Shades In Place Turns 20: From Boston to Tampa

Hello, longtime friend!

Welcome back to We Dress Naked Windows, where I usually answer your burning questions about window treatments with a healthy side of Brazilian zest.

But this round is special. This week, Shades In Place turns 20 years old — two full decades of measuring, installing, and turning naked windows into the best-dressed feature in the house.

So this time, the tables turn: you get to interview me. Grab a cafézinho (iced, if you’re down here in Tampa with me), pull up a chair, and let’s celebrate 20 years the only way I know how — with honest answers and slightly ridiculous analogies.

1. Roger, 20 years?! How did Shades In Place even get started?

Funny thing — I didn’t set out to dress windows for a living. I set out to survive a Boston winter.

I landed in the U.S. from São Paulo back in 2000 with big dreams, zero English, and absolutely no idea how to drive on ice. No GPS, no Waze — just a paper map in one hand and a prayer in the other.

Learning the language at that point felt like trying to read instructions written in disappearing ink.

So I hustled. I studied English at Harvard, delivered pizzas on weekends, washed cars, drove trucks — whatever kept the dream funded.

Then in 2004 I bought a little condo that needed a lot of love, and I renovated the whole thing myself, nights and weekends.

That’s where I found out I was pretty handy — the way you learn to swim by getting tossed in the deep end.

By 2006, a cousin nudged me toward the window covering world, and Shades In Place was born. The rest, as they say, is 20 years of history.

2. Is it true you got fired from your very first window job?

Ha — guilty. And I wear it like a medal.

When I started out in 2006, I took a part-time gig installing for a national chain.

Two months in, they let me go — not for being slow, not for being sloppy, but because clients kept asking for me by name over the other installers. Apparently being too good for the room is a fireable offense.

It was like getting benched for scoring too many goals. Honestly? Best thing that ever happened to me.

I walked out, hung my own shingle, and built Shades In Place on one stubborn idea: do it right every single time, and everything else takes care of itself.

3. What’s changed the most in window coverings over 20 years?

Oh, everything. The shades I install today would look like science fiction to 2006 me.

Back then, “smart shades” meant a shade smart enough to come down when you pulled the cord. Now? I wire whole homes for motorized and smart shades you control from your phone — or just by asking out loud.

Window coverings went from flip-phone to smartphone, and I went right along with them, chasing certifications from Hunter Douglas, Somfy, Lutron, and Norman all over the country so I’d always know the newest tricks.

The technology got smarter. The paper form became apps. The tape measure turned into a laser device. However, great customer service is still old-fashioned great customer service.

4. Boston to Tampa Bay — what made you trade snow for sunshine?

After about 17 winters, my back filed a formal complaint, and I finally listened.

In 2023, my wife Ana and I packed up two decades of Boston and pointed the car south to Tampa Bay. We didn’t close up north — the Boston shop is still going strong — we just opened a brand-new chapter in the sun, and we’ve been growing through St. Pete, Clearwater, Sarasota, and Lakewood Ranch ever since.

The wild part? The whole job flipped. In Boston, every project was about keeping the heat in. Down here, the Florida sun doesn’t just visit — it moves in and puts its feet up on your couch.

So now it’s all about keeping that heat out with solar shades, exterior screens, and UV-blocking fabrics. Same craft, opposite enemy. I love them both.

5. After 800-plus five-star reviews, what’s the one thing you’ll never compromise on?

Showing up like it’s my own home.

That’s the whole secret, and it hasn’t budged in 20 years. I measure like the window owes me money. I treat your floors like they’re nicer than mine.

And if something isn’t right, I fix it — on my dime, no speech, no drama. A window treatment company is only as good as its word, and mine has been the same since that condo in 2004.

People don’t remember the company that was perfect. They remember the one that made it right.

6. So, 20 years in. Slowing down, or just getting started?

Slowing down? In Tampa? Where the sun’s out 300 days a year and every lanai is begging for shade? Not a chance.

If anything, I feel like I’m just hitting my stride — and that’s thanks to the biggest change of all: I finally let go of the tape measure.

For years I was a one-man band. I measured every window, installed every shade, and trusted nobody to touch a job but me.

Somewhere along the way it hit me — if I wanted to dress windows all over the map, I couldn’t stay the only pair of hands in the room. So I shifted my mindset and built a team, and it’s the smartest move I’ve made since hanging my own shingle.

Today, Shades In Place is a lot more than just me:

• Up in Boston, I’ve got a crew of installers handling jobs all over New England — same standards I started with, just more hands to deliver them.
• Holding the whole thing together is Lismar, my office coordinator, who keeps scheduling, orders, and paperwork running like a Swiss watch. She’s the reason I actually sleep at night.
• I personally cover the Tampa Bay area, Orlando and the West Coast of Florida from Gainesville all the way down to Naples.
• Over in the Pensacola panhandle, we’ve got a team covering the area and reaching into Mississippi and Alabama too.

Turns out the secret to growing wasn’t doing more myself. It was trusting good people to care as much as I do — like going from playing every instrument to finally conducting the orchestra.

Bonus Question: Okay, Roger — what’s the biggest screwup of your whole career?

Early on, I landed a big new-construction job — several windows, beautiful home, one of the most expensive shade brands on the market.

I measured everything, placed the order, felt like a real pro. One little problem: the wood trim around the windows hadn’t been installed yet, and I forgot to account for the board sizes in my measurements.

In other words — I measured those windows naked and completely forgot they were about to get dressed.

I didn’t catch it until two months later, when I showed up to install and… nothing fit. The trim was in, my numbers were off, and there was no saving it with a screwdriver and a smile.

The replacement order came to $7,000 — and that was with a 20% courtesy discount stacked right on top of the usual reorder discount.

Now picture this two decades ago. Brand-new business owner. Already $80,000 deep in credit card debt just to keep the doors open. And here’s a $7,000 mistake staring me dead in the eye.

I had a real choice to make: own it and pay for it, or find some way to wriggle out and disappear.

I paid. Every single penny. It hurt like crazy — but doing it right is exactly how I built a name people came to trust. That $7,000 turned out to be the best advertising I never meant to buy.

The lesson? Measure the window for the home it’s going to be, not the one standing there today. And when you mess up — because you will — you make it right. No exceptions.

Final Thoughts

Here’s the real truth: the best part of these 20 years was never the shades. It’s you. Every client who said yes, every neighbor you sent my way, every “Roger, you’ve got to come see this window” — you built this thing. Two decades of it.

So from the bottom of my churrasco-loving heart: obrigado. Thank you for trusting me with your homes, your windows, and your referrals all these years.

Here’s to the next 20. Your windows will never go naked on my watch.

Até logo,

Roger Magalhães
Founder, Shades In Place — Two-Decade Window Whisperer, Recovering Snow Shoveller, Forever Measuring Twice