Justin So good evening. To those of you that are watching, but I want to especially welcome, Shaun and Rhonda Noonan. So, Shaun and Rhonda, you guys, this is sort of a bit of a trip down memory lane. You were, I think, the third subscription in James when we released the subscription model, one of our very first subscribers.
So how long? How long ago was that, now? How long have you been in your business?
Shaun We’re looking we’re coming in August this year to be three years.
Justin Three years. Okay, so. So my three years. So I guess. Well, firstly, where are you? Can you tell me a bit about yourselves? Do you have family?
Shaun Yes. We’re we’re here in Cessnock. We’ve got four children. Yeah. Eldest is 21. Youngest is six.
Justin Righteo, yeah. And so they’re all at home, are they?
Shaun Yeah. Also at home.
Justin You’re a busy household righteo,
Shaun Yes.
Justin So, what were you guys doing before James?
Shaun So I was a, I was a cleaning supervisor. Yes, at, one of the mine sites up in Singleton.
Justin Okay. Right. Yeah. So, traveling away from home a lot?
Shaun Yeah. Was traveling away? Yeah, it was about a 40 minute drive. Yeah. Away from home. So. Oh, yeah. So very long hours.
Justin Yeah. Everybody. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And for yourself, Rhonda.
Rhonda Yeah. It’s just like a cleaner. Just a just a better cleaner at the mine site. As well. So. Yeah. Which is a sort of 40 minute trip, so. Yeah. Yeah.
Justin Oh okay. So you were out there as well, so. Yeah. Okay. So. Well, you guys came with a lot of cleaning experience.
Rhonda Yes. Yep.
Justin Very good. Okay. So what I guess what made you start looking for something different?
Shaun Kind of wanted to do something with, like, I was a bit, you know, get out of that same routine. That 9 to 5 routine type things. Mix it up a little bit, go out on my own, which we had, you know, business experience and stuff like that kind of experience. Just wanted to really branch out by ourselves.
Justin Right.
Shaun And get a life partner. Yeah.
Justin Okay. So how’s the journey been for you?
Shaun It’s been great. Yeah, it’s been really good. Really good. There’s been some ups and downs, but, yeah. Yeah, at the moment, it’s really good.
Justin Yeah. Would you mind sharing some of downs? What’s been the tough things that you’ve found in, in doing it, being in your own business.
Shaun Probably some of the, the learning curves is the hard ones is, some of the quoting, probably the quoting, getting that correct to me, getting that that right to be English. So you know, you’re not out of pocket. Yeah. Yeah.
Justin You’re not spending hours extra on the job more than you.
Shaun Yeah, that’s exactly right. Yeah. Yeah.
Justin Okay. Radio. And so what have been some of the good things for you? Like has anything changed in your family life or has it, you know, you’re both driving lots. Has it been many changes?
Shaun More flexibility in our family life. So if we want to take a holiday where there’s no having to ask a boss or anything for leave and being denied it, we can just, you know, make the plane go, okay, so this week we’re going to take the time off and. Yeah, yeah. And go and do it.
Justin Yeah. Make school sports days and stuff like that.
Shaun Yeah. That’s right. There’s been more time for family. And you know, we haven’t had to turn the kids away for stuff that, you know, because of work and.
Justin Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I remember when we first bought our first James franchise, one of the things for me was I realized we had three young girls, and I’d never drop the girls once to school.
Shaun Yeah.
Justin One of the first things I put in my business was I did the school run in the mornings, and that was just such a.
Shaun Yeah. So that was lovely. That was the same with me. I was never seeing the kids until the afternoon because I started early. Yeah. So I was never the same until after school time. Yeah. Yeah.
Justin Yeah. It really. Yeah. We do find that that these one of the strengths of the business. Is it. And it’s your family actually involved in the business. Do any of your kids help you on any jobs or anything.
Shaun Like they are starting to help us. Yes. Yep. Yeah. Yep.
