Ann Arbor native Meg Roberts takes over as Molly Maid president

After serving as vice president of marketing for both Molly Maid and the connected Mr. Handyman company, Roberts will be taking over as president from Kristi Mailloux. The Pioneer High School and University of Michigan graduate has worked in the marketing sector for most of her career, and said there will be a lot of on-the-job learning in her new role.

“It’s sort of out of the marketing frying pan and into the franchisor fire, but that’s OK with me,” she said.

She will be taking over a company that has more than 450 franchises in the US and another 300 internationally.

“Meg is the perfect example of a hardworking professional that brings the right attitude and focus to the job every day,” Craig Donaldson, CEO of Service Brands International, said in a statement. “Anytime you can hire from within it’s a good indicator of a strong company culture, and Meg is the embodiment of that ideal.”

Roberts already has new points of emphasis she wants to implement in the company. One of her top priorities is to regain the technological edge she feels the company has lost since it won the Microsoft Windows World Open in the late 1980s. She said she also feels franchise sales have been stagnant for a number of years and she wants to reinvigorate those sales by targeting previously unexplored territory.

“We can be far more creative in the way we sell the business or even the type or size of businesses we sell,” she said.

“Ann Arbor would be a typical territory, but there are many other communities that could be territories at a smaller level for a different type of buyer, perhaps someone who wants to do it on the side as a second job. A city like Traverse City comes to mind as a smaller market we could explore.”

As the company expands, Roberts said it’s important to maintain the company’s quality of product and quality of trust with consumers.

“We have a job where we literally go into the homes of our customers, and oftentimes we have the key,” she said.

“There’s a level of trust and professionalism that has to be extremely high for us to succeed.” Roberts said she and other corporate leaders get to experience that professionalism hands-on when they enter the company. Everyone from the president to a receptionist has to go through the “rigors” of training, and that includes cleaning houses.

“If we don’t have respect for how hard the home service professionals are working in the field, they won’t stay with us. It’s critical to understand that,” she said. “So I’ve cleaned plenty of toilets.”