- Speaker #0
Hello and welcome to the Skilled AF podcast, where we give diverse voices connected to the skilled trades a platform to share their story. I'm your host, Amanda Lucchetti, founder of The Skilled Project, an organization on a mission to inspire 1 million people to explore skilled trades and construction careers by 2028. You can learn more about the org at theskilledproject.com. Today's guest is Amy Atchley, co-founder and owner of Amy's Roofing and Solar. Amy entered this role during the pandemic, leaving behind a 16-year career in education to pursue a new kind of impact. In this episode, we talk about the realities of running a roofing and solar company, why roofing remains one of the hardest trades to recruit for, the upsides of working in this evolving industry, and the policy hurdles shaping how we train for these jobs. Amy also shares her hopes for the future and what's needed to support her. support the next generation of skilled workers. Wherever you're at in the world, we hope you enjoy. All right. Welcome to another episode of the Skilled AF podcast. These next few episodes are extra special because we're spotlighting skilled trades and construction professionals right here in Sonoma County. So this is local to us. And even better, we've teamed up with an incredible broadcast and media team here at Petaluma High to help produce these podcasts. So a huge shout out to them. Thank you so much. Without further ado, I am thrilled to welcome today's guest, who's a true force in the residential construction world, Amy Atchley. Amy is the co-founder and owner of Amy's Roofing and Solar, based here in Sonoma County, California. And what I love about Amy's story is her path into the industry. She spent 16 years in education before pivoting into the trades. She's really part of this new wave of companies and skilled trades jobs being created through the clean energy and electrification efforts. I am so excited to talk to her today. Welcome, Amy. Great to have you on the show.
- Speaker #1
Thank you. Thanks for having me. I'm excited.
- Speaker #0
So we'll start on... Question one, how the heck did you get into this industry? What got you into roofing and solar?
- Speaker #1
So as you mentioned, I was a teacher for 16 years. A lot of my students, I was in high school, I was teaching high school. And a lot of my students were feeling like really anxious about the future and feeling like adults in power weren't doing enough fast enough to make a change, you know, and like we were just dumping this scary future in their lap. And so I had... that happening. And then at the same time, my husband, he was a product engineer. So he's the VP of product development at Tesla for the solar roof. So he was building solar roofing. And, you know, he was one of those people that was actually doing something. And there were a lot of people because I knew them, like I knew a lot of them through him. So I knew people were doing stuff, but I just started to feel like this pressure that I couldn't just wait for my students to grow up and like do the thing like I needed to do the thing. So because he already had connections in roofing and solar. And he was feeling like... The solar roofing products that were out there, like solar roofing is the future. Like that's, I guess, where we started. And the products that were out there were really not built to scale. And we wanted to build something that would scale solar as fast as possible to make the biggest impact we could on green energy. So COVID happened. We're like sitting on the couch, you know, I'm working from home and he's working from home and we're just talking on the couch. And he's like, I just wish I had somebody that could run a solar roofing company.
- Speaker #0
Um.
- Speaker #1
And he's like, and then I could develop these cool products for, you know, sort of be our own tester, you know, be our own link incubator. So I said, I'll do it. Like, I was ready to be done teaching. I was ready to do something that could make an impact. So that's how that happened. Five years later, we do, we have a certified patented product, solar roofing product. And Amy's Ravine Solar is doing pretty well, like as far as an install company goes. Well,
- Speaker #0
I mean, talk to me about what is your company from a day-to-day do? So you do a lot of residential jobs. Like for someone that doesn't know anything about solar and solar roofing. What do these jobs look like? What type of projects do you take on?
- Speaker #1
We do roofing, we do solar, we do batteries, and we do solar roofing. So that's a little bit of a separate thing. I mean, it's similar. So we do like regular roofing. Asphalt shingles is the most common one, but we have our product is a metal shingle that is designed to go with solar. So when you put it all together, it's like a solar roofing product. And then batteries, of course, are a big thing now because the way that the utilities have changed the way we get. paid back for our solar generation. So a lot of people do batteries now too. And then of course, if people want like a Tesla solar roof, we do offer that. We offer our own solar product or we offer just regular asphalt shingle with solar on top of it.
- Speaker #0
Got it. And then, I mean, what does the day in the life then look like for you as an owner? You're also a mother of two kids.
- Speaker #1
Yeah.
- Speaker #0
You're running a business with your husband, which is not the whole other feat. Like, I don't think I could do that. What does it look like for you?
