This Side Hustle Spotlight Q&A features New York City-based friends and co-founders Millie Blumka, 31, and Taylor Borenstein, 31. The pair started a side hustle in 2021 called Stakt, an adaptable workout accessories brand.

Blumka was a director of brand partnerships at Showfields and Borenstein was a product implementation manager at Bloomberg when they invested about $50,000 of their personal savings into the business. The co-founders have since grown it from a two-person operation to a lucrative business on track for $10 million in revenue in 2025 as it scales across Amazon, DTC and B2B.

Read exactly how they did it, here.

^{Image Credit: Courtesy of Stakt. Taylor Borenstein, left, and Millie Blumka, right.}

Responses have been edited for length and clarity.

When did you start your side hustle, and where did you find the inspiration for it?
Blumka and Borenstein: We had the idea for Stakt back in 2020 when home workouts became the norm and our old yoga mats just weren’t cutting it. We needed more support and versatility for the variety of workouts we were doing like sculpt and pilates, and we couldn’t find a mat that could keep up. We found inspiration through our own personal need and noticing many trainers we looked up to were rolling their mat in half to get extra support…we knew there had to be a better way.

Related: This Couple’s ‘Scrappy’ Side Hustle Sold Out in 1 Weekend — It Hit $1 Million in 3 Years and Now Makes Millions Annually: ‘Lean But Powerful’

What were some of the first steps you took to get your side hustle off the ground? How much money/investment did it take to launch?
Blumka and Borenstein: Neither of us had started a business before, let alone created a product, so the first step was a lot of networking. We spoke with friends of friends to try to understand how you even go about creating a product. We also did a lot of surveying to understand if this was an “us” problem or if other people were struggling with this, too. We each invested $25,000 of our own savings to get the business off the ground and have invested profits ever since.

^{Image Credit: Courtesy of Stakt}

If you could go back in your business journey and change one process or approach, what would it be, and how do you wish you’d done it differently?
Blumka: If I could go back, I’d probably establish our lanes much earlier. In the beginning, we both tried to touch everything and be hands on for every aspect of the business. Once we defined who owned what, things became so much smoother. Having those roles in place earlier would have saved us a lot of time.

Borenstein: I probably would have hired customer service support sooner, as we spent a lot of our time on customer experience when we could have spent it building the business.

Related: These Friends Started a Side Hustle in Their Kitchens. Sales Spiked to $130,000 in 3 Days — Then 7 Figures: ‘Revenue Has Grown Consistently.’

When it comes to this specific business, what is something you’ve found particularly challenging and/or surprising that people who get into this type of work should be prepared for, but likely aren’t?
Borenstein: Before starting a consumer brand, I had always thought, How hard could it be if you have a good product? It turns out the product is just the first step: Growing a business takes a ton of discipline, hard work, networking and efforts across all verticals to really make it successful.

^{Image Credit: Courtesy of Stakt}

Can you recall a specific instance when something went very wrong — how did you fix it?
Blumka: We once had an entire container of inventory arrive damaged, and we didn’t feel comfortable selling it. Instead, we donated the mats to local organizations and used them for community events. It left us out of stock for a while, so we leaned on pre-orders and reframed the challenge as a marketing opportunity.

How long did it take you to see consistent monthly revenue? How much did the side hustle earn?
Blumka: We didn’t pay ourselves until we decided it was time to make Stakt our full-time jobs instead of just a side hustle.

Borenstein: It took about a year before things leveled out and we saw consistent monthly revenue. For the first year, there were good months, great months and bad months — eventually it became more consistent and easier to predict.

Related: At 24, She Immigrated to the U.S. and Worked at Walmart. Then She Turned Savings Into a ‘Magic’ Side Hustle Surpassing $1 Million This Year.

What does growth and revenue look like now?
Blumka and Borenstein: We are on track to do $10 million in revenue this year — doubling what we did in 2024.

^{Image Credit: Courtesy of Stakt}

What do you enjoy most about running your business?
Blumka: The combination of creativity and community. I love taking an idea and turning it into something people genuinely connect with. That said, the real reward is seeing our products out in the wild, with people actually using and loving them. Building community around movement and wellness has been the most fulfilling part. Plus, doing it alongside my best friend is the biggest bonus.

