By Sal Guarino
A “Man Friday” for Every Day
I have been a natural and straight-shooting maven as long as I can remember—whether extolling the US$.15 bargain price of KitKats at Tony’s Candy Store in Brooklyn at age 7 or indefinitely sharing where the best real pizza exists in and outside of New York City. So, when considering how to continue shining a well-deserved light on our beautiful community of San Miguel, I decided to periodically introduce you to some of our real movers and shakers, those who live and work here and with whom I have had a direct positive experience. Today’s spotlight is on Julian Lopez Cadena, owner of Friday Services, a home improvement and maintenance company whose name alludes to the life-saving literary character Friday from “Robinson Caruso.”
When my wife and I were engaged in 2021, she was living in Querétaro and I in Southern California. After a one-day spontaneous excursion to check out magical San Miguel less than a year ago, we yielded to its charms and decided to call it home completely reversing our plan to settle in California. As our romantic and geographic whirlwind proceeded, we bought a house in Centro and were introduced to Julian to handle some miscellaneous repairs. Pleased with his team’s initial work quality, speed, and fair pricing, we decided to entrust him with the much more daunting task of conducting a multi-faceted remodel of our home that like many in Centro, falls in the chronological bracket of God only knows.
Moments after meeting, I was impressed with Julian’s humble confidence and amiable demeanor. His engaging genuineness and collaborative tone clearly reflected his Friday Services’ “You want it? You got it!” philosophy. As we reviewed the long list of items to be addressed, he interjected with buoyant enthusiasm and English proficiency how he chose the name of his company as a playful reference to his loyalty, readiness, and ability to take on any job, to help one survive as necessary, as did Man Friday in the famous novel.
As is typical with remodeling, things took a little longer than we had naively hoped. Faulty fixtures, supply-chain delays, and some other age-related house issues slowed progress some. One by one, however, Julian solved the problems and calmed our nerves playing the roles of expert manager and leveling family counselor. One specific incident around faulty kitchen tiles aptly illustrates Julian’s Man Friday ethic. After already tiling two ancient bathrooms, transforming them from dark and dingy to brilliant and inviting, Julian’s team finalized the installation of a new kitchen by tiling its floor. Shortly afterward, however, cracks appeared in nearly all of the tiles. The kitchen designer who provided the tiles promptly deflected any potential culpability for the apparent cause of a bad batch of cement squares, finger-pointing instead. Unaware of the designer’s disappointing stance, Julian matter-of-factly assured us that whatever action we decided to take, including completely removing the faulty tiles and replacing them, would be met with zero additional labor cost. “You want it? You got it!” We accepted!
As Julian and I got to know each other, my latent-therapist mind began to appreciate some of the underlying factors of his ongoing business success. I suspect that his keen sense of empathy and people-reading skills got a tragic head start when at just 5 years old his mother died in a car accident. He is also a devoted family man to his wife and young son so it’s no wonder that his business is rooted in family origins. Silvia Cadena, Julian’s aunt, partnered with him back in 2009 extending her popular Ask Silvia Referral Service that graciously connected anyone with a need with appropriate help from how a U.S. expat could get a Mexican driver’s license to where to find the best tortillas. Silvia’s jumpstart certainly helped Julian get a foothold as a relative outsider (from Mexico City) in San Miguel 13-plus years ago; however, Julian’s innate desire to answer people’s needs with fitting and timely solutions has been the battery powering Friday Services’ success.
Another smooth finish on Julian’s solid and worthy business product is his uncanny savvy working with estadounidenses like me. Julian has broadened his handy intuition particularly well to thoroughly understand and adroitly navigate the condescension, demandingness, and other cultural frictions that can accompany working with U.S. expats. He certainly lowered this gringo’s stereotypically elevated angst over the projects at hand.
Like many, Julian has faced his share of obstacles including the early loss of a parent, starting a business in a new location, and continuing to grow it amid rising competition yet excuses are incomprehensible to him in any language. Obstacles are seen as opportunities, rough edges to be smoothed over, uneven barro floors to be leveled and reimagined with traditional ingenuity and fresh modern touches, overgrown gardens to be cleared out to establish new roots.
Two days after moving into our “Mexican Contemporary” amalgamation of traditional and gringo elements, I looked around our Christmas Eve dinner table at those seated in plastic chairs we bought hours earlier. I watched my 86-year-old father-in-law inhaling tamales and ponche, while my sister-in-law served up bacalao and bañuelos, teasing that I better like both. Behind them was the backdrop of our freshly painted orange walls, warming fireplace, and refurbished cantera living room. Between bites, I placed a call to Julian, the Man Friday with an engaging smile, to offer a note of thanks—for his work, patience, flexibility, professionalism, and most importantly, for his humble caring. Julian Lopez Cadena—another reason to love San Miguel!
Julian and Friday Services can be reached at www.fridayservices.com.
Sal Guarino
Born in Brooklyn, NY, now settled in Centro with his Mexican wife, Sal brings a rich set of life experiences to the table. “SALudos de San Miguel!” shares his joy for living through a lens of gratitude and positivity here in San Miguel. Sal’s first book “SALutations!” was published in 2018. Contact: salguarino@gmail.com.
