EPISODE 003: HEATHER SELF, NEW
HOPE SENIOR LIVING
[00:00:00]
Michael Mahoney: Hi, Heather, and welcome.
[00:00:04]
Heather Self: Hello. Good to see you, Michael.
[00:00:07]
Michael Mahoney: It’s good to see you. It’s not every day that I get to
speak with an Amazon Books’ number one best-selling author.
[00:00:17]
Heather Self: Yes, that was a fun project.
[00:00:18]
Michael Mahoney: Yes. So, we’ll start off by letting everyone know that
you are the author of a number one bestseller, “Don’t Quit: Stories of
Persistence, Courage, and Faith.” Before we talk about senior housing, I’m
curious about how the experience of writing that book and getting some
recognition for it impacted you.
[00:00:48]
Heather Self: Oh, it was such an amazing process to go through, because
I thought initially that I’m at the age of my life now where I just want to be
authentically me and I wanted to put my story out there in the hopes that it
would impact even one person, and it would be worth it to me. But it was a very
vulnerable thing to share with the world. I actually got an email yesterday
from a lady in China who had read my story and said how powerful it was for
her. You think, “Wow, there are people across the world reading my words.” I
thought it would be such a small, insignificant project, and more healing for
me. It turned into this big thing for people and it’s just been such an honor
to be part of that book.
[00:01:40]
Michael Mahoney: That’s amazing. Again, if anyone missed the title, it’s
interesting, it’s “Don’t quit: Stories of Persistence, Courage, and Faith.” That’s
available on Amazon and probably anywhere where books are sold. Heather let’s
talk about New Hope Senior Living, which you co-founded in Hendersonville,
Tennessee, along with your husband. A brand promise is the value or experience
that companies, customers, residents, or even employees can expect to receive
every time they interact with your company. What’s the brand promise of New
Hope Senior Living?
[00:02:26]
Heather Self: Yes, that’s such a simple thing. It’s excellent care, excellent
communication, and excellent food. If you have all those three things combined,
the families are at peace, the residents are well taken care of, and it just begins
to flourish a community where friends become family, and that’s our whole point
in doing this project.
[00:02:48]
Michael Mahoney: Okay. That’s a message that’s front and center on your
website where friends become family. It’s your tagline. It’s where friends
become family.
[00:02:59]
Heather Self: Michael, this is kind of interesting to interject here,
but we transitioned into that model after we started building. During the
pandemic, we witnessed so many people that were excluded from family that were
in four walls. They were getting their meals delivered at their doorstep,
outside of some big box facilities, and things like that. I just thought, “Oh
my gosh.” We realize that isolation kills too. It wasn’t just the pandemic
itself. I thought that, in the worst-case scenario, if regulations ramp up and
everything else, we will always have the people in our home that become friends
and family with each other. It’s become the culture of our business.
[00:03:51]
Michael Mahoney: How do you, or how does New Hope Senior Living compete with
these big box operations, or much larger operations, many of whom provide
fantastic service? They do a great job, but you guys are in a very different
space, and I could see some disadvantages to being smaller. It’s a single
location. How do you guys compete? How do you position yourselves to compete
with them?
[00:04:20]
Heather Self: Here’s the thing. We offer value to them. We’ve come into
the marketplace and said, “How can we be of service to you? What do you need
from us?” In return, they’ve done the same things. We have amazing
administrators at our local big box facilities. They can get families and they’ll
go, “You know what? I think New Hope’s just a better fit.” We can do the same
thing if we think that is. It’s not a direct competition because we offer a
very different product. We offer a family atmosphere and a home in a single-family
home that we took and rebuilt to accommodate to make it senior-friendly.
[00:05:01]
Michael Mahoney: I like that. It’s the concept of the Blue Ocean
strategy. You’re not competing in crowded waters. You’re finding or charting
your own path into wide open ocean. You’re not competing with these folks who
have a lot deeper pockets and more resources. You found your own unique niche,
so people come in and they have a family atmosphere and it really is a single-family
home that’s been converted into a really wonderful facility. What inspired you
and your husband to undertake something so challenging as opening a senior care
facility?
[00:05:46]
Heather Self: Yes, it’s a long story, but our mom or my husband’s mom,
my mother-in-law, Eileen, was in a big box facility after Greg’s dad passed in
2014. We realized that she needed a lot more care because they were caring for
each other, which couples often do in their later years. When one transitions
and passes on, then the inefficiencies start to show up. She needed extra care,
so we got her into a great facility here in Hendersonville. We’re big advocates
for them. They do really good work but over time, as entrepreneurs do, you walk
into a space and you’re like, “Oh, how could I do this better? There’s so much
staff and they’re all standing there instead of— You just realize that there’s
people that everything they can do is get up and walk a football field to get
from their room to the dining hall, and sometimes, if you do that three times a
day and you’re 92 years old, that’s all you got. So just by shortening that
length and going to a regular dining room in a house is so much different than
walking that football field three times a day. It makes a huge difference and
impact on their overall health, their energy, their longevity, and quite
honestly, their spirits. But anyway, that’s what drove us into that.
