An Interview With CEO, Ryan Holmes

Ryan Holmes at the Oregon Coast

Is GreenT Climate Software your first volley into  startup or had you done anything prior to that?

Since graduating college, I have spent my entire career in both the medical industries, and software technology industries. But GreenT is not my first stab at entrepreneurship.

At 10 years old, my brother and I started a car wash company during the summer months in our neighborhood called the Car Wash Specialists and I would say it was quite successful. We kept cars clean for about half of our neighborhood. It was an exciting start-up endeavor, but after about 3 months, it was time to shut the doors because we moved on to other things, like school, but that was my first stab at entrepreneurship. 

11 years ago, my great friend and I started a ski and snowboard company called SnoPlanks, where we manufacturing high-end and sustainable bamboo skis and snowboards. It turned into a really successful company that recently my business partner and I donated to Oregon State University Cascades to be part of their innovation, business and outdoor product departments. It was a huge honor after 11 years to be able to hand it off to the new young minds yearning for hands-on experience as part of their college curriculum. 

SnoPlanks booth at Outdoor Retailer in Denver, CO, 2016

Can you tell us a little bit about what challenges you're hoping to solve for with your software solution. 

There are a lot of external forces that are bringing multifamily to the table when it comes to how we strategically manage sustainability with our existing inventory of properties that are out there all around the country. The industry is trying to gain a better sense of how we're going to tackle energy efficiency, reducing carbon emissions, and achieve goals of net zero on a broad scale. 

There are pressures of regulation, but also opportunities for available money and incentives that are really making the goals of the industry come to life. We have funding now that can really help offset a lot of capital intensive upgrades that need to happen on a property level. We can't go and tear down tens or hundreds of thousands of buildings to start from the foundation and then re-build net zero properties, so we’ve got to figure out the best pathways in which we can take existing infrastructure and provide the necessary upgrades in the most cost effective ways and the most strategic ways to accomplish sustainability goals within individual properties or large portfolios of  properties. 

So that's really what we're trying to solve for with GreenT. Look at the complexities and challenges that are causing major frustrations, roadblocks and challenges to drive sustainability in the industry, and provide software that can drive these sustainability efforts at scale to accomplish the goals of the industry on a much larger level. 

So you've taken something that's very, very manual for a lot of people and streamlined it. 

Yes, and that's the core of what we're trying to do. We want to look at how we can achieve sustainability in multifamily at speed and scale and figure out where are the areas of opportunity to help simplify the process. 

Now has there been any industry involvement or is this just things you picked up while you were at a smart home technology company that you're pulling together. 

My recent time at a smart home technology company helped give me an initial appreciation for what companies are going through, but it's been over the last year through hundreds of conversations with key multifamily industry experts and stakeholders, understanding the unique journeys that each organization is going through, what their process is today, what they anticipate their process to be moving forward, and where are the inefficiencies that take place that need real solutions. 

Everything that is going into the software that we've developed has come from industry feedback. We made the decision to develop and start this company based upon what the industry needed, not based upon what our perceptions of what the industry needed.

It took us many months to have an overwhelming number of conversations to truly understand the common denominators of challenges that multifamily is going through, to really be able to identify where the consistencies are with the feedback around these challenges. 

I feel that as we bring GreenT Climate Software solutions to market, we’ll have an incredibly high level of confidence that we're answering to the challenges because we knew the challenges at the time while we were ideating and developing on what we were going to build and bring to market. 

With all of these conversations that you've had, and the experiences, what's made you happiest in your journey so far? 

It's the overwhelming passion and desire that the industry has to drive sustainability. The industry wants to do better for our planet and operate their properties in the most efficient ways possible, the most sustainable ways possible. 

It's been really inspiring and encouraging to hear the industry and the sense of hope for a healthier multifamily industry when it comes to operations and sustainability initiatives. It’s also very satisfying to show that you can do sustainability with positive economic outcomes.

It's been those types of encouraging conversations that have not only helped lead to our solutions that we're developing, but have also been a shot of adrenaline in the arm for me at various times in this startup journey. That's really helped inspire a lot of the ideas and the hard work and just the ability to keep moving forward with this startup. 

Love it. Yeah, with an eye on the future you're building for the present. But let's do a little time travel here. So you get in your time machine. If you could tell your high school self one thing, what would it be? 

I think that in life there's going to be challenges that require real solutions. We've seen how innovation can tackle challenges in so many ways. 

I mean, 10 minutes before this call, I was playing with a brand new pair of Apple Vision Pro goggles. I was just seeing the evolution of innovation and technology that's happening so fast. We're going to continue to see innovation thrive and something I would tell my high school self is that somebody is going to drive innovation and reinvent the world or make the world a better place, why not you? 

I think it's something to appreciate, that someone's got to do it. Why shouldn’t it be you contributing on a greater level than you've contributed to before? 

I would also tell my high school self, don't get comfortable with the comfortable journey. Sometimes the uncommon, uncomfortable journey is the most rewarding. I think we live in a lot of comfort or choose to really gravitate to the things that make us feel comfortable and starting a business from scratch is not a comfortable thing to do, but it's incredibly rewarding and very opportunistic.