Hot Mess Express

Hannah talks with Brittnie Tran about the non profit helping moms with daily tasks.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Good morning, and welcome back toanother episode of the Carolina Cares. Hannah
Tyler joined today by a woman whowas doing some amazing things here in the
Triad, also the country. We'regonna get into that more later. Brittany
tran with I just have to sayyour organization has the best name of anything
I've ever heard in my life,hot Mess Express. I'm glad you like

(00:22):
it. Thank you so much forjoining us today, Brittany. I love
your tagline, not a handout,just a hand And we'll get in more
of that later. But tell mea little bit about hot Mess Express.
Where you guys started and where you'reat now. Yeah, hot Mess Express.
So we are a nonprofit with chaptersacross the country and we come in
and help women who are just strugglingwith like the state of their home,

(00:45):
maybe it's cleaning or organizing, andwe come in and we help and we
no judgment. We just get itdone and try and offer a fresh start.
And where did this idea come from? So it got started here in
the Triad. Jen Hamilton is theone who came up with the idea.
She had seen a mom on aTriad mom's Facebook group and she had asked,

(01:06):
like, you know, if anyoneknew of like affordable cleaners in the
area. She made it clear shedid not have the funds for it,
but was kind of at a pointwhere she had to ask. And a
lot of people were great in offeringall these you know, like options of
affordable people. But Jen kind ofsaw past that and there was like a
bigger need of just why don't wejust help this mom in our community?

(01:26):
We just help her? And sothat's how it started. She got a
group of us. There's about tenof us for that first We call them
rescue missions, and I think it'sfitting. Yeah, right, there's a
group about ten of us. AndI was at that first one and it
just took off from there. Andhow did you get involved in all of
this? So I almost didn't goto that first one. I will say

(01:49):
I was hesitant because, you know, like with anything, it's kind of
it's scary meeting a bunch of peoplefor the first time. And we met
in a McDonald's parking lot and youknow, not sketchy at all. You
know what, nuggets can make anythinghappens. I excited. So get some
strong women some chicken nuggets. You'reset exactly and so yeah, so I

(02:12):
went to that first one and thenafter a couple of missions, Jen realized
how big it was getting and itwas just more than she could take on
with everything else she had going on, and so she asked if I would
I would just take it over,and I was excited to do so.
And you are now president of HotMiss Express. This is blown up in
a rather short period of time.Yes, so walk me through that.

(02:34):
What timing are we at now withthe first meetup to where we are now?
So that first meetup was August twentytwenty one, and in just the
less than three years, it hasgrown to over one hundred chapters over the
country. We've established ourselves as anonprofit last year, and it's just amazing.

(02:55):
Every one we talked to about this. Every woman who hears about it
is like, that's that's what Ineed. I mean, why did I
could have used that when I wasgoing through it? Or I know someone
who needs that? So I knowyour mom of three? Correct, Yes,
walk me through just like the overwhelmingamount of things you have to do
in a day, because I thinkuntil you are a mom, you we

(03:15):
can empathize, but we have noclue exactly just how much stress is on
a mom in the day to day. Absolutely, you know, I mean
it's it starts from the minute youwake up until the minute you go to
sleep. It is absolutely endless.But I think the one thing that people
really don't realize is that you know, you can raise your kids to help
and you know, to be respectfuland clean up after themselves, but they

(03:36):
are still kids, and if youhave, especially more than one, you're
out numbered a lot of times,and they are always taking and undoing the
things that you are cleaning. Youcan clear a countertop, but they're going
to refill it. And if youare doing these things piece by piece,
it is so hard to ever fullycatch up because they're undoing as you're doing.
So when with hot mess, wecan come in and kind of do

(03:59):
an all all over clean and justgive you that, you know, catch
up that I feel like moms reallyneed, but I think all women need.
It's the cleaning fairies. You arethe cleaning fairy. Yeah, and
that's maybe what are some of theservices you offer to moms in the area
who need help. So we doall kinds of stuff, but we we
try and stick to like just theheart of what women struggle with, laundry,
dishes, organizing. We try andmeet needs as we see them.

(04:25):
So in certain certain circumstances, we'vedone things like fill empty fridges for families
who just might be struggling. Onetime we paid for a prescription for someone
whose insurance was not able to coverit that month, and so we just
we covered that. Just think littlethings that your village should do. You

(04:45):
know, everyone talks about a village. We want to be that village for
you and just fill in those littlelittle helping hand when you need it.
Oh, I love that. Nowyou get started. In August twenty twenty
one, you now have one hundredchapters nation wide. How do you grow
that fast? Is it just puttinga video up on social media before you
know what, the whole world wantsto know more about you? It honestly

(05:08):
is. We had I think itwas about two months into this, Jen
had posted a video and it justit just blew up and chapters were popping
up overnight. And it's been kindof an adventure because we've really had to
work backwards and play catch up withall of this. None of us have
experienced running a nonprofit, let alonea national nonprofit. So it's been definitely