[00:07:16]
Michael Mahoney: So that’s what drove you into— Did you have prior
experience with managing, or providing assisted living?
[00:07:26]
Heather Self: Not assisted living. It was really interesting. We dove
all in. We went through memory care certifications. We went through training.
We worked with Teepa Snow on her pack methods. We just full-on reeducated, and
whatever we didn’t know, we hired people that were experts in that field to
fill in our lack of knowledge, while we became more knowledgeable. But it was a
calling for us. I think we’ve seen some things and we’re mission-based people
and I’ve always believed that if you weren’t able, you wouldn’t have the
opportunity, and if you weren’t capable, you wouldn’t have the desire. So, once
we got those things in line and that burning passion in your gut to say, “Wow,
we’ve got to do this.” It was no looking back. We just went full-on in and
we’ve created a beautiful business.
[00:08:26]
Michael Mahoney: Well, apparently you have. You’ve won an award or your facility
has won at least one award that I’m familiar with for top facility in your area,
so you guys are getting attention. It seems like it’s well-deserved.
[00:08:46]
Heather Self: Thank you. We appreciate that. There’s no better reward
than from the community.
[00:08:52]
Michael Mahoney: Can you talk about how you integrate your brand promise
into your culture with your employees and your residents?
[00:09:03]
Heather Self: Yes, I think the first step to that is you just show up
and you do exactly what you say you’re going to do. We instill that in all of
our staff, and all of our families that work with us. It’s just important. You
show up. You do exactly what you say you’re going to do. People know what to
expect, and it raises the bar. That’s really ultimately what we’re trying to
do. We’re trying to define, number one, what it looks like to age in America. This
is a bigger mission than our small home that we service our community with.
It’s a much bigger mission than that. We’re trying to redefine what it looks
like to age in America and the only way that we tell—
[00:09:47]
Michael Mahoney: What do you mean by that? Redefine what it means to age
in America. How is that changing?
[00:09:53]
Heather Self: We’re working with a huge group of people. We’ve now been
added to the residential assisted living support staff. We’re able to coach
other students along with this that believe in the same mission that we do that
sometimes boutique can be better for certain people. I’m not saying we’re
better than the big boxes or anything, but there has to be a product for
everybody. Not everybody likes Coke, some people like Pepsi. You know what I
mean? There has to be options. That’s what people really need when they get to
that point in aging, because they feel like they have none. A lot of their
independence is taken away. Their dignity’s taken away. Everything they’ve
worked for their entire life is now shifting, and we have to be able to help
them shift in a way that’s healthy and a good fit for what they want out of the
rest of their years.
[00:10:48]
Michael Mahoney: That makes sense. Okay, I get it. I bet in
Hendersonville, there’s still a few people that like RC Cola, don’t forget
about them.
[00:10:56]
Heather Self: Absolutely, as long as you have it with a moon pie.
[00:11:04]
Michael Mahoney: Can you share with us a challenge that you faced in
trying to integrate your brand into your operations and how you addressed that?
[00:11:18]
Heather Self: Probably the biggest hurdle we’ve had to come over is if
you start something and do it completely different than the way it’s ever been
done, it’s difficult. You have to be able to communicate that not just to your
community, but to your potential customers. You have to be able to tell your
story and your online presence. You have to have all this branding and start to
get recognition for that that people are like, “Oh, those are the people that
do that.” When you do something differently, you really just have to continue
to tell your story until people understand it.
[00:11:58]
Michael Mahoney: Can you share a story about one of your residents or an
employee and how your unique positioning as a boutique operator and a boutique
facility impacted them in this positioning for yourself as a boutique operation
that provides excellent care and service and friends become family?
[00:12:24]
Heather Self: Yes, absolutely. The one that comes to mind— I have
hundreds now. We’ve been open and operational for a year and it’s so cool to
see the way that we can impact families on such a deep level. We had one
resident in particular. They were in the hospital. She was diagnosed with stage
four cancer. They knew it was the end. The family did, and it was back during
the pandemic time, so they had very restrictive rules on who could be in the
room with the resident. They would have to take shifts, and they couldn’t
change that family member every 12 hours, so if she was passing, they wouldn’t
all be able to come in the room with her and be with her on hospice. That’s the
point of hospice, to recreate and transition the way that you want to with the
most dignity for you. We changed our policy and we said, “Okay, we looked at
the family’s needs. How can we solve this problem? I had two rooms available at
the time, and I said, “Come into our home. This can be the residence room,” and
I said, “I will give the family this other room.” The family essentially stayed
there 24 hours for two months. We fed them. We brought them to the grocery
store. We did whatever we needed to do to help that family and make their
transition the best that it could be, and let me tell you, from then, they have
been our biggest advocates. They’re all over social media. They’re all over
telling everybody about how amazing it is, and they’ve sent us three residents
since then. If you just approach it like how can I solve this problem for these
people, how can I be of value? Big things are going to come and it always pays
off.
