“I was so afraid people would say no, that I would undervalue myself. And so I think the greatest lesson I learned is that no good has ever come from undervaluing yourself. No matter what business you’re in, if you don’t charge enough, you’re gonna end up resenting it, resenting the client, resenting the piece, hating what you do, and it’s just gonna be a miserable way to live.”

 

-Jeremy Hill, founder of Jericho Home

 

Today on the podcast our guest is Jeremy Hill, the founder of Jericho Home, the Marietta, Georgia based furniture company. Jeremy builds furniture that you just want to gather around. He builds custom pieces that fit your home like they’ve always been there. He’s grown his company from a little garage to a thriving and successful business that keeps growing stronger year by year. 

 

But before we get ahead of ourselves, let’s start at the beginning of his story. Like the heirloom furniture, Jeremy builds, his journey into the world of woodworking was passed down from generations before him.

 

The Origins of Jericho Home

Growing up, Jeremy’s grandfather taught him how to build things. He was an architect and a preacher. Jeremy would spend summers with his grandparents a lot. His grandfather taught  him everything from how to build docks to how to frame homes. Eventually Jeremy went to school for English and ended up being a teacher for a long time.

 

Once Jeremy got tired of grading papers, parent teacher conferences and lesson plans, he realized he missed working with his hands. He started building decks again, and then started to branch into more complex and diverse projects. As his interests developed they led him to studying the art of making furniture and had him looking more at design. 

 

Ethan notes that there is always that difference between building furniture as a hobby and building furniture believing you can make a living from it. He wonders if Jeremy ever had the “aha” moment where he realized this could actually be his professional, and creative calling.

 

Jeremy recalls that he had a really good streak going early on where he just got asked to do a lot of jobs in a row, and it felt really good to be busy doing something that made him physically tired instead of mentally tired. Jeremy also notes of course that when you actually own the business, you get mentally tired again, but for him it was just so refreshing to be working with his hands again. 

 

Jeremy also notes that back then of course, he underpriced because he was new to it, and didn’t quite get it. However, it was enough budget for him to realize that he absolutely could make a living doing it.

 

Ethan and Jeremy discuss how much of a leap it takes to go from having a 9-5 and doing woodworking part-time to turning it into a full-time, primary income source. Both caution against impulsivity but also agree to run with inspiration when it strikes.

 

The Evolution of the Business 

For Jeremy the biggest evolution was learning to value his time and pieces appropriately. First, he was listening to half baked advice and the old unproven and untrue formula, of “you should just charge the price of materials times three” which doesn’t work at all.

 

Granted, Jeremy does work on a formula for certain things, but usually not when he’s building custom pieces because the formula doesn’t always fit. Jeremy says you need to be able to consider things like, overhead, material costs, hours, expenses, insurance etc.,

 

Jeremy and Ethan also talk about how hearing the word “no” when starting out seems like the end of the world, like a death rattle for your business. But in truth, a lot of times when you hear that word, “no”, it’s a good thing. It probably doesn’t seem like it at the time, but it is, for a lot of reasons. You get to look back and see why they said, “no”, you get to re-evaluate how you’re presenting yourself to the outside world, and you learn from that. 

 

Then you look back in a few years on that one job that seemed like it was going to be the big break, or was going to be the thing that propelled everything forward, and you may realize that it was actually priced entirely wrong, or you had no idea how to build it, and it would have just been a complete disaster, and could have even tanked your entire business.

 

The Competition 

Ethan notes that Jeremy has said he’s shied away from looking at other people’s businesses or wondering what the competition is doing. So Ethan wonders how Jeremy is getting his clients at the moment. Jeremy says that Instagram has been a fairly effective marketing tool for him and that he tries to treat his Instagram page like an ever changing portfolio. Jeremy has also been fortunate with word of mouth. 

 

Luckily in his area there’s been so much business that Jeremy has rarely ever had a really slow period. The worst he remembers was a couple of years ago, one April was the cruelest month. He wasn’t getting any bids, not getting any messages, the phone wasn’t ringing, but he made it through and at this point, he’s handed out a lot of business cards, done a few trade shows and also does some ads on Facebook marketplace, just to get a little more coverage. 

 

Still, Jeremy would say word of mouth has been incredibly effective. A lot of the calls that Jeremy gets are from someone who says, “Hey, I’m friends with this other client of yours, and I really liked the work you did at their place, I’d love to have you come out and give me an estimate.” Jeremy says that generally keeps the business going.

 

Unique Business Decisions

As Ethan points out, one of the hallmarks of a good entrepreneur is knowing their own shortcomings, be it in marketing, or any number of other things that come up in the day to day running of a company. He points out that Jeremy had that awakening in his business. He was already a strong company, a successful business creator in his own right. However, Jeremy decided to take on a business partner. Ethan wonders what the deciding factor was in that for Jeremy. 

 

Jeremy said he felt disproportionately busy when it was just him, three or four jobs out feeling swamped. Especially when in reality, it’s something where you want to be three, four, five or even six jobs out, because you need that security. Jeremy realized pretty quickly that he needed to find a partner. 

 

The wood business owner went over several iterations of how that would go. He wondered if he should hire someone or get a partner and he finally decided that he needed to give someone a trial period. So he partnered up with a guy named Ed who is a really talented woodworker and furniture maker. 

 

After their initial time working together, they decided to form a new LLC using Jericho Home. It’s been a really great process for the team and they compliment each other well. This allows Jeremy to focus on talking to clients, getting jobs, maintaining relationships, chasing down supplies, and talking to the lumberyard.

 

For Jeremy it made sense to have a partner as someone who would buy into the dream with their own dream because that is always going to be stronger than simply a paycheck, you can hire an employee, and there are some amazing people out there, but for someone you hire, it’s always going to be a job to them. If you’re partnering with somebody, and it becomes their life, just like it is your life, that’s a much different way to work together.

 

To see more from Jericho Home check out the links below:

Facebook: Jericho Home

Instagram: @jericho_home

This episode is brought to you by Jobber – BoostByJobber.com