(05:30):
a learning curve. There's so muchpaperwork to it and different levels of intricacy
that you guys are having to navigateright now. Absolutely, it's been you
know, the last year. Ihave learned and grown so much with this
nonprofit as we've like learned and understand. But the cool thing is is that
this nonprofit. We always say whenyou put good out into the world,

(05:50):
like good seems to find you back. And all of our team has these
like pieces that they can offer.So we might not as a whole understand
everything individually, but together we're ableto piece it together and build it.
And it's been just really great tosee that. That's awesome. We're so
lucky we get in view so manynonprofits here and you see what's happening in

(06:12):
the public and it's great work.But then to sit back and think about,
oh, there's paperwork, in formalities, yeah, government things that all
get involved with it, it canbe overwhelming. For sure. Good Morning
America, you weren't Good morning America? Did I hear that? Right?
We worry? Okay, how doesthat even happen? Like Robin Roberts just
calls and she's like, hey,Brent, what's up. It was,
So we got an email and itwas one of those things where you check

(06:33):
it and you kind of double checkit because you're like, this is that
legit? Yes? Right, Andshe emailed and asked if we would be
interested in being on, and thewhole experience was it was insane. We
were walking down this neighborhood pitch black, like five am, to this woman's
home who didn't know she was beingnominated, and we were standing outside,

(06:57):
you know, doing like the littlethe little reels in the beginning of you
know, good morning America and stuff. And she's just in the house sleeping.
No, nothing's happening in my quietneighborhood. I set my rest on.
That's fantastic. I just to seeyour guys' growth in such a short
period of time not only super cool, but also I have to imagine overwhelming
it can be. So we havea couple of us our full time.

(07:20):
We're all volunteers. Nobody nobody's makingany money. We're all just volunteering our
time because we love it, youknow, and we feel like passionate about
it. But several of us aredoing full time. A lot of us
are doing part time, and yeah, it can be a lot, but
to that point, you're all comingtogether as a community and it's growing.
Can we talk a little bit aboutjust the community you guys have going on

(07:40):
at hot Mess Express. Absolutely,that's my favorite thing. So our community
within just the triad is amazing.We've been able to grow and become that
group for each other, that supportsystem. We have been there for each
other when a lot of us,the majority of us, don't have family
or friends in the area and wefound each other. But outside of that,
we have grown with all of ourcast Coordinators, so that we call

(08:03):
I saw that on your website,Like I need to know more about these
Chaos coordinators. It's a fitting name. Yeah, but we've grown with them
and so we have a what wecall cast Coordinator Facebook page. And the
support that these women give each other, there is no cattiness, there's no
pettiness. There is just like loveand uplifting and support. As they grow
each other, they grow their ownchapters. Uh, And it's it's my

(08:26):
favorite thing. How did the firstchapter outside of where you guys started even
get started? And what's it likewhen someone calls you and they're like,
hey, we're in Minnesota or whereverwe heard about you, How do we
become a part of this and justto see that impact grow that that might
be the coolest thing. I takeit back, It is because when you
know, when we see we doour missions, you know, we see

(08:48):
like us physically actually doing the work, and it's cool to see that.
It's amazing to see the before andafter and of course get the reaction from
you know, the woman that we'rehelping. But what is even cooler than
is seeing all of these chapters thatwe are not directly you know, having
them do We're not directly having animpact on these with these missions, they're

(09:09):
just doing them on their own,but it stems off of what we're doing,
and that's so cool that they're justyou know, on a Saturday,
we'll see something on our Facebook pagelike hey, a mission in you know,
Nevada, and we're like, that'sso cool, let's go. Let's
red These days especially and as timeis progressing, mental health is becoming more
and more in the forefront and howimportant that is. How are you guys

(09:33):
kind of bringing that in with HotExpress and how does that go hand in
hand with having clean floors? Assimple as it may sound, but sometimes
it's just that one little thing thatcan make your day better. Absolutely.
I think a lot of people havethis idea that if your house gets messy,
it's because you're lazy or you justdon't care, and there's so much
more to that. I think that, especially with everything going on in the

(09:54):
world today and stuff like, lifecan be really heavy. There's a lot
of expectations on women, a lotof expectations on moms, and sometimes that
weighs on you. And when youfall behind, even just a little bit,
and then it starts to snowball,it can be really really hard to
just like find that motivation to getgoing or even to like know where to

(10:15):
start. A lot of the womenwe help have ADHD, anxiety depression,
postpartum and allow all that comes intowhy their homes are the state there,
and it's like a direct reflection oftheir mental health. So when we come
in, we try and not onlyjust clean, but we try and offer
something sustainable. We try and makeit something that they can keep in the