Borenstein: At some point, this truly stopped feeling like work. Stakt is an extension of me and my family, and every day I get to work with my best friend and my husband (whom we hired last year). I love that I can make my own schedule, my hard work is rewarded with the growth of my own business, I meet awesome people, and I get the opportunity to design new products and see them come to life.

“Chaos is part of the journey.”

Based on your journey so far, what’s your best advice for aspiring founders?
Blumka: There will never be a perfect time, perfect product or perfect plan, but you have to start somewhere. There will always be a reason to wait, but the real progress starts once you launch. This is when you can adapt, learn and grow.

Borenstein: Everyone will have advice, but trust your gut — there’s no single playbook. And remember, no one has it all figured out; the chaos is part of the journey.

Most people think you need a massive ad budget to grow fast. But earlier this year, I helped a service-based business generate over $5.1 million in just six months — and we did it by focusing on strategy, not spending.

Let’s Get Moving started as a single-location moving company. Today, we have over 70 locations across North America, and I’ve led the SEO and digital marketing behind that growth.

We didn’t rely on hacks or hope. We built a system that generated consistent, high-converting leads across every franchise, even in highly competitive markets like Toronto, Vancouver and Houston.

This is the real story of how we scaled and what any entrepreneur running a service business can take away from it.

Related: 31 Ways to Market Your Business on a Budget

1. We consolidated a disjointed online presence into a scalable system

When I first joined the team, Let’s Get Moving had four active locations: Toronto, Vancouver, Edmonton and Hamilton. Each operated under its own subdomain, a structure that not only fragmented our brand identity but also made it nearly impossible to build SEO authority across the board.

While Google Ads were driving decent results, the long-term organic growth potential was being held back by a lack of a centralized SEO strategy.

Our first step was to rebuild the digital foundation — migrating all locations under one unified domain structure, developing dedicated SEO-optimized pages for each city and implementing a consistent content and review strategy across all franchises.

That move alone positioned us for exponential, scalable growth and created a system we could replicate as we expanded to 70+ locations.

2. We built location pages that actually convert

Most franchise websites create a page for each city, add the name of the location and call it a day.

We went deeper. Every location page became its own mini landing page optimized for the keywords people actually search in that city (like “movers in Chicago with great reviews”), with real reviews, service highlights and clear CTAs.

We didn’t just want visibility. We wanted calls, quotes and bookings.

This helped us dominate local search in dozens of markets without paying for clicks.

3. We turned Google Business Profiles into lead machines

Google Business Profile (GBP) isn’t a “nice to have” — it’s your homepage for local customers.

We optimized over 70 GBP listings to show up in the top three of Google Maps (the “map pack”) by:

• Consistently updating business details, hours and photos

• Encouraging genuine, timely reviews from happy customers

• Posting regular updates and offers

• Using BrightLocal to monitor ranking and visibility

For some locations, our Google Business Profile drove more than 50% of inbound leads. It was free. And it worked.

Related: Ultimate SEO Guide On How to Get 100,000 Visits Per Month From Google

4. We created content with the customer’s real questions in mind

We didn’t blog just to blog. We asked:

“What is our customer Googling the moment they realize they need our service?”

Then we answered those questions clearly, concisely and locally.

For example:

• “How much do movers cost in Toronto?”

• “Can I hire movers on the same day in Los Angeles?”

• “What’s the best time to move to NYC to save money?”

This kind of content didn’t just get traffic — it built trust. It positioned us as the go-to expert before they ever picked up the phone.

We also focused on formatting. Every article used conversational headlines (based on actual search terms), bullet points for scannability and short paragraphs that respected the reader’s time. We weren’t trying to sound like a content mill. We wrote like humans answering real questions.

And it paid off. The more content we published, the more leads came in — and we were ranking for high-intent searches across dozens of cities, all without spending a dollar on paid traffic.

5. We scaled without sacrificing quality

One of the biggest challenges with franchise growth is maintaining consistency across all locations. To solve that, we built internal systems to support every franchise equally — a strategy that many overlook when implementing SEO for franchises.