- Speaker #1
I'm in the office a lot now. When we first started, I would go out and I would do roofing and I would help with solar installs. But luckily now we have a couple of crews that can do that. And so I do a lot of the marketing stuff. I do a lot of the, this sort of thing is what I do. And then I also, I still answer the phones. I still do all the payroll and stuff like that. So my life is a lot in front of a computer or I get to come do like fun things like this, you know, maybe once or twice a week. That's my life. My guys, it's a different day in the life, right? My team. They usually start like seven in the morning. Well, my days, I should say, they start anywhere from like seven to eight in the morning and then I'm done at like six at night. So they're long days to be a business owner. My guys have shorter days, but they're doing physical labor the whole time. And you know, there's laws how long people can work in a day. So they start about seven in the morning also, but they're done by like three or four.
- Speaker #0
There's a lot of new skilled jobs coming from the clean transition. There's a lot of jobs. When you think about traditional skilled trades, there's a lot of aspects within. these solar install roofing jobs that you're kind of combining a lot of trades into one. And so my question to you and for people that are exploring these careers, just what are the titles of your employees? Like, what does that makeup look like? And what are these new skilled jobs you're creating? Because you're a part of that wave of creation right now.
- Speaker #1
Right. The solar roofer.
- Speaker #0
The solar roofer is this new skilled job. Yes. And so what is that from a day-to-day perspective? Yeah.
- Speaker #1
So we do have our crews. they're roughly separate, but a lot of them are cross-trained. So we have people who came in with a bunch of roofing experience and people who came in with a bunch of solar experience. And then we, like some of our roofers will train to help the solar guys. So I guess you could say most of our crew is actually like solar roofers, but some people just more specialize in the roofing bit and some people more specialized, but they can all help each other. And that makes for actually keeps our costs down, right? Because if this crew is small that day, we can, you know, pull somebody to help or whatever. And then it... gives our employees more skills. And so when, you know, like not everybody's going to be working at Amy's Roofing and Solar for the rest of their lives. And so when they go out back to get another job, they have more skills and they could do either. Yeah.
- Speaker #0
And that's why I was wondering like from a career progression, take an example at your company, like what does that look like? They can go and start their own business.
- Speaker #1
They could actually, I mean, if they want to work for Amy's Roofing and Solar, we will actually help them start their new business because part of our mission is to expand the solar roofing market. And so when more solar roofers are out there, that's good for our product side, right? Maybe there's a little more competition for our install side, but for our product side, like the more solar roofers there are, the better, because we have the best solar roofing product on the market, if you ask me.
- Speaker #0
You're giving Tesla a run for its money.
- Speaker #1
Yeah. Yeah. So yeah, as far as people coming in, like what is that career path? There's no really schooling for becoming a roofer or a solar installer. There is something called NABSEP, which some solar installers do. It's like an online, you can do training through them. And then OSHA, of course, you can take your OSHA 10 or your OSHA 30 and that's like free online. You can just go get it and put it on your resume. And then when you go to get a job, like a starter job in any roofing or solar industry or solar roofing industry, it looks really good on your resume to have that. And it's like, it takes either 10 hours or 30 hours, depending on the one you want to do. So that's a good way to start. And like a first aid class, those are pretty cheap, a couple hundred bucks. That's another way to start. get your foot in the door because that shows initiative, but then it also shows that you have the skills to like be careful on a job site because it's the dangerous place. Roofing is the most dangerous trade, I think. Yeah. There's a lot more deaths on roofs, people falling off roofs than any other trade.
- Speaker #0
From the training perspective though, I mean, you're doing on the job.
- Speaker #1
Mostly on the job. There are some training programs like JF is a manufacturer. They do like training, like one week training. That's a good thing to do. Again, it looks good on your resume, but you're not going to really learn how to do it until you're doing it. It's a skill that you have to develop.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. I'd like to talk a lot about some of the, on the training stuff as part of this interview. I think before we get there, when you're looking to hire somebody, like what skills or qualities do you think make a good solar roofer?
- Speaker #1
Well, the safety is a big one. When you're interviewing somebody, it's really hard to tell, but sometimes we'll just give somebody a try and see how they do. And then, you know, if it's, it seems like a good match. So safety is of course always number one. if a person is like accident prone, then they're not careful enough to be on our job site. We don't want them to hurt themselves or anybody else. And then having a good learning attitude, because we don't expect everybody to know everything when they come. And some different companies do things differently. So it may be that this company, you know, wants to do something this way, but our company does it a different way. And so we just expect that they have a good learning attitude and like learn how we do it and how we want it done and hopefully why we want it done that way. So learning attitude is another one. work ethic. That is one that's really hard to find. A lot of people don't want to work hard these days. There are those people out there and just they're awesome and they feel good about a hard day's work. And like I felt that way when I did the roofing. I felt so good at the end of the day because it's like physical labor. You get to see like the progress that you make every single day at the end of the day. And then you're like so tired. You just feel like zen. You're just like, yeah, like that was a good day, you know? And like so some people are like that and some people are just like, no, thanks. I don't even want to do that for an hour. And most of them are like, I don't even want to do that for an hour.
