Banking on KC – Stephanie Sage of Sage Restoration
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Kelly Scanlon:
Welcome to Banking on KC. I'm your host, Kelly Scanlon. Thank you for joining us. With us on this episode is Stephanie Sage, the founder and CEO of Sage Restoration. Welcome, Stephanie.
Stephanie Sage:
Thank you for having me. Excited to be here.
Kelly Scanlon:
You're in a really interesting industry, restoration service. Tell us about what inspired that entrepreneurial leap.
Stephanie Sage:
Well, I was back in the mortgage industry from about 2004 to about 2009, and as we all know, the economy went in the tank, and found myself selling high interest title loans for a corporate company. It just wasn't where I wanted to be, and Alan was in the corporate world, and so I went-
Kelly Scanlon:
Your husband, Alan?
Stephanie Sage:
Yeah, Alan is my husband, Alan Sage, also co-founder of Sage Restoration. I went to him and I said, "We got to quit being sitting ducks here because we just have to go out." I've always had an entrepreneurial spirit. Then also being in the mortgage industry really primes me to work for myself because it's all commissions. So if you're not turning jobs deals, you're not making any money.
Kelly Scanlon:
You're basically running your own business.
Stephanie Sage:
Yeah. Throughout my life, I always thought about owning my own business. So we met with a business broker and looked at different options, and we decided on restoration because we liked the idea that I'd be working with property owners, which I was used to. We thought that it had really good profit margins, and then we also thought that it was recession proof, which it has proven to be. So we dived in. So we actually purchased a franchise, went to the training, and then Alan came back and kept his job in the corporate world. So we had some income coming in the door, and then I basically came back and hit the streets, making sales calls. It was a huge learning curve, to say the very least.
Kelly Scanlon:
So what were some of the challenges you had? What were some of the learning experiences that really created a foundation for you to grow after that?
Stephanie Sage:
Well, it's really a male dominated industry. In the training, I was the only woman there. I had never worked in that industry whatsoever. It's very physically demanding. That's why I jokingly call myself Pioneer Woman. So I look back now and I'm like, really, I had a huge feat in front of me. The odds were truly against our success. But I just came back, hit the ground, making sales calls, and we did not have an in into the insurance industry, so insurance work was really hard to come by. Franchise promised that they would get us work, but that just wasn't happening.
Kelly Scanlon:
When we talk about restoration services, what are you talking about specifically? I know you've changed your niche over time, but back then, what were you dealing with? What sorts of services were you providing?
Stephanie Sage:
We were supposed to deal with the insurance industry, with water damage, flooded homes, flooded buildings, fire damage, but also was a lot of mold remediation, hoarding type of cleanups, odor control, like cigarette smoke, maybe animal, pet waste. Because I didn't have an in to the insurance industry, and I did start calling on insurance agents, but it's hard to break into that because we had some big corporate competition that had a huge foothold in the industry.
So how we actually survived was I started calling on realtors in the very beginning, and I just clicked with them. I had a background in doing loans, so I understood where they were coming from. I understood the mindset that if they didn't close a deal and I didn't make improvements to a house that they needed to turn and get it closed on, they weren't going to make any money. So I fully understood that. Back in the beginning, we did a lot of mold remediation, a lot of odor control, like somebody that had a house that had a lot of cigarette smoke damage, things like that. Then eventually we started getting water work from realtors as well, and we still get a lot of work from realtors to this day, although we have transitioned to more of insurance-based type of work.
Kelly Scanlon:
So you did finally get your foothold with the insurance companies, and how did that finally happen? Had you been in business long enough that the name was becoming more familiar so the introductions were easier?
Stephanie Sage:
Being new to the market and Kansas City, and being a woman-owned restoration contractor, I had to get out there and really prove myself that I could do the work. In the beginning, I did do the work myself. I picture myself in a Tyvek suit up in an attic in July. There were long days back then, and I hired a few people to come on board and help me out. So yeah, I did the work, and then we transitioned and just started building our reputation in Kansas City. We were able to eventually get onto what's called in our industry, TPAs, third-party administrators, and they're basically like a middleman for insurance carriers. Then they promise that they will control cost on claims, and then they find restoration companies like Sage Restoration or even the big corporate chains to sign up as a vendor with them.
Kelly Scanlon:
Your husband, Alan, eventually joined, been a couple of years. He did quit Corporate America and joined you full time, right?
