the road, uh, people go somewhere else and find their product. So I totally agree. You know, uh, a garage door is is a, you know, a good investment, uh, in the house, because, but it's also something that typically isn't replaced, you know, like every other year, typically speaking. So when somebody gets a garage door, they want to make sure not only it suits their needs for long, for long-term, and you know, I remember when I purchased one, it was, it made such a difference. I got an insulated one. The old one, like you said, bought a house that had an old garage door on it, you know. So the old one wasn't insulated. The garage was hot, miserable hot, and you got the insulated door and it's still hot, don't get me wrong, because we don't air condition our garage, but it still made a huge difference in the feeling.

Speaker 3:

Makes it bearable.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and it was the biggest Watch it. Yeah, anyway, watch it. Look on the camera. Somebody you know get a little alert on my phone. It says some of the emotion detected. I can pull up a camera.

Speaker 3:

that's pretty awesome man yes, sir, and that's where we pride ourselves.

Speaker 3:

A lot of people don't realize that, especially if you have a room up on top of the garage or living spaces that are on the sides of the garage door walls or garage walls, if you have an uninsulated door, you're gonna have a very hard time controlling the the temperature in those rooms. So getting that insulated door like you did, it's fantastic, fantastic, and not only is it for the insulation factor. I've gotten to customers' houses, just like a couple of days ago, where they made the big investment 14 years ago. But they made that investment on a good, solid steel back insulated door. There was absolutely nothing that I had to change on the panels, it was just in the springs, the rollers and the cables and they had a door that worked, oh and, and we did replace a motor and that door worked better than it did brand-new. So when you make the right choice the first time, it's gonna go off time and time again that's a good point, and I didn't know about tiger doors when I bought mine.

Speaker 3:

It's okay, I won't hold it against you.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, I appreciate that. But you know customer service is key when you have a problem, you know not having to wait a month or two months for somebody to come out. You make a call that you have very efficient service, people able to get out there in a timely manner. Uh, it means something to you, you know. Yes, uh, I've known people that your garage door broke and they couldn't even get them out of the car. They couldn't even get their car out of the garage man, they needed somebody, like now, you know, uh, so so it's that customer service is very important. Yes, sir.

Speaker 3:

And we are able to see I know a lot of the people that have been in this industry for 15, 20, 25 years in this area and you tell that those that focus more on the product rather than the customer service, they seem worn down, they seem worn out and they started hating the industry out and they started hating the industry. But those that focus on the other side of the coin, which is, in my opinion, the most important side customer service they absolutely love their job, going to work every day. It's something completely different. We were just in Vegas a couple of weeks ago visiting a store that sells shoes it's called Sapo's but their big thing is they wrote a couple books talking about the power of wow and wowing your customers, and that just means going above any expectations that they would have had for your service. So we're trying to bring that same mentality here into our business and doing that same thing for our community here, starting in Ottawa and then reaching all of Chattanooga, all of Cleveland.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely. Yeah, that's great, so you do service the entire Chattanooga region.

Speaker 3:

Yes, sir, yes sir Okay. All right, we've gone as far up as Dunlap and that's just because the mom of one of our customers was up there. So we'll go up there and service. And then she refers us to their neighbor. And but we're trying very hard to stay here in Ottawa. There's more than enough homes here to to keep us growing, keep us happy. But we will service all our surrounding areas. Yes, sir absolutely yeah.

Speaker 2:

Well, if, if, uh, like you said, when you take care of somebody and you do a good job, they don't care to tell you, their friends about you, you know. So that's, that's a good testament that you must have done something right for them to tell you, tell their neighbor about you, you know yeah.

Speaker 1:

It matters Hopefully.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, hopefully. So tell me something. Here you are, you're a young man, you got your wife, you're in Chattanooga, I think you said y'all came about three years ago, so you know what's available to do here when you're not working. What do y'all do for fun?

Speaker 3:

So we all right. I'm very involved in our sports here in Ottawa. So there's a college community church right there by Four Corners. I play volleyball there every Monday and Tuesday. So Wednesdays and Thursdays is pickleball night. So, sadly, yeah, I never spend time at the house that I pay so much for, but I'm always out and doing something. I'll go crazy if I'm at the house. So we'll go hiking, and this is a great area to find hiking trails all over the place. Pickleball sports, volleyball that's what I'm mostly into, something that would absolutely take all my mind away from the day-to-day business, day-to-day grind, and just have fun. So sports does that for us.

Speaker 2:

Is your wife involved in sports with you too usually?

Speaker 3:

It was until we had a baby about five months ago.

Speaker 1:

So, that's about all the sports she can handle right now.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's a she's only her degree in athletics. Chasing after the baby, right.

