Two-time Emmy and Three-time NAACP Image Award-winning, television Executive Producer Rushion McDonald interviewed Mela Lovett.
A serial entrepreneur with multiple businesses including:
-
- Landscaping (Family Lawn Services)
- Mortgage lending (commercial and residential)
- Business consulting (especially on proper business structuring)
🌱 Entrepreneurial Journey
- Mela and her husband transitioned from retail management jobs (Walgreens and Walmart) to starting their own lawn care business.
- The motivation was to build generational wealth and leave a legacy for their children.
- They faced major setbacks, including the theft of their truck and equipment, but persevered and rebuilt.
🧘 Mental Health & Meditation
- Mila emphasizes the importance of mental health, especially for entrepreneurs.
- She shares her experience with postpartum depression and how meditation and journaling helped her heal and manage stress.
- She advocates for taking time to decompress and reset, especially when overwhelmed.
🌿 Lawn Care Insights
- Mila explains the difference between lawn maintenance and landscaping.
- She stresses the importance of quality work and customer trust.
- Rashawn shares a humorous but cautionary tale about hiring an unqualified landscaper who ruined his hedges.
💡 Business Advice
- Mela encourages:
- Multiple streams of income
- Proper business structure
- Resilience in the face of adversity
- She highlights the importance of reputation and referrals in growing a service-based business.
#SHMS #STRAW #BEST
Steve Harvey Morning Show Online: http://www.steveharveyfm.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi. I am Rashan McDonald, a host of weekly Money
Making Conversation Master Class show. The interviews and information that
this show provides are for everyone. It's time to stop
reading other people's success stories and start living your own.
If you want to be a guest on my show,
please visit our website, Moneymaking Conversations dot com and click
to be a guest button Chris submit and information will
(00:22):
come directly to me. Now let's get this show starting.
My guest is the CEO of Family Lawn Services, a
landscape company that excels and providing top tier lawn care
solutions specially explicitly tailored for both residential and commercial properties.
Please welcome to the Money Making Conversation Master Class. Mela
(00:44):
love it? How you doing? Mila?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Hi? Rison, No good? How are you now?
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Would I be wrong and say you've been out in
the yard all day?
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Desolutely would be.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Oh you been?
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Have to see?
Speaker 1 (00:59):
It's okay right there. It's sunshine or rainy days, it
doesn't matter. It's a good day with you.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
Huh Right. Sometimes I'll get out there when it needs,
you know, a lady touch, but I leave it up
to the guys.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Well good, let's let's talk about being a CEO, and
also I want to talk about it. When I was
going through your bio, Mila, it well mentioned something about
being a serial entrepreneur. What does that mean. When you
say a serial entrepreneur.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
I mean I run multiple businesses. Okay, of course you
can't only have one stream of income, and so landscaping
is my top priority. But I'm also a mortgage lender
in Georgia for commercial and residential properties. I'm a consultant
(01:49):
on business setups and how to properly structure your business
because a lot of the time our people wasn't taught
at so I feel like it's my duty to tell
the world, teach them how to properly structure their businesses
so that they can thrive and won't have to continue
(02:11):
to use personal money for business purposes.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
Well, let me ask you this because a lot of
people come to me, and because I first of all,
I love the fact that you mentioned multiple streams of income,
because I talk about that all the time on money
making conversations. Master class that you know, I say, there
are twenty four hours in a day, learn to take
advantage of each hour, and I'm assuming that's what you're
doing with these multiple streams of income format because it's
not based in a forty hour work week. Correct?
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Correct?
Speaker 1 (02:39):
So how do you how do you manage? I heard
that her husband in your byo. I heard kids in
your bio. I hear the multiple streams of income? See, Oh,
how are you doing all this mealer?
Speaker 2 (02:51):
Oh? I meditate. Honestly, I meditate. Oh some days, I
honestly don't know how I'm doing it, but I know
that it's a bigger goal. It's bigger than me. So
my body is pretty much taking its own control and
just doing it. I'll call the people that I need,
(03:14):
put people in places to help me when needed. I
appreciate all my support, but yeah, meditation is my number
one go to.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Now I've never done meditating. I've never talked about meditating
on the show. I've talked about stretchy, I've talked about yoga,
I guess, but meditation. Talk to me about that because
it sounds like something that people need to when they
hit that stress point. Some type of meditation needs to
be in everybody's life, I believe, or slow down button
(03:45):
or a moment to be able to you know, I
guess they say decompress, talk about meditation.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Yes, that's very important. And like I said, I do
multiple things. So I have small children under what seven
and four? So I got children, I have puppies and everything.
Everybody needs something at one time. So when I feel
myself getting a little too much pressure, a little too overwhelmed,
(04:16):
I shut everything down. No phone, no computer, no kids, nobody.
