Hello and welcome to episode 24. I've designed cures podcast, I'm
your host and mentor of Rebecca Ward.
Today. On the podcast, we have a friend
and colleague of mine. Who's local to me, Lindsay,
Kjellberg, and she is out of Modesto which is not too far
south from where I'm at in Sacramento and she has had her
Business lhk Interiors since 2004.
For and she specializes in custom residential design with a
lot of experience in kitchen and bathroom remodels.
And I've seen her work is just beautiful beautiful work and
she's just done so many remodels.
I've coached her a couple of times on raising her rates
because she's just slammed for work because she did such a
great job, but she doesn't charge enough in my opinion.
So I'm going to talk to her about that again.
And so she strives to exceed her customers expectations.
Build a relationship that will last.
And I think the coaching goes both ways.
I learned a lot from her. Even in these two episodes, I
broke them out into two parts, so you'll hear it today in
episode 24. And then again, in episode 26,
she just has so much wisdom. You'll find out that she is a
mother of I think five children. So she has to have all her ducks
in a row in order to have a be running of successful business.
And A successful household. So without further Ado, let's
hear from Lindsay. You're now listening to design,
curious a place where you creative one are here to learn
about what it really is. Like, to be an interior designer
and I'm your host and Mentor Rebecca, Ward, if you're worried
about how to succeed in a creative career, if you're ready
to learn your next steps to become an Interior Designer.
And if you want the satisfaction of doing something you love
every day, you are in the right place.
Grab a coffee, a notebook. And Let's dig into today's
episode. Alright.
Hi Lindsey. Thanks for being on design.
Curious podcast is great to have you.
Thank you, great to be here. And why don't you tell our
audience, where you are working out of and the name of your
business? So I am Lindsay with lhk
interiors and I'm out of Modesto, California.
So I am about two hours south of Sacramento.
Okay, great. So what we are here to discover
is how you got Into interior design if it was something that
you grew up knowing that you wanted to do or if you fell into
it later in life or what was your story.
So no, I did not always know. I wanted to be a designer.
I thought I was going to be a criminal prosecutor until my
senior year and took a decorating and design class sort
of right as we were starting to apply for colleges and ended up
going down to San Diego State to get my bachelors.
And major in interior design. Wow.
And I felt like, I mean, I was one of those kids that always
rearrange my room and didn't, you know, I have that, that hurt
side that creative art brain. But no didn't think I would
follow that path for a career. So I was a little nervous when
it got my bachelor's in case I wanted to use that General Ed.
If I didn't like design, started an internship at a firm, Down
there in Solana Beach and just absolutely loved it.
And, and kept wanting to learn more, learn the business side of
it, and then two years. After I had graduated moved back
to Modesto where my family was, and I was about to get married.
So I thought, you know what, I should just try this on my own
and start hiring some, why not? Exactly.
And so I was engaged my Then I were were just about to get
married. I knew I wanted kids.
So so kind of my original thought was, you know, I can
work as much or as little as I want my jug kids.
When we have kids and make my career as part-time or full-time
through the seasons and so that was definitely a learning.
Didn't quite turn out the way you envisioned it, you know, it
took me a long time. Time to to have it to learn
things so that it could turn out the way I had envisioned in, and
I feel like I'm getting my bearings.
I've now owned my business for 18 years, which is a long time
and my oldest is 14 and how many kids do you have?
So I have five ranging from for is my littlest and 14 is my
oldest so definitely a handful. Yeah, that's a lot to juggle
between. Have five kids.
And another kid, which is your business, I think it's great,
it's great. Exactly.
And you know when people would ask me about having so many
kids, I kind of joke that assembly lines are the way to
go. If you're whatever it is, I'm
like, just assembly line them, you know, it'll be perfect.
Mhm, it took me a long time to figure out that I should be
assembly lining my business. Oh yeah.
I did not have the processes. I thought, you know, we go into
a kitchen and someone One wants a kitchen.
Remodel why was I Reinventing the wheel every time I walked
into the kitchen. Yeah.
And so it did take me a good handful of years, to get those
procedures and the hostas is in play and treat every job.
Yes, their project was custom and they were always one of a
kind. I was one of their designed to
be one-of-a-kind. However, the paperwork should
not be right. Yeah, the processes are always
the same. Every project.
It's just the individual components that you are using
for the design change, right? Right.
When the kids will all my oldest, my littlest is still
little, but when my oldest was little, I felt like I was
working way more hours than if I just worked for a different
design firm, you know, if I just or any job I wasn't putting in
the 925, I was putting the kids to bed and then I was going back
to paperwork and Getting up early before they got up and and
still working and answering calls.
