Today we’d like to introduce you to Kristen Perello.
Hi Kristen, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
We are a female owned permanent lighting company that started in April 2024. My husband and I always wanted to start a business together and provide a service in a niche area that wasn’t saturated. We started having conversations with friends and about our interests and LUMI Outdoor was born. We love that our brand and lights spread joy for years to come and we’ve evolved our offerings based on what customers ask for and want. We started off by offering permanent outdoor lighting that’s app enabled, with the ability to level up your home or business and other areas including barns, boat docks, garages, etc, you name it, we can do it. What was also very important to us was to not just cater to the holidays; we want people to think of us when they think local lighting experts. Therefore, we are offering landscape lighting solutions, walkway lighting, patio lighting, playground lighting, etc. Basically, if there’s a structure, we can light it up! We serve the entire DFW metroplex. We’ve been lucky to have two successful years of LUMI Outdoor and look forward to continuing to create more brand awareness and extend more offerings in the future. We love spreading joy and giving back to our local communities.
If you read our ‘About Me’ sections of our website (lumioutdoor.com), you’ll understand a little more about our personalities.
My ‘About Me’ section from our website: Mother (human and dog). Wife. Daughter. Sister. Relationships are most important. Loves to give back in our local community and beyond. Outdoors obsessed. Social butterfly that’s never met a stranger. Loves a good workout. Veteran family (Marine Corps through my father). Traveler. Cooking new recipes and exploring the local foodie scene. Going to the theater. Dislikes: Laundry.
“In order for the light to shine so brightly, the darkness must be present.”
Francis Bacon
My husband’s ‘About Me’ section from our website: Father. Husband. Son. Brother. Avid surfer. Loves a good workout and hiking. Outdoorsman. Extraverted introvert. Adventurer. May have some dad jokes up my sleeve. Veteran family (Army through my father). Traveler. Always has to have a hands-on project whether it be from fixing or building something at home, working on cars or installing LUMI lights! Dislikes: Glitter in the house.
“Is your house on fire, Clark?” “No, Aunt Bethany, those are the Christmas lights.”
Aunt Bethany & Clark Griswold (National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation)
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
It most certainly hasn’t been a smooth road — it’s our first go at this entrepreneurship thing and we’ve learned so much in our almost two years of operation. I think the biggest struggle, which we view as opportunity, is finding people that care as much about installation quality and doing the right thing always, just like the two of us and how we run our business. One of my best friends, Whitney Creel, who is also a business mentor for me (and the first person I went to when we had this crazy idea of launching our start-up), said off the bat that everything you do comes down to character. We’ve truly adopted a mentality that we only do business the right way (right by our customers, our contractors that help with installation); if we don’t have strong, trustworthy relationships, we don’t have anything. We don’t cut corners and we care so much about quality and our customers being happy! While I wouldn’t call this a struggle but rather classify it as a journey, building trust and brand awareness so that customers keep coming back can take some time as well — I can say we’re truly hitting our stride!
Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
We specialize in outdoor lighting, everything from permanent outdoor lighting (eave lighting and landscape lighting) and can elevate/light up any structure! We cater to homeowners and business owners and come up with a customized plan to help spread joy and increase foot traffic (for businesses). We partner with different distributors based on the customers’ wants and desires and have app-enabled technology. With our bread and butter eave lighting, you can light your house up with different presets or create your own custom scenes; you have the ability to control each individual lightbulb, set timers, there’s AI functionality with some of our products, for example, you can say “the Cowboys play today, get my home ready to shine for the game”, and you can opt for accent lighting and security lighting settings. We love to bring multi-functional lighting solutions to our customers and one of the most exciting parts is seeing our customers and their children so happy with the lighting! You can customize lighting for game day, birthdays, the holidays and every other special occasion in between. We are niche in that we are female owned, a husband and wife team, and local to DFW. A lot of permanent outdoor lighting companies have authorized dealers and you may just get owner Stephen as one of your installers! He’s really the strategy behind all of our installs. We are most proud of our founding principles and that we can work to customize a plan that works best for you and your family/home/needs. We want readers to know that they’ll get a personal touch and consult from providing a quote to closing out a project. We also love giving back in the local communities we install in!
Is there anyone you’d like to thank or give credit to?
Our friends and family have really invested in us and taken a chance on us. When you close deals and build relationships with people that trust you outside of your network, that’s how you know you’re really onto something. Your friends and family always invest first and then it’s onto fending for yourself.
Whitney Creel, who I previously mentioned is a close friend and my business mentor. We are always talking with friends and love to meet and build relationships with other business owners. We’ve started a group in Fort Worth (it’s still fairly new), called Cowtown Collective that brings together niche entrepreneurs — we have friends that have developed a social app to help parents stay organized, a friend who own a caviar business, a friend that owns an umbrella company with multiple sub-companies that service children (therapy, speech therapy, occupational therapy, pilates for the moms), and friends who build accessory dwelling units (ADUs or tiny homes). We’re all excited to not just network but help each other deliver results.
Pricing:
- Each home is custom on pricing depending on what products and services are needed
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.lumioutdoor.com
- Instagram: @lumioutdoor
- Facebook: LUMI Outdoor
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/102057126
- Youtube: https://youtu.be/ZFmkjVpImys