(10:35):
future and make it easy for them, and then also just offer like friendship,
you know. I mean, alot of these women just they want
to talk they want event, theywant to feel that their situation is normal,
and it's okay, I'm sorry,I'm getting a little too deep here,
but I am curious. I scrollthrough Instagram like everyone else does,
and you see the moms who arewe're not only making the bread homemade,

(10:56):
we're grinding it and we're using onehundred percent clean products and all of this,
and for me watching it, itgets very overwhelming, and I think,
my gosh, the pressure that mustbe on moms. It's no longer
one thing to put a meal onthe table. Now we're setting the standard
that it has to be all organicfrom the farm you have in your backyard,
and you have to raise your kidson top of it. I'm just

(11:16):
curious how maybe you, as amom, or maybe other moms in your
community, social impact or social mediais impacting that mental health. Absolutely,
that's something I think we're all strugglingwith. You know, when you can
see all of these pictures of thesehappy families. They're on vacation and their
kids are playing in this pristine,beautiful house and dressed perfectly and they're not

(11:37):
messy and all these things, allyou can do is think about, like
your kids and your situation and youlook around your home and it doesn't look
like that, and that is exactlywhat hot Mess Express is trying to break.
We are trying to show that that'snot a reality. That is someone's
highlight reel. That is what theywant you to see. The reality is

(11:58):
we are all struggling. All ofour sinks fill up sometimes, all of
our rooms become unorganized. All ofus have these non esthetic, perfect homes.
That's not reality, and we aretrying so hard to break through that.
And that's why we make these videosand stuff because we want to show
this as normal. And none ofus come into these homes like with Judgment.
No one comes up, puts theirnose up. These women get there

(12:20):
and they get to work and itis the coolest thing to watch. We're
talking with Britney Trand, President ofhot Mess Express. If someone wants to
get involved, there's so many ways, but first let's talk about if you
want to be a part of thechaos coordinators and there's someone listening thinks,
you know what, I have timein my day to go sweep a floor,
do some laundry, how can theyget involved? Absolutely so, you
can go to our website it's hotmess express dot co. And there is

(12:43):
a link there to start a chapter. It does take some work to get
it going. It does take effortto build it. You know, everyone
is going to be looking to youto be the leader of that chapter.
But it is so rewarding and theconnections that you make with your community,
with the volunteers. We talked toour cash coordinators all the time and it

(13:05):
has done so much for them,like for them mentally as well. And
if someone doesn't want to start achapter, but they want to get involved
in one, how can they dothat? Yes, you can go same
website hot mess express dot co andthere's a link for that as well.
We are always looking for volunteers andI also want to say on there you
can nominate yourself or you can nominatesomeone else. We take both and uh,

(13:28):
you know a lot of times thatwomen they're hesitant to nominate themselves because
they feel like they're undeserving, ortheir house isn't messy enough, or maybe
it's too bad. But I justreally encourage you to reach out because we
do all things. Just this lastweekend, we did a mission where we
picked up laundry, did it atthe laundry. Matt folded it, brought
it back. That was the mission. It's one thing to do the laundry,

(13:50):
but it's another thing to fold itand put it away. So you
guys being able to get ahead ofthat game. It's so fantastic. Also,
it does cost some money for youguys to do laundry and all this
stuff. Yes, are you activelylooking for funds donations? We are as
we've grown outside of just North Carolina. We want to support our chapters as
much as possible. We don't wantthem to have to be worrying about raising

(14:13):
funds so that they can have youknow, cleaning supplies or storage binds to
help organize or even just like lunchfor the team because we're there for usually
around six hours, so things likethat. So we are actively looking for,
you know, consistent fundraising. Welove to uh find partnerships within our
community, things like that. Ialso see on your website that you have

(14:35):
an Amazon wish list. Absolutely,yes, where can people find that they
can find that? So that isagain at hot mess express dot co and
cleaning supplies. There's gift cards,all kinds of stuff that really helps.
It's the easiest thing to do.You're probably mindlessly buying things on Amazon.
Anyways, you might as well buysome cleaning products and get it sent to
you, guys, and you're goingto absolutely And I do want to say,

(14:58):
our chapters as well have their ownamaz sound wishless, so you can
go to there. You'll find themin our chapter directory. You can find
the chapters and all they'll have ontheir Facebook pages. So any sport you
can give our chapters is great too. Hot Mess Express. I love your
guys's name. You don't take yourstuff too seriously, No, and I
live we live the name, embraceit, you know what. That's what
we're here for, right, Brittany. If anybody needs to get a hold

(15:20):
of you or wants to get ahold of you, how can they do
that? Yeah? Absolutely, youcan email us. It's HM at hot
Mess Express dot cou and we werealways we're always in hot Mess so we
respond really quickly and we're just we'reexcited to make any connections with people who
have the same mindset it as us. Brittany, thank you so much for
coming on today. Thank you somuch for having me