I think the side, the paperwork and procedures and getting those
just really figured out. I also needed to set boundaries
with my clients, I almost pretended like they were the you
know those clients were the only ones in my life, I didn't I
wasn't acted like you are so important.
Don't you worry, I don't have family at home, I don't have it.
For games, and cheerleading and gymnastics that, you know,
different things on the weekends that I'm going to.
I would like Duck into the car and call them back.
If it was nine o'clock on a Saturday.
Right. Why.
Yeah, just admire is a call. Exactly.
And so, you know, someone
getting into design or new in the business, whether they're
working for someone or going out on their own, just really
figuring out that At where do you draw the line?
If you want to work Saturdays, that's completely.
Okay. But what day are you going to
take, you know, as Monday year yoga day and instead of go into
the office at 9:00 a.m. and how to just really be clear here my
boundaries, this is my personal cell, I'm not giving that number
out. If there's an emergency, how can
you get a hold of someone and you know most of the time and
design there. No real emergencies.
Oh yeah. Yeah, that happens clients.
Think that it's an emergency for them but really, it's not like a
life-or-death situation can be resolved between 9:00 and 5:00
Monday through Friday, right? Because you're freaking out that
you pick the wrong shade of white.
So, there's a couple of things I wanted to ask you.
More about, you went to school for being a criminal prosecutor.
What was that about? Well, okay, so I thought I was
going to go to school and right when I had to declare my major,
I decided, you know what that is, not what I want to do,
really wanted to go into a creative and as kind of, I guess
for me a more enjoyable career and so, right, as I declared my
major, I thought, you know, I'm going to try interior
architectural And see where that goes.
So okay interesting that it because if they seem kind of far
away from each other, so it was in you know that you would kind
of lean towards criminal prosecution initially and then
pick a completely creative career at the end of that.
So I think because I like to argue when I was younger
everyone said oh you should be an attorney or you should be a
lawyer, you know, I just kind of always heard that happened.
I thought It's okay. I don't like to argue with
anyone other than my family, and in high school I had, I had
taken a kind of an intro, to decorating and design.
Oh, okay. And just loved it.
And I had, yeah, I had already started looking into colleges, I
guess, actually, it was my senior year that I decided
instead of going into Law. I wanted to go into an art or
you know and interior design type of career.
So I started to look and yeah I decided for me, I wanted to get
I'm from Modesto area in California, wanted to get kind
of a Faraway Beach Town, stay in California.
Started looking at where that degree was offered and headed
down to San Diego. Okay.
Yeah. I had San Diego and my sites as
well for a while. While so so you enjoyed the
private down there? Yeah I did it was a great school
at San Diego State. We had to do a, I don't remember
if it was 100 200, you know handful of free hours back.
Then we did the free internships and so I started interning at a
design firm in Solana Beach. So it was just, I don't know, I
guess about a half hour north of where I was at at school and at
the Her ship it was so great. I felt like we get thrown into
so many roles because it's just kind of, you know, the designers
are busy. They're like okay start
organizing the tile library or the fabric room or the binders
and and you get thrown so many different aspects which is so
great and the firm that I worked out was working on a restaurant
in Hawaii and no one in the office.
Knew how to use AutoCAD or SketchUp, SketchUp wasn't even
around back then. But no one knew how to use
AutoCAD and everything was hand drafted.
And here, you know, I come in as just flirting AutoCAD and
they're having me design a bar, and it was just amazing.
I to work on things that I wouldn't have.
But then, what I realized is I didn't see any of the business
side. I didn't meet with clients, I'd
call through the tracking list of Our materials then fixtures
were at, but I never had anything to do with how those
items got put on to the tracking list, okay?
Or really learned about what vendors, you know, it would say,
okay, this is a pin blur fabric. So I'm calling pin puller
because the numbers on there, but I didn't really know
anything about the vendor. I didn't know the different
fabric, you know, what which Fabrics went with which company.
He's what showrooms you could go to.
So, although I felt like I learned so much, I learned a lot
about a little, or a little bit about a lot of things I did.
Yeah. It almost was too much into
short of time. And, and, and I lucked out, I
mean, I know some people finish their internship and, and then
head head back to school and leave the internship.
And I got asked if I wanted to stay on.
And so I worked part time while I was finishing schools.
That was great because I got to keep learning and, you know,
really expand my knowledge but still didn't really see the
business side of the firm that I was at, right?
That's unfortunate. How big was that firm.
It was the owner, the principal designer, and then one lead
designer and one assistant designer.
Okay, well, not as of my firm's trying to think about it for our
interns perspective like, We usually do try to take them in
with all the business side and on meetings and stuff like that.