Justin Yeah. You don’t have to drag them kicking and screaming or anything like that.
Shaun No, no, it’s been quite good actually. The eldest one is, Yeah, he’s really helpful, so.
Justin Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Oh, good. Very good. So what does a typical day look like for you now?
Shaun It’s usually what we thought about, but I. Morning. Yeah. Have a couple of clients. We we usually service about 3 to 4 a day. Yeah. Yep. Then home’s roundabout after school time, 3 or 4:00 in the afternoon, which is good.
Justin Awesome, awesome. And so what? What sort of work is it for most of your clients? Like, are you doing lots of commercial planning or bomb planning or residential?
Shaun You know, at the moment we’re balanced between Airbnbs and residential regular cleaning.
Justin Okay. Well, so so it’s not got the same Airbnb thing.
Rhonda Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Justin Right. Yeah. We find some of the guys on the along the beaches, particularly on the East coast. Get into Airbnb cleaning as well.
Shaun Yeah, we do have quite a few Airbnbs that we are taking on, so.
Justin Okay, cool. And like for your so you finished the day sort of 2 or 3 in school time or a bit later when you get home, like is there much book work or how long do you find for you that takes that sort of side of it?
Shaun There’s not much book work at all. It’s, pretty, pretty quick. Probably spend probably about half an hour to another hour doing book work, which isn’t much at all.
Justin Yeah. Okay. Yeah.
Shaun Yeah, that’s just taking the clients for the next day. And a little bit of invoicing for that day. That’s about it.
Justin Yeah. I think the one thing that surprised me that I hadn’t thought of in my cleaning business, I would love to know what yours is like. Was the rags. I’d never factored in having to wash rags nearly every day.
Shaun Oh, yeah, that’s a lot of rags. Yeah.
Justin Yeah. It was sort of like. Oh, okay. So.
Shaun Yeah. So it’s usually a lot of dye.
Justin Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Very good. Is there one thing you can think of that you can do now that you couldn’t do before? Well, you actually said seeing the kids in the morning was.
Shaun One we kids. We’ve actually taking more holidays. Yeah. More trips around now, so. Which we couldn’t do before because.
Rhonda Of the flexibility, that sort of thing. So. Yeah.
Shaun Yeah. Yeah. So that’s.
Justin And now how do you work that. Because it is is a question that I get asked all the time when people are looking at joining, when you’re the boss and you’re the person doing the job. How do you take holidays. Like what do you get? How do you work your clients? You know, if you take a week off, what happens to them?
Shaun So, so normally, the clients are pretty flexible that they’re really right with us. Yeah. We can usually move them around, which is good. So with both of us, obviously, we can move them around most of the time. Yeah.
Justin Yep. Okay. And I guess has it how has it impacted your time together? You got more or less or.
Shaun You know, our families got more time and more time together. Yeah.
Justin Yeah. Because you do you actually work together or do you guys separately on jobs?
Rhonda Sometimes we work together, sometimes we separate. Just depends on what time of the day. So. Yeah.
Justin Yeah. Right. Okay. Yeah. Well, I guess without being cheesy, what are some things you would recommend to someone who’s looking at James? What are some things possibly that they should be thinking of and, and any, I guess. Yeah. What would you say to people thinking of possibly joining? Well.
Shaun To be honest, first off it is hard work. It is really hard work dealing with clients and you’re basically taking anything you can find. Yeah. So be prepared for a lot of hard work to begin with. Yep.
Justin Yep.
Shaun But there’s but as you as you get further and further into it, you start balancing out quite well and your days are balanced and it gets a lot easier.
Justin Yeah. Yeah. So you feel confident in with your quoting and things like that?
Shaun Yeah. Yeah, that’s exactly right. Yeah. Yeah. You learn from your mistakes. Yeah. Yeah.
Justin So what do you wish that someone had told you before you joined? Can you think of any little pearls that you’re like, man, I wish I known that.
Shaun Don’t think so. Really? No, no.
