A Legacy in the Making: Mom, Wife, and Boss Robiar Smith and her rise into Entrepreneurship

Moth­er of three, devot­ed wife, beloved daugh­ter, and a pow­er­ful influ­en­tial woman in her own right, the CEO of RB Pest Solu­tions and women mogul Robiar Smith is mak­ing a way for black women to also pull up a seat at the table when it comes to entre­pre­neur­ship. This Mom­pre­neur is chang­ing the game by pro­vid­ing fresh and inno­v­a­tive ways for peo­ple to con­tin­ue to enjoy lux­u­ries like eat­ing in restau­rants or even sit­ting in your work­place pest free. Pri­mar­i­ly behind the scenes, she is mak­ing a name not only for her com­pa­ny RB Pest Solu­tions but also for the city of Chica­go.

“I want to cre­ate a space and rep­re­sen­ta­tion for peo­ple who look like me in this indus­try to get reward­ed to pro­vide for their chil­dren and families…Entrepreneurship was not some­thing that I set out to do. cit­ed Robair, how­ev­er “It’s like when the love of your life has been around all this time but you have been look­ing every­where else.”

Grow­ing up, she recalled how the envi­ron­ment she was raised in taught her to go through high­er edu­ca­tion and excel through the cor­po­rate lad­der. Her focus was on her aca­d­e­mics, not real­iz­ing one day the skillsets gained from her years in school would lead her to being a woman CEO of a black-owned pest con­trol com­pa­ny.

Pest con­trol is not a field that is com­mon­ly thought to be in, but when some­one from their team who is speak­ing to the com­mu­ni­ty about the job and its role, they are see­ing a rep­re­sen­ta­tion of them­selves. Robiar pro­vides a fresh set of eyes in this field and although it is cur­rent­ly male-dom­i­nat­ed, the warm wel­come and pos­i­tive feed­back she has received thus far has kept her going. She is giv­ing a facelift to the pest con­trol indus­try and writ­ing new rules when it comes to minor­i­ty women in busi­ness.

Since start­ing her com­pa­ny she has made great strides in a pro­gres­sion such as build­ing up a team of high­ly trained tech­ni­cians, cre­at­ing part­ner­ships of ser­vice with large com­pa­nies such as Dis­cov­er who opened up a call cen­ter on the South Side of Chica­go, and even launch­ing her new pest solu­tions line of mat­tress cov­ers avail­able on her web­site .

The fruit of her labor is a bless­ing and a large tes­ta­ment to the work she is putting in with the dis­trict and her com­pa­ny as a whole.

True Chica­go native, Robiar states that she is real­ly try­ing to put Chica­go on the map and let peo­ple know that RB Pest Solu­tions is here to stay. Their goal is to pro­vide new and inno­v­a­tive ways to find solu­tions to pests and rodents and apply their unique iden­ti­ty to their cus­tomer ser­vice approach. What sets them apart from com­peti­tors is they are not try­ing to be any­thing oth­er than authen­tic.

Hav­ing such a large role in this capac­i­ty, jug­gling being a mom, a wife, and a boss, it can seem to be over­whelm­ing even for one per­son. How­ev­er, Robiar holds it all to the help of her hus­band.

For­ev­er beam­ing at the men­tion of him, she spoke high­ly of the aid he pro­vides into her life. “If my hus­band was not in my life, and he did not say Robi STOP we’re tak­ing a trip, or Robi STOP we’re going on a date, I would­n’t have a bal­ance.”

He has made a con­scious pri­or­i­ty to make sure they stop and rest and take a break from the busi­ness. As emptinesters of three adult daugh­ters, they are able to fall in love again and take some time for them­selves.

Robiar Smith’s tes­ta­ment and jour­ney to her rise shows that women can have it all, espe­cial­ly black women, to keep striv­ing for more and know that it is all a part of the jour­ney. Be a stu­dent of life, be will­ing to learn, and although growth is uncom­fort­able, take heed of the lessons along the way and you will go far.