| Growing up, Christa Hagearty loved the Saturdays
she'd spend with her father, doing odd jobs in his dry cleaning stores.
He knew interesting details about the lives of his workers, whom she recalls
a 'mini-United Nations' of first-generation immigrants.
Hagearty went away to college, earned a bachelor's degree in economics
and was working in human resources when the death of her uncle brought her
back to the family business Dependable Cleaners. "Somewhere in that year I grew to love the industry and the company
again," she said of Dependable Cleaners, which was started by her
grandparents in 1944 in Quincy.
The married mother of three now oversees 17 locations, has invested more
than $1 million in environmentally friendly,
state-of-
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the-art
equipment and in the nine
years she's headed the company tripled its sales to $15 million.
"Some days I do really well and some days are a challenge," she
admits. With a full-time nanny and staff of 250, Hagearty continues the legacy
of passion for people and service. She provides full benefits packages to
workers, some who worked for her grandfather or dad, and supports numerous
charities, including Read to Ride, a summer reading program for kids who
can win a bike through reading books.
Reading helped Hagearty
through a hard time, during her parents' divorce when she was young. She
said, "I think each book shows you parts of
the world you may not see in your day-to-day life."
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