Today we’d like to introduce you to Charlotte Groce.
Charlotte, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I am a business owner. I am a US Army Veteran. I am a mother and grandmother. I am a volunteer. I am a mentor. I am a provider of knowledge, employment, and happiness. I own two small businesses: Palmetto Outdoor Spaces and Substation Maintenance LLC.
In December 2012, I started Palmetto Outdoor Spaces. I had just retired from my wonderful 23-year career in automotive manufacturing in the early Spring of 2012. I was a Logistics manager at a BMW supplier. Prior to entering the full-time workforce, I joined the US Army after one semester of college. Boy, my dad was so angry with me. I gave up a full scholarship to Spartanburg Methodist College, but my desire to serve our country was larger than my desire to get a college degree.
After finishing my full-time service duty at Fort Bragg, I was assigned to a reserve unit in Greenville, S.C. In January 1991, our medical reserve unit, 3273rd US Army Hospital, was called to serve on active duty during Operation Desert Storm. We activated to Fort Campbell, Kentucky; assigned to back-fill for the troops that were to deployed to South West Asia to fight in the Gulf War against Saddam Hussein’s Kuwait invasion. I was proud to serve our country during the war. Though we were stateside, we all knew that we could also be deployed to fight in the Persian Gulf at any time. Upon my return home from Fort Campbell after the war, I started my studies again at Greenville Technical College and returned to the full-time second-shift job I had in a warehouse.
Shortly before graduating, I got pregnant with my first son, Braeden. My priorities were no longer managing a full-time job and college schedule. I needed my job, so I did not enroll in the next semester of college. When not working, I was taking care of my beautiful baby boy. I was completely surprised by my pregnancy and had no idea how to take care of a child. I immediately purchased books by Dr. James Dobson. Bought a subscription to Child and Parents magazine. I wanted to make sure I was armed with all the knowledge available about how to rear a child the right way., the healthy way, the most moral way, A human life was depending on me to do everything right. I had a new and more important purpose in life: being a mother. College had to wait again. After all, this boy was the true love of my life. The moment he was placed in my arms by the doctor, I felt what real love was for the first time in my life.
I continued to work at the small manufacturing facility in Greer. I worked there for ten years. I was prompted along the way several times. I got married to a wonderful man. I gave birth to our second son, Clayton, the second love of my life. Joy and love filled my heart again. I decided to take a needed break and just be a mom for a while.
I entered the workforce again as Clayton approached his first birthday. I started working for a large BMW supplier. I loved the work I did as a planner. I was later promoted to Supply Chain Manager. I was really good at what I did and loved it way more than I should have. I traveled to our other manufacturing locations in Detroit and Mexico often. I had a huge sense of accomplishment and pride. However, my children missed me and I allowed my career to get in the way of spending time with them during their most important years growing up. My sons were 18 years old and 13 years old by the time I retired from my career. Those thirteen years flew by when I wasn’t looking.
I spent the summer volunteering one day a week at a local food pantry, Greer Relief, after retiring. It was hard work. I was lifting heavy boxes of food, stocking the shelves, and filling bags with a week’s worth of groceries. By the time I got home, I was beat. But every week, I looked forward to working in the food pantry again. I felt that same sense of worth and accomplishment. On occasion, I drug my youngest son, Clayton, and his friends reluctantly with me to volunteer. I wanted them to see for themselves how well life was treating them and teach them to appreciate volunteerism.
I accepted a short-term, part-time consulting gig at another automotive company. Again, I loved the work, the stress, the fast-paced environment and the accomplishments. . My contributions were admired and I was offered a full-time job. Logistics management and analysis was my passion, my talent, my craft, my art. But I knew in my heart that something else was calling for my attention.
Entrepreneurship.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I was asked by one of my managers after I became pregnant with our second child, ” How many more children do you plan to have? You know you are burdening the company every time you have a baby”. I wasn’t really sure how I was a burden. I wasn’t paid maternity leave, I had crossed trained my replacement and I returned to work after my required maternity leave. I was also a key employee that worked efficiently and worked overtime when necessary without pay. I was considered a salary employee. The company employed at that time about 110 people. Four of those 110 employees were women. I was the youngest and could at any moment (according to the men I worked with) get pregnant again. I am so glad that women in the workforce today are respected more and allowed to have children without guilt and pressure to not have children from her peers.
Women holding important positions in the ’80s, ’90s and early 2000s were not taken seriously by men. Our ideas were often dismissed. I remember presenting a more efficient way to process work orders to my manager during a weekly meeting. The idea wasn’t adopted. A few months later, a new employee started working in our department, a young gentleman, the same age as I. After working for a few weeks and attending the same meetings, he mentioned to our manager the same ideas I had about processing our work orders on the night shift to increase our efficiency. Our manager immediately turned to him and said, “What a great idea”. This was disheartening and caused me to lose faith in my manager, which I looked up to at the time. I could not understand how the same idea I presented was not considered, but implemented when mentioned by a male peer.
I have also dealt with more than my fair share of sexual harassment on the job and feared that I would lose my job if I said anything. I kept quiet about the incidences, like many other women have over the years. It is good to know that women today do not have to have such fear nor endure harassment and unfairness in the workplace at the same level as those of my generation.
Owning a small business in the construction industry and a business in the utility industry also brings challenges. Some question my knowledge and recommendations. I have learned over the past ten years that it is important for the client to trust my expertise. I have spent hours researching our products, their function, and the manufacturers. I have visited the manufacturing facilities of all of our product makers, some on multiple occasions. We have screened a couple of thousand porches, and installed hundreds of porch shades and hundreds of shutters and porch enclosure panels. I have ten years of experience in this industry. I know what I am doing. If I do not know or am not familiar with a product, then I will admit I have little to no experience. My reputation is more important than getting a new customer. If a customer does not trust me, our team or the products we offer, then we are not a good fit for them.
