Challenge the Status Quo with Erin Holowach

Challenge the Status Quo with Erin Holowach

Kelly Kennedy: Welcome to episode 32 of the Business Development Podcast, and today we have an amazing interview with Erin Holowach of homeFree and ComFree Fame. And today we are chatting a little bit about b2c, so if that's something that interests you, B2C and entrepreneurship, stay tuned.

Intro: The great Mark Cuban once said, business happens over years and years. Value is measured in the total upside of a business relationship, not by how much you squeezed out in any one deal, and we couldn't agree more. This is the Business Development Podcast based in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, and broadcasting to the world.

You'll get expert business development advice, tips, and experiences, and you'll hear interviews with business owners. CEOs and Business Development Reps. You'll get actionable advice on how to grow business. Brought to you by Capital Business Development Capitalbd.ca. Let's do it. Welcome to the The Business Development Podcast. And now your expert host, Kelly Kennedy.

Kelly Kennedy: Hello, welcome to episode 32 of the Business Development Podcast, and today we have an amazing expert interview for you. We have a little local legend here today Edmonton, founder of multiple businesses and one that you guys will probably know very, very well.

We have Erin Holowach today. Erin Holowach and her husband Travis are serial entrepreneurs in the Edmonton business community. Erin began her entrepreneurial journey at a very young age. Being raised at a grain farm just outside of Edmonton. Growing up, Erin not only learned about entrepreneurship and the value of a dollar, but also developed her strong work ethic and love for real estate and adventure.

From 2002 to 2009, Erin and her husband Travis, grew ComFree to 98% brand awareness. One out of three homes in Edmonton were listed with ComFree. ComFree offered a fully supported private sale with everything needed to sell privately. In 2009, Erin and Travis decided to merge and then ultimately sell to a larger corporation.

The vision behind the merger was a Canadian wide ComFree, but partners in the merger had other ideas. This brought an end to the area, the era of ComFree Commission free Realty. Over the next 12 years, Erin and Travis were involved in multiple startups, mergers, sales, and real estate investments and developments.

In addition to growing business, Erin continues to be involved in multiple entrepreneurs organizations. Leadership summits and business coaching to help other leaders and entrepreneurs grow and operate their businesses to their fullest potential. Growing ComFree was one of the most rewarding parts of Erin's career.

In the pursuit of following their passion, Erin and Travis decided to bring back the vision of ComFree. Rebranded now as homeFree. homeFree is designed to, once again be a fully supported private sale, a missing alternative in the real estate market. Parallel to Erin's entrepreneurial journey.

Erin is mom to Jax 18, Reya 17 and Live. 14. Erin and Travis have loved the freedom that entrepreneurship has allowed their family, but everyone in the Holowach family knows that freedom doesn't come without challenges. Hardships and very thick skin. In raising teenagers, Erin has found herself telling her kids to follow their passion and happiness and success will follow.

These words have never been more true as Erin and Travis decide to launch homeFree. That is amazing, Erin, first off, and I totally agree with you what it totally, if you follow your passion, amazing things happen. If you do what you're meant to do, I feel like we all have a calling and I feel like if you're following your calling, great things tend to happen.

How are you today, Erin?

Erin Holowach: I am fantastic. I'm excited to talk a little bit about homeFree and it's a lovely sunny afternoon in Edmonton, so can't complain at all.

Kelly Kennedy: Oh my gosh. Especially, you know, I talked about it on a previous episode, but the forest fires here have been just absolutely horrible. My heart goes out to all the people that were displaced from their homes and we really only just started to get some like sunny skies again this week. It's been weeks now of just horrible overcast, smoggy, smoky conditions.

Erin Holowach: Yeah, absolutely. We were actually very, very lucky, but we were in, we were on an acreage just outside Edmonton and we were on an evacuation alert, so not evacuated right when the fires began.

So certainly got a little sense of what it feels like to be on the edge of your seat and not knowing what your next move is gonna be. So, absolutely. My heart goes out to all the people displaced. Yeah. Cause just a couple of hours of feeling like that could be our reality. Totally. Was. Overwhelming.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah.

We have friends of our family too that were in that ant whistle Wildwood area and you know, really scary. We were getting kind of like update pictures. They have a farm out there, so as you can imagine, you can't exactly just pack up and leave your farm. So they were kind of trying to stick around as long as they could and, and kind of keep their cattle, you know, in the right places.

And I can't imagine what, what kind of fear that must be when it's your entire livelihood. You know, people didn't really think about that. It's like you're displaced from your home, but that is your, that is your home, that's your livelihood.

Erin Holowach: That's just it. And you really start thinking and putting into perspective, what would you take?

I mean, cause you can't take everything in an hour. So then you, it's an interesting thought process. So what matters? Cause if you're losing everything, like I. What outfit you grab or whatever it might be is so irrelevant. And then all the super important things would take, I mean, when there's years and years of memories mm-hmm.

Or on a farm, where would you begin? Like what are you gonna do with your a hundred cows?

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah. No, totally, totally. So just to start out this episode, heart goes out to all of you, everyone who's been displaced. I hope I did hear that a lot of people are able to go home now, finally. So I do hope that you are able to go home and that you didn't lose anything and that things are.

Things are on the up and up. Exactly. Lemme just start this out, Erin, by congratulating both yourself and Travis, you two have both been incredibly successful. You've both been pillars in the Edmonton business community. We talked about this briefly before the show started, but as, as a young, as a young person when I was in high school, I remember seeing ComFree signs all over.