I sit in the room, put on frequency funds, off
the Pandora, and I just breathe in and breathe out.
At that moment, everything that's on my mind, I let
it go. It's nothing I feel about it right now.
Let me take these ten minutes to just really regroup,
(04:39):
because mentally, you can't function properly with so many things
hitting you at one time. That's how I feel about it.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
Well, I like that. I like that. I know that
everybody has a way of dealing with stress. That's a
stress moment right there. When you're meditating, when you're decompressing,
you you're finding a zone where okay, look before I
say something wrong, do something wrong, you know, stop and
that control. I admire the fact that you know your
(05:11):
breaking point or nearing your breaking point. I'm assuming that's
what you're trying to avoid.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Correct, correct, correct, And I actually learned that after my
last son something personal about me. I have postpartum depression.
So I had to really dig into my mental to
understand what is going on, Why is this happening? Why
(05:36):
do I feel such pressure, darkness, sadness, everything is going
on at one time, And that's when I started meditating.
I started digging into paths, traumas all along, writing things down,
getting these things out so I to understand when is
my breaking point and what do I need to do
(05:58):
when I'm reaching it.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
I ask you this because I want to really I
think it's important as we delve into this because of
the fact that you know, as African Americans, we don't
talk about mental health. We tend to shy away from
the those systems that may show we are not perfect.
And we all know we live in a highly stressful
environment because of the color of our skin. So what
(06:21):
did you turn to? What did you find that on
this moment? Was is your husband? Where did you go
to realize, you know, I need help.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
I think what happened was my son got really my
youngest son was really really sick. I mean, everything is
hit at one time and it really hurt, it felt
really heavy. I'm like, I'm just gonna run away, leave
all of this alone. Just run away. I left the house,
(06:55):
I said, and I thought about it. I'm like, okay,
can you really leave your children by theirselves? Can you
leave them to not be raised by mother? Right? No,
can't do that. That's not an option. So I started reading,
started reading about the importance of your mental health. I
(07:18):
didn't have insurance at the time, so I didn't have
a doctor I could go to. Just started reading, and
then I started journaling, writing things out because everything that
I was reading was saying, you have to get out
these past traumas in order for you to move forward.
So I said, Okay, everything that ever happened in the past,
(07:42):
I have to completely and ultimately let it go. Let
it out, let it go. It happened. I don't know
or understand why it may happen, but it doesn't matter
because it doesn't affect who I am today, right.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Right, And I think it's important as entrepreneurs people get
into business that you know, we all want uh lyne
at the door when you open your door. We all
want email box full when you have a business. But
those sometimes it doesn't happen like that. You have down moments,
those stress moments, those stress points that pop up. Now
you've been an entrepreneur in the family lawn service. Now
(08:21):
I got to ask you, this is it a seasonal
period for lawn service?
Speaker 2 (08:30):
When I first when we post first started, we thought.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
It was okay, you thought might be the summertime. It's
when it's like you busy business. In my mind, you know,
and you know, like I'm just saying, like May to
September is if you have launch service company, you busy,
and then all of a sudden when the days get cold,
in my mind, you start shutting down and you have
(08:54):
to make sure you save money from your summer activity.
You're telling me that's that's that's not how it really works. Correct, correct,
talk to you.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
Okay, so it's seasonal. Yeah, you make more money during
the summertime. You would think that at first, But as
your repetition gets out there, people understand what you do,
under respect the quality of work you do, you have
referrals that's referring you to other people. Then the wintertime
(09:27):
can be just as busy as the summertime. The only
difference is we're not doing as many properties as we
would normally do.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Right, right, Okay, So let's talk about uh, you know,
I'm a guy. You know who? Okay, thanks, you know
who thinks he knows lawn service?
Speaker 2 (09:47):
Okay they all do you know?
Speaker 1 (09:49):
I'm a good I know I know about nutsedge and
crab grass, and I know about the cloud clovers, and
you know I got my you know, I got my
weeding feet. The weed they won't harm your the spray,
they won't harm your grads, but to harm the weeds.
So I'm not I'm I'm I guess I'm I know
(10:10):
enough to be dangerous miler. Okay, okay, okay, okay. Now
I call you as a lawn service. What do I
need to be because I brought you on the show,
because first of all, like I said, I know enough
to be dangerous, but I need you to make my
yard last to avoid that ugliness because I don't want
(10:31):
to be the neighbor who has the bad looking yard
in the in the in the neighborhood. So when I
call you, what in any particular questions I should be
asking you as a family lawn service.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
Yes, okay, So when you initially call a landscape company,
it depends on what kind of services you're looking for.
Now you have lawn mace, okay, cool.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
Is lawn mainmenance cutting your grass?
