Finding the human side of athletes in NASCAR

Where did you grow up? How did you get the interest in NASCAR?

"I grew up in Chicago. I spent my entire time up until high school there. I went to Arizona State University to study broadcasting and communications. I had known I wanted to be in the NASCAR industry since probably middle school. I got a pretty early start. It was me and a couple of buddies going around; we were 12 and 13 years old, interviewing people in the garage area at the track, like we had no right to be there whatsoever. My Dad knew that wasn't necessarily the right way to go about it, but no one's going to yell at a kid so I had been in the industry for a while and I had a path that I knew I wanted to go down and to eventually move to Charlotte. Dirty Mo Media actually wasn't on my radar until I talked with Mike Davis. It was at the Daytona 500 when we sat down before the race. It was me, him and my Dad. We talked about what it would look like if I came to Dirty Mo Media. There wasn't really a role for me at the time. I didn't want to be a podcast producer, but we kind of formulated a way for me to fit in here and they offered me a job as soon as I graduated, and it was a role I could not refuse. I graduated and moved here in February. I started the very next day, and my first show, which was Door Bumper Clear —that was the next Monday. So I moved here on a Thursday. The first day of work was Friday, and then the first show Door Bumper Clear was Monday. It was wild."

So where did the passion start for just racing in general?

"Early on, my dad took me to my first race in 2010 at Chicagoland Speedway, and before that, he'd always watched it on TV and I never understood why he liked watching it. (laughs) Like, how is this entertaining? Then I went to my first race, and I remember specifically, we left about halfway through the race cause he wanted to beat traffic. He was going back the next day. I'm like, are you kidding me? Why do we need to leave? We were in the infield, we did the whole tailgating experience, and I was hooked; this is so cool. And, I haven't looked back since."

Are you a goal-driven person when it comes to stuff you want to accomplish? Do you kind of have a path that you see yourself going on?

"I think that changed somewhat when I got to Dirty Mo Media because the goal is always to get a job in the industry, and that was my goal for so long, and then once I actually got in, there was a period of time where I was thinking what do I do now? I just do the job you know, and now that I've been here for a little bit over a year, there's definitely goals. I want the Dale Jr. Download this year to continue to grow. We took on a brand new format, working with Dale, the goal is to just get that show to be the best it can be by the end of the year and going into next year. I love the on-camera stuff. I love doing stuff with people, with fans, with drivers capturing their stories, so to continue to find out what that looks like here is definitely what I want to see through."

I love that, you’ve definitely have seen growth with Dirty Mo Media since the podcasts have started. I think that the fun, quirky stuff really gets fans to interact with the drivers and sport.

"That is how I got started in the sport. When I was that little kid running around, those were the types of questions that we were asking. And it's amazing, the respect you get from the drivers and from other media personalities because like you're asking the different questions, and they remember that. Everyone's going to ask, how's your car this weekend, right? And sometimes that's the important question, that’s the story you're following, but I love the human interest stuff. I feel like it can connect a fan to a driver, you know. For example, I interviewed Jeff Gordon years ago and I found out he scuba dives and I scuba dive and he scuba dives at the same place that I frequently go to Grand Caymon and I'm like, wow, that's crazy. Like we share this connection that I didn't know and it made me a bigger Jeff Gordon fan. So I feel like, especially now, with personalities and the Netflix show, they are so important to grow the sport. I like to bring that out of people, and I think it's important."

What is your biggest struggle in life right now?

"Right now is just finding a balance for everything. I mean, I love the job, but it can be intense at times. It can be long days and a lot of prep, and I wouldn't trade that for anything but I have other goals outside of just work. I'm big into the triathlon scene, and I'm going to be training for my next Iron Man 70.3, which is coming up in October. It's like, oh, man, I need to find time aside to train for that and then just time to relax and spend time on my personal life and stuff like that. It's finding a balance for all that right now. Which, you know, means if I have to get up early, wake up at 5:30 in the morning before a podcast day go for a swim and then come to work and then do a full day's work podcasting, maybe that's what I have to do, but that's probably the biggest thing is finding that balance."

So, you just said next triathlon. Have you done a full Iron Man?

“Not a full. I've done 2 halfs and I'm training for my third, which will be in October. We talked about that work life balance — that is like a full-time job training for a full (laughs). So that's a back pocket thing. But I have to do one eventually, no doubt.”

What is a proud moment in your life that has shaped you into the person you are today?

"It's not one specific moment, but my favorite thing to go back to is that I got started with my Dad being my camera guy and he was, up until I started at Dirty Mo Media. It was the two of us as the team, and obviously, when I started working here, we're like, well, dang, we just were at the Phoenix championship race a few years ago. That was our last race. And what's been really awesome is, I'll be going to Chicago. And I went to Daytona, and there are certain races where he'll still go to, and he knows so many people in the industry, and we'll be able to do it again together, just like the old days. I think it's just unique because you don't really see that type of thing carry on for a father and son. And so anytime we're able to share a weekend together, it’s amazing."

I love you and your Dad started this as a team.

"He's just my camera guy. That was it. He has some friends he made when he used to work at the Chicago Bulls. So he had some friends or coworkers that went from the Bulls to NASCAR, and knew some folks there and he was able to kind of help make some connections back when we were just first trying to get a conversation with NASCAR to get media credentials. But yeah, we've kind of networked and gotten to know a lot of the people in the media world just together, working through it over the years, which is awesome, cause now every time I go to the race track and he's not there, everyone like, hey, how's your Dad doing? Where is he at? When's his next race? "

10 years from now, what are you aiming to accomplish in this career?

