Today we’d like to introduce you to Jonathan Reimann.
Jonathan, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
It’s been one intense road.
But it really is an amazing story. I guess the key is where to start. Well if I’m going to do this, I’ll start by giving glory to the Father in Heaven. Things don’t always go as I planned, but I can be certain they are going as He planned.
I was going to college to study architecture at Cal Poly Pomona straight out of high school. I was a pretty good student not the best, not the worst, but I’ve always been good at cramming. So I got into the architecture program because of a class I took in High School, that God lead me take. I literally asked Him what class I should take, and I was moved to take a TV production class, in which the only thing I learned was Adobe Photoshop. I put that I knew that on my application to Cal Poly and I’m quite sure that’s what got me in.
I’m a window cleaner and I’m talking about architecture right :p Well, sit back, it’s my story lol. I do 3d Modeling as well.
My mom got sick my second year of the architecture program. Breast cancer. Of course, that’s a story in and of itself. She had gone down for an alternative treatment in Mexico, which I don’t recommend because it didn’t work.
My sister was with her, I came home from college on day and found a message on the answering machine, yep this was before cell phones had really taken off. Telling me she was at the Methodist Hospital in Arcadia, and to get there right away.
This was maybe 4-5 months after my mom told us she had cancer.
So I was stressed, to say it lightly. Believe me, architecture is a difficult subject, and I was in love with a young woman that was not feeling the same for me…
I was a wreck, I ran outside, got in my little Mazda 323 that my uncle had given me and drove as well as I could to the hospital in tears, and screaming at the top of my lungs because I needed to release some of all that was awful going on in my life.
There was a huge rainbow in the sky, huge clear, and blatant as I drove to the hospital, I remember it as clear as day.
We are all from Southern California, when is the last time you saw a rainbow?
I’ve seen them, but never anything remotely like this, I wish I had a picture.
I know not everyone out there is a Christian, but I wish you all were as I am to be able to understand what that meant to me, because it is going to be terribly hard to put into words. But I’ll try.
The rainbow is a sign to us all that our Father will not flood the earth again. After a hugely traumatic incident like a worldwide flood, He used it to say it’s okay, this won’t happen again.
So when I saw it that is instantly what I thought. “It’s going to be okay, and this won’t happen again.”
From that point, I was pretty sure my mom would die, and while that sounds terrible, I believe her death will follow in the future with her resurrection, I knew that even so it was going to be okay. Still hasn’t been easy.
I dropped out of Architecture school, and stayed with and took care of my mom from home while my brother worked to take care of bills, and my sister helped, my church helped, we had so much support, which I can’t be more thankful for.
After she died, I got a job as a window cleaner, with a guy in my church.
So now you get it. I would have never been a window cleaner if my mom never had cancer.
Now you have to understand, I was planning on being an architect, so I looked down on this kind of work.
But my boss was amazing… I mean the level of skill and detail to his work, while remaining one particular skill, rivaled what I had done in architecture. And working outside with your hands, constantly moving, it’s really good for your body.
I came to enjoy it in the 2 years I worked for him.
But finally, the time came. My mom’s last wish for me was to finish college. So I went back.
And it was a tough road, but I had her wish to pull me through and I did it. I graduated in 2010.
And there wasn’t any architecture work around… At least not for me. It was kind of a dark period in building, though some of my other friends had found work, not I.
I was offered a job in Cincinnati, So I headed out there, I was supposed to be doing construction estimating, and they had absolutely nothing prepared for me.
Construction estimating isn’t what I was trained for, they would need to train me, but they were not set up for it, and this office had an unbelievable turnaround of employees by the time I left, there was only three employees which were the same as when I started and one was the secretary, and the other a friend of the boss… So needless to say, the worst managers on the face of planet.
Anyway, my dad got sick, so I got a job with a friend doing SEO, Search Engine Optimization, and headed back to California because I could do that work from anywhere in the US.
My mom and my dad got divorced when I was young, so he was more like an uncle. But I wanted to be close by.
The timing again was perfect, I was able to be near when I needed to be. Folks, these things don’t just happen…
My friend’s business went under, and I needed to find work fast. So I called up someone who had offered me a job in window cleaning a few months before.
I went back to work as a window cleaner, my dad ended up dying, but peaceful without any pain, and I started up my own business about a year ago. And a few months ago, as one of my own clients, I cleaned Tyra Banks house in Beverly Hills. It’s a rental property mind you but not too shabby for someone who’s life seriously tried to run over.
One of my clients asked me to join his Leeds club in Burbank. I did and I met Christine Curtain the owner of LA Maid, that’s how I made the contact… It’s been moving so fast, I cleaned Jerry Bruckheimer’s office a week ago.
It’s exciting, challenging, and new, and while it’s all that, I don’t know how much I would change, I’ve grown so much in the hands of the Potter, and I’m much, much stronger now than I have ever been.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Arc Window Cleaners story. Tell us more about the business.
Precision, and speed. You have to be good, and you have to be fast as a window cleaner. May people are one or the other, but it is hard to be both.
You don’t clean Jerry Bruckheimer’s office, if your bad at it, but you also have to be able to be able to do so according to his schedule.
Right now, it’s just me, but with my two-handed method of cleaning windows I’m able to do the work of a guy and half.
And a guy and half of very good window cleaners.
Of course, I do my own SEO, and I designed my own website. I can manage and change those things whenever I want. Some of that Adobe Photoshop skills coming back into the mix here. This gives me an edge on the competition in keeping down my costs, I’m extremely affordable for the high level of care I give my customers.
Has luck played a meaningful role in your life and business?
It’s not luck its blessing, and to be honest, besides the hard work I’ve put into being good at what I do, that blessing is everything. I wouldn’t have a business without it.
Contact Info:
- Address: 1616 S. Mayflower Ave., Unit E,
Monrovia, CA 91016 - Website: www.arcwindowcleaners.com
- Phone: 6262970771
- Email: [email protected]
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/arcwindowcleaners/
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/arc-window-cleaners-monrovia
Image Credit:
Quiniesha Singletary https://www.facebook.com/quiniesha.singletary.5
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