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Yeah? Okay, your edging blowing, that's line. Okay if you
if the hedges are included, will trim the bushes as well?
Speaker 1 (11:12):
Okay, now let me ask you this, let me shure it.
So so oh, you know, I'm just using my yard
as an example. Not gonna get too descriptive. And now
I do have the hedges, and then sometimes, you know,
you walk and I got these little limbs probably need
to be cut back. I guess would you call that trimming?
Speaker 2 (11:28):
Trimming? Okay?
Speaker 1 (11:29):
Cool? So hedges we call trimming as well. That's you know,
hedges you walk around the path where you they look
like they're a little fat, you know, look like they
need to be you know, trim back a little bit
so off the top knock off. Now that's a skill. Though.
Now I hid the wrong person one time and almost
(11:49):
lost all my hedges.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Okay, how do I know.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
The right person to get out there? They won't have
me cry because I cried. I cried. I walked out there,
I saw this guy and I went I have made
a major mistake, and you know he cut my He
cut my head just so bad that he left and
didn't even ask for no money. Not that I would
have paid him, but no, he knew, he knew he
(12:19):
had messed up that bad. I wouldn't. I'm telling you
something me like. It was just a moment for me
in my yard, because you know that's where I get relaxed.
You know your yard is where you get relaxed. You
come home and you feel good. You're walking into your
house and I hide this guy. He would he left
a little note in my mailbox, right You laughing at
(12:42):
me now because you said, Rishan, that's sign number one mailbox.
No up table were about to go to break so
I could finish this story, Beela, because you're laughing at
me now because you know I'm making some mistakes. I
made some mistakes. Now I'm not making those mistakes anymore.
We're talking to her, Meela love it. She's a serial entrepreneur.
She's the CEO Family Lawn Services. Now, she doesn't go
(13:02):
out there and cut no grass, but she knows and
tells everybody what to do. She lives a life of accudition.
The rest of those people out there working in the sun.
You call her, She'll keep me in the sun. We
be right back with Family Lawn Service CEO Mela love It.
You're listening to Money Making Conversation Masterclass. I'm your host,
Rashaan McDonald.
Speaker 3 (13:22):
Please don't go anywhere. We'll be right back with more
Money Making Conversations Masterclass. Welcome back to the Money Making
Conversations Masterclass, hosted by Rashaan McDonald.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
My guest is the CEO of Family Lawn Services, Mela
love It. Mila Os was laughing at me chuckley and
I say chuckling when I told her how I got
my lawn service. Somebody had left a note in my mailbox,
you know, trusting me, I hired this person to do
(14:00):
lawn services manicure unless used the word manicure. That's what
he said on his note me love he did lawn manicures. Okay,
came in and destroyed my hedges so bad that when
I went inside and came back out, he was gone
(14:22):
and I never saw him again in Mila. So that's
a testimony to how bad he did my York. So
with that being said, what did I do wrong?
Speaker 2 (14:31):
I'm so sorry for lasting? But first, first, for say,
a note in your mailbox. No sorry, no, sir. Even
when I started a landscape company, we never opened somebody's
mailbox but a business part on the side or on
(14:54):
the front, because you know, it's a set of room
fit to open the mailbox. Elp, Like we're in preschool.
You want to be my boyfriend? Yes or no? No? No,
no sorry. You should not have allowed him to do
anything to your bushes. Last, you need to check the
(15:17):
resources right.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Well, you know I but you know sometimes it goes
to the whole thing. It's like, even if I call
the people, you know, I didn't know where to look.
I was in a hurry. I'm gonna use that excuse.
I was in a hurry. You know what could somebody
do wrong? You know? And I discovered that they if
they don't know what they're doing, they out there. You
let somebody damage something that you If you do it wrong,
(15:46):
then guess what you have to physically replace the hedges,
which I wind up doing. So. He may have left
without me paying him, but he left a bill, right,
And what made you feel that was an area of
business that you could be successful in?
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Honestly, it was just off the hope to be able
to lead something to our children. Okay, my husband said,
I want to cut grass.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
I said, okay, that's that's really that's an understatement. What
was he doing prior to lawn service?
Speaker 2 (16:26):
We were both working at retail stores. I was the
assistant manager at Walgreens and the manager at Walmart.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Okay, so y'all had successful jobs with the medical uh
health care plans, and y'all independently thought y'all would going
business together to do lawn serve. And that's really I'm
just trying to figure out why lawn service? Did you
go through a list of opportunities for business uh options?
(16:58):
Why lawn service? Because your husban said, let's cut grass.