- Speaker #0
You would think, I mean, you were talking about accident proneness, but you would think somebody that's been an athlete, that would be a decent job for them.
- Speaker #1
Oh, yeah. In great shape. You stay in great shape doing any of the trades, I'm sure.
- Speaker #0
Well, we were talking about the solar roofer as like a new skilled trades job that's coming out of the clean energy transition. Are there other jobs or do you have other perspectives around job creation around clean energy that you're seeing firsthand?
- Speaker #1
So solar roofing is the one that, of course, is the most firsthand because we're sort of building that right now. Like there's not a lot of companies that do both. I was looking into it thinking about this and indoor plumbing and indoor electricity weren't even around until like 1930s. And we're only like 95 years from that. It's so recent. Like to me, the emphasis is that we're just constantly changing. Like people are like wanting to hold on to the past and be like, no, no, we should keep burning fossil fuels to like provide energy for the world. but like we've been changing like massively for the last hundred years.
- Speaker #0
Well, didn't we start with whale?
- Speaker #1
And this is just one more. Whale? Whale oil. Yeah.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. What's that sound? Genius.
- Speaker #1
The history of energy. Right now we're on petroleum oil. That's like our main source of energy. And before that, the world transitioned from whale oil to fossil fuels. So I'll learn something else if you want to know another little fact.
- Speaker #0
I love fun facts.
- Speaker #1
Apparently, the reason that like the dinosaurs and the plants and stuff way back in the day, Turned into oil is because they didn't have, like, the proper, like, bacteria and stuff to break down the matter. And so it just, like, turned into oil. But we do now have that. So, like, we're not making any more oil.
- Speaker #0
Okay.
- Speaker #1
Yeah.
- Speaker #0
When you think about, I was mentioning you on our brief break, was, like, I think about, like, the automotive industry. Like, before that, we were, we had horses, right, and carriages. And then all of a sudden, we created this new. thing and then we had to develop an entire workforce around it and I'm sure I don't know people that were working on horses I who knows like they're still working if they're going to work on cars it's like it's just job creation these are new jobs that are getting created and through these changes in industry and these changes of technology incorporating energy into it and what that looks like so it is interesting to think about and you're right it's been such a short amount of time. of time when you think about it from like this big, huge perspective of how long we are really on this planet, the planet, like how long the planet's been around. Right.
- Speaker #1
Yeah.
- Speaker #0
Well, you talked about, you had shared with me in the past around, it's hard to find people who want to do the, I mean, you just mentioned work ethic, right? That's a skillset that not everyone you're finding when you're interviewing has. We'll start with that. Like, why do you think it's tough finding people who want to do. the roofing one?
- Speaker #1
Because it's physically hard. Yeah, just people avoid it. I don't want to be like mean to people, but like I think they're just used to watching their phones.
- Speaker #0
Maybe a question in and around that is how does roofing compare with like other trades then, like with plumbing or with carpentry? Like, do you think it's the hardest?
- Speaker #1
It's really physically demanding. I mean, there's probably other trades that are as hard. I mean, plumbing is like sometimes you have to be uncomfortable, like getting into small spaces. Sometimes you're, you know, your job is to go deal with a clogged toilet. There's some things about plumbing that are not as enjoyable probably. Same with electricity. Sometimes it's small spaces. But roofing is like you're literally like you have like a shovel thing and you're like tearing off stuff on the roof. So it's just like it's just so hard on your body. And then I'm actually standing like on a pitch all day long. Like it's super hard on your feet. Like you're like kneeling, you're standing, you're hunched over. So it is it's just really physically demanding job. And the people that
- Speaker #0
end up in roofing are people who take pride in having such a like a physically demanding job and they're in like really good shape super strong people well are there physical body body being shot is a big thing that people discuss when i mean throwing shame both people say throwing shame at the trades but how do you see you're saying these people are like really in shape they seem to be doing well like i guess i'm thinking about like the resources around them or the resources around your team, do you see like... more things that need to be stood up in order to better support the people that are working with you, for you, the industry?