This included:

• Centralized SOPs for SEO and content

• Shared review generation templates

• A monthly dashboard for rankings, calls and traffic

• Ongoing support and local keyword research for every new franchise launch

By giving each location the tools to succeed and tracking performance, we created a self-sustaining lead generation system.

The result

In six months, our combined locations generated over $5.1 million in tracked revenue without relying on PPC, traditional advertising or gimmicks.

And we’re still growing.

What other entrepreneurs can learn from this

Even if you’re not in the moving industry or don’t run a franchise, here are the key takeaways that apply to any service-based business:

• Think beyond traffic, and optimize for search intent and conversion.

• Treat every local market like its own opportunity.

• Build a brand people trust before they ever contact you.

• Create repeatable systems so you can scale without chaos.

• Don’t ignore the tools that are free but powerful, like Google Business Profile.

Related: 7 Local SEO Strategies I’ve Used to Help Businesses Boost Their Revenue 10x — Especially Blue-Collar Companies

We didn’t win by spending more money; we won by thinking smarter, moving faster and obsessing over what our customers were already looking for.

If you’re building a service business in 2025, SEO isn’t optional — it’s one of the highest-ROI growth channels available. But only if you treat it like the revenue engine it truly is.

Tony Lamb is the founder and CEO of Kona Ice, the mobile shaved ice franchise (ranked #30 on the 2025 Franchise 500) known for its tropical trucks, kid-friendly Flavorwave station and deep community involvement. Lamb started out in sales, then launched Kona Ice in 2007, initially as a side hustle to teach his kids about business. He felt the ice cream truck model was outdated, often associated with poor quality and unreliable operators. When he considered shaved ice — with its low product and labor costs and its more interactive nature compared to ice cream — he knew it was the right fit.

Kona Ice has since grown into a 2,200-unit national franchise that’s returned more than $200 million to schools and local organizations. Despite the growth, the brand’s $3,000 annual royalty fee hasn’t changed in nearly two decades.

During the pandemic, Lamb expanded his portfolio with Travelin’ Tom’s Coffee, a mobile coffee concept (#217 on the Franchise 500) named after his father and Beverly Ann’s Cookies, a dessert truck inspired by his mother.

Learn how Lamb built a recession-proof, feel-good franchise business — and what advice he has for aspiring entrepreneurs — here.

Responses have been edited for length and clarity.

Related: Considering franchise ownership? Get started now to find your personalized list of franchises that match your lifestyle, interests and budget.

How did your prior experience prepare you to launch a mobile shaved ice business?
I started selling vacuum cleaners during college, door-to-door, in Kentucky. I eventually graduated and ran six offices, had 300 salespeople and made “rock star” money for a while. It’s a tough business, but it teaches you everything about small business: marketing, customer interaction, sourcing and building teams. After that, I did marketing consulting for a while. That gave me the confidence to think, If I can figure out vacuums and mobile marketing, I can figure out an ice cream truck.

Related: Emma Grede Dropped Out of School at 16. Now the Skims Boss Runs a $4 Billion Empire — Here’s How.

What sparked the idea for Kona Ice?
One summer, I was in my backyard, and an ice cream truck came down the street. My kids ran toward it, and it was everything you warn kids about: a shirtless guy in a white van with a few stickers on the side. I thought, This industry is already part of our culture, but it’s been dragged down to the lowest common denominator. What if we built something beautiful, open and interactive that parents could trust?

Related: How to Turn Big Business Moments Into Lasting Brand Momentum

Lots of people have great ideas. How did you go from an idea to your first truck?
I knew how to make a vehicle look great because I’d built mobile billboard trucks before. I hired an engineer and a designer, brainstormed everything from layout to customer interaction and built the first truck in 2007. I thought I’d have, maybe, five trucks as a side hustle to teach my kids about business. But when I let someone in the next county try one and they succeeded, I knew I had something bigger.