He went and got a couple of lawnmows, a couple
of weed eaters. He knew. Somebody give us some backstory.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Yeah, literally, he used to cut grass with his brother
when they were younger, when they were you know, kids
cut the neighborhoods grass and things like that. But outside
of that, I've never seen him cut grass until we
got a house of our own, right, and he cut
the grass.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
So basically, you're telling me that, you know, like he's
an interesting story about me, Like I didn't, you know,
I didn't. My mom always cooked, but then as I
got older, I fell in love with cooking and baking
because I started doing it myself. So are you saying
that when you got a house it kind of triggered
maybe an entrance, because he was he really like really
(17:50):
jazzing up your yard, like really killing the weeds and
doing the hedges and all that stuff.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Yeah, yeah, he started. He started on our we're grass
or our grads. Wow.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
And then so so how do you start hiring people
for your company? How do you do that process? I
guess I want to say me. I know you said,
Look Chean, I handle the paperwork. They do the task.
He's by himself. He's told you you have successful jobs.
Y'all not leaving You know, y'all not leaving jobs that
not that that that people are companies that people don't know,
(18:29):
very familiar jobs. What did people say? Your family members
say to you, people you know, tell you you're quitting
two jobs as managers, system managers to cut grass.
Speaker 2 (18:43):
Well, originally I didn't quit.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
Okay, okay, okay, you played it, played it, played it smart,
you quit, you cut grass. I'm just keeping up. I'm
keeping up. Forty hour with job.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
That's what you say, right till we, you know, get
it rolling, which we did it, because does any business
have losses? Right our first season, somebody stole the truck,
the equipment, everything, literally sole everything we had.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Okay, now you know that happened to the guy who's
cutting my grass too. So you know, he came to
me one day and uh, he said, ray Sean got
some bad news. My truck and all my equipment was stolen.
So how did it happen in your situation? You know?
Because he literally said, you know what he did was
(19:33):
parked in front of somebody's house. He walked inside and
he came back and everything was gone.
Speaker 2 (19:40):
Yeah. And the way it happened, our truck was parked
in this ride way, in your driveway, in this riveway.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
And what type of truck was it?
Speaker 2 (19:51):
What type of truck was It was a white I'll
never forget it. It was like a two thousand and five,
two thousand and six white Dodge lamp to see her
in the back, yep, yep. Put the small equipment on
the bed, put the one lawn moor on the trailer.
(20:13):
I walked outside. I'm about to go to one and
I'm like, babe, way up truck at He said, it's outside.
I said, well, wait to park it in. He said,
to stop playing. I'm not for the place to you.
I'm not saying plasce to do our parked the car
right outside. I said, oh, okay, where you come look
(20:36):
cause I don't see sure enough? It was not out there.
Blew everything up, blew everything up, had to start completely open.
He wanted to quit, and I was like, no, we
ain't gonna get nobody that much power because we still
need to leave something to these children. At that time,
I only had one. We still need to leave something
(20:58):
to this kid. So we kept going.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
How did you recover from that? How did you recover
from that? Did you have to get loan? Did you
start one lawn more? Because the insurance cover your equipment?
Did it cover the vehicle that was stolen?
Speaker 2 (21:17):
The equipment was not covered. The vehicle was covered, so
we were able to get another truck with no problem.
We just had to get equipment. So we have loan
for the equipment.
Speaker 1 (21:35):
We were talking about about Mila love It. She's the
CEO of Family Lawn Services. Mila, how can one get
in touch with you?
Speaker 2 (21:43):
Eight hundred four six zero eight. One more time eight
hundred four six zero.
Speaker 1 (21:52):
Five eight. And what is your website?
Speaker 2 (21:55):
The website is Family Lawn Services dot com.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
Let me ask you this as we close out this interview,
what do you think for your company? Is your strongest
strength as a company when it comes to lawn service
abilities both residential and commercial pass down?
Speaker 2 (22:11):
I would say the quality of work. My boys are
out there showing out and I'm grateful to them.
Speaker 1 (22:19):
So you're telling me, Rashwan McDonald, if you call Family
Lawn Services and you want somebody to do the hedges,
you know, get them all nice and round or squared off,
you know, trim back the trees, I should be calling you.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
Absolutely, you should be calling me because I'm not gonna
mess up your bushes, right wine, perfect wound, however you.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
Like them, well, I'll tell you something that's that's a skill.
That is something I can't do. I've seen it done
wrong so and I've had tears in my eyes when
it was done wrong. But more importantly, you know, this
is a great interview from a standpoint of honesty. You
talked about the meditation, You talked about being a serial entrepreneur,
multiple streams of income. You talked about stress, You talk
(23:09):
about overcoming the arts or walking away both you and
your husband, walking away from full time jobs. Being smart
enough to know that as you enter into the independent
entrepreneur space once you keep working and one should venture
into that task and then then all at the top
of it, when all was stolen from you, you didn't quit.
