About You Name It
Whether it’s building custom floating shelves, refinishing an antique dining room table, painting your nursery, or finishing your basement for in-laws, we’ve got you covered! With John’s decade-long carpentry experience and Joeci’s decade-long painting experience, they are a perfect match to tackle any of your home improvement and home maintenance needs.
John and Joeci are a young, energetic couple with an eye for detail and a healthy amount of pride in their work. They’ve constructed buildings and maintained existing buildings from rural Oklahoma to the Cape to the Western Alaskan Bush with a focus on you as the homeowner getting what you want out of the place you call home.
They have a passion for sustainability and preservation in the construction industry and actively incorporate these values into every project they take on. Through efforts to decrease waste, provide longevity in the finished outcome, and listen to each client’s specific needs and wants, they have gotten their overall construction waste down to 1-2% compared to the industry’s 30% waste. They are changing the way the construction industry operates and encouraging other trades to follow suit.
Their carpentry service is more than just working with wood. Carpentry is about solving problems. Taking something in theory and turning it into physical reality, using a vast assortment of materials as new inventions in the carpentry trade are available to them, beyond just wood. Additionally, their painting service is more than just paint. They spend time talking with their clients about their homes and how their homes are used to determine the best brand, sheen, and durability for each area of the home.
You Name It does not build for mass production and fast wealth; they build to create something that lasts, to preserve what is already here, and to build dreams. While doing that, John and Joeci support their family and live fulfilling lives knowing that they are providing safe, durable, beautiful improvements to their clients’ homes that will last for generations to come.
More About Joeci and John
John and Joeci met in the bush of western Alaska in 2015 as they were both volunteering at a youth camp. They became good friends, traveling back and forth from Tecumseh, Oklahoma (Joeci’s hometown) to Lunenburg, Mass (John’s hometown) many times before getting married at the edge of Explorer Glacier in Girdwood, Alaska after camp in 2017. Joeci moved from Oklahoma to Lunenburg in 2018 when she was four months pregnant with their daughter. At the time, John was working for another great construction company in Gardner and Joeci began doing outreach to neighbors, presenting herself as the “Odd Job Specialist”, saying “You Name It, I’ll do it”, which meant stacking firewood, painting, weeding gardens, house-sitting, and whatever else she could do to serve the community. John had his whole life as carpentry experience, growing up around the trades and his father who also worked in the trades. While at the same time, Joeci had her whole life as business management and painting experience ‘almost’ on opposite sides of the country as she was raised around entrepreneurial parents and managed painting all her family’s rent homes.
Their daughter was born in the winter of 2019 with gastroschisis (a hole in the abdomen causing her intestines to grow on the outside). After snow plowing and construction, John would leave his job in Gardner in the late evenings, pick up Joeci from recovering at home, and drive 40 minutes one-way to Worcester to visit their daughter in the NICU for hours upon returning home to sleep so they could repeat it all the next day. After a month of seemingly relentless exhaustion, their daughter was able to come home with them.
After a year of leaving for work before his daughter would wake up in the morning and coming home after she was in bed, John and Joeci decided it was time for a change of pace. And for her Valentine’s Day gift in 2020, Joeci asked John to give his months’ notice and join her in her adventure of forming You Name It, their own Home Improvement company, where he would offer his craftsmanship and she would offer painting to Lunenburg and surrounding towns.
In March 2020, the day after Governor Baker declared a state of emergency, You Name It was born kicking and screaming into a new pandemic that shook many lives and many businesses throughout the country. To this day, John and Joeci believe that if their business was born that day of all days and has thrived by supporting their community, offering exceptional services, and paving a way for education in the home improvement industry, they can do just about anything.
These days, and with the opportunity of owning You Name It, John is able to enjoy breakfast with his daughter, read her a couple books, and then go offer exceptional craftsmanship to his clients and Joeci is able to put her creativity to work, always looking for more ways to serve their community and meet needs no matter the socio-economic position of her clients.
When you hire You Name It, you’re hiring a small business with a family behind it. John offers carpentry; Joeci offers painting; and their daughter (4yo) offers comedic relief, confidently telling you all the things in your home that need fixed.
Joeci Gilchrest
Owner, Founder, Painter
Joeci Gilchrest is the founder, the communications director, and lead painter for You Name It. Her typical work days are spent helping her clients achieve their perfect home and office space. She is able to provide consultations virtually or in-person, depending on the customers’ needs. She believes our surroundings should inspire creativity and calm, that getting rid of distractions help us get back to the people and things that are most important to us. She created You Name It to help others achieve this balance. When Joeci is not working, she typically heads outdoors to explore her backyard and the world at large with her husband, John, and their toddler. She enjoys working, walking barefoot through her vegetable garden, shopping for chickens online, snuggling her two doggos, and simply being outdoors experiencing all life has to offer.
John Gilchrest
Co-Owner, Carpenter
John Gilchrest is the lead carpenter, home improvement consultant for You Name It. He takes great pleasure in delivering high quality work as well as practical solutions for his customers. Previously, he spent several years as the construction and snow removal field supervisor for a local general contractor. John has worked on a wide range of construction projects, from metal roofing on Martha's Vineyard to building cabins in the western Alaskan bush. When he isn't wearing a tool belt, John can be found on a mountainside holding an ice axe, riding a mountain bike with his wife, Joeci, or reading a book in his hammock. He lives with his wife and daughter in Lunenburg, MA.