Related: How to Recover from a Bad Business Decision (and Rebuild Trust)

You started franchising just a year later. Why so fast?
A guy saw the truck on vacation and wanted one in Nashville. I realized franchising was the best way to hold the brand tightly. Safety and trust were central, and you can’t get that if anyone can run their own version. I set the royalty at $3,000 a year — and I’ve never raised it. I didn’t want to get greedy. I wanted franchisees to keep the lion’s share of the money.

What were the key innovations that helped Kona Ice grow?
The big one is the Flavorwave, a self-serve flavor station on the side of the truck. It gave kids a “keys to the candy store” feeling and justified a higher price point. For franchisees in colder climates, we added the Kona Mini so they could work indoor events. And, from day one, our franchisees made money, which fueled growth.

Related: What My First Failed Startup Taught Me — and How I Finally Got It Right 20 Years Later

The pandemic wiped out all events for a significant amount of time. How did you adapt?
We were 95% event-based, and within two weeks, every event was gone. I spent two days in the fetal position, then we launched “Curbside Kona” using adapted delivery software. Customers booked stops online; we optimized routes and texted them arrival times. That saved us in April and May. From there, we built a $4 million custom platform, Kona OS, which now handles everything from routing to marketing. It has made scaling much easier.

Kona Ice is also known for giving back. How did that start?
In 2008, during the economic crisis, PTAs told me they had no budget. I offered to come to schools, sell to kids and give the PTA 25 to 30% back. Shaved ice has great margins, so why not? It locked us into the community — we weren’t just selling a product; we were helping fund helmets, playgrounds, uniforms. That became our culture, and now our franchisees have given back over $200 million.

Related: Want to Own a Franchise? This 3-Tier Approach Can Help You Choose Wisely.

You’ve since launched Travelin’ Tom’s Coffee and Beverly Ann’s Cookies. What was the inspiration to launch those brands?
During Covid downtime, I dusted off some concepts I’d been sitting on. We prototyped a coffee truck and named it after my dad — a colorful, gregarious guy. It took off. Then I created a cookie-and-ice-cream truck named after my mom, using her college portrait on the side. Both brands use the same mobile vending principles that make Kona successful.

Looking back, what’s the single most important decision you made that set Kona Ice on this path?
Not changing the royalty. Investors have told me to switch to a percentage, but that’s not who we are. Keeping it at $3,000 a year makes franchisees healthy and keeps competition out. You can’t build what we’ve built and charge what we charge — and I want the people doing the work to make the money.

Join top CEOs, founders and operators at the Level Up conference to unlock strategies for scaling your business, boosting revenue and building sustainable success.

Too many corporate-startup partnerships fall apart despite everyone starting out with good intentions. Big companies say they want to work with startups. Startups jump at the opportunity to scale their ideas. But a year later, both sides often walk away disappointed and empty-handed.

It doesn’t have to be this way. When done right, these partnerships can unlock enormous value that pays off many times over for both sides. But the key word here is partnership. Too often, corporations treat these relationships as transactions, not collaborations. And startups, for their part, don’t always know how to navigate the maze of corporate expectations and politics.

That may help explain why a 2024 survey of over 800 health-tech decision-makers found that just 15% of corporate-startup collaborations succeed — barely up from 13% five years earlier.

Here’s what I’ve learned about making corporate partnerships actually work.

Related: Startups & Corporates: A Symbiotic Relationship

Don’t go silent after the kickoff

One of the biggest mistakes I see corporations make is treating the startup business partnership like a box to check. They kick off the project, then walk away and expect the startup to deliver magic. I can tell you: That almost never works.

Startups thrive on feedback, iteration and course correction. If you leave them alone for months, you risk missing key opportunities to adjust — or worse, ending up with something that doesn’t fit your needs.

As a startup, don’t be shy about pushing for regular check-ins. Insist on ongoing conversations, even if it feels like you’re nagging. I’ve worked with startups that were afraid to “bother” their corporate sponsor, only to find out months later that they’d gone down the wrong path.

If you’re not talking, you’re headed for trouble.

Watch for the “not invented here” syndrome

Here’s a common attitude trap: Big companies love to say they’re open to outside innovation, but when it comes down to it, I’ve seen many struggle to embrace something they didn’t invent themselves.