(23:33):
That is real important advice that everybody needs to hear.
And I really appreciate you coming on Money Making Conversation
master Class.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Thank you Mila so much, mister McDonald for having me.
I really enjoyed it.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
This has been another edition of Money Making Conversation master
Class posted by me Rashaun McDonald. Thank you to our
guests on the show today and thank you listening to
the audience now. If you want to listen to any
episode I want to be a guest on the show,
visit money Making Conversation. Our social media handle is money
Making Conversation. Join us next week and remember to always
(24:06):
leave with your gifts. Keep winning.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
H
Hi. I am Rashan McDonald, a host of weekly Money
Making Conversation Master Class show. The interviews and information that
this show provides are for everyone. It's time to stop
reading other people's success stories and start living your own.
If you want to be a guest on my show,
please visit our website, Moneymaking Conversations dot com and click
to be a guest button Chris submit and information will
(00:22):
come directly to me. Now let's get this show starting.
My guest is the CEO of Family Lawn Services, a
landscape company that excels and providing top tier lawn care
solutions specially explicitly tailored for both residential and commercial properties.
Please welcome to the Money Making Conversation Master Class. Mela
(00:44):
love it? How you doing? Mila?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Hi? Rison, No good? How are you now?
Speaker 1 (00:49):
Would I be wrong and say you've been out in
the yard all day?
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Desolutely would be.
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Oh you been?
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Have to see?
Speaker 1 (00:59):
It's okay right there. It's sunshine or rainy days, it
doesn't matter. It's a good day with you.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
Huh Right. Sometimes I'll get out there when it needs,
you know, a lady touch, but I leave it up
to the guys.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Well good, let's let's talk about being a CEO, and
also I want to talk about it. When I was
going through your bio, Mila, it well mentioned something about
being a serial entrepreneur. What does that mean. When you
say a serial entrepreneur.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
I mean I run multiple businesses. Okay, of course you
can't only have one stream of income, and so landscaping
is my top priority. But I'm also a mortgage lender
in Georgia for commercial and residential properties. I'm a consultant
(01:49):
on business setups and how to properly structure your business
because a lot of the time our people wasn't taught
at so I feel like it's my duty to tell
the world, teach them how to properly structure their businesses
so that they can thrive and won't have to continue
(02:11):
to use personal money for business purposes.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
Well, let me ask you this because a lot of
people come to me, and because I first of all,
I love the fact that you mentioned multiple streams of income,
because I talk about that all the time on money
making conversations. Master class that you know, I say, there
are twenty four hours in a day, learn to take
advantage of each hour, and I'm assuming that's what you're
doing with these multiple streams of income format because it's
not based in a forty hour work week. Correct?
Speaker 2 (02:38):
Correct?
Speaker 1 (02:39):
So how do you how do you manage? I heard
that her husband in your byo. I heard kids in
your bio. I hear the multiple streams of income? See, Oh,
how are you doing all this mealer?
Speaker 2 (02:51):
Oh? I meditate. Honestly, I meditate. Oh some days, I
honestly don't know how I'm doing it, but I know
that it's a bigger goal. It's bigger than me. So
my body is pretty much taking its own control and
just doing it. I'll call the people that I need,
(03:14):
put people in places to help me when needed. I
appreciate all my support, but yeah, meditation is my number
one go to.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Now I've never done meditating. I've never talked about meditating
on the show. I've talked about stretchy, I've talked about yoga,
I guess, but meditation. Talk to me about that because
it sounds like something that people need to when they
hit that stress point. Some type of meditation needs to
be in everybody's life, I believe, or slow down button
(03:45):
or a moment to be able to you know, I
guess they say decompress, talk about meditation.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Yes, that's very important. And like I said, I do
multiple things. So I have small children under what seven
and four? So I got children, I have puppies and everything.
Everybody needs something at one time. So when I feel
myself getting a little too much pressure, a little too overwhelmed,
(04:16):
I shut everything down. No phone, no computer, no kids, nobody.
I sit in the room, put on frequency funds, off
the Pandora, and I just breathe in and breathe out.
At that moment, everything that's on my mind, I let
it go. It's nothing I feel about it right now.
Let me take these ten minutes to just really regroup,
(04:39):
because mentally, you can't function properly with so many things
hitting you at one time. That's how I feel about it.
Speaker 1 (04:47):
Well, I like that. I like that. I know that
everybody has a way of dealing with stress. That's a
stress moment right there. When you're meditating, when you're decompressing,
you you're finding a zone where okay, look before I
say something wrong, do something wrong, you know, stop and
that control. I admire the fact that you know your
(05:11):
breaking point or nearing your breaking point. I'm assuming that's
what you're trying to avoid.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Correct, correct, correct, And I actually learned that after my
last son something personal about me. I have postpartum depression.
