A few months ago we had the pleasure of having founder, Tom Milligan, of an up an coming company Our Divorce join our show. Episode 241 we are joined by the other half, Jill Blankenship!
You might be wondering how this partnership ended up working. Jill has known Tom for about 12/13 years, she said it gets fuzzy. After years of working in the same spaces, Tom brought his idea of Our Divorce to Jill and because Jill is a queen of start ups it was a perfect marriage! *see what we did there*
After Jill’s own divorce she moved to Orca Island. She jokes that she didn’t want kids to run away, that is why she moved to an island. She said at the time, she was outnumbered and needed some control in her life after her divorce. After many years on the island, she is finding her way back to Utah soon!
Jill found her motivation to start businesses because of living on Orca Island. With a population that is mostly there during the summer and with businesses shutting down in the winter, she had to find a way to create a remote work force. In 2005 she started her first business, Front Line Call Center, and 15 years later her call center is still alive and running. Over the years she has grown the business and continued to add to the call center industry developing software and more.
Starting Our Divorce with Tom was something that she, and he, hadn’t delved into yet except the experience of being divorced. It was a new market for her and joining Tom, she is playing the role of investor and developer. Jill works with the development team and the technical side, mostly. Jill said Our Divorce was going to be a simple start up and then things went big, and so fast! Even after a short time on social media they’ve already found themselves going viral on platforms such as TikTok.
If you were wondering how high the numbers of divorce’s has been during COVID, well it has gone up 40%. And no, Our Divorce is not trying to put attorneys out of business. They are simply a resource center, think Turbo Tax of Divorce. Our Divorce has been working the last few months working on putting amicable couples on their platform to do their divorce together. When Jill and Tom started the company they wanted to have a company where people could have a successful outcome. They started it with the question in mind, what experience would they want as Tom and Jill if they were going through a divorce. The wanted to create an environment for couples divorcing from a money based situation to an actual experience. A good experience.
Jill’s most interesting/unique thing that she has discovered about Utah is more specific to where she will be living. Jill said the one thing that is unique is that you have the mountains in your face. They’re right there. Wildlife you’re cohabitating with. Jill said she hears the coyotes, she sees the wild turkeys (that love her mulch), and what she loves about Utah is that you never know what you’re going to wake up to. She loves Utah, Post Malone will be her neighbor and is excited to be back.
You can follow Our Divorce on Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, and visit their website if you need (or know someone that needs) information on an impeding divorce!
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