When corporate teams subconsciously (or even consciously) resist integrating the startup’s work because it feels foreign, or simply because of an ego reflex, the “not invented here” mindset is getting in the way of innovation.

Startups need to pay attention to this dynamic early. Ask yourself: Is your partner genuinely committed to bringing your innovation inside? Do you see them involving their internal teams? Are they championing your work internally?

If not, that’s a red flag. A partnership where the big company never really intended to adopt your solution is just window dressing and will probably end up being a waste of your time.

Related: When It Comes to Corporate Partnerships, Remember These 5 Relationship Tricks

Don’t let your corporation partnership get buried in bureaucracy

Let’s be honest: Corporations can be slow and bureaucratic. Startups … aren’t.

I’ve seen great startups get bogged down in legal reviews, compliance checklists and approval processes, draining resources and killing momentum. If you bring all the corporate bureaucracy to a startup, they will fail. Trying to find that balance is really important.

As a startup, you need to be honest about what your team can handle. If there are just ten of you and the corporate partner is bogging you down in demands like you’re a big vendor with endless resources, speak up. Don’t be afraid to push back and set clear limits. Whether it’s about timelines, resources or anything else, be clear on what you can deliver.

On the corporate side, the best partnerships happen when the company makes an effort to adapt. Simplify processes and give the startup breathing room to operate. Again, startups beware: If you’re not seeing that kind of flexibility, think carefully about how much you’re willing to tolerate.

This is even more important as corporate interest in startups grows. In 2023, corporate-backed deals already accounted for 19% of global venture funding, and the numbers are growing. This shows just how much big companies rely on these partnerships to drive innovation and how much is at stake if they fail.

Redefine what success looks like

One of the most important mindset shifts for both sides is understanding that success isn’t always about launching a blockbuster product right away.

In some of the best startup partnerships I’ve been a part of, the immediate result wasn’t a shiny new thing on the market. What we learned from a project often helped us to solve a problem elsewhere. So — it was successful.

It was learning. It was building capabilities. It was solving problems elsewhere, sometimes in surprising and unforeseen ways, by using what we discovered together.

I like to say: Don’t measure the partnership just by the end product. Measure it by the progress it enables. By the degree of innovation it brings to your company. That is the kind of mindset that keeps both parties motivated.

Creating this win-win relationship is important. You can apply that to intellectual property, licensing and credit, for example. Too many partnerships fail because one side tries to squeeze too much value out of the other. The result is that in the end, nobody wins.

Startups should make sure their corporate partner values the knowledge and connections that come out of the collaboration, beyond the deliverable itself. These expectations need to be managed from the very beginning in open conversations.

Related: Making Startup-Corporate Partnerships Succeed: The How-To

What you should take away

If you’re a startup thinking about partnering with a big company, here’s my best advice:

• Speak up! Insist on regular meetings as part of the process from day one.

• Be honest about your capacity and set realistic expectations.

• Remember: Success is much more than a glossy product launch.

These partnerships can be transformational. They can open doors you’d never reach on your own — but only if you go in with the right mindset and a true partner.

If you treat it like an actual collaboration, not just a deal, you’ll unlock opportunities others might miss.

Poor pricing always comes with a profit margin, whatever the category or product you have. In 2024, returns in ecommerce reached $743 billion, almost 15% of all retail sales in the US. A significant part of these returns would not have happened if priced right.

Such errors are not only responsible for lost revenue but also come with missed customers, eroded market share and shattered brand trust.

The good news? I’m about to share five proven ways that you can use to help your sales grow.

Related: An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Startup Pricing Strategies

1. Dynamic pricing

The retail landscape in 2025 is more tense than ever. Real-time competitor activity, demand shifts, stock levels monitoring and scraping, all while using AI-driven tools, make it now easier than ever to adjust prices within a few seconds. This allows ecommerce brands to remain agile and competitive without manually updating listings.

Take Airbnb as an example. Their ‘Smart Pricing’ tool fine-tunes nightly rates based on seasonality, local events and demand spikes. Hosts using Smart Pricing are nearly four times more likely to receive bookings and report a 12% increase in revenue, on average.

