Lucas Foust:
All right. Hey, we're here with Jennifer Hornick Johnson of Miller's Jewelry, today. And Jennifer, I wanted to first thank you for being the first, the very first Business of the Month for Foust Law Office. And we appreciate your time today. But we want to get to know a little bit about you and a little bit about Millers and how you ended up here. But I have this question that I ask of all jurors. And of everybody, and I'll ask of you as well. Jenny, setting aside your faith and your family, two very important things, just setting those two things aside, and your business, setting aside your business, your family, and your faith, setting those three things aside, what's the passion in your life, Jenny? What gets you out of bed in the morning? What are you about?
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
Well, that's a tough question. I would say one of my passions because I won't pigeonhole myself into just one thing, but one of them would be dance, actually. I've been dancing in some capacity most of my life. I started at a very young age. My mom was a dancer, as well as her mom. And I was in companies and dance teams all through middle school, high school, college, and beyond. And I actually have started dancing in the Bozeman community, as well. I was at rehearsal last night for a tap piece I'm currently working on. So that's really been fun to kind of bring that joy back into my life and get dancing.
Lucas Foust:
So not only is your family's... What type of dance did you do as a kid growing up? Was it ballet? Was it a tap? What was it exactly?
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
I've done actually a little bit of everything over the years. So yes, ballet, obviously the foundation. And I did do point, but I've done jazz, hip hop, modern lyrical, Latin, ballroom, tap. Yeah, a little bit of... take a little bit of African, all sorts of stuff.
Lucas Foust:
That's good. Here's the next follow-up question I have for folks. What does that say about ya?
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
I'm creative, I guess. I'm musical. I like to move and be active and express myself in different ways, I guess. I like to perform.
Lucas Foust:
That's great. Now we do get to talk about your family. Tell us all about your family.
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
My family, my side of the family... I'm originally from Miami, Florida, and we actually are almost all jewelers. I'm a third-generation jeweler. So my grandfather came back from World War II and used his stipend to go to watchmaking school. And so he went to school in Colorado and then came back and started a little booth where he just changed watch batteries. And then it moved into watch bands and other watch repairs and then into retail. At which point my father went into business as well. And he was doing colored stone dealing, like door-to-door salesman, kind of traveling salesman. And our retail store has been in Miami, in Coral Gables in the downtown there, since 1945. And then both my sister and I went into the business as well. I do have a brother who's not in the business. He lives in California, but he is in tech software. But my sister is still working with my father in our Florida business.
Lucas Foust:
So you grew up in Miami and ended up here. What was your first winter in Montana like?
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
It's funny that you asked that because my first winter of Montana was really harsh. Everybody was saying that it was the worst winter in a decade and it was very shocking for a girl from south Florida. I've always loved snow though. I grew up skiing as well. So it wasn't that I had never experienced it, but I'd never lived in it. But I just tried to stay optimistic and felt like if I could survive that it would only get easier from there.
Lucas Foust:
I'm going to take a wild guess at my next question. How you ended up in Bozeman has a lot to do with how you met your husband, am I right? Tell us about that.
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
It's a classic love story, right? You move for love. The things you do for the people that you love. My husband-
Lucas Foust:
And in February, you're wondering why the heck you did it, probably.
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
I need to defrost every spring.
Lucas Foust:
There you go.
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
So Cec is my husband and also the co-owner of Miller's Jewelry. And we actually met at the Gemological Institute of America. So Miller's Jewelry is his business. His family has owned the business. His parents were the owners and we purchased and moved as the next generation after them when they retired at the end of 2018. But they sent him to get his graduate gemologist degree. And my family had sent me to do the same and we met on the first day.
Lucas Foust:
No kidding. Oh, wow. So where was the technology school? Where did that occur?
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
It's in Carlsbad. Which is really close to San Diego, California. And it's a very international school. We graduated with just 18 people in our class and half of them were from outside of the United States. So we had people from India, from Japan, from Canada, from... Actually, we had some people from Africa, all over the world. And then the people in the United States were obviously all spread out and all different backgrounds, all different ages. And both of us obviously had come from other careers. Cec was a teacher first and I was actually in advertising in Atlanta for a while, before I came back into the family fold. And we both decided to join the family business and went out there for that additional education. So I like to joke that it was a marriage and a merger.
Lucas Foust:
Okay. Well good. And do you still have business ties to south Florida?
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
We do. We're sort of sister stores. Obviously, it's a very different market and they're independent businesses, but we do. We can share inventory, so it allows us to provide even more for the Bozeman market because if there's something at our other store that might fit a need here, we can obviously easily pull that in. And sometimes we'll go to trade shows together and buy together, things like that. Although no trade shows are happening right now.
Lucas Foust:
Well, that give me my next question. Has this COVID outbreak changed the way you do business and if so, how? How has it changed things?
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
It absolutely has. I mean, we're in a business where we interact with people, human interaction every day, and it's really important to be able to judge people's reactions and have that connection. From a standpoint of regular day-to-day, obviously, there's a lot more cleaning and sanitation protocol. We're all wearing masks and face shields and things like that. But a lot of the services that we used to provide as people waited, we, unfortunately, can't do as they wait. We're still doing for the public here, but we have to check everything in because if you think about it, everything that you're wearing, your rings, your watches, they go with you everywhere. So aside from the fact that you may sneeze or cough, but they went with you to the grocery store. If you were on an airplane, they were with you.
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
And so people taking things, especially right off their body and handing to us, which we then have to inspect up close to our eyes and our nose and our mouth with the microscope or a loop, or even opening up a watch to change the battery could put us at risk. And so we just have to take a lot of extra precautions. But I'm feeling pretty great... I'm going to knock on wood a little bit... Here about our precautions. Because even though we are doing a lot and it may be a little inconvenient for my staff and for our customers, we're actually one of the only places that I know of right now that... I guess I'll just say we haven't been shut down yet. And a lot of people have had to close their doors because of some sort of situation. So I'm thankful that what we're doing has worked so far.
Lucas Foust:
One final question. What do you like most about having a small business in Bozeman, Montana?
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
Well, Bozeman Montana in general, is just such a wholesome community where people really connect and care about each other. Obviously the beautiful outdoors, and it's a wonderful place to raise our children, which was one of the big decisions for Cec and I to choose Bozeman over Montana. I mean, over Miami, pardon me. But our business is so fun. It's about celebrating with people. You know, people come to see me when they have a new baby being born, or there's a graduation to celebrate, a retirement, a birthday, big anniversary, they're getting married. So I get to be a part of all these huge moments in people's lives. And it's really beautiful and special. And we're honored when, when we get to have those connections and be a part of all those magical moments in life. That's what it's all about.
Lucas Foust:
Great. Well, Jenny, thank you so much for taking time with us today and we really appreciate it. And thank you so much. I'll go ahead and wrap this up today and we'll go from there. Thanks Jenny. Have a good day.
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
My pleasure. Thanks for having us.
Lucas Foust:
You bet ya. Anytime.
Jennifer Hornick Johnson:
Bye-bye.