I grew up in Spruce Grove, Alberta, so I remember there just being ComFree signs everywhere. Like you had an incredibly successful venture with ComFree. And then yeah, I, I just wanted. To hear, I wanna hear your story. You, you must have an absolutely amazing story. You're a serial entrepreneur. You've had, I think at this point, you've been either, you've either owned or founded five different companies.

So it's it's, it's no it's no new thing for you. Tell me, bring me back to the beginning. What was it like to found ComFree?

Erin Holowach: Yeah, it was one of those things that just came to be my husband and I met just as we were graduating high school, both from sort of humble small town beginnings and went to university here in Edmonton, moved outta home and really quickly we connected, as you know, a couple and as business partners that entrepreneurship was the journey we certainly wanted to be on.

And then fast forward, To our very first company, which we started and we founded when we were 22 years old. Yeah. And it came out of just a need in the marketplace. We finished university, we got married and we said we wanted to start a business. We were broke. We didn't have debt. Thankfully we had no student debt, but we also didn't have any money.

And we said, well, let's flip a home. Let's buy a home that needs. Some TLC and some paint and lipstick and let's see what we can do with that. And so we bought a home in Northeast Edmonton. And those 35 days, if you wanna talk about hard work, were really hard work. We landscaped, we learned how to roof, we learned how to tile, and this was all self-taught.

I mean, we were 22 years old figuring out how we could maybe earn some money so we could fuel our first venture. And that's really where the. Concept of a private sale came about 35 days later of kind of dawn till dusk working on this house. And when we went to go sell it is when we learned what real estate commissions were all about.

Mm-hmm. To that point in time, we hadn't been in the real estate market, what weren't aware what, how the commission structure works to find out that there was maybe 25 or $30,000 that we could have earned from this renovation. And about the first 12 or $13,000 was gonna go to a real estate agent just for putting a sign on our lawn.

Mm-hmm. And that was really where it came about that, oh my goodness. There had to be a better way. And we reflected back at that point in time, many of you will recall the Autotrader in the Bargain Finder. Yes. And you know, that was where people sold cars if they weren't dealing with a dealership. And we're like, where do people sell houses if they don't want to use a real estate agent?

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah, no. Yeah. Like, It blows my mind that, that that was the early 2000's and that I'm like, not to say that you guys weren't very intuitive and in, but like how had nobody thought of that. Like it sometimes you look at a business idea and you, and you think like, I. It's so obvious. It's so obvious.

And yet like someone like you just walks in is like, yep, obvious. We're definitely gonna, we're gonna figure that one out. We're gonna figure out how to do this. So congratulations. That was an, that was an amazing idea at that time. And like you said, also, this is before YouTube, this is before it was easy to just figure out how to roof your house.

Like, and not to say that that's easy, but like the information was not as widely available on how to do those home renovations either. Was it?

Erin Holowach: Well, definitely not. That was that was the school of hard knocks. Let's figure it out. Very many trips to Home Depot. Yeah. Hopefully you met, met a kind person in the aisle that knew something about what we were trying to figure out.

But yeah, definitely before the time of YouTube and any of those sorts of things. But even more so bringing ComFree to market in 2002. And this is really gonna date myself and I'm not that old. Ha. Everybody didn't have internet in their homes. No, we didn't have mobile devices that, you know, were attached to our Palm 24 7.

So figuring out how to. Bring that to market and provide the alternative in some ways was more challenging, you know, too than it is today. Just because having that information readily available, you know, as a buyer or a seller wasn't as easy.

Kelly Kennedy: Totally, totally. And you know, we touched on this and I mentioned it kind of before the show started, what a lot of the stuff we talk about and a lot of the people that we've interviewed so far on the business development podcast.

We're very much business to business. They're dealing with other organizations. In this case, you really had to reach out to individuals. What has that been like? Like what are some of the challenges in, in reaching out to, to customers directly?

Erin Holowach: Well, in some ways there's two ways to look at it. When you think of b2c, so business to consumer, everybody is your customer.

We're often asked, you know, what's your demographic? Well, anyone who lives under a roof, yeah, which is everyone is ultimately our demographic is, you know, old, young, male, female. Student professional trades, it really doesn't matter. So the positive is, is everybody as our customer, the challenge is, is how do you connect with those people?

And I mean, no matter what industry you're in, there's tons of noise in the marketplace. And although back in the ComFree days, we were the only for sale by owner alternative. And fast forwarding today to homeFree, we again, are the only for sale by owner alternative, but the real estate industry is very, very competitive.

There's very few people you speak to that don't say, oh, my friends a realtor, my cousins a realtor, my uncle's a realtor. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So although everyone's our customer, how. We deliver that message and have them pick me, pick me is, can be challenging for sure.

Kelly Kennedy: Why? You have my wheels turning. Why do you think that it just, that nobody had done that.

It, it's, it seems. You know what I mean? It just seems a little bit crazy, doesn't it? It's like we can sell our own cars. You know, we hop on Kijiji and we sell our things. I get that those infrastructure things were not in place in the early two thousands. But like, like you said, it's like you, you created, you created ComFree.

You kind of created an alternative for people to sell their homes, which to me, in being in business development sales just looks like an amazing idea. I would love, I think, you know, when we sell our home, that is how we're gonna do it. Cause why not? Why do you think that it, it came about, and like you said, you're bringing it back.