By automating price decisions, you can react instantly to the market, run A/B tests to identify price sensitivity and keep your margins healthy even in crowded categories.

2. Competitive pricing

The US e‑commerce market, worth $1.19 trillion in 2024, is projected to hit $1.29 trillion by the end of 2025. Such growth always comes with fierce competition, requiring competitive pricing, which is named as a top priority when making a purchase by 46.8% of online shoppers.

Competitive pricing means strategically changing your prices, depending on other players on the market and your value proposition. It’s often used by businesses selling similar products with little differentiation, where everyone is fighting for the same customer.

Walmart and Amazon are stuck in a constant pricing battle. Walmart uses competitive pricing backed by dynamic algorithms, closing its price gap with Amazon by 3% and even reducing prices by 4% on Amazon’s top‑selling products. This approach has helped Walmart remain a strong competitor in fast‑moving categories like grocery and packaged goods.

If you’re in a competitive niche, monitor competitor pricing regularly and use dynamic or AI‑powered tools to adjust in real time.

Related: A Marketer’s Guide To Successfully Navigating A Price War

3. Value-based pricing

Value-based pricing focuses on what customers are willing to pay based on perceived value, not just production cost. This approach positions you for better margins and long-term loyalty.

Apple is the gold standard here, with its customers staying loyal despite being in quite a premium segment with high prices. People see how a company invests in innovation, user experience and brand prestige and that’s when they’re willing to pay more. As of Q1 2025, Apple held a 19% share of global smartphone shipments, up from 16% the year before.

Start by understanding what value means to your audience. Gather feedback, analyze market perception and position your brand clearly.

4. AI-driven pricing

In 2025, over 60% of enterprise SaaS products embed AI features, many of which are used for pricing optimisation and personalisation.

AI-driven pricing uses machine learning to analyse customer behaviour, competitor prices, supply levels and market trends in real time. Then, the system determines the ideal price point to maximise both conversions and profitability.

Google Workspace recently raised prices by 17–22% after integrating AI features into every business plan. By bundling AI capabilities directly into its offering, Google increased perceived value and reduced churn, even with a higher price tag.

For ecommerce businesses, the takeaway is clear: invest in AI tools that integrate with your existing platforms (ERP, BI, CRM). Make sure to monitor the financial impact, avoid abrupt price shifts and allocate resources to maintain and update your AI models for continued accuracy.

Related: AI’s Role Is Up to You — These 4 Rules Make the Difference

5. Promotional pricing

Temporary discounts with urgency are one of the simplest ways to attract new customers and boost sales. It can come in many forms: percentage discounts, flash sales, coupon codes or free shipping. A 2024 Statista study found that 62% of online shoppers are motivated to buy when offered a promo code, especially via email or social media.

McDonald’s changed its McValue platform in the US to add popular options like the $5 Meal Deal and ‘Buy One, Add One for $1’. These promotions are forecasted to drive revenue growth to $27.4 billion in 2025 – a 5.1% year‑on‑year increase.

Incorporate promotions into your broader marketing and financial strategy to drive short‑term sales, clear inventory or launch new products.

Pricing is a living, evolving part of your business that can influence your profits and, what’s more, customers’ trust. Data-driven strategies can help you course-correct quickly. The best way to increase sales is to adapt your strategies as markets change and combine dynamic, competitive, value‑based, AI‑driven and promotional pricing.

Despite all the talk about strategy, innovation and growth, one of the most undervalued assets in modern leadership is something deceptively simple: presence.

Not stage presence. Not personal branding. But the steady, intentional presence of a leader who knows how to show up. Especially when it’s inconvenient, uncomfortable or uncertain. In today’s world of constant disruption, remote work, geopolitical shifts and cultural change, presence has become a strategic differentiator. And yet, we rarely talk about it.

As the CEO of BGN, a global energy company operating in complex, volatile markets, I’ve seen firsthand how a leader’s presence has an outsized impact on business outcomes. How we show up for our teams, clients and partners is far more about consistency than sheer charisma.

