Ask Alex Hinojosa what sets HV Colonial Flooring apart, and his answer is about who shows up at the customer’s house. “The people selling the job are also the people installing it,” he says.
HV Colonial is the Hinojosa family’s flooring business in Woodland. Hinojosa and his father deal with most of the customers. The family runs the sales and the rest of the business, and family members still do most of the installs. That arrangement shapes how the company talks to the people it works for.
“When we tell them this can be done or this can’t be done, it’s because that’s the truth,” he says. “You won’t have to deal with other people. You’re dealing with the same people throughout the whole process.”
The same holds for start dates, because the person setting the date is the one who knows the crew’s calendar. “We’re not just salespeople,” Hinojosa says. “We’re not just selling the product, we’re also installing it, so we know our schedule best.”
The installer’s eye shows up before a single plank goes down. One homeowner who had hardwood put in throughout her house noticed her floors were not level. In her account, Carlos Hinojosa, the company’s chief executive, went under the house to check the beams and took pictures before any leveling or installation began. The company lists substrate preparation, moisture control and custom cuts as part of the job. It supplies and installs wood, vinyl, carpet, tile and baseboards, and it takes work up to about 100 miles from Woodland.
The business grew out of an installer’s trade. He always wanted a store of his own, and his family worked alongside him from the start. As Hinojosa recalls, the Woodland showroom opened in 2022 in about 800 square feet. The family built a name in Woodland and nearby towns like Davis, and especially in Sacramento, where his father had started out.
About two years later they moved into a 3,000-square-foot showroom with room for a much wider range of product.
Most jobs are in homes, Hinojosa says, simply because most customers are homeowners. The commercial side includes a contract with a retirement community, putting down the flooring in its apartments.
Everyone in the family has a hand in the business, and Hinojosa says that is why they guard its name so closely. “We try to take care of our reputation,” he says.
The store was always meant to be handed down. “We definitely do want to scale it,” he says. “My dad’s long-term goal is to at least have one for each of his kids, which there’s four of us.”