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Vojo Popovic, 20 years old and currently the founder and CEO, Piece of Cake Moving & StorageHe emigrated to the United States from Montenegro and worked at McDonald’s to make a living.
But just a few months into the job, Popovich was already looking for his next opportunity: longer hours, more freedom and a higher salary. But he was still learning English and “didn’t have any special skills,” so his options were limited. A friend and fellow countryman told him that movers were always in need of extra help.
So Popovich started working as a mover in New York City. “I immediately fell in love with the job,” Popovich says. entrepreneur“It was very vibrant and from an expat perspective, I got to see the different lifestyles in New York City. I think it’s interesting for someone from overseas, and really for anyone.”
Related: How to Start Your Own Business as an Immigrant in the United States
After one year at the company, Popovich became a driver and crew leader, enjoying managing the team and the overall job. But he soon found himself “too used to it” and wanted a different challenge. So he moved to the company’s sales department. To succeed in that role, he read books, watched YouTube videos, and studied English. He also enjoyed the job.
“It was nice to really push myself. There were no limits.”
“It was really nice to push myself,” Popovich said. “There were no restrictions, no specific hours. It wasn’t like I was going to do an eight-hour shift and then be done. I just worked as long as I needed to and was held accountable for the results.”
Yet after a few years in sales, Popovich felt a familiar restlessness. It was time to set new goals. At that point, Popovich’s years of experience in the moving industry gave him an inside look at the industry’s inefficiencies. He knew he could do better. “The industry was very outdated in everything from communications to emails to customer service experience to operations,” Popovich explains. “There was a lot of room for improvement. I saw my opportunity there.”
So in 2018, at the age of 24, Popovich bought a moving truck for $20,000 and set out to develop a brand that would stand out from the competition in more ways than one. It started with the company’s name and branding: “Piece of Cake” juxtaposed with hot pink and purple. The name “was unlike anything else in the market at the time,” Popovich recalls, and the bright colors were sure to draw attention to the company’s trucks “in a line of 100 trucks.”
Images/Photos Courtesy: Piece of Cake Moving & Storage
Related: Creating a Brand: How to Build a Brand from Scratch
“Ensuring every customer is satisfied has always been at the heart of our business.”
Popovich has also worked hard to change the way we do things when it comes to customer service, fully recognizing that customer satisfaction is key to word-of-mouth referrals and new business. “Every touchpoint is handled with care, from the customer’s first phone call, to the email correspondence, to the day of the move, to the actual follow-up after the move. Satisfying every customer has always been at the heart of our business,” says Popovich.
Piece of Cake also uses data, such as customer feedback, to improve operations and inform decision-making. For example, if customers report more damaged TVs than usual, Piece of Cake plans more training for staff. Additionally, the company closely monitors which zip codes are attracting the most customers, so it can analyze why some zip codes have fewer customers and address the discrepancies.
Related: Harness the power of data to boost sales and customer connections
This innovative approach worked: Today, Piece of Cake is a fast-growing company headquartered in New York with offices in Miami, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Dallas. The company performs more than 100,000 moves each year across all 50 states, employs 800 people, and has a fleet of 350 trucks, yet has no outside investment.
“We started as a small business with one truck and a few employees. 1718297999 Living with and supporting hundreds of people and seeing the brand I created in my notebook in every major city in the U.S. definitely excites me and motivates me to get up every day and give my best to the company,” Popovich says.
Images/Photos Courtesy: Piece of Cake Moving & Storage
“How do we know enough to handle the next phase of the company?”
But Piece of Cake’s prosperity hasn’t come without some challenges, Popovich says: finding enough employees to support the company’s expansion, and then speeding up their growth within the company, at a time when most industry leaders step into senior roles from the ground up. “How do we speed up the process?” Popovich says. “How do we make sure we know enough to handle the next phase of the company? How can we, including myself, learn and grow to best serve our positions as CEOs?”
Popovich said the key is to give people ample opportunities to learn and improve — and to get those chances early on.
“So we don’t have to wait for someone to say, ‘Hey, I’ve been in that position. I feel stuck. I’m looking for ways to improve.’ Popovich explains. “We approach that person and say, “You’re doing really well. Would you like to try another challenge?” [We’re] It always pushes people out of their comfort zone, and they [are] It proves that we are right.”
Related: Get Out of Your Comfort Zone, Take a Risk, and Run with the Big Dogs
Popovich says that pushing yourself out of your comfort zone repeatedly is what helps you turn your dreams into reality, and he encourages all aspiring entrepreneurs to do the same.
“Dream big and don’t put limits on your dreams because if you have a good product and a good service, it’s possible,” Popovich said. “If you have value to offer to the consumer, [just] A matter of time [before] It’s going to be exciting. If it gets in front of the right people and everything gets going, it could be really big. So think big. Dream big.”