- Speaker #1
Well, a lot of rovers don't get healthcare through their job. And like they should because it's a tough job. And just one thing is like roofers, you know, as a group of people are aging. Like there, you know what I mean? Like there's a lot of people that know how to do it that are like 50, you know what I mean? Or like 40 and above. And then there's not that many people coming up behind them. And I think that's true for a lot of trades, right? Isn't that like a big, I mean, that's why you're doing what you're doing. So this relates to something like that article that you sent me that we'll talk about later, I guess. That there are contractors that are like good and they like, they have retirement. They have... health care. We do a bonus structure. There's contractors that really do care about their workers and respect how hard the job is. And then there are contractors that really take advantage of people. I had a guy come. I get probably once or twice a month, I'll get somebody just come to my shop and just be like, are you hiring? And a guy came, I don't know, a few months ago and said, are you hiring? I have this much experience roofing. And I said, how much do you want to get paid? And he said, well, right now I'm getting paid $8 an hour. Wow. Yeah. I mean, obviously, that's not done legally. Yeah. I don't know this person. My assumption is maybe he wasn't here legally, and so he could be taken advantage of in that way. But that means that there's some contractor out there that is willing to do that. Yeah.
- Speaker #0
This goes to, there's this article that came out. I've been sent it by a lot of people. New York Times article came out last week or two weeks ago. It was how contracting work became a race to the bottom. And one of the stats that they include is they're— in 2021, the Center for American Progress estimated that 23% of construction workers and 32% of workers are undocumented. For me, I'm thinking about what's going on with immigration right now. Right. Like how has that been a reality in your business? What are you seeing firsthand? I mean, that's a prime example of what you're talking about regarding like $8 an hour and being treated that way.
- Speaker #1
Yeah.
- Speaker #0
But the impact of what's going on, I think, politically. And just that stat in general, 32%. That's huge.
- Speaker #1
It is huge. And it's like the people who are willing to do that job maybe just weren't born here. People that were born here are like born into this like comfortable life and don't want to do that. I mean, it's tough because I'm compete like as a business owner, I'm competing with contractors who are willing to like cheat the system that way. And then people get my bid. And, you know, there's other contractors that are more than me, but like they'll get my bid and then they'll get one of these contractors bids. And they'll be like, well, why is this one thousands of dollars less than this one? Literally, I can match this one if I just pay my guys minimum wage. But I'm not willing to do that because it's not a minimum wage job. Like, you need to have skills and you need to be careful. You need to work hard. I try to respect, like, their— Well,
- Speaker #0
you're valuing the job.
- Speaker #1
Yeah. But that's what—the race to the bottom, like, that's actually something that my husband has said, like, many times. You know, like, our salespeople come in and say, oh, well, this person got this lower bid. They're wondering if we can come down. And he's like, I'm not trying to get in a race to the bottom. Like, I don't want that for the industry, not just for us. But, like, that's not right. You know what I mean? We shouldn't be doing that. And it's hard. I own a home and I want to shop things out. So I understand where customers are coming from. But I think a lot of them maybe aren't thinking about the whole picture. They're just thinking about the comparison of these two pieces of paper.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. It's like this ripple effect or this downstream impact of by that decision-making that you make, this is the impact it's going to have. Yeah. The immigration piece is just fascinating for me. One, there's tons of opportunity, right? You have this company, you're bringing people. you're developing workforce here locally. You are giving them a good paying job. You're trying to provide opportunities that they can grow from. Right. And you're part of this wave of people that sees the power and the potential of the industry and are trying to change it in a way that really benefits people. So I think about just from the challenges on the pipeline, how we're developing talent, the licensing stuff. All these things that need to kind of exist in order to really support the industry to, you know, install more solar and roofing on people's homes, both residentially, commercially, and actually electrify and do this clean energy transition. Like, there's just so much that needs to go into it. And it's a system. Like, it's not just.
- Speaker #1
Right.
- Speaker #0
Oh, right. So it's from your POV then, like, what kind of changes do you think need to happen to better support companies like yours?
- Speaker #1
Going back to what I was saying about how like roofers are aging, like as a group of people, like 40 to 60 year old people that are doing roofing still that like actually know what they're doing. It would be really helpful to get some training for people because, you know, there are certain people who they're maybe they're willing to work hard, but they just don't have the skills. And so if there was like a training program for roofing, solar roofing, solar, solar, I feel like is less of a need. I feel like it's like roofing and solar roofing that really need the skilled labor. because solar is such a new industry and it seems like there's like a lot of momentum behind it. A lot of people who do solar don't actually know like the best way to do things because they've been trained on the job. So there's no like standard. Whereas like an electrician, they've been trained on the job. Like they have a really good training program for electricians because like, you know, you don't want to burn down somebody's house, right? It has to be like standardized. But a lot of solar people, trades people in general, like if they just get trained on the job, they don't know all of those like little details. that they need to know, you know?
