We recently connected with Marley Juarez and have shared our conversation below.

Marley, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Folks often look at a successful business and imagine it was an overnight success, but from what we’ve seen this is often far from the truth. We’d love to hear your scaling up story – walk us through how you grew over time – what were some of the big things you had to do to grow and what was that scaling up journey like?

Our scaling was challenging. The biggest factor in growth for us is organic word of mouth exchanges. Parents post on community Facebook pages asking for resources and another parent comments recommending Strides. Parents chatting at a T-Ball game start talking about their kid’s challenges and one mom says her kiddo had the same challenges and Strides was helpful. Pediatricians refer kids to us, and at the kid’s next annual physical they hear how much it helped and refer more. But all of those things take time, and there is not much that we can do to “market” to get parents to comment on other parents’ Facebook posts. We focused on getting our name out there. We signed up for every trunk or treat event, every conference, every school activity, just to have a booth and make our name and logo recognizable. Hiring was, and still is, one of the scariest parts. What if we hire this person and don’t have enough work to sustain it? It’s definitely a leap, and one we lost sleep over many times. But we were confident in our vision and overall plan, so we took the leap. And then took it again. We had buildings donated to us to grow our space, and we committed to spending the money to get those spaces up and running. Scaling in a business like this is hard because it costs a lot up front, and the income to justify and cover the growth comes after rather than before. You cannot grow without more clients, you cannot take on more clients without more office space. So you expand the office space, and hope that the growth continues and covers those costs that you already spent.

There’s no perfect recipe, but believing in what we do at its core and trusting the work that we have already put in will continue to support us is how we approached it. We went from maybe 10 clients a week to now seeing more than 325 kids every week.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

My name is Marley Juarez and I am a co-founder of Strides Pediatric Therapy. Strides is an outpatient therapy clinic offering physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, mental health therapy, and recreational therapy to kids ages 0-21 with a variety of disabilities and/or needs. We have traditional clinic spaces including a sensory motor gym, speech therapy offices, a gross motor gym, a feeding room, a mental health gym, tactile exploration rooms, etc. but we also focus a lot on outdoor activities, doing sessions in the parking lot with chalk, on our sensory trail, or in our barn with our equine partners. The environment at Strides is different. It is not like a doctor’s office or therapy office, kids don’t have to sit quietly in chairs, and our therapists are not in dress clothes. It is loud, chaotic, full of life and joy and all the things that make childhood wonderful! Therapists are crawling through tunnels and riding bikes around the property.

We work with an extensive list of diagnoses, everything from quadriplegic cerebral palsy to just delayed milestones. There is a place for every kid at Strides, and we work hard to make our families, feel like family.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

At Strides, we have always focused on doing the right thing for our kids and doing it for the right reason. Then we trust that the business side of things will work itself out. If Strides is not the best fit for a client, or we know another clinic that would be a better fit, we refer them out. If clients call and we are out of network with their insurance, I make every effort to give them quality referrals to places that do take their insurance, and encourage parents to look into those before using out of network benefits here. When kids get to a point where they could graduate from therapy services and be successful independently, we graduate them. We provide free consultations and recommendations to parents, even if the recommendation is not our clinic. We walk them through what therapy is, what they might be looking for, what resources are available, etc. Parents are always surprised by how much time we take on the phone with them to help get them into another provider, and I always respond that we started Strides for the kiddos. It is always about what is best for them, and it will always be about what is best for them. I believe business side will work itself out if we stay focused on doing what is right. Word about that attitude spreads, and I think it has helped build our reputation within our market. Our clients are not just numbers, and I’m willing to sacrifice numbers to get kids to where they need to be.

Do you have any insights you can share related to maintaining high team morale?

Be protective of your team. Prioritize hiring the RIGHT person over hiring A person. When the work builds up and the opportunity for growth is there, it can be tempting to just get positions filled. But the team is one of the main reasons people choose to work where they do, and it is one of your greatest assets as a business owner. So protect your team. If something or someone threatens morale, take care of it right away. Do not be afraid to lose a client or even a staff member in order to protect your team. Invest the time and money to find the right team members.

Show them that you value them! Ask their opinions. Take their advice and suggestions. Make it clear that you value their work, their abilities, their input, and their knowledge. Treat them as equals whenever possible. Spend some time and money doing team building outside of work. It seems cliche, but it really makes a huge difference when your team is more than just co-workers. Make work fun! Ask your team how they feel when their alarm goes off on Monday morning, and make sure the answer is positive!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.stridespediatrictherapy.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stridespediatrictherapy?igsh=MWo5aDZwdGljM3lsMg==
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StridesPediatricTherapy

Image Credits

Accidental Exposure Photography
Wild Honey Photography