1169: What Would Lu Do?: Now That It Works, Lead It

Welcome to a well-designed business.

My name is Luanne Igarra and I'm so glad you found this podcast.

Together with my husband Vince and our partner Bill, we have grown our company Windowworks

from the ground up.

So I know and I understand the challenges you face in running your interior design business.

I also know that your talent alone isn't enough to ensure your success.

So on this podcast, we talk about strategies and practical steps to help you grow your business.

But make no mistake about it.

We have our share of fun here too, mixed in with those aha moments that I love so much.

This isn't fluff, nobody has time for that.

Whether you are a new interior designer or a seasoned designer, I am here to help you

create and to manage the kind of interior design firm that you dream of.

It's straight talk and it's action.

Are you ready?

Let's get started.

Hi, welcome to a well-designed business.

Today is part five in our 10-year birthday series.

The podcast turned 10, February 15, 2026.

And if you've been listening along to the series, by now you've understood that it's a little

more than just a celebration of the podcast.

It's important to celebrate milestones in our business, but the intent has been twofold.

The second objective has been an honest examination of what it actually takes to build and sustain

a profitable business over time.

In parts one, two, and three, I walk through the origin of the podcast, the risk connected

to launching it, the recalibrations, it took to breathe life into it and to grow it.

And in part four, I talked to you about what it means to build the house on purpose.

Those episodes were about building.

Building the foundation, building the systems, building the standards required for a business

to be strong.

I've shared my journey as a framework, but the purpose has been to illuminate the journey

so that you can see your business in it.

So if you're just now joining me in part five, I do encourage you to go back and listen

to parts one through four as well.

Part five is different.

Part five is about leading what you've built.

There is a difference, and if you miss this difference, you can spend the next decade

busy instead of happy, satisfied, satisfied, and proud of what you've accomplished.

In my first book, The Making of a Well Design Business, I shared a story that happened

about ten years into window works.

It was a simple moment.

After writing an order for a long time client, I did what I always did.

I thanked her, I looked her in her eyes, and I said, I appreciate that you always call

window works each time you have a project.

And what she said stopped me in my tracks.

She said, Luann, of course I always call window works.

I love you and our chats, but it's more than that.

You give me honest advice.

You don't just sell me, and Billy, he's so patient and so respectful in my home, and

always greets me when I call like a long lost friend.

After a window works makes an appointment, you guys show up or you call if you're running

late.

You keep me informed throughout the order, and on top of all of that, I love everything

you've ever put in my home.

I wouldn't dream of calling anyone else.

Whenever I remember this day, I also remember feeling four feelings almost instantaneously,

all at once.

First surprise.

It hit me in that moment that the least of what she spoke about, and the least of why

she called us over and over, was actually about the products that we gave her.

Instead, what she talked about was how we delivered those products.

For ten years, I had missed where our real value lived.

It was a big aha, a huge aha.

We weren't selling window treatments and awnings.

We were providing reliability, trust, respect, craftmanship, consistency.

The second feeling I came rushing over me was pride.

Pride in the reputation we had built, and the deeper nuance was that I realized we had

built that reputation simply by doing what we believed was right, by operating with integrity,

by showing up with commitment to our clients.

You know you're doing the right thing for your clients.

When you're doing it for reasons like we were, because it's just how you show up in the

world, but it was the moment then that I understood that they saw it too, that they felt it,

that the customers were naming it, and it becomes tangible.

It's kind of like when your kid gives you sass for morning to night, and then you go

in for your parent teacher, conference, and they're like, oh, she's a gem, she's so kind,

she's so helpful, and you think to yourself, are we talking about the same kid, right?

But in that moment with the teacher, you know and you realize that all the lessons, all

the modeling, all the quiet conversation at home are baked into your child.

It was that kind of pride.

It's when I realized that what we were doing was baked in, and then the third feeling

was gratitude, because the thing about trust is that it is not automatic.

