Rachel has been shining since the spring of 1997, joining Kevin as operations partner in April 1999. Her experience and talents have been focused to build a company that would employ recovered alcoholics and bring out the best in everyone. She has enjoyed bringing her many creative abilities to the shine venue, from serenading customers with her ukulele and improvised songs, to leather art and custom color patinas. She is uncanny with leather color restoration, and takes great pleasure in learning new tricks and methodology to continually improve our services, from shine magic to customer relations. After the pandemic, when everyone decided to move on, Rachel took over as “last (wo)man standing,” and re-booted. If the shoe fits… let’s shine it!

Freddy has been a shoeshine family favorite since November of 2006. He is a fun loving artisan who paints and plays guitar. He has a beautiful singing voice, always ready to get a rousing chorus going amongst friends. In the fall of 2007, Freddy took over operations at the Olympic Club shop. After shining there for as long as we provided services he joined te crew as a rock who has always been on a roll. After the pandemic, Freddy came back with all the generous spirit he’s always had keeping the 555 location afloat, and always offering a laugh, a great story and a beautiful shine.

Ronan literally grew up in the shoeshine shops. While his mom Rachel was running around building the business, shining shoes, coaching alkies with support to stay sober and keep on shining, Ronan would be toddling around in a stroller from shop to shop getting played with by all the shiners (thank you). Now helping out the family with the pandemic re-boot, Ronan can be found cracking jokes and talking about film projects and social interests while he puts the Leamy glow in the toe.

Ru is a recent high school grad with sights on becoming a firefighter. He is also a nature lover spending time in the conservation corps. Easy going, friendly, reliable, and dedicated to doing great work, he has made a wonderful addition to The Guild

Jack has been a shoeshine family friend for his whole life. Rachel boasts that she was one of the first people to get to see him right after he was born. Jack is into music, gaming and honing his pool game. He is new to shining but dedicated and meticulous, his shines are sure to impress.

The L and the X are silent, but Doug is not. Doug is sure to strike up a fun conversation with anyone in the chair. Our newest shiner-Doug has a long history of customer service, performance art in various medias, and many other creative endeavors. I think we will see Doug taking on more creative tasks, as he is picking up the art of shine wonderfully!

New to the shine groove, Solanum is a quick study, and an exacting shiner. I am excited for her to apprentice with me doing specialty dye work, and hopefully she’ll evolve the art to new heights!

Here for the summer, stopping by to shine and help mama Ray Ray with some social media upgrades