Rhonda I we already knew it was going to be, like, hard work. Sorry. Yeah.
Shaun Yeah. Yeah. I mean, do you really have anything? No.
Justin No. Okay.
Shaun No.
Justin And I guess for you guys particularly, you had both been working in the cleaning industry, so. Yeah.
Shaun Yeah.
Justin The work it’s self wasn’t so different.
Shaun No, it wasn’t, no, it definitely wasn’t. It was when you were getting ready to.
Justin Yeah. I often find when I ask that question to other, you know, franchisees. Business artisan James, you know, most people haven’t had a cleaning background. So they say, oh man, the first few weeks we found all these muscles we didn’t know we had, we were a bit sore or different. But, you know, I want it. We call it getting work fit.
Then I’m sure you’d understand after, you know, a couple of months, you you body get used to that.
Shaun It does get used to years. Yeah, yeah.
Justin Yeah. Okay. So is there any advice you’d give to anyone that’s thinking of owning a franchise? Has it been. Are you glad you did it?
Shaun Yeah, I’m definitely glad I did it. Yeah. Because obviously we have we have the support. There’s a back up supports, which has been great. Because we did have a bit of a struggle period. Yeah. And with, the coaching and everything from Alan helped us build it up to where it is today.
Justin Right. Great. Yeah. Yeah. And congratulations. Like, I, you know, we we walk the journey together two and three, 40 years ago. But I haven’t sort of. Yeah. Seen much of you guys since then because you’re working with the coaches and just catching up. Looking at your figures. It’s just been awesome to see.
Shaun Yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s. It’s been really good.
Justin So good. Okay. One of the challenges that people in their own business, not just James. One of the potential challenges is that work life balance. So, you know, I seem to have got it happening. Is there anything that you’ve had to do to sort of maintain that, like to stop things getting out of control?
Shaun Yeah. Yeah. So you’ve just got to learn when to switch off, when the when to switch off or when when it’s time for family time. Otherwise your work life will just go off. Will really take over. You’ve just got to go. Okay. But, you know, you set yourself a time at the end of the day. Okay. So about 5:00.
That’s it. After that. It’s on family time. That is that is it? Otherwise you you find yourself sitting up at all hours of the night doing stuff that you shouldn’t be doing.
Justin Yeah, I know my wife and I, we often just go, right? No more gyms.
Shaun Yeah. That’s right. Yeah. It’s not that, is it?
Justin Yeah. Because when you both work in the business, I don’t know what you two are like, but we often, you know, you’ll be sitting around having dinner, talking about whatever’s going on in your business.
Shaun We find that conversation has to be.
Justin But that works well. Yeah, because otherwise it just becomes all consuming. And. And you.
Shaun Go, yeah.
Justin I draw the line that right now we’re family time. That’s cool. That’s good. Yeah. Very good. Well, that probably really covers everything that. I wanted to have a chat with you guys about tonight. But. Yeah. Any final words of wisdom? Any lessons that you’ve learned at all.
Shaun That you should be quoting was a big one. Yep. Don’t be afraid to, to over quote like if you if you. Yeah, that’s really a big one to be frightened over. Quote Yep. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. We pretty much it. Yeah. Because otherwise you’re find yourself. You’re working for nothing. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. You’re a.
Justin Good. Awesome. Well, thank you so much. To both of you for taking the time out after big day.
Shaun No worries.
Justin I guess if people want to chat to you, you’ll find numbers on, like, everyone in James on that website. But, yeah, actually, write a little blog about you on there. And.
Shaun Yeah, for sure. So beautiful photo. Yep.
Justin Awesome. Well, thanks once again. And, look forward to catching up soon.
Shaun No worries.
Rhonda Thank you.
More Information on subscribing to your own business
Want to speak to a real person about joining our network? Get in touch directly with our National Director of Sales; Justin Kelly on 0438 780 363
Want us to contact you? Submit an enquiry