- Speaker #0
In regard to registered apprenticeship programs, so California has its own. There's also a federal one. I think there's 29 states that have their own registered apprenticeship programs. And for solar industry-specific occupations, we're limited because the Department of Labor does not recognize the occupation of solar installer or any solar-specific occupation as a principal. There's a new, like, draft construction labor registered apprenticeship that was recently created. There's no, like, solar and battery storage, like, apprenticeship.
- Speaker #1
And that's in California? Just anywhere?
- Speaker #0
Not that I'm aware of. That's, like, a whole other thing where I was, like— And then there's this licensing change, and I mentioned to you, I've gone down the rabbit hole on, of, like, how you used to have to have a Class B license in the state of California.
- Speaker #1
C-10?
- Speaker #0
Well, now it's a C-10. Uh-huh. But before it used to be, it was, like, a general contracting license. could do solar installation and battery storage. And now you have to have a C10, meaning you have to have your electrical license.
- Speaker #1
And they had in California, they had the C46, which was solar only license too. So you could do it under a B, a C46 or a C10. Got it. Yeah.
- Speaker #0
And so there's been these changes. And so now it's like, you're limiting these license holders to like be only, I think, electricians and quickly do the battery paired storage. you know, solar-powered battery storage stuff. So it's just interesting to see, like, what changes need to happen in order to actually form a workforce. Right. And how these registered programs intersect with licensing requirements.
- Speaker #1
Well, and it's interesting because you would think, like, there would be sort of a natural tendency for the electricians, like, union or, you know, like, the people who are training up electricians to, like, have a program to train solar people. But there's kind of, like, an animosity between... I want to say, maybe we should fact check this later, but I think the electricians' union was actually a big part of making, I don't want to get into too much politics here, but they gave money when they were trying to recall Newsom. And then suddenly there's these changes of the utilities, like repealing them or going to an M3, which is not as good for solar customers in California. Like it's sort of...
- Speaker #0
Yeah.
- Speaker #1
Like I don't know why the electricians hate the solar people. Like, they don't want to do that work.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. And I think the training, like, the thing that I was learning about when talking to somebody who's been heavily involved in this is the fact that you have within the curriculum of the 9,000. It's like 9,000 hours, right, to become a journey electrician. And you would need, I think, only a portion of that, though, touches solar and battery storage. Like, it's not like… And so the argument is like, well, there's so much that happens with the solar battery storage roofing, like all of that. Yeah. And so it's like, why doesn't it have its own track?
- Speaker #1
It should. I know they're like revising the C10 right now. So hopefully the new version will have more solar. But I also know the people who are contributing to the C10 like revision are like mostly already electricians, not necessarily solar people. Hopefully they're asking solar people too, but there should be. I would think that there would be, but yeah, there isn't. It's weird.
- Speaker #0
It's very interesting. And it's something that we're going to continue to dig into.
- Speaker #1
Yeah.
- Speaker #0
Calling BS on things. Well, obviously, a lot of things are happening on, I'm thinking politically what's going on right now. And it's impact on your business. Like, have you seen tariffs from immigration stuff? From, I mean, the fact that the whole clean energy thing and wanting to drill, drill, drill, right? So I'm just. From a political standpoint, like what does that impact on your, or how's that impact?
- Speaker #1
Well, yeah, a lot of impact from the federal government recently. Like I would say the day after the election, the Department of Energy's website went from like, you know, they just completely scrubbed out of clean energy. Like no climate change wording in there, like nothing. And there's like a giant picture of an oil tanker. If I sent the link to somebody to look at the information about the 30% tax credit that you get when you put solar in your house, it would take you to this picture of a giant oil tanker. like the day the day after you know the day after the inauguration did i say election inauguration about 30 still is that still you still get a tax credit right oh yeah yeah so far and people actually that's a frequently asked question people ask if like if we think it's going to be repealed and i'll give you my answer if you want to hear it yeah it's a law the itz is a law and that means that congress passed it and so congress is the one that allocated that money to that cause. And so Congress would have to repeal it, which...
- Speaker #0
Could happen, but it would take a little bit of time. And so we would get some notice. And it benefits both parties. Like there are states, you know, red states and blue states that benefit from it. And actually, I think maybe red states slightly more. And so I don't think it's going to be repealed, which is great. But then again, it is going towards, you know, making our world more solar, you know, run. And so maybe they'll find a way. But I don't think so. I think we're pretty safe for now.
- Speaker #1
For now, it's day by day. I find all of that. The seat you have right now. your role and the company you're running and just seeing the impact that has, what something nationally, right, can have the local impact.