We’ve been impressed with Palmetto Outdoor Spaces, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
Palmetto Outdoor Spaces began in December 2012 as a Louvered Pergola Dealer. In 2013 we were approached by a motorized screen manufacturer in Florida, ClearView, and asked if we would sell and install their products in Upstate South Carolina. We made a visit to the factory, completed installation training and sales training. We returned with a new product line that we immediately started offering. Later in the year, CraftBilt in Souderton, Pennsylvania, asked us to sell and install their retractable awnings and canopies. We visited the factory, trained on installations and attended sales training. We started offering retractable awnings and canopies in 2014. To date, we have visited four other factories that manufacture motorized screens, porch shades, Bahama shutters, pergolas and retractable awnings. We now install aluminum hand railings, retractable awnings, motorized screens, motorized porch shades, porch privacy panels, porch Bahama Shutters, interior window shades, Eze-Breeze porch enclosure panels, and screen porches.
If we had to pick one service or offering that we love the most and are the best at doing, it is our porch/patio screen framing and screening. We offer the best screen meshes and the largest selection, the highest quality screen doors in custom sizes and designs, and the best framing design. We have the most product knowledge and the best precision at installation. We believe everyone deserves our best and deserves a quality install. It does not matter if you own an $8 – million home on the lake or a patio home in Simpsonville. You get the same quality products, same quality install, and same fair price.
I have spent hours researching, making phone calls across the U.S. to other businesses that are similar to Palmetto Outdoor Spaces, to understand from their experience what are the best products, what brands they rely on, and what problems they have experienced. I have spoken with our local competitors, swapping stories about epic fails, product issues, logistical issues and the like. I have offered my help to them and the intern has offered their help to me. The owner of one of our competitors is about the same age as I. We come from the same school of knowledge. We can call each other on a particularly bad day, exchange stories, and laughs. We respect each other. It always helps to know that someone else out there is going through the same crazy stuff you are. It is bringing them down as it brings you down. But as soon as you speak to each other on the phone, you realize we are all in the same boat. All you needed was a laugh or “I got one better than that” story to get you through. So one of the things that set us apart is respect for our competitors and honest. We realized early that we have an opportunity to help each other be successful.
Another aspect of our business that sets us apart is our focus and mission. In order of priority: Safety, Employee Satisfaction, Customer Satisfaction, Profits, and Community Stewardship. If the first two priorities are met, then the last three will follow.
If we knew you growing up, how would we have described you?
I was always getting in trouble for talking too much. My desk was either pulled to the front of the room, perched beside the teacher’s desk or moved to the very back of the room facing the back wall. I remember in second grade, Mrs. Davis, had moved my desk to the back of the class after I continued to speak out of turn when she was asking the class questions. She was frustrated with me, so she told me to slide my desk to the back of the room and face the student cubbies. After a while, I turned to a few students that were sitting in the last seats of the rows and started chatting. Mrs. Davis came to the back of the room as she dragged a flip chart behind her. She put it behind my desk, then took another that was standing nearby at the back of the classroom and put it beside my desk. I was completely out of sight, blocked from seeing anyone and anyone seeing me. I remember the embarrassment of that moment. But her tactics, which oftentimes included slapping the top of my hand firmly with a ruler, making me write sentences at recess, making me stand outside the classroom in the hall or moving my desk, and my embarrassment didn’t deter my classroom expressions. It wasn’t until parent-teacher night that I realized I needed to straighten up my act.
During class the day of the parent-teacher night, I fretted over the position of my desk. I was worried what would happen to me when my parents arrived and saw my desk was not in line with everyone else’s desk. Mrs. Davis would surely tell them about all the talking and trouble I was making in class. She would tell them all the things she had tried to persuade me to be quiet, so she could teach. I knew I was in for a blistering, a whomping, a tan your hide, leg striping with a switch, a butt busting with a belt, or “I’ll beat you til the blood runs” kind of whipping. I was too nervous to chat with friends, too stressed to shout out an answer to a question, too scared to squirm in my seat, too worried to get out of my seat eight times to sharpen my dull pencil. All I could think of was the wrath of my parents. I sat all day quietly, dreading the evening event.
That evening when my parents and I walked into the classroom, filling in with other parents and students, I immediately noticed my desk was not beside Mrs. Davis’s desk, it wasn’t on the back wall where it had been that morning. It was back in line with the other student’s desk. Whew. I was safe. I cannot promise I behaved much better after that night, but I do remember telling her the next day thank you. I did try to do better; she deserved that until the next teacher-parent night for sure.
I had a healthy fear and respect for my parents, their authority and their discipline. If anyone could make me mind for more than an hour, it was my parents. I still got into plenty of trouble at home. I got a spanking for something about every few days. All of them deserved it. At the time, I would threaten to run away from home or call the police. My mom would say, “if you dare run away, I’ll send you to the state girls’ home.” That stopped me from making that statement too often. I hated the spankings but loved my family. I could not imagine living anywhere else.
I am so blessed to have Mr. and Mrs. Gordon and Susie Hawkins as my parents. My dad passed when I was 35 years old. That was the worst time of my life. A piece of me died when my dad died. I am so grateful that I still have my mom. Both of them molded me into the person I am today. I am proud to be me and my parents get most of that credit.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://palmettooutdoorspaces.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/palmettooutdoorspaces/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PalmettoOutdoorSpaces
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/NewWaveOfShade
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/PalmettoOutdoorSpacesGreer
Image Credits
Jennifer Grimes Photography Studio for the Photos.
Missi May for the Makeup.
Pamela Turner for the Hair.