But I can see how when you're really busy to just throw that
in, turn out, like what you mediately need, and then you're
not giving them the variety that they actually should get while
they're there. And with this design firm, it
was open. Open to Walkins, I mean, we
didn't have a lot of walking and but pretty much.
I'm and the front desk or woman. Okay.
Yeah, and so I saw the clients come in but I wasn't involved in
their meeting. So I didn't hear how the
presentations went. I didn't go to job sites.
I didn't get a lot of involvement in that portion of
the firm that I was that, but most of the time we didn't have
the phone's ringing. We didn't have people coming in.
So then I was getting to kind of get my hands on helping with
some of the design and pulling samples and that condemned.
That's good. Did you ever ask to be involved
with any of the meetings or I thought I did?
And so she tried to let me kind of come into, never out of the
office. So I never got to see the job
sites, but if there weren't people coming in and if there
weren't tasks to do then she started to kind of let me be in
the room and see what was going on.
But I just Never really saw the projects from start to finish
and how the whole process went. And I look back and I don't
think I knew what to ask. I don't.
Ya think, I don't know, it's just what I was.
Yeah. Yeah, I didn't realize what I
was missing and then I moved back to Modesto area and started
my firm and realized huh. Now I am the, the lead meeting
the clients for the first time. And I saw it, I felt like I knew
what I was doing and in the design world, but I don't think
I really knew how to and finish, right?
How to navigate its way through. So, at the beginning of owning
my own business, it was a lot of trial and error and, and I
hadn't met any mentors yet. I hadn't, you know, podcasts
weren't really around. Hmm, back when I started my
business, It snows. Wow, yeah, it was harder the
before all this, these great resources.
That's why we're here though. Yeah, another thing I was going
to ask you, was you mentioned how with your kids, you
developed an assembly line, you know, getting out the door and
all the things he had to do and did your brain automatically
transfer that into your business or did not.
And why do you think Think it didn't if if not yeah so I
definitely you know, when I had the first child and didn't need
assembly lines yet, you know, it's kind of the same with when
you have your first client and you're trying to figure out,
okay, what should the process B and then you add a second
client? And a new project comes in, I
realized very quickly that I would sit at my desk staring at
a blank Excel page and thinking. Okay, Working on a kitchen.
What do I need for a kitchen? So, and I'm list and now, we
need. Okay, we need.
What are the drawer fronts going to be?
What are the doors? Oh, wait.
Okay, I forgot. What type of hinges are going to
be on these? And then on my spec list, it
would, you know, my Excel page I type in, okay?
We need Outlets well, the islands a different color.
What we need a line for that and the third project would come
along, okay? It's a kitchen, I'd say Sit at
my blank Excel page and went, why am I typing this out again?
And so I think just really realizing.
Yes. We're going to customize each
project specifically to that clients needs.
However, we don't need to customize the paperwork every
time. So not only did I start
realizing okay. Yeah, I was quickly smarter in
my processes and realizing. Okay, I need to save these Excel
pages but then I started, Ding them into the operations manual,
so that anyone in my office could at and at the beginning, I
didn't have any stuff but I thought I had an intern myself.
How would I even tell them? How to open up the blank Excel
page? How to name it?
How to copy and paste it into a new file?
Okay, what's that folder even named?
I mean that's I had at one time, one employee and two interns and
I realized everyone wanted Added to name folders very
differently. And at one point, we were
working with three women that were relatives and all had the
same last name, and one of those women had two houses that she
owned on the same road. Well, if you don't have a
process to how to save those folder names, like we would
never find each project that we were working on, you know, it's
like, okay, where's Kathy's? Where is Ashley's?
Well, why is one under the first day?
Wondering who the last name. And so I think just with all of
that realizing I can't sit and hand hold.
Every person that comes into my office to help me.
And so making sure that you know, assembly line concept is
on the operations manual and being utilized her, as best as
possible, right? Right.
Is there an operation manual for kids like something?
I mean, so you like, did the assembly line brought that into
your business? - but then reversing it because
sometimes you feel like, you know, you need that manual for
your kids? Yes.
Oh my goodness I wish there were 14 the kids.
Yeah, well and there should be and it would be different with
each. I feel I have to come up with a
different parenting style for each personality for each of my
kids. Mmm.
And my littlest just started TK. So she's four years old, just
started TK. And I have not figured out I
guess if she is a bribable or a threat Noble child.
Anyway, yeah. Yeah.
Well, I mean, how do we parent? Yeah, I think there's a lot of
parallels though you can drive that because even presenting to
a client or selling, you know, because we sell is a huge part
of our company is that we are selling product or selling
design, but each client's going to race.