So I had to really dig into my mental to
understand what is going on, Why is this happening? Why
(05:36):
do I feel such pressure, darkness, sadness, everything is going
on at one time, And that's when I started meditating.
I started digging into paths, traumas all along, writing things down,
getting these things out so I to understand when is
my breaking point and what do I need to do
(05:58):
when I'm reaching it.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
I ask you this because I want to really I
think it's important as we delve into this because of
the fact that you know, as African Americans, we don't
talk about mental health. We tend to shy away from
the those systems that may show we are not perfect.
And we all know we live in a highly stressful
environment because of the color of our skin. So what
(06:21):
did you turn to? What did you find that on
this moment? Was is your husband? Where did you go
to realize, you know, I need help.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
I think what happened was my son got really my
youngest son was really really sick. I mean, everything is
hit at one time and it really hurt, it felt
really heavy. I'm like, I'm just gonna run away, leave
all of this alone. Just run away. I left the house,
(06:55):
I said, and I thought about it. I'm like, okay,
can you really leave your children by theirselves? Can you
leave them to not be raised by mother? Right? No,
can't do that. That's not an option. So I started reading,
started reading about the importance of your mental health. I
(07:18):
didn't have insurance at the time, so I didn't have
a doctor I could go to. Just started reading, and
then I started journaling, writing things out because everything that
I was reading was saying, you have to get out
these past traumas in order for you to move forward.
So I said, Okay, everything that ever happened in the past,
(07:42):
I have to completely and ultimately let it go. Let
it out, let it go. It happened. I don't know
or understand why it may happen, but it doesn't matter
because it doesn't affect who I am today, right.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Right, And I think it's important as entrepreneurs people get
into business that you know, we all want uh lyne
at the door when you open your door. We all
want email box full when you have a business. But
those sometimes it doesn't happen like that. You have down moments,
those stress moments, those stress points that pop up. Now
you've been an entrepreneur in the family lawn service. Now
(08:21):
I got to ask you, this is it a seasonal
period for lawn service?
Speaker 2 (08:30):
When I first when we post first started, we thought.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
It was okay, you thought might be the summertime. It's
when it's like you busy business. In my mind, you know,
and you know, like I'm just saying, like May to
September is if you have launch service company, you busy,
and then all of a sudden when the days get cold,
in my mind, you start shutting down and you have
(08:54):
to make sure you save money from your summer activity.
You're telling me that's that's that's not how it really works. Correct, correct,
talk to you.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
Okay, so it's seasonal. Yeah, you make more money during
the summertime. You would think that at first, But as
your repetition gets out there, people understand what you do,
under respect the quality of work you do, you have
referrals that's referring you to other people. Then the wintertime
(09:27):
can be just as busy as the summertime. The only
difference is we're not doing as many properties as we
would normally do.
Speaker 1 (09:36):
Right, right, Okay, So let's talk about uh, you know,
I'm a guy. You know who? Okay, thanks, you know
who thinks he knows lawn service?
Speaker 2 (09:47):
Okay they all do you know?
Speaker 1 (09:49):
I'm a good I know I know about nutsedge and
crab grass, and I know about the cloud clovers, and
you know I got my you know, I got my
weeding feet. The weed they won't harm your the spray,
they won't harm your grads, but to harm the weeds.
So I'm not I'm I'm I guess I'm I know
(10:10):
enough to be dangerous miler. Okay, okay, okay, okay. Now
I call you as a lawn service. What do I
need to be because I brought you on the show,
because first of all, like I said, I know enough
to be dangerous, but I need you to make my
yard last to avoid that ugliness because I don't want
(10:31):
to be the neighbor who has the bad looking yard
in the in the in the neighborhood. So when I
call you, what in any particular questions I should be
asking you as a family lawn service.
Speaker 2 (10:45):
Yes, okay, So when you initially call a landscape company,
it depends on what kind of services you're looking for.
Now you have lawn mace, okay, cool.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
Is lawn mainmenance cutting your grass?
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Yeah? Okay, your edging blowing, that's line. Okay if you
if the hedges are included, will trim the bushes as well?
Speaker 1 (11:12):
Okay, now let me ask you this, let me shure it.
So so oh, you know, I'm just using my yard
as an example. Not gonna get too descriptive. And now
I do have the hedges, and then sometimes, you know,
you walk and I got these little limbs probably need
to be cut back. I guess would you call that trimming?
Speaker 2 (11:28):
Trimming? Okay?
Speaker 1 (11:29):
Cool? So hedges we call trimming as well. That's you know,
hedges you walk around the path where you they look
like they're a little fat, you know, look like they
need to be you know, trim back a little bit
so off the top knock off. Now that's a skill. Though.
