Laurie & Greg Ruselowski are the proud owners of Cascade Signs and Graphics, whose territory covers Seattle, Washington. Part of the SIGNWORLD brand, this business opportunity has been one of the leading signage producers for the past four decades and has now grown to more than 350 locations throughout the U.S.
Laurie and Greg’s journey is nothing short of inspirational, which is why FranNet of Michigan chose to feature the couple as part of our ongoing series of Client Success Stories. Assisted by FranNet Consultant Mark Cory, the Ruselowski’s were able to turn their entrepreneurial dreams into reality. Below, in Laurie’s own words, she shares the details of their personal journey and how they’ve built a thriving and successful small business of their own.
Background
Story
“I
graduated from the University of Michigan with a Bachelor’s Degree in
Psychology and went on to get my teaching certificate. That led to a decade in
education where I worked as both a librarian and in IT services, with a bit of
graphic design work thrown in there as well. I retired about 15 years ago and
my husband Greg followed a couple of years later, which precipitated a move to
Florida. Our kids are grown, so we got to hang out, play tennis, and just relax
and enjoy ourselves for a while.”
On
Deciding to Pursue an Entrepreneurial Future
“After
living in Florida for about five years, we decided to move closer to our
children in Washington state. I guess you could say we became a little bored
with the ‘Cabana Life,’ so to speak! Around that same time, we began looking at
some small businesses we might like to own. While working at General Motors, Greg
had facilitated a connection with Mark Cory of FranNet, so we reached out
to him to get the entrepreneurial ball rolling. Mark had us both take the
FranNet assessment test to determine what we were looking for in a business
opportunity.”
On
What Attracted Them to the SIGNWORLD Business Opportunity
“Once
we got the results from our assessments, Mark Cory came back with a short list
of franchise opportunities, which included a couple of tech-related concepts,
senior care, and of course SIGNWORLD. One route we definitely didn’t want to
take was anything food or beverage-related – just too much hassle involved. But
owning a sign-related company sounded reasonable to both of us because after
all, everyone needs signage, right? It’s literally everywhere you look. I also
kind of liked the graphic design component, having a little experience in that area
myself. And Greg is also quite the handyman, so we figured that would be
helpful to us for any installations. We ended up enlisting our son to handle
all of the financial side of the business – all the quotes, invoicing, and
billing. We actually looked at three different sign-related businesses, but
only SIGNWORLD was a non-franchise opportunity. That appealed to us both
because we didn’t really want to go the traditional franchising route, with all
the royalties, 50-page operation guidebooks, and the compliance issues that
were involved. SIGNWORLD is a more of a licensing type deal, with a simple
two-page contract. We could take the business wherever we wanted, create our
own hours, and enjoy a whole lot more flexibility. We also liked that there was
no retail storefront necessary, we could set up our operation wherever we
liked. We were looking for a straightforward 9-to-5, Monday through Friday deal
– no working on the weekends. In the end, we decided that the three of us
working together could pull it off and make it work.”
On
Launching Their Business
“We
actually opened up for business right as Covid was hitting and that made us a
little nervous. As in, ‘Should we be opening a business right now?’ The
economy was pretty shaky, but we got ourselves a nice space in a business park,
got our equipment and everything in place. Our training took place in
California and when that was done, we just jumped right in the deep end with
both feet. I think one of the biggest challenges we faced at the time was that
we were newcomers to Washington state. We didn’t really know anyone, had no
contacts, we just had to start from scratch finding installers, establishing a
client base, and getting out there to network and hustle business. We ended up
working with a small internet marketing company that helped quite a bit.”
On How
it’s Going…
“Oh,
let’s see…we’re in our fifth year of operation now and things are coming along quite
nicely. I mean, this isn’t like a hobby for us, but because it wasn’t our bread
and butter, we could approach things in a more relaxed manner. We were really
looking for a way to keep ourselves busy, to keep our minds sharp, to stay
active in the community and maintain our edge during retirement. Things may
have started on the slow side, but business picked up in a hurry. Looking back,
you could say we were winging it a little bit, just kind of learning as we went
along. But we did establish some mainstream goals to be more responsive than
our competitors – which turned out to be pretty easy. Many people here were
totally surprised when we followed up so quickly, as that hadn’t been their
exprerience before. And so the calls continued to pick up and the business
really took off. Over the years, I’m proud to say we’ve developed a great
reputation in the community and that’s helped us get referrals and a lot of
repeat business.”
On
Living an Entrepreneurial Life
“My
husband Greg used to work 80-hour weeks at General Motors, but now he has a lot
more time to enjoy doing the things he loves, such as hiking and biking. We get
our entire weekends to do what we choose. He’s gradually stepped back from the
business and that’s allowed my son and I to do the heavy lifting. That being
said, I get to choose when I want to work. I get to meet new people. It keeps
my mind sharp. It’s given me a great opportunity to get to know the people here
in our community and we’ve made a lot of new friends through our networking
efforts. Still, we can go on vacation if we feel like it – there’s so much
more flexibility now than when we were working our traditional jobs. We’ve
really found our niche and we enjoy it very much. At the beginning of every
week, we sit down and map out our responsibilities and then get after it.
Overall, I’d say we both have a lot more time to do our own things.”
On
FranNet’s Support
“Mark
Cory has been amazing to work with. He’s very receptive, very open – very easy
to talk to. He really helped us narrow down our choices and explained them all
thoroughly. Had it not been for his involvement, I feel pretty certain we’d be
stuck doing something we didn’t really like. Mark was always there to reassure
us and was very instrumental in setting up the right introductions and getting
the conversations started.”
On
Their Future Plans
“We’re
kind of status quo for the time being, but eventually I think we’ll present our
son with the opportunity to take over the business. Over the years, he’s become
much more comfortable with the business and the installations. He’s not a
graphic designer, so he’ll need some help there, but I might stay somewhat
involved. So, if he wants it, he can have it. I suppose we’re talking about
three or four years down the road, but we’ll see. We set our own schedules around
here. If it turns out this is not something he’s interested in continuing,
we’ll probably look to sell it to another party. He’s 45 now, so the decision
is all his – we’ll just continue to play it by ear for now. There’s really a
lot to like about owning a sign company. We get to meet a lot of interesting
people and no two jobs are the alike. Every day, we wake up and it’s
something different and that’s just how we like it.”
For more information,
please visit Laurie and Greg Ruselowski’s SIGNWORLD business, Cascade Signs
and Graphics.
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