Today we’d like to introduce you to Kristina Molina and Guillermo Santoyo.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Kristina and Guillermo. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
(Kristina Molina): I was always interested in art ever since I was a little girl. Right out of high school, I was hired at a screen printing and embroidery shop and quickly fell in love with the embroidery side of the business. I was so excited about embroidery that I quickly developed my skills to digitize (converting artwork into embroidery) designs. The owners of the company treated me like family and I am so grateful of everything I learned and for the five years that I was with them.
I took a higher paying job as a graphic designer and marketer for a corporate company but soon realized my passion was in embroidery. At the age of 24, I set out to start my own embroidery business but realize I needed financial help to get it started. Thankfully, my now husband, mother and sister all pitched in and helped me buy my first embroidery machine. Because of the years of experience digitizing, the quality of my embroidery was beautiful and clients quickly spread the word for me and soon found myself feeling overwhelmed juggling a full-time job, my side business and time with my boyfriend (now husband)/family.
(Guillermo Santoyo): During this time that my wife (Kristina) was starting her business, I was barely finishing up my pre-requisites before I applied to optometry school and since I worked in the medical field I would always ask doctors for advice as far as pay vs. loan debt ratio. My passion was always working with people and customer service since I had always been in sales and somehow I had come up with the idea of opening an optical store when I finished school and start an awesome business and take off but I was misinformed. Although I did well in school my heart was never in it because I always wanted to be in business and work with people. A close doctor/friend told me that nearly 90% of doctors are in debt and that if his father didn’t own an optical store and the military wouldn’t have paid his loans he would have never become a doctor because the debt is extremely high.
I was astonished and grateful for his words, I knew I would someday marry Kristina and I didn’t want to go into marriage bringing nothing but debt plus my passion was always selling so I made a deal with her and said if in one year I can’t double your sales then I will stop working with you and go back to medical school. I quit school cold turkey once I had her blessing. My mother was not happy with the idea of me quitting school but Kristina and I were always a team and we trusted each other and believed in our abilities. I started driving around going from business to business selling her high-quality work and our great customer service and we were having so much fun doing it. We quickly outgrew her parent’s small home office and moved the business into her parent’s garage. Before we knew it, we were crammed in a two car garage with machines, boxes and orders everywhere not to mention no AC. The garage would no longer do so we set out to find our first storefront which is where we are to this day rocking it out and having fun helping everyone get their business branded.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
For the most part, it has been smooth because we’ve always taken calculated risks and never tried to rush the growing process. There were times where business was slow like for example after Harvey but we ride the lows and enjoy the highs when we can.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the KM Grafix story. Tell us more about the business.
Here at KM Grafix we do custom screen printing, embroidery and promotional products for small to large businesses, corporations, nonprofit organizations and much more. We specialize in custom embroidery because we pay attention to small details and have crisp and modern embroidery designs.
We are known for always having great communication with our clients and always keeping them updated with the status of their orders. We take pride in our customer service. Believe it or not people always call us with complaints from their current provider whether it’s about not receiving a follow-up call, not getting their orders on time, or just plain not receiving what they were promised.
We call all of our clients in a prompt and timely manner which makes a world of a difference in getting their orders on time.
You will find print shops throughout Houston but we take pride in our customer service, work and we always deliver on our due dates and appreciate everyone of our awesome clients.
Has luck played a meaningful role in your life and business?
We consider ourselves pretty lucky for the most part. We are fortunate to have such a smooth and awesome relationship as teammates in life and in business. We are constantly looking to better ourselves in all aspects. Whenever we think we have a streak of bad luck we stay positive although it’s hard sometimes we know it will pass.
Contact Info:
- Address: 13211 Stafford Rd. STE 100
Missouri City, TX 77489 - Website: www.KMGrafixTX.com
- Phone: 832-330-1714
- Email: EMB@KMGrafixTX.com
- Instagram: kmgrafix
- Facebook: facebook.com/kmgrafix
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