We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Sarah Bell-goedde a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Sarah , appreciate you joining us today. Along with taking care of clients, taking care of our team is one of the most important things we can do as leaders. Looking back on your journey, did you have a boss that was really great? Maybe you can tell us about that boss and what made them a wonderful person to work for?

I worked for a large “chain” appliance repair company but the owners did not treat any of us as if we were just employees they treated us as family, we had 2 times a year company bbqs, they did nice things for us when they could afford it and made sure we were all taken care of. I loved so much working for them and learned how I wanted to run my business which at the time I never intended on starting, however upon opening up Lone Star Appliance Repair LLC I knew that is exactly how I wanted to run my business.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I started in the industry in 2008 working for an AC company learning dispatch which was a large part of my background, in 2010 I got laid off, got another job with AC laid off again and then at the end of the year started working with a local appliance repair company and ended up running the office for them. After some struggles I decided to depart ways with them and went to work for another appliance repair company I loved, for a few years I was there never intending to leave and then they hired a BDA that changed things, after much discussion and really hard decisions I left, went back to the prior company, helped straighten up some things for them for everything to keep falling apart so we decided it was time to try on my own, in 2017 I started Lone Star Appliance Repair LLC. We try our hardest do to the best we can by our staff and our clients. For staff we take a yearly beach trip so we can all get to know each other and relax and just to show appreciation because I could not do this without them. I am quite proud of the work we do even thru hard times we all stick together and trudge thru.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Due to family hardships when I was 17 I was a couch surfer for about a year and a half, I worked constantly to keep food in my belly and had many friends who allotted a spot on their couches for the time to stay on to have a safe place to sleep. I never really thought too much about it. I didn’t realize until it was pointed out to me a couple of years ago that I was for all intensive purposes homeless. Right before I turned 19 I found a home and ended up getting married and shortly thereafter had my amazing daughter, constantly working to build a better life.

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

We had a vehicle purchased from a family member amongst other things we sold to be able to open up Lone Star Appliance Repair LLC. It was quite the journey

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.lonestarappliance.us
• Instagram: lonestarappliancerepairllc
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lonestarappliancerepair
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-bell-goedde-15927731/