- Speaker #0
Well, and cost of materials has gone up like crazy. I mean, since COVID, really, it's gone up like crazy. But then, of course, all these tariffs, you know, everything's going up. You know, we get calls and emails like at least once a month, you know, this is going up, this is going up, this is going up. And more recently because of the tariffs.
- Speaker #1
And so with Like, I mean, how are you factoring that in when you're working with your customers? Are you eating a lot of the costs?
- Speaker #0
So we always have a thing in there saying that if the material cost changes more than 3%, then that amount gets billed to the customer. So we eat up to 3%. And then if it's more than that, then we do. I mean, honestly, we've never done it. We've never charged because it's just, it's a bad experience for people. But we have it in there so that we don't like lose our shirts, you know, if it's ever like something really big. Because sometimes people are in contract. They're maybe building a new house. They're in contract for 18 months. And so, you know, if there's this 50% tariff and this pandemic and whatever in that time period, then, you know, it would go up enough that we would just lose money on it. We'd be paying for their solar, you know. The tariffs are impacting the whole industry. I mean, all the industries, you know, all the construction.
- Speaker #1
Well, are there anything else on workforce policy stuff for you?
- Speaker #0
I mean, I could go off on workers' comp. Workers' compensation insurance is super expensive. and a lot of contractors just like kind of cheat around it. And it's sort of tempting as a contractor, you know, to try and compete, you know, by like cheating the system. But then also, like, we're a company that takes care of our employees. So like there was one of our guys got hit in the head with a tool the other day. Like he was working on this roof and somebody else dropped it from the second story roof and it hit him in the head. Like he should have been wearing a hard hat. We were like, you know, oh yeah, like go take care of yourself. Like if you need to take tomorrow off to rest too. Like we definitely don't want you on the roof dizzy. Like that's a bad idea, you know? And so we're willing to pay him for that to take care of himself. But then because he went to the doctor, then it's now a worker's comp claim, which raises our rates. And it's like, he has, if he's going to go to the doctor and say he got hurt at work, it has to be a worker's comp thing. And so like we would have just taken care of him, but instead we have to like go through worker's comp. And then, you know, even if we did end up paying him for his time, but it still increases our rates just because he went. So it's hard because it... penalizes people who are doing the right thing, and then incentivizes people who are cheating the system. I get what they're doing. They're trying to protect the workers. I get that.
- Speaker #1
Well, I'm just wondering, what should be done differently? Is there a better alternative to handling a situation like that that you see?
- Speaker #0
That's a good question. I would think the workers' comp people could look at what a company is doing, because they have to go do a whole thing anyways. They have to go investigate the situation and see what the company is doing. If they're a good company, you know, doing their safety training, like paying on time and, you know, taking care of their employees, that like maybe they would take the whole picture into consideration instead of just like looking at this piece of paper and then charging me for looking at the paper. Yeah.
- Speaker #1
There's like a lot of fear baked into all that. Probably on both sides in a way, but like probably more on their side of like, what's going to happen next? I don't know. Right. That's an area I don't know a lot about.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. So I appreciate you bringing it up.
- Speaker #1
And something to continue to look at because I'm sure it's intertwined into all of this. Well, as we think about just like this next generation and like growing the workforce, growing workforce locally here, what do you want this next gen to know about these jobs? About the opportunity, like what would be then your pitch to them to go into the industry?
- Speaker #0
Okay, well, so I'm a person who has a college degree and now I'm in the trades. So I would say like any of the trades. But, you know, like solar is really good bet because we are that does seem to be that where we're going. So there's a lot of job security there. And then it's also a nice kind of pathway into like electrician. If you want to be an electrician, it's a good way to start, especially because now you have to work under electrician to do work on solar. Some people just prefer to work with their hands like they prefer to work with their body. And like for those people, like this is a really good way. Like you don't have maybe you don't enjoy being in a classroom. Like it's a good way to start a career. That is actually, there's like a... serious path to success there. Like you get paid pretty well for working in the trades anyways, because, you know, it's a skill that you develop. Like you can start kind of on the ground level and then you learn as you go. And, you know, you can make $100,000 a year pretty easily. And then if you want to, if you're still motivated after that, like maybe you can start your own business and then you can train sort of the next generation and like learn new skills about what it means to run a business, you know? Because some people, they want to do the same thing for their whole career. But a lot of people want change and growth. And so if that's the kind of, you know, either one of those people, it's a good option. Because it's a good paying job. Like, we're always going to need reverse. We're always going to need electricians. You know, like, we're going to need more and more solar installers and people who can work on solar, like O&M, like operations and maintenance stuff. Like, it's going to be more and more needed, like, as the future, as we go through.
