Today we’d like to introduce you to Krista Streeter.
Krista, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
We moved here the summer of 2010 from Flint, MI with the idea of a fresh start, new beginnings, and endless opportunities for our family of 5. Crazy but we had only $3000 to our name, 1 vehicle, no jobs lined up, just a house rented and waiting for us in Granbury, TX. Quickly, we got to work job hunting and both found jobs. Meanwhile, our real estate agent who found us the rental house invited us to a start-up networking group that had recently formed since she knew Steve was a Master Electrician. After going to the first few meetings, Steve joined the group and we decided to start Streeter Electric. Within a few months, Steve was actively getting referrals for work, he was doing his part time job in the morning and then working as Streeter Electric the remainder of the day. Since the networking group was providing us with so much work, after about 6 or 7 months, he resigned from his part time job to focus fully on Streeter Electric. Meanwhile, I was working for 95.9 The Ranch Radio Station and after about 8 months, resigned to jump into the family business with Steve.
Between the 2 of us, we make an unstoppable team. Steve is a brilliant electrician, easy to get along with, our customers love him! I am super organized, type A, go-getter. I keep the business going in the office, all the “behind the scenes” stuff. I am very active in the Community, President of a few different organizations and I keep the name Streeter top of mind in the public.
Within the first year of business, we were voted Runner Up Best of Hood County and kept that from 2011-2016. This year, 2017 we finally got #1, Best of Hood County. Our company which started with just Steve, now has 15 employees and thousands of customers we’ve served.
Has it been a smooth road?
The biggest struggle we have had is finding licensed, qualified electricians. Career paths in the trades’ field, Electrical especially, seems to be a dying path. We could take on even more work if we had more employees. Steve and I are people pleasers so we tend to try and make everyone happy, taking on as much as we can which means Steve has had to work a lot over the past 7 years.
In the beginning, we office out of our home, our bedroom actually so it was very hard to separate work and home life. Being a strong minded, list type, get it done person, I will keep going and going till a project or task is done. I had to learn to cut work off and to just be present with my family. However, even with those sacrifices, I believe it is what helped contribute to our success today.
Now, we have an office that is a mile down the road from our home and we both keep set business hours.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Streeter Electric story. Tell us more about the business.
Our business does a lot of new construction for residential homes besides the Service Work. We currently have about 75 homes we are in the middle of wiring at one stage or another. The Building Industry has continued to surprise everyone and stay very busy. We have about 8 employees that focus just on new construction.
The other half of our business is servicing our community with Residential and Small Commercial Service Work.
I am most proud of our reputation. We do what we say we will do. We are honest, reliable, friendly, and fair. We are small, family owned, and proud of it. We love our community and that we can be trusted and counted on as Hood County’s #1 Electrical Contractor.
We still send out Thank You postcards to our customers. We will never stop thanking and being blessed for a customer choosing to hire us.
How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
Still growing, the need for electrical work isn’t going anywhere. New Construction will most likely die off for a while but that comes in shifts with the housing market.
The need for licensed electricians will be higher than ever as a lot of the electricians in the current market will be retiring and not as many new ones are entering it.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.streeterelectric.com
- Phone: 817-776-6224
- Email: info@streeterelectric.com
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/streeterelectric
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