Speaker 3:

Oh, yes, sir, Thank you. I think she's gained more muscles and more biceps. I mean that baby's five months old and he's 20 something pounds. I'm amazed. We went up in Columbia. There's this big rock that has 750 staircases, or just steps going up, and she carried the baby the whole way up because we said she wouldn't be able to. And she proved this wrong, wrong, like many times she does 750 steps yes, sir, yeah that kind of woman deal with me, so yeah, good for her.

Speaker 2:

Sounds like you better just watch that right hook Roberto yes, sir, yes sir, I'm cooking, I'm cleaning, yeah, well, that's, that's awesome.

Speaker 2:

That's awesome. You know, a lot of times guys don't help their wives out, so so kudos to you too for doing that. Roberto, you know it sounds like to me y'all y'all suffered a big loss when you lost a family member jacksonville and you decided to do something different. And I don't want to get into anything that's too personal, but can you, can you share with us a maybe a life challenge or something that you've endured and went through and, looking back now that you can see that you're stronger or better for it?

Speaker 3:

yes, and I think we could use that same. What happened there? And the thing is that we lost our son, our first son, at the end of the second trimester. We had to do an emergency C-section and going from it being the first grandchild of the family on both sides to now that big loss Not only that loss, but one thing is for the guy. For the guy it could be tough, but for the mother it's a whole different ballgame. She suffers through all that and still there's nothing to reward her. We just needed to get out of there and within like two weeks after her C-section, we were hitting the road to Chattanooga just to clear our mindset.

Speaker 3:

Now, the good thing, the silver lining in this, is that we came to Chattanooga to be involved with a ministry for a year. So for a whole year we took no payment whatsoever. It was just working for the ministry and God provided. We had little savings and we lived off of it for 12 months and God just provided for absolutely everything you could imagine. And that's when I realized that, hey, you're thinking way too small. You need to think bigger. God has your back. Look, you've been here 12 months and God has covered absolutely every single thing that you could imagine. We were able to make the car payments, we were able to put food on the table. I lived as carefully as I could possibly be and I realized that most of the fears that I had about letting go and jumping into something bigger were because I was scared about the small things, the essential the food, the rent, the house, the car. And in that year I learned that, hey, you have a big God, that for some reason he cares for you. He's going to cover all those things. So, think bigger. You know, take a chance, go bigger and don't let fear limit what you can do.

Speaker 3:

And now we're bringing that into the business. We've only been open since September, where our 12 months kind of ended our sabbatical. And in these past couple months I mean, if you compare us to many of the other companies, especially our size, or just the next level up, especially our size, or just the next level up God, with God's blessing and with us continuing doing the work that we are, I believe we're going to be in a much better spot two, three years down the line than companies 10, 15 years old. And this is not a competition, this is a hey.

Speaker 3:

I proved in my life and God has proved that he's going to be there for me. So if I know my dad's my father's like that, I'm going to go out and I'm going to do everything I can to kill it, and God's going to have my back. And that's why we're able to offer that extra kind of service that nobody else can, because we can stick our necks out, not because our service will necessarily back it up, but our values, who we believe in and the pride in the work that we do. I feel that God is going to reward all that a year down the line. And that's how we're building this business, where yeah, we'll get into the name later. I know you wanted to ask about that, but even the name has something big to do with it and it kind of shows where we come from and where we want to go with this company.

Speaker 2:

It sounds like it's good timing. Just go ahead and talk about that now.

Speaker 3:

So my last name is Infante. I didn't think that Infante Garage Doors was going to be too successful, so I was like, hey, we need something that sounds white and sounds professional. Tigrig is actually an acronym. It's for thank you God. So the T-Y-E thank you God, and then the last three letters in lowercase are my initials. Last three letters in lowercase are my initials, and I think it's about uh, it shows what we're building with the company, where we accept the name of god first and then we're just like this, the miniature player that is just there as support and we just want to be the instrument that god uses. Um, and thankfully, within the the past couple months, we've been able to attract people to our business and to our lives that share that same kind of commitment for our community, for our customers here in Chattanooga area, and I think that, god willing, we'll be able to make a big impact here.

Speaker 2:

I love that. I love that. Thank you, God being first, I've looked at your name and tried to figure out where it came from. I have. I'll be honest with you, Thank you God. That's awesome man that's really awesome.

Speaker 3:

So many people call me Ty.

Speaker 2:

I'm like all right, let's just tie this tie that no, my name's Roberto. Aka Ty.

Speaker 3:

We'll go with it.