Stephanie Sage:
Yes. He came on board with me, and that really helped us expand because I didn't have to go make sales calls, get on the job, which would maybe take a week or two depending on the type of work we were doing.
Kelly Scanlon:
You have to start sales calls again.
Stephanie Sage:
Yeah, exactly. So he went out and started. We shared duties and then we had to find what each of us was best at and make the most of it. So that's really where we started to really take off.
Kelly Scanlon:
Complementing each other like that. Then you were able, as you said, you'd hired a few people, but you grew even more. I'd imagine with the insurance work, you had to ramp up even further.
Stephanie Sage:
Yes. Then we just kept on adding people on. Then we won 25 Under 25, which was a huge milestone for us. We were really proud of that. Then in 2016, our son Connor came on board with us full time. He got out of high school about 2014 and went to KU for a couple of years. One day he called me up and said, "You know what? I think I want to come learn the family business." So he came on board, worked for us full time. We made him start at the bottom as a technician. He had to work his way up to a lead, to a project manager. Then now he's really grown and turned into a true leader for our company and is going to take the company into the future.
Kelly Scanlon:
You are a family-owned business, you and your husband, now your son. How has that influenced the company culture and also its operations?
Stephanie Sage:
Working with family is a challenge all in itself, especially working with your spouse. It can definitely have challenges. I think we do really well. We have really dissected what each of us is best at, and that takes a learning curve over time. Being a family-owned business, a lot of people in the community respect that, especially being a woman-owned business as well. I think people like working with local family-owned businesses, so I think that has served us well.
Kelly Scanlon:
You've talked about the insurance companies and getting that insurance work, which contributed greatly to your growth, but what other strategies have been effective for you over the years in growing Sage Restoration?
Stephanie Sage:
What's really been effective is Connor has really got in there and took over business development, and he's been very successful at getting into the commercial market. So we still want our residential work, but we also want to get in there and do a lot more commercial works, work with property managers, property management companies, et cetera. We have really grown that area of our business in the last three or four years. Anything can happen in a commercial building, mostly it's going to be water damage. But now we also do repairs. We got into reconstruction, and we really took that stride in the last couple of years. We get a lot of work, especially in the commercial sector with repairs, fire damage, or we also go in and repair houses that have extreme fire damage. That has really grown our business this year and scaled us in a big way.
Kelly Scanlon:
Have there been any innovations in the restoration industry that have allowed you to work faster or better?
Stephanie Sage:
One thing that we started using probably about five years ago maybe is called Matterport. What it is, it's a camera that you go into a commercial building or a home and you set it down and literally it does a videotape of the home and measures every little thing in the house and documents whatever's in that room, in the house, et cetera. Because traditionally when we would have a house fire, our project manager has to go in and literally sketch every single room and all the measurements, take pictures of every room. It's very, very, very time-consuming to say the least. Think about your own home, three or 4,000 square feet, and if you had to go in and literally take pictures of everything, sketch it. I was terrible at sketching, by the way. It's pretty difficult if you're not very artsy.
Kelly Scanlon:
Definitely a skill, to get all the proportions right.
Stephanie Sage:
Yeah. Or even on a small water job, you have to go in and sketch out that finished basement or just one room or whatever room is flooded, and literally create a picture because that's how you do your pricing in your estimating is based on that. So that is a huge advantage to have a Matterport. This also comes in handy too when you're working with adjusters, because they don't have to go in and do all that sketch themselves. You can just send that to them. So that helps you communicate and get in with adjusters as well.
Kelly Scanlon:
So what have you found most rewarding about Sage Restoration personally? Then with the kind of work that you're in, you've seen it all, I bet. So what are some of your most memorable moments as well?
Stephanie Sage:
I think the most memorable moments are just when you see people so happy that you're there to help them out in a critical situation, especially a fire. People are just shell shocked when they're either at home or they come in and they find out that their house started on fire and they've lost a lot of belongings. They're out of their home. They're just truly distressed because that's your safe place. Because a lot of people say, why do you do what you do? It's messy, it's dirty, et cetera.
But we're like, well, you have to have the right mindset because it's about helping people at one of their worst times in their entire lives. We've had many people that have called us where they come home from vacation and they pull in their garage and water's pouring out, or they walk in and their ceilings are falling in, and that's pretty devastating. Then they're like, where do we go from here?
