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Grand Valley’s Jenna Brooks stands amid the storage racks her Mississauga-based company, Racked Out Inc., installs for clients.
ROSEMARY HASNER
Stepping Up Jenna Brooks sets her alarm for 4:30 a.m. Early call times are all in a day’s work for the warehouse racking entrepreneur. BY JANICE QUIRT
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n the early days of Jenna Brooks’ company Racked Out Inc., which designs, supplies and installs warehouse storage systems, she’d often be perched 20 feet in the air on a scissor lift, installing the racking herself. She might have been covered in dirt – she was surely outfitted in a hard hat, safety shoes and reflective clothing, with a full tool belt jangling at her hips. Indeed, Jenna scoffs at what she calls the worst advice she was ever given, which was to keep her head down in the traditionally male-dominated
warehouse and construction industry. “That’s not who I am,” says Jenna, now a leading player in her industry. “I’m a peacock. I don’t stay low. And that’s why I’ve attained the success I have.” Eight years into the business, she’s currently taking it easy on those scissor lifts – she’s pregnant with twins, due in June, and has a nine-month-old, Sophie – but an irrepressible drive continues to propel her accomplishments. Jenna, 29, was recently recognized as one of On-Site Magazine’s Top 40 Under 40 in Canadian construction and is a
natural role model for women looking to work in construction fields. Jenna, who grew up in Erin and now lives in Grand Valley with her partner, Tyler White, and Sophie, admits she didn’t initially feel the industry’s pull; she went to college for policing. “When I graduated I looked around and realized I needed a base-level income immedi ately. I applied for a job as a mainten ance person in a warehouse, and was soon fixing and building everything.” She was very handy with tools and impressed her boss, the operations C O N T I N U E D O N PA G E 8 9
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