Speaker 2:

When you said you needed a name that sounded white. I liked it. That's great. Oh, my goodness, that's funny. Oh goodness that's funny, that's funny. Oh well, so you know, you shared so much with us from your journey. You know things. You've went through building the business, what it means to you, customer service. I just want to ask you if there was one thing that you wish that our listeners knew about the heart of Roberto Infante and Tigrid garage doors, the heart of the business. But they probably wouldn't know it unless you shared it with them and you'd like to just tell it loud and proud here today on the good and never podcast. What would that be?

Speaker 3:

We want to create a business that is a blessing to our community and also a blessing to those that work for us. A lot of times I think, many people it's easy for them to say that, hey, we help out in this, we give to this charity, we do this, we do that, it's you know, and they're basically exploiting their, their employees, they're giving off of the backs of their, of the people that are working for them. I think that we take pride in that we take care of our employees where it's customers and our employees are the most important thing, and actually we believe that if we take care of our employees first, they'll be able to pass that blessing down to the customers first they'll be able to pass that blessing down to the customers. We have seen that. We have seen our employees go the extra mile, because that's the kind of culture that we have created within our company.

Speaker 3:

I think that a lot of people won't notice that. I think that unless we talk about it here, or unless one of them talks about it later, nobody else our customers wouldn't see that, unless, I guess, our employees go the extra mile for them and kind of show them that. But we do take care of our employees, because garage stores is a hard industry and it's a dangerous one too, and we need to make sure that everyone's winning. I think it's fake to say that, hey, we're going to be a blessing to our community and have our employees worrying about, hey, where are they going to pay their bills from? Where are they going to get this? They're going to get that. So I think there's more than enough business and profit for everybody to win, and I do believe that God will repay that.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I agree with one thing you said I was thinking it before you said it that a really happy employee, a happy and content employee, will project that when they go to a customer's house. They'll project that because they want to do a good job. They want to keep that relationship between you and them good and they want to do a really good job. So if there is a call, the call will hopefully be man. Those guys were awesome Rather than man. They did a crap job over here for us. You know they don't want to hear that, so they're trying their best to step out and please you so they can keep that relationship well, and you know so. I think that you'll reap great benefits from that kind of attitude. Roberto, I really do, and thanks for sharing your heart with us, and I want to give you an opportunity now to just tell us where we can find out more about you and how we can contact you, whether online or offline.

Speaker 3:

So tygrigcom, t-y-g-r-i-gcom. Through there you'll be able to go through our social medias. Uh, texas, the main phone number. It will go through our computer system and I'll get a copy of the text message. Um, you can reach out to to us by email at info at Tigriccom, and if nothing else, I drive a big white truck but one inch garage door sign. If you're anywhere near Ottawa, you have seen me here. I drink coffee every morning at the Wired Coffee Shop, so you can find me. You can find me, yeah for sure.

Speaker 2:

I've heard a lot of people talking about that Wired Coffee Shop. I love it.

Speaker 3:

One of the businesses that practice that customer service is right here and I could talk to the owner, lisa. We could probably benefit from hearing a couple of things that he has to say, but you could see it. You could absolutely see the difference. Yeah, I'm actually here right now. I'm recording in her office. So talk about customer service. I'm at the wire. I think I'll show it here. I'm at the Wired Coffee Shop, because that's just the kind of people they are.

Speaker 2:

That's awesome. That's awesome, man. Lisa, thank you because we are certainly enjoying having you on the program today. I was thinking about you, talking about Lisa. You put a bug in her ear that we've been trying to get her to do a podcast with us for a while.

Speaker 3:

Really, we've been trying.

Speaker 2:

You put a bug in her ear that we want to talk to her. Okay, I think she may be here.

Speaker 3:

I'll go get her right now, man. Yeah, we'll see, we'll do something.

Speaker 2:

All right, Well, glad to have you with us today, Roberto. Thanks for everything that you shared with us and good wishes to your continued success.

Speaker 3:

Thank you, Mr Scott.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely. And you know, to all the good neighbors of the greater Chattanooga area, after meeting Roberto and learning more about Tiger Garage Doors, I know that he hopes that you'll take a moment and consider him when you're in need of the product that he has, whether you need a new garage door or they've got one that's kind of needing service the springs and stuff or where it makes all the noises when it comes down and or don't come down like it's supposed to. You know just the, maybe the your motors went out and you're just having to do everything manually. I know he would like for you to consider what he does and what he offers. So remember him, reach out to him, find out if he can help you. And before ending this episode, I'd like to thank you all the listeners, for taking the time out of your busy day to be with us today and listen to the Good Neighbor podcast. Always remember to support the locally owned and operated businesses in the greater Chattanooga area. This is Scott Howell. Hopefully everyone goes out and makes this a remarkable day.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to GNPCclevelandcom. That's gnpclevelandcom, or call 423-380-1984.

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