Nicole Humber, center in red jacket, shares her enthusiasm with her Bravo Restoration team.
until afterward. “That’s my joke, that we’re still together even after I pulled that,” she says. “He’s amazing and I’m very grateful for him.” “One of my strengths is, ‘What I don’t know doesn’t hurt,’” she says. “Like, I didn’t know enough to be as scared as I should have been. Looking back, I should have seen red flags and should have just never done it. But here I am and it’s working out so far.” She adds: “Although sometimes it’s still scary.” She says that buying the shares in the company allowed her some time while she worked on getting her contractor’s license, which she would need to purchase the business. But the first time she took the test to get her license she failed. “I was so focused on the laws, the trades part I just didn’t study for at all,” she says. “That was a really defeating moment of like, ‘Oh, my God, am I really meant to do this?’” But then Humber’s resilient spirit kicked in. “I was like, ‘suck it up, you’re fine,’” she says. She hit the books again, took the test and passed. “That moment
Nicole Humber, Bravo Restoration in Windsor Nicole Humber bought Bravo Restoration in 2016. The Windsor business offers such services as smoke, fire, water, mold and biohazard cleanup in Sonoma and Marin counties. Humber had been with the business since 2011 as the bookkeeper and receptionist as well as doing estimates and sales. “I kind of just touched a little bit of everything because we were so small,” she says. Even with all that knowledge, there was still a lot she would later find she needed to learn about running the business. “It gave me the confidence to take on the business and I thought I had a good understanding,” she says. Added Humber: “I think I realized probably within hours how much I didn’t know.” She was really excited on her first day of ownership and recalls thinking, “Oh, I’m a business owner, yeah! High five everybody!” But she immediately had to learn how to deal with unexpected challenges—like a disgruntled employee who didn’t want to work for a woman. He yelled at her, quit and stormed off, taking one of the company vehicles with him. “I’m in a very male-dominated industry and having to deal with those different societal situations, it’s been quite challenging,” she says. She says she weathered that storm and many others since, and they’ve made her stronger. “That kind of became my strength because I had to let the ego go to the side and ask for help,” she says. “I immediately hired a lawyer, a consultant, and made sure that I was doing the right thing(s).” That wasn’t all that Humber had on her plate. As a mother with two young boys, she was also taking classes at Santa Rosa Junior College and recalls many late nights. “You know, putting the kids to bed and then doing my homework,” she says. There were nights when she just wanted to “cry and give up.” “But honing that grip to accomplish something has set me up for success as an entrepreneur in general,” she says. “The biggest reward I got from getting my degree was just practicing resilience, perseverance and discipline—just truly never giving up.” Humber took out a second mortgage on her home in order to buy shares in the business before purchasing it. She laughs and says that her husband is understanding and supportive, but she didn’t tell him
when I passed the contractor’s license exam, that was kind of my, ‘Oh, my God, here I am’ moment,” she says. She’s made a lot business. “I changed our niche, our clients, changed the way we hire and the way we do contracts,” she says. “I changed our estimating software and our accounting software processes. Honestly, I even changed the logo and design.” “The previous of changes since taking over the
Nicole Humber, with husband Ian and sons Austin and Bryce.
June 2024
NorthBaybiz 33
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