[00:14:21]
Michael Mahoney: Yes, that is an extraordinary story. Thanks for
sharing. That’s something that you can’t really do things at scale easily. What
you just described is something that really is unique to a smaller boutique
operator such as yourself. Wow. What’s your vision for the future for New Hope
Senior Living. You’ve only been at this for a year. You guys are just getting
started. Where are you looking to take this in the future?
[00:14:58]
Heather Self: Two years into totality, but up and running for a year. That’s
a great question. It’s ever changing because as we’re in the trenches, every
single day, we’re identifying more problems. Our biggest thing is the best way
to add value to the community and to humanity is to be able to solve problems,
so we’re always looking at what those are and trying to identify that. It’s constantly
switching. When we find a new problem, we’re like, “Oh, we’re going to add
this. We’re going to subtract that.” We’re revamping constantly, but we’re
definitely looking at growth. Right now, I’m working on architecture plans for a
specific memory care home that we can do. It’s just growth and education. We’re
trying to enlighten as many people as possible about it, because even it’s
always been done a certain way, doesn’t mean that’s the way that it has to
continue to be done. I think that’s the beauty of an entrepreneur.
[00:15:59]
Michael Mahoney: How do you spread the word within your community in
Hendersonville? How do you get the message out about what you are doing?
[00:16:08]
Heather Self: Every way possible. That’s the thing when you’re doing it
so differently, you have to take every single avenue. You have to brand
everything. We give gift bags after tours that have branded coffee mugs. We
give away a copy of my book. We give away marketing materials or collateral,
everything like that, and also resources that they can use in the community,
whether it’s veteran’s benefits or a hospice nurse specifically that we think
would be a good fit for them or whatever that might be. We’re just constantly
giving. Another thing that I do that I think your viewers will be really
interested in is the little thing that I call marketing without advertising. What
I do is I go to our hip community pages on Facebook. Just about every town has one
or ten. It’s pretty popular. We go on there and what I do is I’ll ask for
things like recommendations, because we do a farm-to-table model at our
assisted living too, which of course you could not do in a big box, but in a
boutique experience, you can. We grow a lot of our own vegetables. Our
residents participate. We have indoor tower gardens where they pick their own
herbs from. They cook with the chef. They’re very interactive in their own
life, which is what gives dignity, so that’s very cool. That’s one thing I do.
I ask for organic farmers.
[00:17:44]
Heather Self: I get to figure out who are my beekeepers, who are my
growers, all of these things, my farmers. I compile my list that way. They’re adding
value to me, but they’re also learning about what I do. But I didn’t have to
put in my number, my email address, my website, anything, and they start to get
the message. Another really effective means was we do a taste of Hendersonville,
which we get everybody on our bus on Thursday, and we take them out to a local,
usually non-chain restaurant, and we take them all out to lunch. They’re out in
the community. I post on those pages for recommendations of local businesses
that we can visit while we’re out. Then I invite people. “Hey, if you see us
out and about, pull up a chair, come have a conversation, let’s take picture.” Now
we have a list of fifty-some people, which is growing every day. “Hey, where
are you going to be this week? I want to come see you guys.” We have people
come out and buy our residents lunch. They want to take selfies with them, so
they’re all promoting on Facebook too. It’s just been a really good way to grow
our mission.
[00:19:07]
Michael Mahoney: You really take this to heart. The “where friends
become family” that you are describing as you started to pull back the layers
here and share, that’s really remarkable. The gardens and working with the
chefs, just the way you really light up when you talk about going out and
people around the town seeing you and spending time with your residents. That’s
amazing. Wow.
[00:19:38]
Heather Self: Thank you. It’s an honor.
[00:19:42]
Michael Mahoney: It’s a great mission. It’s a beautiful mission. I can tell
that you are making an impact on your community. It’s wonderful and they’re
very fortunate and blessed to have you, your husband, and the whole team. How
can listeners find you online or find New Hope Senior Living?
[00:20:06]
Heather Self: Okay, our website is newhopeseniorliving.com. Also, follow
us on Facebook, New Hope Senior Living. We’re pretty easy to find with a quick
Google. If any of your listers would like a free copy of my book, “Don’t Quit:
Stories of Persistence, Courage, and Faith,” they can go to heatherself.com,
put in their email address, and it’ll be emailed to them. I also have a list of
20 lessons I learned from tragedy. It’s an entrepreneur’s guide to success and
significance, and they will just get one small little tidbit of a thought
process I went through, a lesson I learned, once a week in their email box,
like a two-minute read at most.
[00:20:49]
Michael Mahoney: How does somebody reach out to ask you for that if
they’d like to receive a copy?
[00:20:55]
Heather Self: They can just go to heatherself.com. It’s right there on
the homepage. They can put in their email address and it’ll auto-send.
[00:21:02]
Michael Mahoney: Okay, fantastic. I’m going to get my copy. I look
forward to reading it. Heather, thanks for joining us today and for sharing
your story and the story at New Hope Senior Living. Really enjoyed it.
[00:21:18]
Heather Self: Thank you. It was an honor. Thank you so much, Michael.
[00:21:20]
Michael Mahoney: Thanks, Heather. Bye-Bye everybody.
