Today we’d like to introduce you to Todd Stevens.
Todd, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
What I’m doing with Renovation Marriage is basically my third career. After spending thirteen years in information technology and electronic commerce. I transitioned to fulltime ministry. As a pastor, a big part of my focus was leading our churches to reach out to the community by meeting needs and doing acts of kindness. We’ve seen how demonstrating love can change lives.
Over the years, my wife (Erin) and I got increasingly involved with leading weekend marriage retreats. We soon realized that we were consistently seeing more life change happen in a single weekend marriage workshop than we did in a year of fulltime church ministry. We wanted to invest more time into seeing more people impacted. So after 19 years of church ministry, I made another career shift and went fulltime with Renovation Marriage, a nonprofit organization we launched in 2023.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
There have been a lot of lessons learned with launching a nonprofit focused on equipping couples with tools to strengthen their marriages. When we started, I thought my focus would be almost exclusively on creating content and interacting with couples. I didn’t realize I’d also have to learn so much about things like audio/video equipment and lighting, search engine optimization, Google algorithms, event planning, and fundraising. Erin and I are both entrepreneurs at heart, though, so we thrive on meeting these sorts of challenges and learning new skills.
Overall, things have gone even better than we hoped and prayed. The organization continues to grow and we increasingly connect with more couples hoping to improve their relationship through both in-person and online workshops.
During the weekend, we share honestly about our own relational challenges. I’d estimate that 3/4 of the couples attending our retreats are experiencing some level of crisis. Their struggles may be because of infidelity, a porn addiction, an inability to communicate about hurts or conflict, or just that they’ve drifted apart and begun to feel like roommates. Over 98% of the couples who complete the Renovation Marriage workshop indicate that it was helpful for their relationship. As far as we can tell, that is currently the highest success rate of any marriage intensive in the country.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
Our goal as an organization is to be not only the most effective marriage intensive in America, but also the most affordable. Part of what makes Renovation Marriage unique is we keep our registration cost at only a fraction of what other marriage intensives charge. We do this because we want every couple to have access to the tools they need to build a strong and loving marriage. Our generous donors also make it possible for us to offer a partial scholarship to any couples who want the opportunity to attend, but are facing financial barriers.
Another distinctive feature of the workshop is our exclusive SHARE model for
better communication. We unpack it piece by piece and give couples hands-on practice with using it to address problems without creating new wounds. It’s a practical, proven approach that helps couples to understand each other’s emotional needs, break free from destructive communication patterns, and resolve conflicts in a way that achieves true healing.
We’d love to hear about how you think about risk taking?
Launching a new venture is always a risk. We’ve dealt with that multiple times in planting a church, opening my wife’s retail business, and starting Renovation Marriage. I see risk as very different from chance. Chance is random. Risk is calculated. When you put together a solid plan, stay teachable by continuing to learn, and put in the hard work, then the risk becomes much more manageable.
Pricing:
- $500/couple (normally $750) includes 9 facilitated sessions and coaching support
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.renovationmarriage.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/renovationmarriage
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/renovationmrg
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/toddstevens1/
- Twitter: https://x.com/renovationmrg
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@RenovationMarriage
- Other: todd@renovationmarriage.com