- Speaker #1
Have you seen firsthand any of your employees, like, let's say...
- Speaker #0
previous employees gone from residential into commercial or like make any of those moves or is mostly stay within like residential for sure i think in solar and roofing like a lot of times companies will do both yeah that's sort of like permeable like there's not really good so a lot of the commercial jobs are on flat roofs there's like you could do solar on flat roofs but there's not a good solar roofing product yet for flat roofs so solar roofing itself is we have patents on it. But we don't have the product yet. Got it. Yeah. So you're going to be developing.
- Speaker #1
That's really interesting. I hear lots of misconceptions when talking to people, like in regard to either working with your hands, working in the trades, working in the construction industry. What do you think is the biggest myth that you hear still?
- Speaker #0
Well, one of them is that it's for males. So I wanted to use my friend Nicole as an example. Nicole runs Bravo Restoration and Construction. She's the license holder, so she's the constructor. And her company is 50% women. And they're not just women in the office. They're women who go out and do the demolition. They tear up, if there's a bathroom that has a bunch of mold under the floors or something like that, they tear up the floors, they do the whole thing. And they do a really good job. It doesn't have to be, you know what I mean, just because it's a physical job that women can't do it. I think that's a big one.
- Speaker #1
The representation hole.
- Speaker #0
It's a viable career path for all genders. Yeah,
- Speaker #1
exactly.
- Speaker #0
Maybe the myth would be that it's not. Like that you're not going to make as much money. Like I think we all grew up and it was like everybody has to go to college. Like if you don't go to college, then you're like less than. I don't think that's true. I got my degree and I still ended up in the trades. And I love it. Like I love meeting the homeowners in Sonoma County. Like I love working with, you know, like helping like develop our teams and our company, you know. So that maybe is the other one like that, that it's not a respectable career path because it's super necessary and it pays well. And there's room for growth.
- Speaker #1
Cool. Debunking salary and then just in general, like the value of touching on it. Like these are valuable jobs, very needed. You have the career trajectory. You can own your own company. There's just so much there that we're kind of missing on. And we have to like talk more about. And you are a prime example of what you're doing, what is possible. Yeah, how we need to change it. What advice would you give your younger self? And anyone, these students helping us here, like what advice would you give?
- Speaker #0
I would say do the thing you want to do and like don't get caught up in your brain about it. Because whatever it is that you want to do, like if you're excited about it, you're going to do well at it. And you can always do other things. Like constantly people are changing careers. I mean, I was a teacher and now I'm a roofer. You can make all kinds of pivots. Like when I was in college, I was really interested in marketing. I thought that would be really fun. But I took a class in psychology and it was it started to look at like advertisements and it was like so gross. Like there would be like clean coal ads type things, you know what I mean? Where it was like blue skies and green rolling hills and it was an advertisement for like coal. And I just thought I was so disgusted by that, you know, I was like, oh, I'm not I don't want to be a part of that, you know. But now I realize, you know, 25 years later, I could have gone into marketing and just not been one of those people. Or been one of those people enough to learn how to do, you know what I mean, how everybody's doing stuff, like get the experience and then use it for good, you know?
- Speaker #1
You're kind of doing this now, though. I mean, you're out here marketing yourself. Right.
- Speaker #0
Right. And now it would be super useful for me. Yeah. To have gone to school for that. Like I would be a much more useful person in my company. Now I'm just like having to learn on the job, which is fun. I like it. But I feel like I could have been doing marketing my whole career and then, you know, switched over to do solar roofing or whatever.
- Speaker #1
Experience is like the best maybe nugget of... nugget of knowledge of like you learn by doing a lot of time. That's true.
- Speaker #0
But that's probably what I tell myself. Like, don't, don't psych yourself out. Don't overthink it. Just like, do the thing you want to do because if you're excited about what you're doing, you're going to succeed and you're going to grow and you're going to change and you're going to end up somewhere you didn't expect. But that's great because you've been doing what you wanted to do.
- Speaker #1
Nice. I love it. So what do you love most about the work you're doing now?
- Speaker #0
Okay. Is there also a what you don't love? Yes. Okay.
- Speaker #1
We got to tell both sides of the story. Yeah.