Receive it or want to receive it in a different manner to based
on their personality. So it's kind of understanding
your clients like the way that your understanding your kids.
Yeah. And so I actually have two
clients. YN is an attorney, she loves
billable hours, loves them. She loves how detailed we write
them out. She loves paying them and the
second we put $1 a markup on product.
She is she'll fight us. I mean, fight us all.
And the bill, like, oh why did you and it's not that she's
cheap at all, but she fills our Lily.
That's how she wants to be built by us and there stands.
Yeah. Right.
And I have another client, that
is a real estate agent. He gets paid on commission.
He hates seeing our billable hours and he's like Lindsey just
put it in the product. Hi.
It basically has told me, just hide it in there and send me the
bill. I don't want to see your hourly
list it out. And and you know, it's very much
a joggle of, okay, wait a minute, who's running the
business, right? My going to let them run my, you
know, tell me how to run my own business, but it's also if he
doesn't want to see. So I have learned just to do
kind of a package price for him. I don't tally up every minute,
he doesn't feel nickel and dimed, whereas we know, Purdue a
package price for our attorney client and we just list
everything out. Every minute I spent on her
project, she is build and she is happy to be built for it and see
it. She really just wants to see
that detail. So it's yeah, same size box for
anyone. So, as you started growing your
business, do you grow your business and your family
simultaneously? Basically was there.
A point where you're you thought, maybe having kids were
being put on the back burner or that, your, your business was
taking too much of that bandwidth in your life that you
need to set some boundaries. Yes, definitely seasons of
sometimes. I felt like I was neglecting
clients and they were kind of getting frustrated with my
timelines or or neglecting the kids and they were getting
frustrated that, you know, maybe I was at that baseball game.
But I'm answering emails on my phone or just not being present.
Hmm. One thing I really had to do is
sit down and figure out what do I want my hours to look like?
So, working with my husband, through the schedule of, if I'm
drop off in the morning and then he's pick up in the afternoons,
just making sure that my staff knows that my clients now, I'm
not going to tell them that I'll call them at 8:00, if I'm
dealing with. The drop-offs.
And then also, looking at the schedule of Summer, if my kids
are out of school and I really want to focus on them, I've
gotten to a point where I will Roar really, really hard to
catch up on things before summer, so that I can kind of
take a refresh. And part of that also is a lot
of my clients, my ideal client. They want to spend Christmas
time with their families or, you know, the holidays right with
their so, Not contacting me, they're not wanting new
consultations watching my numbers and just my data from
the year and going okay, if August is my slowest time of
getting new calls take that as my own time.
Mhm. And so maybe that you know it's
telling the kids. Okay.
Well I'm going to work a whole lot this month so that next
month, I can take some time off. And we'll go on vacation and
yeah, and just gonna planning everything around And when my
data says I'm busy and when it says I'm not right, right?
And that's one of the luxuries that we can have as business
owners is taking that time off when ever, we decide is best for
us. Yeah, I closed in December for
at least two weeks and sometimes, two and a half, I
think it's just good for the company.
I mean, because like you said, nobody really needs to get.
They want to be with their family.
Nobody really needs to get anything done between those two.
Right? And I mean, isn't that why we
started a business? That's that was the dream.
Yeah, I think that definitely for me as well played a part as
like thinking. This is a career that I could do
both like be a mom and kind of present for the kids, not just
have them, you'll be able to work from home and not just have
them in daycare all day. And then also have a business
For myself, but I definitely would say that it didn't
organically happen the way I thought it would.
I ended up, you know, having to make up hard choices of being
like okay. Do I take this meeting today or
tomorrow or should I hire a babysitter and then you know
trying to find that good balance between being partly a
stay-at-home mom and then partly a working mom was challenging?
Yeah I do love one thing though is as the kid Get older and
especially so for me, my oldest is about to turn 15 and she her
whole life has kind of been drugged to vendors, and
retailers and vendors in the paint store.
And when she walks in my flooring, guys, they know her.
They asked her how, you know, oh, how'd your last game go and
just two things that have been so beneficial to cr1, how the
older kids interact with Adults, because they've been taken into
stores and they've, they see that I'm at work.
They know. They have to behave a certain
way. They know they need to speak to
adults, they know, or don't know a certain way and you know, it
was hard when they were young and I'm trying to either pick
paint picked I'll you know, shoot we leave and I forgot to
pick the grout because one of them starts running around.
I'm like, nope. Okay, we're done and but then
also, Seeing that the older kids have pride when they talk about.
I own my own business and what their mom does and and seeing
them like explain it to a friend.
