So when Ms. Kallina found workers from Ameriscapes Landscape and Irrigation decorating a nearby home, she signed on.
Wednesday afternoon, professional installer Quinton Locklin scrambled across the rooftop. Jolly like Santa and nimble like Spiderman, he attached a lengthy strand of Christmas lights up and down gables, under roofing shingles and against rain gutters.
Ameriscapes owner Locklin is one of several Temple-area entrepreneurs who say this seasonal work is a niche that helps fill their stockings with Christmas cash in what is typically a slow time for landscaping contractors.
Hanging outdoor Christmas lights helped him survive his first year in business.
“When you’re young and you have guts of steel, then you will do just about anything to put food on the table. So at 23 years old, we started doing Christmas lights,” he said.
“When you’re starving to death that first winter of opening your own business, you do what you have to do,” Locklin reminisced.
One of his first gigs - lighting up several buildings with tall steeples at Baylor University in Waco - paid well, but at a price, he said.
“It was 40 degrees outside, and raining, and blowing about 30 mph the entire week,” Locklin said. “It is way, way up there. You could see our boom lift five miles down the highway.”
Seven years later, Locklin has developed a system. He sells the lights, custom fits them to the individual home, hangs them, returns after the holidays, takes them down and bundles them for next year.
Carol Sepulvado and her son, Damon Bro, opened Able-i Illumination in Belton six years ago. They quickly saw an opportunity to serve businesses and homeowners who are either too busy or not agile enough to hang their own outdoor lights. This year, they lit up the Temple Chamber of Commerce, Santa Fe Depot and some of the finer homes in Salado.
“It is a way to diversify because so often this time of year, since we are an outdoor lighting business, it just really slows down. This is a way to keep our crews busy … for the holidays,” Ms. Sepulvado said.
For the last two years, Ms. Sepulvado’s crews have illuminated the three-story Holiday Inn Express in Salado, a challenge due to high winds.
“We have to strap our guys down once they’re on top of the building,” she said. “The last thing we need is for them to be blowing off.”
Rosemary Molina and husband Mario opened Full Care Lawn Service three years ago. When the grass goes dormant, they park the lawnmowers and break out the ladders. After the season is over, they take down the lights and haul them to their storage facility. Ms. Molina said they decorate homes for all ages.
Worries about the economy has dimmed the Molina’s Christmas lighting business this year, but not their spirits.
“Whether it’s cold or icy, if our customers call us and say they need it done, we’ll go out there and do it,” Ms. Molina said. “It’s hurting us, but we’ll pick up again. We’ll be OK.”
And it’s not just landscapers who slow down in winter. Mike Dunlap supplements his income selling boats at Texas Boat World in Harker Heights by hanging outdoor Christmas lights. He serves a diverse clientele.
“Most people, either they’re older and don’t want to get on the house, their husbands are gone to Iraq, or some people just don’t want to get on the roof and risk hurting themselves,” Dunlap said.
Back on Ms. Kallina’s roof, holding the end of a strand that stretched more than 30 feet, business owner Locklin said installing lights from two-story homes is like walking a tightrope.
“When it comes to hanging Christmas lights from rooftops, there’s a fine line between brave and crazy,” he said.