 Is it just the power of, of real estate? Of like, of like the real estate companies that have just kind of consolidated the marketing and kind of said you have to use a real estate company if you wanna sell your home. Why do you think that there's been such a monopoly by real estate companies?

Erin Holowach: That's a good question.

First of all, there's a lot of them. I mean, there's tons of real estate companies, and I mean even more so the number of realtors, licensed realtors, whether it be in greater Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. So there's just the power in numbers. So that's the first point. The second point is, is they have a lot of money.

They earn the average commission on a home. In Edmonton or Greater Edmonton is about $20,000. So if a realtor and their brokerage is earning $20,000 for every home they are listing or helping someone purchase, that's a lot of money to throw into the pool of marketing. But I think really the most important thing is they've built their entire business on fear mongering and people just have this underlying idea that.

You know, their home is their biggest asset for most people, and that they need somebody to look after it for them because something's gonna go wrong. And where they're mistaken is no matter how you sell your house on Kijiji with homeFree or with, you know, the top producing agent according to the bus bench in your neighborhood is it's a lawyer who looks after and protects your interests.

And in Canada you are, you need a lawyer to close your real estate transaction. They are the one who reviews your offer to purchase. They're the ones who register your mortgage, discharge your mortgage, so on and so forth. But the actual act of marketing and showing your home is not only is it not scary, it's actually very comfortable to do on your own.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah, no, I agree. And then like, who better to know your home and to tell your home story than you? Right. It's like, Whenever you're selling any type of product or service, people like to hear the story behind it. And I think, you know, real estate agents, they'll show you the home, but they don't know the story.

They can't tell you Yeah, our kids, our kids grew up in this house. Right. It's like being able to kind of add a story gives, gives your sale power. It really does. And it doesn't matter whether it's in business, business or I imagine in selling a home or a vehicle. Yeah, like, I guess one of my questions is when with homeFree, like what, what does a typical process look like?

Erin Holowach: So the typical process, I mean, first of all, you have to know about us. Yep. So that's, as we've launched into the market, it's getting our brand out there. But the process is, is you log onto our website you sign up all the information of what's included in listing with homeFree is on our website.

And from there you can. Submit all your information on your own or you can have us help you with it, and we provide all the tools and support that you need to sell privately. So you go and visit homeFree.com, you say, I'd like to sell my house. It gives you an overview of what's included. Yeah, it's a flat fee of $797, which is a very, you know, affordable amount when you compare that to the $20,000 in average real estate commissions.

Totally. And. From there, we have it listed and marketed for you, provide you signage, your buyer's guides virtual tour, you name it, it is all included in that price. And we've made it really simple for the consumer to be able to get their home up and listed with us.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah, no, it, it sound, it, it makes a lot of sense.

It makes a lot of sense and I'm excited to see what comes of it. Now that you guys are kind of back into it. I do wonder, you know, you had your experience with ComFree. Are you doing anything different with homeFree than what you did with ComFree?

Erin Holowach: The only difference would be is just technology has changed in 20 years.

When we kind of built the foundation of ComFree in 2002, like I mentioned, just how we used the website and our mobile devices was entirely different. But probably the biggest differences is we used to print a magazine that was available in, I think we were at six or 700 locations in Greater Edmonton, and we all.

That magazine rack that's at your local Sobeys? Yeah. Or Shell gas station or doctor's office. That's was a big marketing piece for us, and really that's the only difference overall is that we're not printing that magazine anymore because people don't typically look to a paper copy of anything. I mean, how do most people consume news or relevant information?

It's. Not typically through a free magazine that they pick up when they're grabbing groceries.

Kelly Kennedy: No, no, it's, it's all mobile now. It's all internet. Right. So totally. You have to kind of change your approach. Now are you utilizing, like primarily your website to kind of list these homes? Is that kind of the way that you're gonna do it going forward?

Or is there an, are there other avenues that you guys are using?

Erin Holowach: I mean, primarily our website, but like any good website, it's fully interactive and you can connect through us, through Google, through Facebook, through Instagram. But I mean the foundation of where you begin the listing and upload all your information is all done through our website.

And right now we have just a mobile version of our website as we're in the launch phase. But by this fall we'll have a full mobile app. So, I mean, you can be. Sitting on your couch and you know, list your house for $800. Wow. And within two or three days, you're on homeFree.com. You have a sign delivered to your home, you've got buyer's guides in your inbox, and you've got the full set of tools and support available.

And I think one of the biggest things you ask what we're doing different one of the biggest things we are doing the same, and which would be one of the. Biggest factors of our success then and will be again now, is having someone available, a real live human being that understands real estate in your given market.

Cool. Answer the phone or answer your chat when you have a question, because if. You go back to, I was saying people are just nervous about the process. Totally. Sometimes they just need to say, do I have this right? And when a friendly person says, you're bang on, or like, you can consider this it's providing that support and service that they know we are there to support them and hold their hand so that that fear piece.

Isn't so predominant when they think, am I making a mistake in this process?

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah. Yeah. And, and you actually mentioned something else there that I think is kind of critical. Do you guys have like information on how, how to go about the process? Like with regards to people maybe like how to show your home?

Like are there, you mentioned you have tools available, can you maybe elaborate on some of those tools?