It is not something you just get.

It's earned slowly over dozens of small interactions, the interactions that no one calls out, and

no one high fives you for, showing up when you say you will, returning the call when

you say you will, owning a mistake that you made, keeping a client informed, even when

there doesn't seem to be a whole lot to say, leaving a home cleaner than the way you found

it.

These moments don't make the headlines, but they compound, and in that instance, I realized

she wasn't just complimenting our work.

She was telling me that when something was happening in her home, a renovation, a change

of disruption, she didn't worry about our part of it.

We were the parts she could rely on.

We were the parts she didn't have to think about.

And as a designer, you know exactly what this means.

Because unlike window treatment pros, you're not in someone's life for a couple of visits

and an install.

You're in their home for months, years.

You see the stress, you see the construction chaos, you see the family dynamics.

You are present for real life.

And when that client welcomes you back for project after project, that's not just about

furniture or finishes.

It's about trust.

It's about respect.

It's about in the fact, the fact that in the middle of disruption, you bring the calm.

Don't underestimate the real life benefit you bring to someone when they trust you at

that level, because you just can't take trust at that level lightly.

And then finally, the fourth feeling was this unhinged energy, like renewed energy and

joy for our business.

I had energy now.

I wanted to formalize at window works what we had previously been doing by instinct, energy

to shift it into our messaging.

That was the season when I created our tagline, experience, expertise, excellence, not because

it had nice ring to it.

But because when I sat and I thought about her words, I was like, wow, this is exactly

what it is.

It captured at a fundamental level exactly who we had become ten years into the business.

And from that moment on, it appeared in every single print advertisement, every piece

of collateral, every conversation.

It stopped being implied and it became declared.

It was also the season that when we imported new employees, we changed that conversation

as well.

We no longer trained simply on product knowledge.

Now we actively talked about training on the window works way, the way we show up, the

way we communicate, the way we solve problems, the way we respect a client's home, the way

we represent the company when we don't know if anyone is watching or not.

The mindset set shift from an appointment that was, hey, one appointment, let me go see

this lady to the fact that it was always the opportunity of the possibility of the beginning

of a multi-year relationship with a client, the legacy of that client.

And it was also the mindset shift from just getting it done for being known how we do it

from transaction to reputation.

It was the beginning of running the business with this acute awareness that, in fact,

we were writing our obituary in real time, right?

We were every day, the things that we did, all the actions were accumulatively going to

become the things that people say about our business, okay?

The shift at window works wasn't a one-time insight.

It did mark the beginning of a different level of leadership for me.

And the crazy thing is is, at 10 years into this podcast, I've realized I'm standing

at the same kind of moment again, right?

The symmetry is almost unreal.

The thing is though, this moment isn't unique to me, right?

It happened in window works.

Now it's happening again here.

It shows up in every business, every business that survives long enough to become stable.

Your team exists.

The revenue is consistent.

You're no longer in survival mode.

The business works.

Here's the thing.

Once it works, it's a different danger now to your business.

Not dramatic, but subtle, right?

Because you can coast now because things are steady.

You can be busy every day, but not very intentional.

You can talk about growth in your dreams for the next decade or era of your business,

but you can avoid doing the things that it actually takes to get to that.

You can say you want to be boutique, but never tighten your standards to protect that

model, right?

Whatever the where it is that you want to go.

This is the stage where your leadership must mature, right?

The early years are about proving what works.

Can you generate revenue?

Can you deliver?

Can you survive?

This stage is different.

This stage asks, does it work?

For the goals I had, the life I envisioned, the way I want my company to be thought of.

When you started, you imagined something.

Maybe you imagined scale, a large firm, national projects, right?

If that's the vision, then this is the moment to build accordingly, strengthen that infrastructure,

elevate the standards, grow into it fully.

Maybe you imagined something else, a boutique firm, high margins, a tight, exceptional team,

flexibility.

If that's your vision, refine it, remove what doesn't fit, price appropriately.

