 In our continued small business showcase, we now feature Dependable Garage Doors, owned by Byron Echeverria. With over 25 years’ worth of garage door repair and garage door installation experience, Echeverria has developed a reputation for being among the best local companies around. In fact, during our interview he was fielding calls while we spoke.
What is unique about Dependable Garage Doors is that, unlike other contractors, Echeverria is focused on keeping the company small. Most garage door service companies go the opposite route, trying to expand too fast at once to keep up with demand. However, Echeverria has truly mastered his craft. When he needs a few extra hands, he will bring on his children, now grown, with garage repair skills of their own, but more often than not Echeverria is a one-man show. While this may sound like he is limiting himself, he is busier now more than ever. He services many local communities, including Temecula, Murrieta, Menifee, Winchester, Lake Elsinore, Wildomar, and even has clients as far as Orange County. Of course, this did not just happen overnight. Echeverria has been living in California for many years now. Before moving to Murrieta, CA, he spent about a decade in the San Diego area, honing his craft with many reputable garage door agencies in the area. For about ten years, he was hard at work with many of the big names in the local garage door market. By 2009, he was ready to strike out on his own. Most homeowners may not see it this way (at least not until they have garage door issues), but garage installations and repairs are a true trade, just as being a mechanic or a plumber is. Working with garage doors means dealing with several thousands of pounds of tension, making even the most basic repair a potentially bad day. But Echeverria keeps to a simple enough plan of attack for his business: stay upfront and honest, and be good at what you do. And that is exactly what makes Dependable Garage Doors such a success. One man handles every aspect of the company - Echeverria takes all of his own calls, he handles all of his own work; he even goes so far as to handle the sales end himself as well. When asked why he did not just hire a marketing agency, he explained that at one point, he had. But they did not market his company the way that he had wanted; in fact, the two sides seemed to be in direct opposition with one another. While Echeverria wants to be open and honest about his small workforce, they, instead, tried billing him as a far larger company with many employees who did not even exist. The assumption was that his advertising costs must be high; but instead, he relies on free advertising online. Despite not being a part of many websites, many customers find him through Facebook and Yelp. When asked if he had any regrets or intentions of changing course, Echeverria replied that he was satisfied with how things began, as well as how things have remained. “If I were to try and grow the business larger,” he explained, “I would have higher overhead costs. Higher overhead means charging customers higher pricing. And since now, eight, nine years later everyone is doing garage repairs, I can’t risk charging more.” In a time when more jobs are facing automation, it is refreshing to find someone with that classic American Dream attitude. Echeverria told me that since day one, he has seen to it that his business is essentially run 24/7; in order to live without the safety net of a weekly paycheck, you have to keep the phone ringing, he explained. For a company that is dedicated to operating the way that one would expect, Dependable Garage Doors lives up to its name. A true family owned small business that keeps the middle man out makes Echeverria a true local entrepreneur.
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