Erin Holowach: Absolutely. On our website, there's a whole how-to section, so there's about 10 or 12 different guides. It goes from everything you know, why should I choose homeFree? How to use the homeFree pricing advantage to price your home.

How to consider pricing your home. What to do to prepare my home for sale. How do I successfully show my home? How do I negotiate an offer? And then we also have tools for buyers cuz buyers sometimes say, Hey, I'm not exactly sure what I need to do to purchase a home privately. So again, just a step-by-step process and all of them are one to two pages, point form, and really demystifying what's a really simple process that a lot of people are just.

It's uncertain about, and we have that both as a readable format and most of those in videos and more to come. So you get to choose how you'd like to consume that information. Do you like to read about how to sell your house or do you wanna watch a two minute video and we'll, we'll talk it through for you.

Kelly Kennedy: You know, that's, that's so, that's so cool. Have you guys ever thought about doing like a podcast on it?

Erin Holowach: I mean a podcast as in a guest on your show. Absolutely. A podcast just about that. We host, you know, that's a good question. I was listening to one of your past podcasts and talking about the need for podcasts in every single business.

And actually as I was, Thinking about chatting with you today, I was like, Hmm, where would we fit that in? So, it's a good question. You might have to ask me in a couple months. Yeah. And I'll be calling you to say, so how do I launch a podcast?

Kelly Kennedy: Not as hard as you think, believe me. No, it really is. Right?

Because you think about. The way that we consume media these days. Right. At least for myself. Yeah, I do watch a little bit of YouTube, but primarily I listen to, I listen to audio format and actually a lot of the stats are showing that most, most entrepreneurs and professionals are listening to it in that way.

Mostly I think because we're either driving places or we're doing work on our computer doing like data entry and stuff, and so kind of, I think when we're doing stuff like that, we tend to have some like passive stuff going on in our heads with regards to what we're listening to. I know. For me, believe it or not, I don't actually listen to an absolute ton of business podcasts.

I know, shame on me cause I have one. But primarily I listen to like, I love listening to Scared to Death. I love listening to like box of odd, he's just like fun entertaining podcasts. Right? But I think what I find is that most people do enjoy doing it that way. And when I was actually talking with Fatima Zaidi the, the president of Quill Inc.

She was really touching on that. That is, that is the Stata the, the statistic is that most people are listening to an audio-based format. They don't really need the video aspect of it. What they really need is an easy place to listen to audio.

Erin Holowach: Now you've got my mind thinking where that fits in the to-do list of a startup.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah. Well maybe where it fits in, at least for you guys, maybe you don't need a full-time podcast, but maybe having like a 20 part series talking about different aspects that people should consider and what to consider might be a good avenue to look at.

Erin Holowach: I'm, I'm definitely intrigued and like you made so many great points cuz I don't watch a ton of YouTube either, but I do listen to a ton of podcasts and take in things either reading or by listening, but very rarely by watching.

I watch sports and that's pretty much the extent of my TV watching.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah, no, for sure, for sure. Like we, we watch entertainment at night, right. But. Yeah, I'm not typically listening to business oriented stuff, or I'm not watching business oriented stuff at night. That's like, that's my time. Right. But when I'm working, absolutely.

I'm listening to business stuff, listening to audiobooks. Listen, but we're mostly listening, I think is the key word here. Most, most entrepreneurs are listening, professionals are listening. So if you wanna find them where they're at, that's what you gotta do. Check I'm in. All right. I want to, I wanna go back here because you are my first kind of B2C person, so I do wanna talk and, and I, the reason I also want to hit on this is because I know that you've had multiple businesses and they haven't all been b2c.

You've had to do some B2B marketing too. So I wanna chat a little bit about. What are some of the avenues you're utilizing to market ComFree? I guess ComFree would be marketed a little bit differently back in the day, but let's, we can even touch on how you plan to market homeFree. And then I would like to talk about a little bit about maybe R3 Deconstruction and Abatement and maybe some of the differences between marketing B2B and marketing B2C.

Cuz I think you're an expert in that at this point.

Erin Holowach: Well, thank you. I don't feel like an expert, but I'm certainly willing to share anything, anything I know or anything I can. I think the biggest thing in my opinion in the B2C world is the branding is you need brand recognition. And so every avenue that we look at, it's how can we.

Say or put forward the word homeFree and it was no different. Really. We're doing the exact same things other than just 20 years Fast forwarded that we did with ComFree. It's that you need people to recognize that we are a brand in the marketplace. Totally. And so we focus all of our ad buys or organic advertising or marketing, if you wanna call it that, on getting our brand out.

Because telling the entire homeFree story is a little bit more complicated. We need them to have something catchy that says, I'm gonna go to homeFree.com, and then we're confident what they'll find there is everything that they need.

Kelly Kennedy: Yes. So have you found certain avenues to be more effective than others?

Erin Holowach: It's gotta be a mixed bag. It's not like the, probably the biggest thing is, is you can't do a one size fits all because like we were talking, everybody consumes the information that they're looking for. Whether it be from an informational perspective or from a looking for a product in the marketplace perspective a little bit differently.

I mean, When you look at some of the brands that have been launched, whether it be in Edmonton or in North America over the last couple of years, and some of the ones that we're following, following and emulating, it's, it's a really solid social media strategy. I mean, that is where people consume a ton of information and, and they choose what they wanna follow, but really building both a paid and organic piece to social media that makes it easy for them to make that purchasing decision or, I mean, we all know.