Both are fine.

Both are excellent.

What's not is drifting to one or the other by default, okay?

In the early years, you're building a reputation.

Now you are maintaining and protecting it.

When there's two or three people in a company, you can catch everything.

When there's 10, 12, 15, you can't.

Now it's about modeling.

It's about reinforcing.

It's about documenting.

It's about repeating.

It's also the stage where harder team questions will start to front surface.

Because the people who help that you hired and you helped and worked with you to get

you to your 3 or your 7 or your 10 may not be the ones to take you into the future.

And you have to understand, this isn't their betrayal of you or your betrayal of them.

It's just evolution.

Definitely rehabilitate people when possible, but release when necessary.

Not because someone's a bad human, but because the business has changed, it's grown and

maybe that person is better served in another spot in another company, right?

Now as your expertise grows, your pricing must grow with it.

If your skills have doubled and your fees have not, what are you avoiding?

Why are you not doing that?

All right?

There's another question that happens at this stage.

Doesn't usually happen in year one or year three, but now what do I actually enjoy?

Because if the business is stable, if it's profitable, if referrals are steady, you

have earned the right to ask this without guilt.

And last year, I did exactly that.

I realized how much I love speaking at live events.

I love seeing you in real life.

I love the room.

I love the energy.

I love the conversations before and after.

But last year, I also had to admit something.

Producing three episodes a week across both podcasts, coordinating guest schedules, living

inside other people's calendars, it was competing with the thing that I loved the most.

And I felt the tension.

And my first instinct was sort of practical.

Cap to speaking.

One or two events a month, be a responsible adult.

Don't say yes to everything.

But I don't know, it didn't feel right.

That's what I love to do.

Then I had a more radical thought.

What if I just shut the podcast down?

It's over 1100 episodes.

You have built a profitable business from this archive.

It could continue to serve.

I seriously considered it.

But when I sat with that opinion, that option, I didn't feel so great either.

Because this isn't just a catalogue of conversations for me.

It's a living, breathing community.

And I'm not done, right?

So instead of asking, what do I cut?

How do I get rid of something?

What has to go?

I had to focus on what is my highest contribution now?

And what do I like to do the most?

And I got honest.

And I had to face having the 40th conversation about documenting systems or knowing your

numbers wasn't exactly energizing anymore.

It doesn't mean the lesson is any less valuable.

But I don't know how many times it needs to be repeated at this point, right?

The work is there.

The archive is there.

It has already helped a generation of designers.

It can help you if you're new to the audience.

So I began to think differently.

What if instead of repeating foundations, I curated them?

What if instead of having that same conversation over and over again?

What if I distilled 10 years of those conversations, hundreds of experts, thousands of insights

into concentrated NBA level as episodes?

One hard question, one hard decision, one type actionable framework.

Not surface, not recap synthesis.

And let me tell you, honestly, I love this idea.

I'm doing it.

But these episodes are much harder to produce than I anticipated.

Inscribing over 1100 shows, comparing ideas across hundreds of experts, distilling them into

something cohesive and useful, it's serious work.

So that's why in the last year, you've heard me talk about this new format, but you haven't

actually seen it yet.

They're coming.

And even though they're taking way longer than I imagined, I know this is the right path.

The first 10 years of this show, I am insanely proud of.

And the next 10 years must meet that same personal standard.

I cannot phone it in.

I cannot produce episodes to just say we're producing episodes.

If we do this, we do it to our best.

And that's the part that matters for this next phase of life and business, for me and

for you, right?

For me, by shifting the format, I can research and write from the beach house from an airplane

on a Tuesday morning or a Sunday night on my schedule, without coordinating around 14

other people's schedule, right?

And the gift in all of this is the freedom for me to be able to say to as many in-person

events as I want to, okay?

So this is recalibration again.

This is not burning it down.

This is not clinging to what it was.

This isn't standing in the middle of the room and saying, I don't like what it is.