I always tell people, you're glad that you called us, but then you're glad to see us go because that means your life's back on track. Or we have situations we've helped people that are living in horrible conditions like hoarders or houses full of mold that are just totally unhealthy. So we're all about helping people get their lives back on track again.
Kelly Scanlon:
So what lessons have you learned on your entrepreneurial journey that you think other listeners who are entrepreneurs or aspiring entrepreneurs might benefit from?
Stephanie Sage:
You have to believe in what you do and that you have to believe in yourself. Because I look back as a woman in a new industry with a huge learning curve ahead of me, knew nothing about what I was doing, epitome of fake it until you make it, I guess.
Kelly Scanlon:
True. It's true of so many entrepreneurs.
Stephanie Sage:
Yes, exactly. I learned to believe in myself, and I could tell some stories where I didn't get jobs because I didn't have the experience or somebody didn't believe in my abilities. But for me, I learned early on that you have to believe in yourself even when other people don't, and don't give up on your dream and don't give up on your belief in what you can accomplish. So I can think of one experience specifically where I was going to be on my first job in an attic, and it was in the middle of July, probably one of the hottest days of the year.
I was going to be working with a product we commonly use when we clean for mold or also fire as well. So it's called Serum 1000, and it's a 22% hydrogen peroxide product. It cleans like a miracle, but if you breathe it in or you get it on your skin, it will burn your skin. Not literally burn it, but it's itchy and it's uncomfortable, and you have to be in full Tyvek, full face respirator.
I had the guy who was selling that product in our area, he was going to be with me to train me on using the product, and later he admitted that he was chuckling to himself that I would never last. Later he thought it was funny that I actually did last the whole day. It's very hot. Those Tyvek suits don't breathe. You are climbing up through usually a little square opening in somebody's garage or a closet, and you've got to get a sprayer up in there. So you're up there like balancing on rafters in a Tyvek suit, full face respirator, sweating like crazy, holding either a HEPA vacuum on your back and your arms are up, your shoulders are killing you, and you're HEPA vacuuming a whole attic, and then you have to spray it down with this Serum 1000. So you're trailing an airless sprayer behind you. So yeah, it's no small feat. Definitely, it is a challenge. So I did succeed that day and proved myself.
Kelly Scanlon:
You learned that day really what you were made of, and so you knew you could face anything, you got through that day.
Stephanie Sage:
Yeah, although I will admit that I was up there thinking, I don't know any of my girlfriends that would be up here. What am I doing? But I'm just a person that I persevere, I just do what I have to do. I learned a lot that day. I've done a lot of tough work, and it's exhausting. That's also why we appreciate our employees. I understand, because I've been out there, I've done it. I understand the hard physical work that it takes to go in and extract the water from somebody's basement. Sometimes you have to remove the carpet and pad, and then you have to bring in heavy drying equipment to reduce the humidity levels and dry their area out so they don't get mold.
Kelly Scanlon:
When you say you're full service, you not only come in and provide the actual service, but you have to also play that role of being the empathizer. It is a 360 relationship that you have to have the physical property as well as really making them whole again, emotionally after, as you said, in their safe place, they've been devastated.
Stephanie Sage:
I'll give you a story. This is a perfect story how I started branding Sage Restoration, which relates to what you were just talking about. One day I got a call that one of our competitors got kicked off of a job because they came in, just took over this lady's house, started dragging in equipment, going to work, and didn't take any time to talk to her apparently. So she got upset, said, "You're done." Then I think it was, she called her insurance agent, I don't remember. Then they called us.
So when I heard that story, I thought, well, that's totally not the way I do business. We call it the Sage way. I like to go in and we talk to the customer, see what's going on, and then take a look at the situation, and then we explain what we're going to do, why we're going to do it, or why we have to do it. At least put their mind at ease. Because when you're in somebody's home, we take that really seriously. That's their safe place, that's their domain, and you're a stranger waltzing right into their house. We try to be polite and respectful, but just really take time for the customer. That's how I branded we approach every job with a sense of urgency, because that's the business we're in. Also combined with care and compassion.
Kelly Scanlon:
As you've said, through your entrepreneurial journey, you have learned to never give up and your situation in the attic just really cemented that for you. Then also just the compassion and the care and the urgency that you need to show customers. It's a different kind of customer service than maybe a retail store has to offer, but customers and being empathetic to their situation, are other good lessons for all of us.