You say that you're interested in a pair of Nike Shoes, the next time you are visiting Facebook or Instagram, you're seeing ads for Nike Shoes and it's really learning about how to do that cost effectively and successfully. So homeFree is just popping up in their head all the time because again, we're also not like shoes where you buy a couple pairs a year.

There's only so many people Yes, that are in the real estate market at any given time. They have to know that if and when they're there. homeFree is one of the alternatives that they're gonna have in their consideration.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah, absolutely. Like I talk about it a lot in, in my podcast, I'm a firm believer in active marketing and what I use at Capital and what I kind of recommend to my other business, to business companies is that you use an 80 20 rule where 80% of your work is with active marketing.

It's actually calling your clients, chatting with them, having direct contact, and then 20% you wanna have that passive strategy where you're using socials, you're doing your weekly posts. You're finding maybe other ways if you wanna spend a little bit on, on LinkedIn ad revenues or things like that, or, or advertising, Facebook advertising, whatever you want to do.

But it should be, at least in this case, in business to business, it should be a 20% or the much smaller amount. Whereas I do think that in B2C that shifts because it's a little bit harder to reach out to individuals one-on-one. That way, you know, you might be going through, like obviously there's no phone book to just go through and call all these people like there used to be right. So I feel like in your case you almost have to go to like an 80 20, but in the opposite way. Does that seem accurate?

Erin Holowach: That definitely seems accurate because not only is it not feasible for us to call, you know, a million people in Edmonton over the next couple of months. Yeah. But people don't always, The idea of a telemarketer is not, you know, fondly perceived by consumers in general.

It's one thing if it's, if you know they're in the marketplace and you are presenting them an alternative. Let's say they've got the black and orange sign on their front lawn as you pick up the phone and say, I think we have an alternative for you, but not many people in, at least in my experience, when you're thinking of a consumer purchase, wanna be.

You know, have their phone ringing off the hook to be sold something. But what they do want is to have that information readily available to them when they're looking to consume it, and have somebody willing to talk to them about it when they're wanting to talk to us. So that's a big part of our strategy.

And again, it comes back. There's not a lot of companies out there, and I'm talking more in the B2C world, that still answer their phone with a real human and not through an answering service or a chat bot. So both from our phone perspective and the chat feature on our website, it's dealt with by us internally, homeFree staff.

It's not third party out. It's not a chat bot because this is a big decision. And yeah, I mean we've all got like, let's use an airline chat bot for example. Cause they've had a tough go in the last few years. Eventually you're frustrated. Yeah. Because you're not getting any of the answers that you can find.

And this is a big decision when people are selling their houses. And I mean, although they only pay us that $797, it's the volume of being able to handle multiple listings and just talk to them. Cuz that's what the B2C wants. But what they, what my experience tells me is it has to be on their terms. And when you think b2b.

Typically the value of the transaction is higher. Yeah. And the sales funnel process is entirely different.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah. But congratulations by the way of, of going that route and being a human. I talk about it on my show all the time. Right. In a, in a time of AI and Robots be a human. That's literally how you stand out.

It actually sounds crazy. It sounds a little bit crazy that in 2023, the way to stand out is to actually pick up the phone when people call, to actually reach out and build a personable relationship with people to, to not not do an auto crafted email, to actually type something up with some heart, with, with some you in it, right?

And I talk about it all the time, but ironically nowadays, that is the way to stand out. The, the way to stand out is literally just to be yourself, which is pretty great. If you look at the other side of it.

Erin Holowach: Absolutely. And when we started crafting the business plan to relaunch homeFree, I just happened to be making a purchase on way Wayfair.

We all know Wayfair, you know, you purchase home products there, and I was having some issues. It was in my cart, and yesterday it was $200, and today it was $250. And so, I said chat with an agent and you know that's what I selected on the Yeah. Whatever on the screen. And it wasn't 30 seconds later and there's this phone number from Boston or whatever, and I don't actually often pick up numbers I don't recognize.

Yeah. And I did. And it's like, Hey, it's Sally from Wayfair. I understand you were having some issues. I've got it all rectified for you. Do you want me to stay on the phone while you go back and look at your cart? And I was like, oh my goodness. Like I wanna buy everything from you. Cause just that picking up the phone.

And they called within 30 seconds and they knew what the problem was, wasn't a major problem. They had it rectified and it was like you could just hear their smile through the phone and it just felt like such a great purchase.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah, no, that's awesome. One of the other things that I kind of want to touch on with you, which I think is interesting is that you and your husband, you guys are, you guys are business partners, you're a team.

What is it like to work with your husband?

Erin Holowach: Huh? That's a question. That's a good question. I think what's super unique for us is how long we've been together and when our, our personal relationship began and we were young for sure. We started dating at 17 and 18 years old. But it was that we were starting out together where, and that's I think the number one contributing factor for us to be successful business partners. You see a lot of examples that people, one person will have a business and the other joins, and that's got a different set of dynamics. Sure. Or let's just say fast forward and you're starting at 35 and not 22. You have a, you know yourself a little bit better and that can have pros and cons, but for us, we had to grow up and we've grown up together.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah. It's a lot of change in that 10 years.

Erin Holowach: Tons has changed, but when you grow up together and you've been on the same journey. Yeah. It's actually weird to say this, but in 26 years of being in business together, or sorry, 26 years together and 22 years in business, wow. We have very few business debates or we have lots of debates arguments I should say.