I like what it was.

I don't know what it should be.

And I'm just like not moving, right?

This is your moment to make decisions, clear ones, but you've got to spend time getting

quiet.

Don't just keep being on a treadmill.

When your business is solid and it's running and it's good, you need to ask the question.

Because my current day-to-day reflect the life I said I wanted, right?

And it changes over time, you all right?

So you have one season of life.

It looks one way, one season of life that looks another way.

But we carry the responsibility of self-employment for one primary benefit.

A life on our terms, right?

That's why you don't have a bus.

It's a life on your terms.

That's the trade.

That's the trade for the payroll on your head.

It's the trade for being the last one in the office when the lights go out.

It's the trade for being the one to handle the hard conversations with clients and trades

and employees.

But if we aren't designing that life consciously, then why are we doing all those hard things?

So before I close this series, I want to acknowledge something very important.

Working here in a well-designed business, Luana Igarra Inc, happens or exists by accident.

It exists because of long-term partners and collaborators who believe in the same standards

that we talk about here on the show.

Cravid Inc.

Elevating how you source and discover products with efficiency and intelligence.

My Doma Studio, supporting your operational excellence so you can run your business like

a business.

New genders helping you communicate your vision with professionalism and polish.

And windowworks, the business that started it all started it all and continues to operate

with experience, expertise and excellence, serving boots on the ground for you and your

projects in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania.

These are not short-term sponsors.

They are long-term partners.

And that's just so amazing and incredible and such a gift.

You will find links to each of them in the show notes.

Sponsorships alone, don't build this platform, this community, this whole thing with staying

power.

People do.

The show exists because I still choose to do it every day ten years in.

And because the VIN man supports the time and energy it requires for me to do it every

day ten years in.

And because the windowworks team continues to carry forward the 44-year legacy with integrity

and excellence, because my aunt and uncle continue to edit every single episode with such

an extraordinary attention to detail and immense quality, immense commitment to quality that

it's hard for me to fathom or describe.

And because my mom keeps the books clean and accurate and because you show up.

Whether it's one episode or you've listened to one thousand, you are part of this

community, you are part of me, you are part of what I do.

And I'm grateful to you because no business with staying power is ever built alone.

And so the thing is, ten years could feel like a summit, right?

It could feel like the top of the mountain.

And it could have felt like a natural ending.

But instead, what I know in my core is it's the foundation.

And let's not forget it's the year of the fire horse.

It's the shutting it down in the year of the fire horse, right?

I can see the vision of what this can become over the next decade.

And I am going after it with the same intention with renewed energy, that same drive and passion

that built the first ten years.

And I want you to know that you can do the same.

You can build something that matters to you.

You can build a business that your clients trust deeply, that your trades respect, that

your family benefits from.

You don't need whatever unnamed advantages you think somebody else on Instagram has in

order to be successful.

That's not a secret sauce to a profitable business, whatever you think you're missing, right?

You have everything you need.

You do need to decide on your standards, your mission, your vision, your values.

And you do need to choose every day, every single day, over and over again, to operate

with those ideals, those standards, top of mind.

Creating your reputation, creating your legacy isn't something you stumble into.

It is exactly like interior design.

You know that you don't end up with a beautifully appointed proportionate room by accident.

You plan it, you choose it, each layered thoughtfully.

You consider how every detail interacts with the other details.

You design for an outstanding result.

Please, please do that with your business.

Design it for the result you want.

You deserve it, and you can do it.

Thank you for joining me for the last 3,665 days.

It is my pleasure and my honor to do this work with you.

Decide to be excellent.

Thank you for joining me today.

This podcast is a production of Luan Nigara Inc.

If you want to know more about me, my books, or Luan University, go to LuanNigara.com.

And if you are interested in having window works help you with your next window treatment

or awning project in the New York, New Jersey metro area, go to windowworksng.com to learn

more.

Have an excellent day.