Now I hid the wrong person one time and almost
(11:49):
lost all my hedges.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Okay, how do I know.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
The right person to get out there? They won't have
me cry because I cried. I cried. I walked out there,
I saw this guy and I went I have made
a major mistake, and you know he cut my He
cut my head just so bad that he left and
didn't even ask for no money. Not that I would
have paid him, but no, he knew, he knew he
(12:19):
had messed up that bad. I wouldn't. I'm telling you
something me like. It was just a moment for me
in my yard, because you know that's where I get relaxed.
You know your yard is where you get relaxed. You
come home and you feel good. You're walking into your
house and I hide this guy. He would he left
a little note in my mailbox, right You laughing at
(12:42):
me now because you said, Rishan, that's sign number one mailbox.
No up table were about to go to break so
I could finish this story, Beela, because you're laughing at
me now because you know I'm making some mistakes. I
made some mistakes. Now I'm not making those mistakes anymore.
We're talking to her, Meela love it. She's a serial entrepreneur.
She's the CEO Family Lawn Services. Now, she doesn't go
(13:02):
out there and cut no grass, but she knows and
tells everybody what to do. She lives a life of accudition.
The rest of those people out there working in the sun.
You call her, She'll keep me in the sun. We
be right back with Family Lawn Service CEO Mela love It.
You're listening to Money Making Conversation Masterclass. I'm your host,
Rashaan McDonald.
Speaker 3 (13:22):
Please don't go anywhere. We'll be right back with more
Money Making Conversations Masterclass. Welcome back to the Money Making
Conversations Masterclass, hosted by Rashaan McDonald.
Speaker 1 (13:39):
My guest is the CEO of Family Lawn Services, Mela
love It. Mila Os was laughing at me chuckley and
I say chuckling when I told her how I got
my lawn service. Somebody had left a note in my mailbox,
you know, trusting me, I hired this person to do
(14:00):
lawn services manicure unless used the word manicure. That's what
he said on his note me love he did lawn manicures. Okay,
came in and destroyed my hedges so bad that when
I went inside and came back out, he was gone
(14:22):
and I never saw him again in Mila. So that's
a testimony to how bad he did my York. So
with that being said, what did I do wrong?
Speaker 2 (14:31):
I'm so sorry for lasting? But first, first, for say,
a note in your mailbox. No sorry, no, sir. Even
when I started a landscape company, we never opened somebody's
mailbox but a business part on the side or on
(14:54):
the front, because you know, it's a set of room
fit to open the mailbox. Elp, Like we're in preschool.
You want to be my boyfriend? Yes or no? No? No,
no sorry. You should not have allowed him to do
anything to your bushes. Last, you need to check the
(15:17):
resources right.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Well, you know I but you know sometimes it goes
to the whole thing. It's like, even if I call
the people, you know, I didn't know where to look.
I was in a hurry. I'm gonna use that excuse.
I was in a hurry. You know what could somebody
do wrong? You know? And I discovered that they if
they don't know what they're doing, they out there. You
let somebody damage something that you If you do it wrong,
(15:46):
then guess what you have to physically replace the hedges,
which I wind up doing. So. He may have left
without me paying him, but he left a bill, right,
And what made you feel that was an area of
business that you could be successful in?
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Honestly, it was just off the hope to be able
to lead something to our children. Okay, my husband said,
I want to cut grass.
Speaker 1 (16:17):
I said, okay, that's that's really that's an understatement. What
was he doing prior to lawn service?
Speaker 2 (16:26):
We were both working at retail stores. I was the
assistant manager at Walgreens and the manager at Walmart.
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Okay, so y'all had successful jobs with the medical uh
health care plans, and y'all independently thought y'all would going
business together to do lawn serve. And that's really I'm
just trying to figure out why lawn service? Did you
go through a list of opportunities for business uh options?
(16:58):
Why lawn service? Because your husban said, let's cut grass.
He went and got a couple of lawnmows, a couple
of weed eaters. He knew. Somebody give us some backstory.
Speaker 2 (17:07):
Yeah, literally, he used to cut grass with his brother
when they were younger, when they were you know, kids
cut the neighborhoods grass and things like that. But outside
of that, I've never seen him cut grass until we
got a house of our own, right, and he cut
the grass.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
So basically, you're telling me that, you know, like he's
an interesting story about me, Like I didn't, you know,
I didn't. My mom always cooked, but then as I
got older, I fell in love with cooking and baking
because I started doing it myself. So are you saying
that when you got a house it kind of triggered
maybe an entrance, because he was he really like really
(17:50):
jazzing up your yard, like really killing the weeds and
doing the hedges and all that stuff.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Yeah, yeah, he started. He started on our we're grass
or our grads. Wow.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
And then so so how do you start hiring people
for your company? How do you do that process? I
guess I want to say me. I know you said,
Look Chean, I handle the paperwork. They do the task.