Kelly Kennedy: Sure, sure. Well, that, that was what I was gonna say is like how do you, when, when that is your life, when you guys are teammates in that way, How do you separate business from your personal life? That must be very challenging. Or is it even possible maybe is another question.

Erin Holowach: I don't think it's possible in the sense, just like it's all a continuum.

So I mean, just like in the middle of a business day will, you know, there'll be a personal discussion of, you know, who's picking the kids up at school or did you pull the chicken out of the freezer for dinner? Yeah. At the dinner table there's a lot of of business discussion and so honestly for us it's just about, there's a few sacred times.

I mean, we both work out in the morning and that's not business time. We just have sometimes have to say, okay, let's hang out and like the next two hours we're going for a walk. Yeah. And we force ourselves to not talk about business cuz it's so easy. That's the easy part. Easy is, you know, there's always something to talk about.

Absolutely. In the world of business. So it's, it's comes down to communication. It's, it's always intertwined, but sometimes it's like, Kate, nope. We get a two hour shutoff. Or you know, for three days we're away. This isn't business time.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah, no, yeah. We struggle with that in our family too, because, you know, my, my fiance is a high performance professional, and so am I.

And like you said, the easy things to talk about are work. And unfortunately, because they're the easy things to talk about, sometimes they, they take up more space than they should. And you al you almost have to find a way to step back and say, okay, that's great. Work is great. Like, it's all good. That all that's going great, but like, how are you, like, how are we personally?

Because I think sometimes, especially for us, We get so wrapped up in our works, it becomes such a big part of our identities that sometimes it's hard to like differentiate, okay, where does work? Stop. And I begin.

Erin Holowach: No, that's, that is very true.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah. It's have you found any ways to like, to be able to find separation?

Like, you know, you've been doing this a long time. How do you find separation and time for yourself in your busy lifestyle?

Erin Holowach: Routine is a big one for sure. Just from a day-to-day element. You know, I like to wake up and get my day set up and then I spend an hour with the kids and get them off to school, even though they're teenagers.

My oldest is graduating, just getting to see them all in the morning. I'm still the mom. They're very independent, but my gift to them to this day is I love making them lunch. They're too lazy to, you know, wake up early to make lunch. Yeah. Or do it the night before. Yeah. But it's interesting how much they appreciate it.

And that's often, I mean, none of us are morning people, but slowly, you know, share a coffee, share a smoothie, make sure everyone's got, you know, some fruit or a quick sandwich. So anyways, and then we work out. And so sometimes people are like, oh, what time do you get to the office? I'm gonna get to the office at 10:00 AM sort of person.

Awesome. Because I did an hour of office work. Yeah. I did an hour of family time. I did an hour of me time. And then at 10 o'clock I'm raring to go. And I feel, I feel like I've checked off a lot of boxes. Yeah. And that's been our routine or my routine for. For probably a good 10, 15 years. And it feels really good cause I've checked a few boxes off before work becomes all consuming.

Kelly Kennedy: That's amazing. And first off, I want to touch on this because one of the things that you talked to were the amazing benefits that entrepreneurial lifestyle has brought to your life. And I definitely see that as one of them. Can you maybe name some of the other benefits that you've, that you've found for yourself as an entrepreneur?

I always like to motivate new entrepreneurs. I know with this show, We have a lot of people that are kind of on the fence about starting their own businesses or, you know, they got this great career, great job, and they're just kind of, but they also have this great idea and it nags at them. And I know I struggled with that for years before I started Capital Business Development.

You know, I had the idea for probably five years before it ever happened. And yeah, like can you maybe, can you maybe talk to some of the benefits of entrepreneurship for people?

Erin Holowach: I think the number one, one for myself is freedom. And freedom doesn't mean that you can just do whatever you want. It doesn't mean, oh, you can have whatever financial future that you want.

It's that you have the power to choose what every minute of your day looks like, and it's an active choice. And I think what's been phenomenal is I never felt like I missed out on a ton of my kids' things, even though I did. And nor did I feel like I had to give up, you know, a couple of years to stay home and raise my family because I had the freedom to choose and.

With freedom comes a lot of responsibility totally. But just being able to make that choice. And I think the other benefit is, and you mentioned it when you were introducing me, is being able to follow your passion. If you find something that you love and you believe in, and you can really see that space in the market for whatever it is that you might want to be doing, nothing beats waking up in the morning and being excited to go to work.

Or Sunday night rolls around and it was like, wow, that was a great weekend, but I'm looking forward to work tomorrow.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah, absolutely. You, you hit the nail on the head. I, I genuinely look forward to work every day and, yeah, like what else is kind of funny that you talked about? Is that like the morning person thing?

I was never a morning person, but when I started my own business, and frankly we have a family too, I needed more time. The morning ended up being a great place for, for peace and quiet. And to kinda get a little bit extra work done. And so over time, I have very much become a morning person, but I never used to be.

I think entrepreneurship really kind of was like, okay, we need to find some extra time. You only have so much time in a day. You're either working for clients or you're working for yourself. Where are you gonna find that extra time? And I also needed to find time. That wasn't my family's time. Because that's the flip side, is that you're always stealing time from somewhere.

So who are you stealing it from? I'd rather steal it from myself in the morning than from my family after school. Right.

