Saved annually by partnering with Hire Bloom
Better retention than hiring US agents
Satisfaction score from Zerorez call center managers
Zerorez cleans carpets, air ducts, upholstery, and tile for homeowners across the country. It operates 18 corporate-owned locations that account for roughly half of company revenue, plus a network of franchisees. Behind those locations sit busy call centers handling outbound sales, dispatch, and customer callbacks.
Those calls are not simple. "We're not dealing with simple stuff," said Ben Oyler, Zerorez's Chief Operating Officer. "We're having to explain to people what we do, how we do it. We're upselling people." A rep who can't explain what air duct cleaning does, or why it matters, costs the company a sale. "We pride ourselves on our customer reviews. We have technicians standing in front of customers all day, every day. We're a sales organization."
Staffing those call centers the traditional way was expensive and unstable. US-based agents cost $20–$25 an hour. Turnover hovered around 70%. The constant cycle of hiring and training disrupted operations, and recruiting ran mostly through personal networks, which kept the candidate pool small and the process slow. With 40-plus agents to manage and seats that always needed filling, leadership knew the path wasn't sustainable.
Ben had seen the obvious alternative before, and he didn't like it. Over a career that included the founding team of the Ancestry DNA product and two biotech startups, he had built call centers onshore on purpose. The overseas providers he'd encountered fell short in two places. First, you couldn't really train the people. "It's kind of like, 'Here's the script, read from it. Hopefully you get through these calls and nothing big comes up and customers don't get too frustrated.'" Second, language. "If you're spending half of your time trying to understand what the person's saying, it just adds to the frustration of the call."
Those providers work fine, in his view, for tracking a package or checking on an order. Zerorez needed something else.
Zerorez started with 5 Hire Bloom team members embedded directly in its call center operations. They took outbound calls, routing, dispatch, and callbacks, and reported to Zerorez managers, not to a vendor.
Ben joined Zerorez after the program was already running. Six months in, he dug into how customer service was actually organized. What he found changed his view of hiring overseas. "The thing that struck me most was that we could have Hire Bloom reps that we could help select, we could help train, we could put on a path of understanding and knowledge that you don't get in the traditional offshores," he said. "Having this opportunity to not only select, but then mature and work with and continue to grow reps was a big deal."
The talent itself was part of it. Hire Bloom recruits US-educated candidates through BYU-Pathway, and Ben said the difference showed on day one. "You most often get people in the door that you can trust, that have a really good linguistic acumen, and — probably because of their schooling — understand a little bit more about business and customer relations."
Within a few months, Zerorez asked for more. The team grew from 5 to 23 Hire Bloom team members: 22 customer service representatives and 1 in accounts receivable. Rather than working personal networks or waiting out long recruiting cycles, managers could call Hire Bloom and get qualified candidates ready to interview within days.
The numbers moved first. By staffing a significant share of its call center with Hire Bloom team members, Zerorez saves an estimated $500,000 a year compared to hiring only US-based agents. Hire Bloom team members also stay 2.2x longer than Zerorez's US agents, which means less time spent in the hire-train-replace cycle.
Then the culture moved. Zerorez managers give their Hire Bloom team a 10 out of 10 satisfaction score. Jeff Lewis, Operations Manager, put it this way: "I have sat in on the training meetings with our Hire Bloom team members and the desire they have to succeed amazes me. They are not afraid to ask questions and are eager to learn. They want to do the work and they want to do it well. It is infectious and our other team members see that."
Ben doesn't oversell it. Not every hire has worked. "We've had good Hire Bloom reps. We've had some that we've had to let go," he said. "But in the end, the ones that have been really good have produced something that I don't think you can get in a traditional offshore call center."
Zerorez runs AI tools alongside its Hire Bloom team. For Ben, the two work together: AI handles the routine, and the humans handle the calls where a customer needs an explanation, a recommendation, or a reason to say yes.
Ben's advice starts with what scale actually means. "Any offshore provider can provide scale. You can get more people, shorter wait times, all that, at a lower price," he said. "The scale that matters is the scale of a more mature workforce that allows you to get people in, get to your objectives faster, and manage the outcomes a little more tightly." The difference, in his words, is an arrangement where "that employee really does almost work for us, and Hire Bloom has just facilitated the connection."
Price matters, but it isn't the whole story. "Business is always about price. If you can get a great rep for a great price, that's always going to be appealing," he said. "But at the end of the day, if they don't do their jobs well and our customers aren't happy — money matters, but it's not as important."
And then there's the part he says buyers care about more than they admit. "There's part of me that buys it for the dollars. There's part of me that buys it because of the value you've created. But there's a part of me that buys it just because I want to be a good person, and want to be able to say we've helped 20 people live a better life with their families and make a wage that's meaningful."
For Darlyn, a Hire Bloom team member in Guatemala, the job at Zerorez has changed more than her paycheck.
In her country, the minimum salary is around $300 a month. In her role at Zerorez, she earns more than three times that. Financial pressure had forced her to drop out of school. Her Hire Bloom income covers her daily expenses and has let her restart her university studies and save for the future.
It has also let her show up for her family. Darlyn's mother was seriously injured in a car accident and lives with lasting health complications that make it difficult to walk and require daily care. Because Darlyn works from home, she can pay her mother's medical bills and be there during the day. "On my lunch break, I'm able to cook meals for my mom, help her move around, and make sure she has what she needs," she said. "Before, I was gone all day, and it was so hard to take care of her. Now I can share those moments with her and still keep up with my work. It's a huge relief for me and for my family."
For Zerorez, partnering with Hire Bloom stabilized a call center that used to turn over every year. For Darlyn, it made all the difference in her life and her family's.
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