It just gets me. Well that's really sweet.
I think it's sort of that affirmation that.
Yes sometimes I wasn't there and sometimes I was there and not
100% pleasant but I tried my hardest and Then to see them
have benefited from it that. Yeah, just I don't know.
It's nice to see we all need that affirmation sometimes and
for sure. Yeah.
As they're getting older, I go okay, I did something right,
right? Yeah, I mean, you're modeling to
them, what it's like to be an entrepreneur and owning your own
business and finding that balance in life, with, they're
going to have to do themselves, to do any of your kids
interested in following in your But steps so far, you think
anybody in designers? I don't know that any of them
will do design, but one of my son's has talked about being an
architect and I already actually last Market.
I drug my oldest daughter with me and I said, oh my goodness,
she was awesome, I put her to work.
She was writing down everything I was Finding what fly into
snapping all the pictures she was saving it.
She was posting on Instagram Damn, you know, stuff that I
didn't want to do and didn't have time to because I was
trying to focus on each client and I mean I bribed her with a
Cirque du Soleil show and so what I thought yeah, just the
ability to just kind of hand or my phone and say you're younger
than me. You know how to cook works?
Yeah, it was something for me. And so it that, Exciting.
That was kind of my first like, wow, okay, my children are
hireable. Yeah.
I mean it's not a bad job for them to have in the high school
or you know, start going to college or something just to be
an assistant in the office and helping you out with things and
can learn skills that are transferable even if they don't
stay within the industry, right? Right.
And even through the summer, we received most of our deliveries
at a Receiving and delivery or or the office, however, it's
still astounding. How much shows up at my house
when I'm not expecting it. Yeah.
And so he and a, my son, the tracking figure it out.
Start start putting together piles.
So I don't know. That's been fun.
So we talked about how we had to set more boundaries with your
clients, as you added more kids like into the mix.
Was that hard for you too? To set those boundaries with
your clients and to advocate for our family time or is that
something that you struggled with for a while.
Yes. And I mean, I can't say that
even to this day on perfect with it because I am definitely
someone who doesn't know how to say.
No. Very well.
So if a client, you know, really needs a week and, and really
wants an evening or and if I really want to do the project,
I've gotten to a point where I have my Boundaries it if they
need a weekend. I migrated I'm willing to work
on a Saturday if I want that project bad enough, but the
hours are going to be doubled the rate.
You know, my rate is going to be doubled and so if that deters
them and they go, never mind will fit into a weekday then
great. You know, I accomplished my
goal, but I also feel if they, you know, I'll tell them what
time of the weekend or what. A more I'm not willing to do and
I don't feel taken advantage of because they're willing to pay
double my rate and I feel. Okay?
You know, if they really couldn't make a weekday work, or
couldn't make my hours work, but then at least I feel.
I'm the one in charge of those guys, that's important.
Yeah. So whereas I used to just say
sure I'm available anytime any, you know, and and I think
sometimes too, I feel this in, this might be sure.
Rio typing just a little bit, but I feel sometimes as a mom
and sort of pretending like I don't have other priority.
Don't have kids that are my number one priority and I'm sort
of pretending like, oh, I'm this even though I'm a working mom, I
feel sometimes. Like I have to prove that my
career is the most important thing to me.
Yeah. And I mean the reality it's not
I mean my little ones are. Yeah.
But I've seen my Take a phone call with all of the kids in the
car and and you know, it gives me a panic attack, just the fact
that he's taking a phone call, and it might be from his boss.
And he's like my boss knows it's the weekend.
I'm with the kids and with the family, I'm going to take a
phone call and he's not going to apologize though, right.
Nice. Well, where can people go to see
your beautiful work and all your projects.
So my website is lhk Interiors.com Calm.
And then also, I try to post more current things on Instagram
at lhk, interior. So Interiors.com for my website
and could not get the S4. My monster will put those links
in the show notes. It's our bacon.
Go find you. But thanks for sharing your
wisdom and insight. Eat today.
Oh, well, thank you so much for having me.
So fun talking with Lindsay and it's not over yet.
We have some more great Insight from her for episode 26.
So you want to get a stick around and come back and do
weeks to hear what else Lindsay has to say.
And don't forget, you can get all of the information about
Lindsey connect with her in the show notes.
And while you're on my website on the show notes, you can go to
download the three things. I I wish I had known when I was
starting out my career and get on the mailing list for the
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You'll be hearing the five. Courses that you need to take to
start your career and it was hard for me to narrow it down.
I will admit so but there's one in particular going to
definitely want to take. So find out next week with that
is and we'll talk to you, then, thanks for listening.
If you loved this episode, please leave a rating and a
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