Erin Holowach: Well, good on you, but I have still yet to become a morning person. And what's even harder, I don't mind when the day is done at 10 o'clock or 10 or 11 at night, hammering off an hour or two of work, but it has two problems.

One, most other people aren't working. So if you need something to move that project along, it's challenging. Yeah. But now having teenagers, they never go to bed. And it's really interesting when I'm like, okay, like. Everyone's settled. They're home. It's 10 o'clock. They should be like winding up their day.

It's like the verbal diarrhea that comes out at midnight when I'm trying to get some work done that I didn't finish. I'm like, you can't shut it down cause you just want your teenagers to talk. But no one in our family, my husband or three kids likes mornings. So just even the little bit that I get up, maybe half an hour before that.

Yeah. I don't think I get as much work done as you do, but I try to steal it from the opposite side of the day, which is probably the most challenging part that I'm finding this go round with a startup.

Kelly Kennedy: Well, I'm very much hoping that I can get to a space where I have a few extra days during the week for freedom and a little bit of me time.

I haven't found them yet, Erin and I, but you know what? I think, I think it's coming. I just think that for me, it's. I, I always love momentum, right? I, I definitely see it as an entrepreneur. I think you can really see momentum when you have it, and I'm a huge advocate of when you got the momentum, use every last minute of it because it doesn't come every day.

And when it does come, you need to maximize, you need to maximize your return on that momentum, right? And I definitely feel like at this point in capital business development at this point with the podcast, we got some momentum. We're rolling along. And so I think I'm working probably a little harder than I should.

I might be burning the candle on both ends, but I look at it from a long. Term benefit. I think burning a little bit extra time right now will mean down the line. Yeah, maybe I do have a Tuesday or a Wednesday that isn't so bloody hard.

Erin Holowach: Well, and when I say freedom, it's not always full days. For me, freedom is I didn't have to ask my boss to leave at one o'clock Totally.

To go to the orthodontist appointment. Yeah. I didn't have to ask, you know, there's a Christmas concert in the afternoon. It's that I could stand up and put that into my schedule. Doesn't mean I don't have to steal it from somewhere else. Yes, it's the ability to, you can fit more things in your schedule when you get to control.

Every hour of that calendar. Yeah. And, and that's the freedom that I really, really value in the world of entrepreneurship.

Kelly Kennedy: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. It, it's kind of a, it's kind of a bit of a double-edged sword, right? Because on the one hand, as an entrepreneur, if you don't do the work, no one's doing it for you.

So you do kind of have to find, like, there's a, there's a weird mix of like insane responsibility because you have obligations, you got clients, you got commitments. But on the other hand, it's like, But yeah, if you need that one hour to go to go pick up your kids or you need that extra hour or to do whatever, it's usually there.

So it's weird. It's, it's a freedom. Absolutely. It's a freedom mixed with an equal amount of responsibility I think. And specifically personal responsibility. It, you almost have to hold yourself to a higher account than you've ever held yourself to before in your life. That would be a easy way. You're absolutely right.

Yeah. It's so funny cuz my fiance will pull me to the side and she'll be like, Kelly, I've never seen you work like this in your life. And it doesn't feel like that, but it obviously is. It obviously is. Because to me, personal responsibility and accountability is so important. Being able to show up weekly on this show to kind of put out these, these episodes, I recognize it's bigger than me.

Right. Like, it, it can seem very small. When you're in a podcast studio and you're talking to the world, and I think you, if you guys do something to this, you'll notice that too and be like, yeah, this feels like nothing. But the reality is, We have thousands and thousands of listeners who look forward to this show, who are looking for help, who are looking for advice.

So there definitely does feel like like not just an accountability to myself, but an accountability to you guys, my listeners, because I recognize that, that these podcasts are bringing benefit to your life and your business.

Erin Holowach: Yes, absolutely. But like I remember this, growing up with privilege comes responsibility, and that's basically what you're saying with freedom comes responsibility.

Kelly Kennedy: Yes, yes, absolutely. Absolutely. Erin, do you have a piece of advice that you would give to a new aspiring entrepreneur? You know, you guys were young when you did this and you were incredibly brave and congratulations for that. I don't know a lot of people that in their early twenties would've had.

Would've had, frankly, the responsibility, the commitment, or the strength to do what you and Travis did. Can you, can you give a little bit of advice to a new entrepreneur?

Erin Holowach: Ah, that's a tough question cause there's so many elements, obviously to choosing the journey of entrepreneurship. But we've talked a lot about the positives, but I think the biggest piece of advice is finding that, call it your confidant or your somebody that you can talk to and tell them your highest highs and your lowest lows and in return, they are committed to telling you, you know, what they're seeing from the outside.

And I think, you know, a lot of people that choose any type of leadership role or an entrepreneurial role you wanna put on this persona like, I've got this all covered. Sure. And many hours of the day. You do. But the reality is, is many hours of the day you don't. And you cannot be on that journey alone.

And I've been fortunate to be on that journey with my husband, but a few other key people in my life that, you know, pick you up when you're in pieces, that you can run an idea past them and they'll be honest and you can take their feedback. But that's the. Person or the support toolbox that I feel every entrepreneur needs.

And sometimes we forget to surround ourselves with those people. We're either looking for a cheerleader. You can't have someone cheering you all the time cuz you need them to be real and you can't have someone bringing you down either. And finding that person might seem easy, but it isn't as easy as you might think.

