If there’s one thing that Chuck Kuhn understands, it’s that nobody likes moving. Packing boxes, having your life turned upside down (‘Where is the remote?’), and living out of a suitcase stinks. “It’s highly disruptive,” Kuhn says. “Planning is everything.”
As founder and CEO of JK Moving Services, the largest independent moving company in North America, Kuhn has seen his fair share of terrible moves. The NoVA native started his company 42 years ago, at age 16, as a result of monumental moves-gone-bad.
“When I was just entering the seventh grade, my parents had an opportunity to take a job relocation to Iran, and they thought it’d be a great opportunity for us to see the world,” he says. “The movers showed up late, it was snowing, and the movers got into my parents’ liquor boxes. They started drinking, and they wound up in a snowball fight. The snowball fight ended up in a fistfight. So, there’s a fight, there’s an ambulance, there’s police officers; it’s an epic disaster on a very stressful day. That was my first introduction to a ‘professional’ move.”
Once they got to Iran, there were more issues with the onsite moving company, Kuhn recalls, and the family endured yet another disastrous move. The Kuhns were then caught up in Iran’s political upheaval in 1979 when the Shah’s regime was overthrown. Chuck and his brother went back to Virginia to live with their uncle and aunt in Montgomery County.
Around the same time, Kuhn’s uncle purchased a small moving company, so the teen and his older brother worked after school and on weekends in the warehouse, learning the trade of moving and storage. Eventually, Kuhn’s parents moved back to Northern Virginia (and experienced another catastrophic move).
When he turned 16, using the money he had earned working for his uncle, Kuhn started his own moving company.
“I thought, ‘We can make a difference,’” he says. “I started doing moves on weekends when I was not in school and in summertime — a very busy time for the moving business. When I got out of school, I [worked] full-time to grow JK Moving Services.”
The Little Company That Could
JK Moving Services (named after his dad, James Kuhn) has grown from one full-time employee to almost 1,300 today. Kuhn also founded a corporate relocation company called CapRelo for global moves. Between CapRelo and JK Moving, Kuhn has offices in five countries — the U.S., Canada, England, Albania, and Colombia — to accommodate global relocation.
“I’ve said it to our teams before, I think we all need to move every three to five years,” Kuhn says. “One, to purge out all the stuff that we don’t need, and two, to remind ourselves of how stressful and disruptive it is to be packing up and moving, whether it be finding the remote for your TV set or your clothes for work.”
They’re doing something right: The bulk of Kuhn’s business is from repeat customers and referrals. His Sterling-based company is structured around core values, including the importance of collaboration, care and courtesy, commitment to growth, and delivery of a quality product.
“We train to the core values, we stick to the core values, and we walk the talk,” Kuhn says. “We spend a lot of time training. We actually have a house built inside of our warehouse, and our people will train in our training house long before they’ll ever be put in your house, and our industry doesn’t typically train that way.”
Family is paramount to Kuhn, who’s 59. During the company’s 40-plus years, he has employed his parents as well as his two older brothers. Add to that his proudest accomplishment: his 32-year marriage to his wife, Stacy, and their nine children (seven biological and two adopted) and 13 grandchildren — 12 of whom are age 3 or under. “Every weekend is a big Thanksgiving, it feels like,” he says.
Conservation and Controversy
Despite juggling two successful businesses and an expanding family, the western Loudoun County resident still finds time to focus on preserving land for future generations. Kuhn says he started JK Land Holdings in part to purchase land to put into conservation easements.
“When we moved to western Loudoun, I realized how precious [the land] was,” he says. “We were really living in a living, breathing museum of open space and significance. It made me realize how important it was to protect Loudoun County.”
Kuhn did a deep dive into learning about conservation easements and their tax benefits. His JK Land Holdings acquired substantial easements in Frederick, Fauquier, and Loudoun counties, as well as in Colorado.
“He is a very passionate guy,” says Henry Stribling, CEO of Old Dominion Land Conservancy, who worked on easement projects with Kuhn. “When he deeply cares about something, he goes for it and does it.”
Collectively, Kuhn is responsible for conservation easements on nearly 22,000 acres.
“Essentially, you’re trading off the rights to build homes on the land for tax credits,” Kuhn says. “It can never be developed. There’s no overturning those easements, it’s forever. When my great-grandchildren are driving by that property, it will look the way it looks today.”
Kuhn’s actions impressed Leesburg land use attorney David Moyes, who says he’s never met anyone else like him.
“He’s a very creative entrepreneur,” Moyes says. “He’s kind of put a line in the sand for anything that can be preserved; he’s put us on it right away.”
Some of Kuhn’s actions with JK Holdings have been more controversial. The company has bought and sold large parcels of land, some of which is earmarked for mixed use development and data centers, according to The Washington Business Journal.
“As a business owner and resident of this region, I support a balanced approach to development — one that creates business opportunities and a business-friendly climate through thoughtful planning and working together with government, businesses, and residents to ensure maximum workforce benefit,” he told Northern Virginia Magazine in a statement. “We also need to place flex and industrial buildings — including data centers — in appropriate areas while conserving land where possible.”
Kuhn reiterated his commitment to preserving land through conservation easements, while balancing that effort with business development.
“Through JK Land Holdings, we have placed more than 22,000 acres of our land purchases — over half in the Northern Virginia region — into conservation easement, ensuring vulnerable vistas and habitats and historic sites are preserved and protected for future generations. We also work to provide space for businesses to operate, balancing land preservation with the region’s need for economic growth,” he says.
Planting Purpose
Kuhn’s service to the community continued when, using land acquired for a conservation easement in Purcellville, he donated 150 acres to start JK Community Farm. The working farm practices regenerative, sustainable, chemical-free, four-season agriculture, and grows crops solely for those facing food insecurity.
“It’s amazing to me to live in one of the wealthiest counties in one of the wealthiest countries in the world, and to see the amount of food insecurity right here at home is unbelievable,” Kuhn says. “One in six children will go to bed tonight hungry due to food insecurity.”
JK Community Farm, started in 2018, grows more than 50 varieties of vegetables, fruits, and herbs on 14 acres of outdoor fields, two high tunnels, a greenhouse, and 14 raised beds. The farm donates its yield — about 772,000 pounds of food so far — to partners like Loudoun Hunger Relief, Food for Others, Arlington Food Assistance Center, and DC Central Kitchen.
“I’ve seen Chuck out there helping plant stuff and dig up potatoes,” says Jennifer Montgomery, executive director of Loudoun Hunger Relief. “I’m always really impressed [by] how knowledgeable he is about food insecurity.”
Kuhn’s daughter Samantha, 31, serves as executive director of the farm and says watching her father’s example helps her lead.
“I think all of my siblings and I have learned so much from his work ethic,” she says. “Having my dad as my mentor, I’m really fortunate. If there’s ever any questions my siblings or I have about anything on the business side, we all know we can go and get a good answer.”
For his part, Kuhn gives advice when asked, but lets his children make their own decisions.
“Sometimes my coaching is well-received, and sometimes they need to learn from their own trials and errors,” he says.
After a Long Day
Kuhn admits he struggles to balance all the hats he wears and still dedicate time to family. He averages only five hours of sleep a night, takes phone calls at all hours, and favors long nature walks with his wife to unwind. When dining out, he chooses one of the Great American Restaurants, noting he worked at GAR’s now-defunct Fantastic Fritzbe’s Flying Food Factory as a teen. The payoff for Kuhn’s hard work, he says, isn’t money or prestige.
“Growing the business has been a never-ending, enjoyable challenge,” he says. “The ability to give back in the community — that’s been the most rewarding aspect of growing a successful business.”