Related: This One Overlooked Habit Could Transform How You Lead, Connect and Grow Your Business

Why presence matters more than perfection

Leaders often feel pressure to have the right answer, the perfect plan, the flawless execution. But in high-stakes environments, people aren’t looking for perfection. They’re looking for stability. They want to know someone is paying attention, making decisions and staying engaged, even when the path forward isn’t clear.

That’s what presence delivers: It signals reliability in the face of chaos. It builds trust when trust is hard to come by. And it anchors teams through uncertainty.

In our industry, technical expertise may get you in the room, but genuine presence keeps the deal alive. It’s what allows you to be called upon when things go wrong without fear of being labeled foolish. It’s what gives your team the confidence to act without second-guessing. It’s the reason people stay, especially in highly demanding and stressful sectors.

The myth of the distant leader

The old-school leadership model glorified distance. Leaders would once hide behind a corner office, a closed door, and rely on an immovably rigid chain of command to gain respect. But the world has changed, and that model doesn’t work anymore. Leaders today are expected to be accessible without being overbearing, present without micromanaging, and available without losing sight of the broader company mission.

That balancing act takes intention. It means being deliberate about how and where you spend your time. It means having the discipline to stay visible when it would be easier to retreat behind data, dashboards or delegation.

For BGN, for example, presence takes the shape of physically showing up in new markets instead of relying on intermediaries from a distance. I must be prepared, and am even honored, to answer tough questions in open forums — even if I don’t have all the answers. This also means taking the time for real conversations with clients, port workers, technicians and new hires. Not just with the executive circle.

Related: This Overlooked Leadership Skill Will Help You Build Trust, Influence Teams and Thrive Under Pressure. Here’s How to Develop It.

Presence is especially powerful for female leaders

For women in leadership, presence is often misunderstood. We’re told to “speak up more,” “take up space” and “command the room.” But authentic presence, as we’ve learned, is less about performance than it is about being grounded in our values, our priorities and our responsibilities.

When women leaders show up with clarity and calm, it disrupts expectations in a good way — especially in spaces in which we are underrepresented. It changes the energy and helps to refocus attention on the mission, vision and broader impact of a company’s work.

And in many environments, it opens the door for others to lead differently, too, with more empathy, more nuance and more depth.

How to cultivate real presence

Like most things in life, presence is a practice and habit refined over time. Like any practice, it requires intentional effort. Over time, I learned that there are a few simple ways to do this:

• Be available when it matters most. Don’t just show up for the good times — show up for the setbacks.

• Listen longer than you speak, especially when tensions run high. Presence is about making space for others.

• Respond, don’t react. People notice when you stay composed under pressure. It creates psychological safety for them and the wider group.

• Be consistent. In your values, your tone and your follow-through. Unpredictable leaders, while arguably effective in the short term, lose trust and confidence in the long term.

• Invest your time in people. That’s where loyalty, insight and innovation come from.

Related: 5 Core Strategies for Cultivating Executive Presence

In a world where chasing speed, scale and visibility seem primary goals, presence may feel slow or soft by comparison. But don’t underestimate its power. Presence is what steadies a company during transitions. It’s what keeps clients from walking away during conflict. It’s what gives teams the courage to act boldly because they know their leader is right there with them.

When leadership is grounded in presence and substance, not ego, that’s when the real work gets done. If powerful and long-lasting relationships are the engine to strong business, then presence is the fuel.

A stuffed giraffe named Joshie broke the internet — and taught a masterclass in client service.

When a three-year-old boy left his beloved stuffed giraffe, Joshie, behind at a Ritz-Carlton in Florida, the hotel could’ve done what any service-oriented company might: return the toy.

Instead, they gave Joshie a vacation of his own.

The giraffe came back in a box, safe and sound — accompanied by a photo album. Joshie lounging by the pool. Joshie driving a golf cart on the beach. Joshie getting a massage. The gesture went viral — not because it was a marketing stunt, but because it was business as usual for a company where service isn’t a tactic. It’s the culture.

And it works.

Related: We Have an Empathy Crisis on Our Hands. Here’s How to Combat the Rising Trend of Poor Customer Service.