It's not your best friend, it's not your sister. It's somebody who understands that journey that you're on.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah, totally, totally. I, I totally agree with you. I definitely struggle to talk, I think, business with, with family mostly because I feel like it's hard for them to understand and, and I think it's hard for people in general to understand outside of your business.

Your business is unique. Almost all business is unique and your challenges are unique and kind of what you're dealing with. But I think you're right. I think it is important that at bare minimum you have somebody that you can talk to, somebody that you can say, you know what? Today was really hard because I think as entrepreneurs, We, you're right, we take it all up.

We have to put on a pretty face to the world. And I actually have an upcoming show talking about mental health and I think wellness, it's very important and I think for entrepreneurs it's incredibly important because we do put on a pretty face even when things are not so pretty in our life.

Erin Holowach: Yes. And it's having the place to just allow yourself to let the, let let the real inner heart of what's going on show that you don't have to be tough for everyone else because.

You're right. Entrepreneurship and mental health go hand in hand. And I don't, you know, I've yet to meet an entrepreneur that hasn't had some type of struggle with anxiety or just fear or worry or growth or financial. And that all relates to mental health. Totally. And that doesn't mean that everyone's not mentally healthy because they're an entrepreneur, but you do have to have the strength to navigate that.

And the recognition to know when your mental health needs some attention.

Kelly Kennedy: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I, I actually have an entire show on stage frightened anxiety because, you know, I've struggled with, with a little bit of stage fright and a little bit of like meeting anxiety most of my life. Like I was very much an introvert.

Before I kind of got, which is super funny, I get it. It's kind of weird that I'm in business development deal, talk with people all the time, and I'm a bit of an introvert. But yeah, I definitely had to overcome a lot of fear with regards to cold calls, with regards to meetings with people that were incredibly successful.

And, you know, I still get nervous to this day. I still struggle at times with anxiety. I think it's just natural. I think it's very much human. And yeah, I, I definitely wanna try with this show to normalize hu like humanity. Cause I think we're, we're all human, right? We're all dealing with these things.

Whether you show it or not, just understand that If you feel those things, it's totally okay. It's totally normal. And you could have a thousand meetings and still get anxious sometimes. I'm living proof.

Erin Holowach: Well, I'm excited to hear that show.

Kelly Kennedy: Erin, it's been an absolute pleasure having you on the show. I'm really, really excited to see what comes of homeFree and welcome back to the Edmonton Chamber of Commerce.

This interview was only possible because Ken introduce us and Ken Gee, absolutely amazing. If you're a Edmonton business and you're not currently a member of the Edmonton Chamber of Commerce, I highly encourage you. It's, it's an amazing atmosphere. It's very welcoming. It's very, It's just great. It's just great.

There's no two ways about it. If you are in business in Edmonton and you are not currently a member of the Edmonton Chamber of Commerce, I highly, highly recommend you join. Erin, once again, amazing. Thank you so much for coming on the show. Thank you for telling your story. If people want to get ahold of you directly, what's the best way for them to reach you?

Erin Holowach: I mean, you can click through our website. That's the easiest to remember. If you go to homeFree.com and you hit Contact Us, they, it will always get directed to me. Or you can find me on LinkedIn. I'm just Erin Holowach . Or again, if you go to the homeFree LinkedIn page, it'll click. Click through to me.

And if you like to just email me, I'm Erin@homefreerealty.com. So would love to connect with anyone out there, whether it be to talk about homeFree, but any of the other things, you know, whether it's a starting entrepreneur or you know, someone struggling in that journey of. Entrepreneurship. I've been there.

I haven't overcome all of those things. And just really love connecting with fellow businesses and business owners in the community. So thank you again, Kelly, for having me today. It was a wonderful conversation and I look forward to many more conversations in the future.

Kelly Kennedy: Me as well, and hopefully we'll we'll finally get together at one of these Edmonton Chamber meetings.

One of these days I've just been, I've been so busy. I typically send Cole, my employee to go to the, I'm just too busy on this end at the moment, but as soon as I have time, I love, I love going to Coffee with the Chamber. It's such an amazing event here in the city, and I do hope to meet you at one of them.

Erin Holowach: Looking forward to it. Kelly, thanks so much.

Kelly Kennedy: All right, well, this has been the Business Development podcast. You've been listening to episode 32. If you've enjoyed this episode today, please come over to our website. You can get it, or you can reach me directly at podcast@capitalbd.ca. We do have a new segment of the show that's gonna be happening I'm hoping for once a month if we get enough questions, but it'll be called Community Questions.

And if you guys want to send questions to the show for me to answer as. To the best of my ability. You can get me at podcast@capitalbd.ca. Otherwise, if you've enjoyed this show, please like, and follow on your player of choice. And we always love any type of reviews or feedback. So if you want, you can always reach me on LinkedIn.

Otherwise you can shoot me email, you can leave a review on our website. You can leave us a review on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, and they're greatly appreciated. They're all they're all read and yeah, we'll recognize you on the show for them. Thank you so much for joining us today. Until next time, we'll catch you on the flip side.

Outro: This has been the Business Development Podcast with Kelly Kennedy. Kelly has 15 years in sales and business development experience within the Alberta oil and gas industry, and founded his own business development firm in 2020. His passion and his specialization. Is in customer relationship generation and business development.

The show is brought to you by Capital Business Development, your Business Development Specialists. For more, we invite you to the website @ www.capitalbd.ca . See you next time on the Business Development Podcast.