Today we’d like to introduce you to Jorge and Maricela Leiva.
Jorge and Maricela, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
We started this business with my wife Maricela in 2009, We always wanted to own our business, so we tried other things, photography keepsakes, bookkeeping office but we failed. Then we started Bee Maids a year after our second daughter was born. I was a teacher in the Houston area and my wife was working as an account executive for a food broker in the Houston area as well. We started from the ground up, she began cleaning one customer at a time and adding customers little by little. I helped on the side with quotes, website, and marketing. I also did some house cleaning while on vacation or right after I got off of work when she was really busy.
In 2014 we were about to close Bee Maids because we didn’t see any growth, we were stuck and Maricela was still cleaning (something we didn’t plan to do for so long) so we put all of our effort to make it grow within 6 months or we would close it and do something else. All that effort and sacrifice finally paid off. We began to see growth and we started getting more clients and of course hiring more cleaning technicians.
We are an award-winning cleaning service. (Best Car Graphics 2015 and best uniforms 2016) We are now part of ARCSI (Association of residential cleaning international). We also partner with Cleaning for A Reason to provide house cleaning services to women undergoing Cancer treatment absolutely Free.
At this point, we have 9 full-time employees, 8 cleaning technicians and one office manager. We expect to continue growing not only in the Katy-West Houston area but also in other areas in the Houston metropolitan area.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
It hasn’t been a smooth road at all. We have had to overpass many challenges that we didn’t expect. Our plan, for instance, was for my wife to clean for a year or so, and it didn’t happen. She had to clean for more than 5 years because we were making so many mistakes. We had lost several clients, and we had to fire employees and found ourselves cleaning again. It hasn’t been a bed of roses but we love what we do and we do it with passion every single day!
Please tell us about Bee Maids.
Bee Maids is a house cleaning company that serves Katy, Richmond, Cypress and Far West Houston that specializes in residential cleaning although we do have some small commercial accounts.
My wife Maricela is in charge of the books and quality control and I am in charge of the marketing side as well as the customer service.
I believe that besides our awesome cleaning services, we are known for our great customer service. Our main focus is to provide our clients with the best experience from the time they request a quote and beyond we have finished cleaning their house, each and every time.
What makes us proud is that we are building a company where everybody wins. We want our clientele to win with our cleaning services. We, of course, want our employees to win by offering them an excellent work environment with great pay and incentives and where excellence is always rewarded. And if they both win, we as business owners win as well.
We are also very proud to offer free house cleaning services to women undergoing Cancer treatment. We currently serve 2 patients a month, we clean their homes for 4 months, and then we receive 2 more. The more we grow the more free cleanings we can offer and that definitely makes us happy.
I think, what sets us apart is our focus on a total customer satisfaction. Nowadays, providing an excellent cleaning service is not enough, we always go above and beyond to create that house cleaning company that people want to have at their home.
If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
If we had to start over, we would have definitely pay more attention to systems, education, and marketing. Home cleaning is just a small percentage of the whole business process. Constant education and training is key to keep growing, no matter if you clean homes, you are a teacher or an attorney.
Pricing:
- Our rates start at $78 per hour.
Contact Info:
- Address: 3880 Greenhouse Rd., Suite 409, Houston, Texas 77084
- Website: https://beemaids.com/
- Phone: 281 671 4550
- Email: info@beemaids.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/beemaids/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/beemaids/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/beemaids
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/bee-maids-houston
Image Credit:
Jorge Leiva
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