Service isn’t a slogan. It’s a system.

In a world where pricing can be matched and products copied, service is often the last true differentiator. But it’s also where most businesses fall short.

Here’s what the data tells us:

• Nearly one in three customers says they’d walk away from a brand they previously loved after just a single poor experience.
• More than half of U.S. consumers believe that most companies still have work to do when it comes to delivering a satisfying customer experience.
• More than $3.7 trillion is lost globally every year due to poor customer experiences.

That’s a problem — especially for service-based businesses where loyalty is earned through trust, consistency and follow-through, not flashy perks.

Related: Still Chasing Quick Wins? Here’s How That Mindset Is Stopping You From Scaling Your Business

Want better client service? Start behind the curtain.

Most service breakdowns don’t start with the client. They start behind the scenes. Businesses with high internal responsiveness — how quickly and clearly colleagues communicate — outperform their peers in both client satisfaction and profitability.

Why? Because great internal service creates great external results.

• Clear communication leads to confident delivery.
• Fast handoffs mean fewer dropped balls.
• When your team is aligned, your clients feel it.

Here are five steps to build a culture of service.

1. Build a shared service standard

If you don’t define what “great service” looks like, every employee will make up their own version. That’s a consistency killer. Write it down. Make it specific. Train on it. Then keep it alive. Your service standard should include:

• How customer communications are handled
• Follow-up timelines
• Attitude and tone guidelines
• Response expectations, both internally and externally

Most importantly, it shouldn’t be a one-and-done onboarding checklist. Bring it into team meetings, use it in performance reviews, and tie recognition to it.

Key takeaway: Clarity breeds consistency. And consistency builds trust.

2. Start your day like the Ritz

Every Ritz-Carlton shift kicks off with a short, focused meeting on service. They call it “The Lineup.” It’s not a chore — it’s their cultural glue.

You can do the same. Even a five-minute huddle once or twice a week can keep service values top-of-mind. Talk about:

• A recent service win
• A client challenge someone handled well
• One simple improvement for the week

These aren’t just check-ins. They’re momentum builders.

Key takeaway: Small, regular rituals shape big, long-term behaviors.

Related: The 4-Step Secret to Exceptional Customer Service

3. Share your “Joshie moments”

You don’t need a viral stuffed giraffe to build a service culture. But you do need stories.

Create a shared space — a file, a Slack channel, even a corkboard — where team members can log standout service moments. Call it your “Joshie File.”

Highlight:

• Internal wins (teammates helping each other)
• External wins (client shout-outs or surprise solutions)
• Process fixes that improved service delivery

Use these stories in onboarding. Feature them in meetings. Turn them into training moments. Celebrate them publicly. Because here’s the truth: Culture isn’t taught. It’s caught. And stories are the best carriers.

Key takeaway: Recognition drives repetition.

4. Make internal service count

Want to truly embed service into your culture? Redefine how you measure performance. Too many organizations reward output but ignore how that output affects others.

Start asking:

• Did this person communicate proactively?
• Were they a roadblock — or a bridge?
• Did they contribute to a team win or just focus on their lane?

When internal service is part of the scorecard, people stop operating in silos. They start thinking like owners.

Key takeaway: Reward the lift, not just the stats.

5. Empower your team to take ownership

Want world-class service? Empower your people to make decisions without waiting for sign-off from four layers of management. Define the boundaries. Give your team tools, training and trust. Make it clear: If something needs fixing, they can fix it. That autonomy leads to:

• Faster response times
• Happier clients
• Employees who act like entrepreneurs

And that’s exactly what you want—people who take ownership because they can, not just because they have to.

Key takeaway: When people feel trusted, they lean in.

Culture over campaigns

You don’t have to send stuffed animals on vacation. But you do need to make people feel seen, understood and supported — consistently.

Clients don’t want perfection. They want to know that when something goes sideways, your team has it handled. That they matter. That someone’s paying attention.

And that kind of trust isn’t built on policy. It’s built on culture. If you’re in the service business — and let’s be honest, every business is now — this is your competitive edge.

Not once. Not sometimes. But every time.

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