Hubby's House: Making a business work

Jeff Green | Jun 11, 2015

When Jen Andrews' (nee Seguin) parents purchased Saylor's Inn in 1994, she came along to help run the business with her boyfriend Kyle Andrews.

The Seguin family found that while the business, which was located on Highway 7 just east of Arden, did very well during the tourist season, it was very slow in the off-season and the overhead was very high. Kyle and Jen went to work elsewhere, and in 2004 the Seguin family sold the business.

The story only starts there for Kyle and Jen, however.

“We moved out here from Montreal in 1996 and fell in love with the area, so even though the Saylor's Inn was a struggle, we learned about business and found the place where we wanted to live,” said Kyle.

Not surprisingly Kyle and Jen were immediately drawn to the restaurant business. They were both working at Swiss Chalet in Kingston, Jen as a manager and Kyle in the kitchen. He decided to start up a small cleaning business, which he promoted during his part-time evening job delivering pizzas for Domino's Pizza .

“I would stick my flyer onto the back of the pizza boxes,” Kyle recalls.

One thing led to another and the cleaning business, Hubby's House, developed over time, and Kyle and Jen have been working full time in their own business for over five years.

Based in Tichborne, Hubby's House runs two crews who clean houses all across Frontenac County and in Kingston. They also do window cleaning and offer a variety of handyman and other services.

Business has been steadily growing for eight years now, and the key to it all is a professional approach and consistency.

“We learned a few lessons over the years, as does everyone in business,” said Jen, “such as not to take on work that is beyond what we can handle with the excellent staff we have.”

It is homeowners who have been making them busier and busier, and the business has seen constant growth year after year.

“Many of our customers have us in once every two weeks, to keep the home or cottage in top form,” said Kyle, adding that before starting with any customer either he or Jen visits the customer and goes over every part of the house to see what needs to be done and how often in order to determine a final price.

The same level of care is offered for one time jobs such as homeowners getting ready for a large event or preparing a house for sale, a seasonal cleaning job on a cottage as the summer season approaches, or for their monthly, bi-weekly or weekly customers.

Hubby's House cleaners work in teams of at least two, adding to efficiency and decreasing the amount of time their customers are inconvenienced.

Hubby's House uses all their own equipment and eco-friendly, scent-free cleaning supplies.

For more information, contact Kyle or Jen directly at 613-375-6573 or 613-888-3758, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or visit their website hubbyshouse.ca.