- Speaker #0
I mean, I love meeting all these people that I wouldn't normally meet. I'm, you know, I love people. That's like why I was a teacher. I love the learning the marketing stuff. That's exciting to me. And like doing this kind of stuff is really fun. I guess the thing that I love the most though, is that I have this vision. I used to wake up and be like, oh, you know, like start my day and like, oh, I have this in front of me, you know? And now I start. I start my day and I'm like, I'm on a mission. Like I'm just going to do my thing. And then I'm going to like go hang out with my kids and then I'm going to go to sleep and then I'm going to do my thing again, you know? And so I think that's the thing that I love is just having a purpose. I feel like I'm, I mean, even as a teacher, I was doing it because I felt like it was a good way to leave the world better than I found it. But you know, it's just a different thing.
- Speaker #1
This is energizing you.
- Speaker #0
Yeah. And it's exciting because I'm learning. Like I really love to like learn new things. That means I fail sometimes. So I'm learning to be better about failure.
- Speaker #1
What's the hardest part of the job right now?
- Speaker #0
The hardest part is when we have, so on Amy's Refuge Solar side, when we have customers that aren't happy. That's the part I lose sleep over. And I guess, I think that's actually a good thing, like for a business owner to like be upset when customers aren't happy. But what I'm having to learn is like, okay, is this our responsibility to do the thing they want us to do? Or is it not? That's the thing I'm learning right now is like, okay, how to be really clear? Because I'm happy to take responsibility if it's my responsibility, but I will overtake responsibility.
- Speaker #1
Yeah, let's figure out those boundaries.
- Speaker #0
I'll take too much. Yeah, so where's the line? And like, be clear about the line and then just respectfully communicate the line, you know?
- Speaker #1
I ask everyone this question, but is there anyone you'd like to thank? Like someone in your journey that you're like, you've had such an impact on my life. I want to thank you.
- Speaker #0
Letitia Henke. Yeah. When I was first in, when we first started our business, I was just doing some research about what other roofing and solar installers were around here. And at the time, Letitia had, her company did roofing and solar. And I was like, another lady roofer. This is amazing. And so I just called her up. She generously gave me her time. She took me under her wing. She really is like a pay it forward, you know, the Lime Foundation. She's like, she's such an amazing community member and like a mentor to me. And And. She never, you know, technically we are a competition for each other, but she never made me feel that way. Like it was always, how can I help you? She's amazing.
- Speaker #1
Like women are powerful too in that regard. Yeah. That's really cool. Is there anything you didn't touch on that you want to touch on?
- Speaker #0
Let's talk about a vision for the future, because I do feel like that is a thing that we all need. Humanity like really needs like a vision for where we're going. Like I want artists and writers to do more like... art and stories about like what this future looks like that we're working towards because it's so hard to work towards something when you don't have a clear picture you can't see it yeah and I think I guess that's it like I just want to spread the word that like we need a vision for the future and so like maybe just everybody who's listening everybody's watching think about what what does the future look like in the future that you want what does that look like in the future you want your kids to inherit like I think about that a lot
- Speaker #1
I mean that's probably the why you're doing the work that you're doing.
- Speaker #0
I love my kids, but I don't know. For me, it's definitely bigger. I mean, I guess that's the thing, right? When I had my daughter's, the older one, and when I had my daughter, I remember like very clearly, I had an experience where like we were laying in bed, like she was a day old or something. We were laying in bed. There was this weird burst of like energy, so much love. It just like encompassed the earth. That's how much love I had for her. And so for me, it's like very much about like all of us, you know, how do we save this, you know, for all of us? Because I think the earth is going to be fine. oh yeah it's gonna be us the earth is gonna be fine it's just us yeah but we're the probably the biggest appreciators of the earth that have ever existed like as far as we know right yeah that's actually a good way to put it i never thought of it that way that's really special like to be able to appreciate it would be a bummer if we just perished from the earth mankind yeah let's not do that we'll keep doing the work that we're doing yeah on that note amy actually it was wonderful having you on the skill day of podcast you are skilled af officially
- Speaker #1
You're such a supporter too of my, you have a shirt that you wear around. I love it. I do.
- Speaker #0
I love wearing it. I get lots of compliments on it.
- Speaker #1
It makes me happy. Thank you so much for... sharing your journey, your story, your thoughts around workforce, policy, what we need in order to build this future that we want to have and continue to have. And just thank you because you're truly an inspiration for other women getting into this industry. And I think a lot about representation and you are that representation of like, this is possible and this is what it can look like.
- Speaker #0
Thank you. Yeah, it was fun. Thanks for having me. And thanks for the work you're doing also.
- Speaker #1
Thank you. Thank you so much for tuning into this episode of the skilled AF podcast. If you enjoyed it, please rate, review, subscribe to it, wherever you're listening. And if you want to stay connected, partner, you name it, head over to the skilled project.com or follow us on social media at the skilled project until next time. Stay skilled AF.