He's by himself. He's told you you have successful jobs.
Y'all not leaving You know, y'all not leaving jobs that
not that that that people are companies that people don't know,
(18:29):
very familiar jobs. What did people say? Your family members
say to you, people you know, tell you you're quitting
two jobs as managers, system managers to cut grass.
Speaker 2 (18:43):
Well, originally I didn't quit.
Speaker 1 (18:47):
Okay, okay, okay, you played it, played it, played it smart,
you quit, you cut grass. I'm just keeping up. I'm
keeping up. Forty hour with job.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
That's what you say, right till we, you know, get
it rolling, which we did it, because does any business
have losses? Right our first season, somebody stole the truck,
the equipment, everything, literally sole everything we had.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Okay, now you know that happened to the guy who's
cutting my grass too. So you know, he came to
me one day and uh, he said, ray Sean got
some bad news. My truck and all my equipment was stolen.
So how did it happen in your situation? You know?
Because he literally said, you know what he did was
(19:33):
parked in front of somebody's house. He walked inside and
he came back and everything was gone.
Speaker 2 (19:40):
Yeah. And the way it happened, our truck was parked
in this ride way, in your driveway, in this riveway.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
And what type of truck was it?
Speaker 2 (19:51):
What type of truck was It was a white I'll
never forget it. It was like a two thousand and five,
two thousand and six white Dodge lamp to see her
in the back, yep, yep. Put the small equipment on
the bed, put the one lawn moor on the trailer.
(20:13):
I walked outside. I'm about to go to one and
I'm like, babe, way up truck at He said, it's outside.
I said, well, wait to park it in. He said,
to stop playing. I'm not for the place to you.
I'm not saying plasce to do our parked the car
right outside. I said, oh, okay, where you come look
(20:36):
cause I don't see sure enough? It was not out there.
Blew everything up, blew everything up, had to start completely open.
He wanted to quit, and I was like, no, we
ain't gonna get nobody that much power because we still
need to leave something to these children. At that time,
I only had one. We still need to leave something
(20:58):
to this kid. So we kept going.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
How did you recover from that? How did you recover
from that? Did you have to get loan? Did you
start one lawn more? Because the insurance cover your equipment?
Did it cover the vehicle that was stolen?
Speaker 2 (21:17):
The equipment was not covered. The vehicle was covered, so
we were able to get another truck with no problem.
We just had to get equipment. So we have loan
for the equipment.
Speaker 1 (21:35):
We were talking about about Mila love It. She's the
CEO of Family Lawn Services. Mila, how can one get
in touch with you?
Speaker 2 (21:43):
Eight hundred four six zero eight. One more time eight
hundred four six zero.
Speaker 1 (21:52):
Five eight. And what is your website?
Speaker 2 (21:55):
The website is Family Lawn Services dot com.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
Let me ask you this as we close out this interview,
what do you think for your company? Is your strongest
strength as a company when it comes to lawn service
abilities both residential and commercial pass down?
Speaker 2 (22:11):
I would say the quality of work. My boys are
out there showing out and I'm grateful to them.
Speaker 1 (22:19):
So you're telling me, Rashwan McDonald, if you call Family
Lawn Services and you want somebody to do the hedges,
you know, get them all nice and round or squared off,
you know, trim back the trees, I should be calling you.
Speaker 2 (22:36):
Absolutely, you should be calling me because I'm not gonna
mess up your bushes, right wine, perfect wound, however you.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
Like them, well, I'll tell you something that's that's a skill.
That is something I can't do. I've seen it done
wrong so and I've had tears in my eyes when
it was done wrong. But more importantly, you know, this
is a great interview from a standpoint of honesty. You
talked about the meditation, You talked about being a serial entrepreneur,
multiple streams of income. You talked about stress, You talk
(23:09):
about overcoming the arts or walking away both you and
your husband, walking away from full time jobs. Being smart
enough to know that as you enter into the independent
entrepreneur space once you keep working and one should venture
into that task and then then all at the top
of it, when all was stolen from you, you didn't quit.
(23:33):
That is real important advice that everybody needs to hear.
And I really appreciate you coming on Money Making Conversation
master Class.
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Thank you Mila so much, mister McDonald for having me.
I really enjoyed it.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
This has been another edition of Money Making Conversation master
Class posted by me Rashaun McDonald. Thank you to our
guests on the show today and thank you listening to
the audience now. If you want to listen to any
episode I want to be a guest on the show,
visit money Making Conversation. Our social media handle is money
Making Conversation. Join us next week and remember to always
(24:06):
leave with your gifts. Keep winning.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
H
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