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Get to know Julie Parish who slowly but steadily built her maid service and kept it running successfully for 24+ years!
Julie’s journey started in 1984 when she opened her first cleaning company. She sold it, started a new one in Dallas, Texas, shut that one down, took a break from the industry, and in 1994, restarted one in the Houston area.
She has been managing The Home Keepers in Houston since then and is ready to celebrate its 25th anniversary next year!
In this article, learn more about Julie’s journey, her ongoing search for freedom, and how ZenMaid has impacted her business.
For Julie, it all started on a whim as a result of not wanting to work for anyone else. Who can blame her?
The initial kick in the butt was delivered by her younger brother who suggested she should run a cleaning business. She instantly liked the idea and gave it a go.
At the beginning of her career, Julie took on every challenge alone. She was a single mother the majority of those years, taking care of her family and business all by herself.
“All of my children grew up with me running my maid service from home. Employees coming in and out!”
To efficiently manage both her household and her business, she had to combine the two. Her office was located inside her home and as a result, her children were used to staff coming and going, and seeing employees rush in and out of their home.
That meant that Julie found herself in a place where she didn’t have much of a home life. Looking back now, she wishes she had the technological advancements that we enjoy today during that time.
The more she started to integrate technology into her life, the more freedom she got out of the business.
Over time she has noticed that software continues to connect her with both employees and customers, consistently and conveniently.
Julie also credits technology for helping her meet other cleaning business owners like herself in online groups such as the ZenMaid Mastermind. Online industry groups are the support network she never had, and never knew she was missing.
“Thank God for technology and all the advancements and being able to stay so connected to everyone in the industry now!”
Julie found her tribe when she reached out to the Association of Residential Cleaning Services International (ARCSI) twelve years ago. Prior to that, she felt very alone in running her business.
The exchange with like-minded people showed her how important having the support of a community is for running a business. Ever since she has lived by the motto “collaboration over competition!”
Without Julie and a few select others, ZenMaid might not even exist or be where it is now! Her encouragement, kind words, and valuable input kept ZenMaid going even though initially, she was not a customer.
But that changed a few years later. Nearly four years after Amar first spoke to Julie on the phone, they finally met in person at the ARCSI Convention in Chicago.
In Chicago, she sat down with her office manager and star ZenMaid customer Roman P. (profiled in another ZenMaid case study here) to give ZenMaid another look.
Two weeks later, The Home Keepers fully moved to ZenMaid, with the help of our onboarding program provided by the team.
For the past year and a half, we have been proud to call Julie a customer and are so grateful for her continuous support of our company, our industry, and most importantly of each other.
So why didn’t Julie sign up when she first discovered ZenMaid?
In her own words:
“Now ZenMaid KNOCKS your socks off with features! When it was first getting up and running It honestly did not have very many features and I was waiting for it to be developed a little more. So glad to see the progress of Amar, Courtney, and the rest of the team :-)”
Julie didn’t feel like taking any risks, so she waited until ZenMaid was further developed. Because she now sees what ZenMaid does for her and her business, she is happy that she made the decision to use the software and she has truly become one of our most cherished members.
And, because she made the wise decision to join ZenMaid, Julie finally found the freedom she was longing for in her early years of running her maid service!
“I am not sure I can put an amount of time or money to it, but it has given me so much more flexibility to live my life and for my employees as well. It’s given us a better quality of life for sure!”
Because she likes to work at night, from home, outside or in a Starbucks, with the help of the ZenMaid software, she is able to do this.
She has the freedom to work from anywhere, even at a swim meet watching one grand baby swim while holding her other five-month-old grand kid at the same time.
Pretty cool for a lady who considers herself not tech-savvy at all!
“Amar has made me a little bit famous with our story. An honor to be a part of the ZenMaid story for sure!”
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For Julie, the benefits of using ZenMaid was not about the revenue or time numbers but the freedom it gives her for a healthy work/life balance.
Her family and the search for a better quality of life are what first kept her going in business.
She wanted to be her own boss while creating a good life for herself and her family. Nowadays, she still holds these values high.
Through her contact with ZenMaid’s co-founder Amar, she heard about the concept of digital nomadism (Amar edited and finalized this very case study from Croatia). Julie admits that to travel while working sounds pretty alluring to her and a way to take her freedom to the next level.
So we are curious to see how Julie and her business will develop in the years to come!
To conclude, we asked Julie whether she would recommend ZenMaid to another maid service owner and if so, why?
“ABSOLUTELY in a heartbeat! For all the reasons I’ve mentioned:
Freedom.
Accessibility to all my information at my fingertips – my customers, my employees, my #’s!
My employees have access to their schedule and they love it!
Another big factor and I discussed this on FB once…You can NOT get this kind of access to the owner/software engineer/programmer like you can with Amar and his AMAZING TEAM!
Amar has built a great team that represents him well. They are upfront and personal! Ready to jump in and help you with most anything.
You just can’t get someone’s “ear” like this, they really want to know what will make our lives easier and it’s their JOY to make it happen!”
Julie’s journey showed us that building a successful business does not have to be about growth and numbers.
She encouraged our efforts in building a community for maid service business owners and further develop and improve the ZenMaid software.
ZenMaid now offers Maid Service owners around the globe the freedom to focus on the things they value most in life.
Whether that is more time with family, 4-day work weeks, or going on crazy adventures like joining Amar in Thailand or Iceland! 😉
You can also connect with our team by dropping us a note at support@zenmaid.com
You and your Maid Service deserve a little peace and quiet. Sign up for your free trial today at ZenMaid.com and discover the freedom and clarity that ZenMaid can bring to your Maid Service!