Stephanie Sage:
Yeah. To add on that, because we've recently expanded into content cleaning and textiles over the last several years, which is why we had to move, what, three times in three years?
Kelly Scanlon:
We've moved a lot. Yes.
Stephanie Sage:
Because we need space. But when somebody has a house fire, or even with the recent flooded pipes in January, a lot of times ceilings fall in, everything in their house is wet, and we have to move everything out of the house, even sometimes in extreme water damage. So we take your belongings to our warehouse, so their stuff just disappears in their eyes. It's gone. We understand that that's a little scary for people. So it takes a lot of communication, letting them know that their belongings are in safe care and that we're cleaning them, or we have to dispose of them, what have you. Then we store them, then we have to move them back. So it's just a lot of handholding a lot of times because people are afraid.
Kelly Scanlon:
Expanding into the textiles was a natural outgrowth of something that you saw was a need.
Stephanie Sage:
Well, we also saw it as a way to really truly be a full-service provider, because traditionally in the restoration industry, let's just say you had a house fire. So what's going to happen normally is the adjuster's going to meet with you, and then they're going to call in somebody to come in and get all of your textiles. So they come in and get all your drapes, your clothing, rugs, et cetera, and off your stuff goes with a contractor. Then another contractor would come in and get all of your furniture, dishes, contents, and off they go. Then they call in another contractor that does the mitigation, which is the cleanup, removal of the soot, smoke, et cetera.
Kelly Scanlon:
Which is where you normally work.
Stephanie Sage:
Right, that's the space we were in traditionally. Then they come in with the company that does repairs. So you're working with, what, four different contractors.
Kelly Scanlon:
Trying to keep track of it all.
Stephanie Sage:
Right, and where is my stuff? Who's doing it? Plus the insurance carrier is dealing with four or five different contractors. So we have expanded to the point where you just have to make one phone call to Sage Restoration, and we can do it all. So you know who's handling everything. One company. So it's one phone call to one project manager. It helps out, I think, the insurance carriers too, so people don't realize that you could possibly be dealing with that many different contractors
Kelly Scanlon:
Streamlines the whole process for the homeowner or the building owner. Looking ahead, what are your plans for Sage Restoration? You've had so much change. You've mentioned some of the areas you've expanded into more recently, you've moved three times in the last few years, so you might just be wanting to just take a breather. But as you look ahead, your son Connor has joined now and is really making an impact. What are your plans for the next several years, and how do you envision where the company's headed?
Stephanie Sage:
Our vision right now is, well, we feel like we're very poised right now and positioned to carry on and continue expanding because we have all of our resources. We have the appropriate size building. We had to set up a whole fire line system to clean dishes. We have a whole laundry area set up. That was a huge undertaking a couple of years ago to get all of that set up. So we are definitely poised to continue scaling our goal into the future, to continue taking on more market share, more insurance work, and more importantly, we've really expanded into the commercial space.
Kelly Scanlon:
When you say you are scaling, not only in the services, but do you see a geographic scaling as well, are you going to cover more territory perhaps?
Stephanie Sage:
Yeah. That's another one of, especially Connor's goals, is to become more of a regional provider. We recently just worked down in Springfield. We've been up in the Omaha and Des Moines area, and Wichita, of course.
Kelly Scanlon:
Well, Stephanie, thank you for coming in and sharing your story, some of your entrepreneurial wisdom and insights from someone who really started with nothing and has built it to, like you say, a well-respected brand here in the Kansas City area, and now into other areas as well. So, thank you so much. We appreciate it. Well, thank
Stephanie Sage:
You so much for having me. It's been a lot of fun.
Joe Close:
This is Joe Close, president of Country Club Bank. Thank you to Stephanie Sage for being our guest on this episode of Banking on KC. Stephanie's journey from the mortgage industry to founding Sage Restoration is a classic family business story, also involving her husband and now her son. Along the way, Stephanie overcame challenges in a male-dominated field, embraced new avenues of business, and adopted time and cost-saving innovations. Her story of perseverance, growth, and commitment to helping others during their toughest times exemplifies the care and respect for customers that is at the heart of any entrepreneur's success. At Country Club Bank, we believe in supporting local businesses that put it all on the line to make a difference. Thanks for tuning in this week. We're banking on you, Kansas City. Country Club Bank member FDIC.