Podcast Recap: Kathy Pear with Pear Project Services
On the Market Meets Podcast, Heidi and Rachel from Market Real Estate in Boulder, Colorado sit down with the entrepreneurs, owners, makers, and builders of Boulder. They get behind the scenes of the market with unique and inspiring stories that will help everyone see our community in a new light. Check out all the Market Meets Podcasts.
A few months ago, we had the chance to sit down with Kathy Pear from Pear Project Services. If you’re in the Boulder and Denver Area, chances are, you’ve stepped foot in an office or space that Kathy has either helped clean up, or get set-up, especially given that she has been an entrepreneur in the area since the 1980’s. Now the self-proclaimed “Queen of Crap”, Kathy Pear is on her third company, which focuses on rehoming commercial furniture and keeping it out of landfills.
Kathy was an office furniture dealer for many years. She sold Pear Commercial Interiors, her first company, in 1996, and her second company, Citron Workspaces, in 2014. While both sales went well, Kathy realized within a year of both that the new owners wouldn’t want to hear from her anymore. She took it a bit personally, but that didn’t stop her from figuring out what would be next for her, since retiring wasn’t in the picture for the work-driven Kathy. From her previous business, she learned that getting rid of old things in a sensible manner was always a huge issue. She began calling the process “furniture matchmaking” where she would agree to take old furniture, and if it was in good shape and still trendy, she’d house it for someone else who might look to her to fill their offices in the future.
“Most moving companies are woefully unprepared to deal with old furniture and they are clueless until they get a bid from a customer for removing the furniture. These companies can’t believe it’s going to cost almost as much to tear it down and move it from a building downtown, move it to another building or storage, and reinstall it. You might as well just buy new furniture at that point.”
So, Kathy and her lean team of three took up a 25,000 SF warehouse in Denver where she stores old gems and looks for a new owner for them. Some pieces will be re-sold, some will be donated to nonprofits, and some will be recycled. A very small portion ends up in a landfill. Kathy says she and her team are able to keep 92% of their removals from landfills. Half of the job is keeping her ear to the ground to find out who needs what. For example, Pear Project Services partnered with the Humane Society to provide furniture for a cat cafe initiative. Obviously, your finest leather won’t hold up against the wear and tear of a cafe, not to mention many felines, so donating her “not so trendy” furniture makes the most sense.
Having been in the furniture business for decades now, Kathy has been privy to all of the office and commercial furniture trends over the years. Prior to a COVID-19 time, Kathy was seeing a massive uptick in coworking spaces. These sometimes look like huge open spaces with some tables and private space that can be used upon rotation or booking. There’s also an increase in collaboration, so large tables surrounded by comfy chairs is another common scene. This is a huge contrast to the cubicles that used to be office norm.
For Kathy, her favorite part of the business is simply being able to put things together for someone who needs an office full of furniture. She loves working with the contract designer who is able to conceptualize a space with AutoCAD, and most of all, appreciates being able to rehouse otherwise large pieces that would end up being tossed. She is the Queen of Crap that we didn’t know we needed!