"That's a good question. I don't know. I like what I'm doing here, and you see a lot of people who have been here for so long. I could certainly see myself still here; I don't know in what capacity that would look like; obviously at least for me, the goal has always been to do some sort of TV coverage, whether it be on pit road or kind of like what a Marty Smith does or what a Rutledgewood did. I'd love to continue to chase that, but I don't know. TV is changing, so fast with what that format looks like. It's finding some sort of fit like that would be interesting just to continue to tell those human interest stories, and you know, I love just getting people's stories and having a chance to get to know something that I would like to do."

The micro and macro to building community and a loving family

Take me back to earlier times, what was the journey like for you to Charlotte?

"We moved to Charlotte in 2014. We were living in New York and fell in love with the city but very quickly realized we couldn't afford it. I am originally from Pinehurst, I just had a job up in New York and that’s where I met Page, and we started dating. It was an amazing two and a half years but we just realized that when we were looking at a second or third-floor walk-up, that we wanted to have kids, and that you would be bringing strollers and cribs up and down. Then we started looking around. She was in the entertainment business, and she was on the talent acquisition/identification side of the TV roles, the head of the department at NBC typically then went on to a role in TV, and that's what Page wanted to do. I think she got a few offers in Richmond, Miami and Raleigh. We both went to Chapel Hill — I'm from North Carolina, and she's from Virginia. So, we said let's do Raleigh, and you get to Raleigh and you think you're fancy, right, like oh we are from New York. But it was right around when Ashley Christensen was opening these great restaurants in Raleigh, and they were all starting to pop off; we had a ton of friends from college still there, and we just fell in love with it. All three kids were born there, and we were like man Raleigh’s it. This is where we're going to be. But if we were ever going to go anywhere, it would be Charlotte because Page’s brother, Casey Crawford, who runs Movement Mortgage, is down here and it would bring us closer to family; my folks are still in Pinehurst. They'd still be close, and then she started looking at stations, and there is a Fox affiliate, and Fox is the only local news that doesn't go to a bigger show. For example, NBC goes to the Today Show and ABC goes to Good Morning America. So I mean, truly, you talk about stars aligning — Fox reaches out and says Page, we want to start a morning show and we want you to be one of the anchors. And she's like, wow, OK, we got to take this seriously. She gets the gig and fast forward, comes down here, and we have been here ever since and it was really cool; you'll probably recognize some of these names. It was a really cool period of time because Garrett Tichey was running We Love CLT and it was like a whole group of us connecting and networking. It was crazy, and I'm a big networking nerd. I love that stuff. Now I realize and I'm a little further away from it now, I got my kids that are getting older. I'm tied up in that stuff and Movement and so maybe these types of things are still happening, but it doesn't feel like it. At the same time you had We Love CLT and then you had Corri Smith who was doing #instabeerupCLT. They would go to a brewery and everybody would show up. Uber was sponsoring rides home so people could actually have a couple drinks. And I'm like, this is the best. I’ve got to give those two so much credit because they brought together the community in a big way, and I know you just asked me about when we moved here so I'll stop. But anyway, that was the era. That was 2014. You had the Panthers winning like crazy, the city was just electric. You had really cool networking events happening and it was a really it was a cool year to move here."

I love that, I’ve met and interviewed a few folks for this and your name always came up so it’s cool to see everyone going back to that point in time and realizing how important it all was.

"For sure. And then the other thing I was gonna add is that right around that time, not long after we got here, Page and I started a podcast called Date Night, and it was a really cheap way to make friends, you know? I mean, we found some cool people in Charlotte, we would bring them on with their significant other and when you interview someone with their significant other, they open up and they say things that they probably wouldn't normally say. Especially when you get athletes who are constantly being interviewed. So the interviews or the answers can get a little rouge. We did like 90 of them or something — it was just a blast. I've always been a Panthers fan. I've always been into the sports down here and that just really cemented it all for us.”

So, how did that transition for you kind of evolve with becoming the hype man and working with the Panthers? Did you have a vision of being that social and present with these teams? Was that a goal for you?

"No, so I came to Movement in 2017, and I got to give Movement and all my leaders here credit because they love the side stuff. They see that I'm building community, and they see that I'm putting eyeballs on Movement, and they're so supportive. Page and I always hosted things and saw things, and we just did that stuff together, and it has evolved into her own gig now where she's giving keynote speeches. For me, it evolved in a really different way. I worked in sports prior to all this and in 2008, the Beijing Olympic Games I'm working for USA Baseball and the International Baseball Federation, and we had been kicked out of the Olympics. That was our last Olympics, and we were trying to make a splash to impress the International Olympic Committee and put us back in the games. So what do we do? We can't bring the players because the players did not want to stop the season. So what else could we do? We brought in the Head of Entertainment for the New York Yankees, and his name was Mike Bonner. Fast forward from 2008 to 2020, I think he got a gig before COVID and ran entertainment for the Panthers and, so Bonner gets the job. I think he went Yankees, Broncos, Notre Dame, then to the Panthers, and he calls me up, and he said, I've got a crazy idea — I see the antics with your family online and all this kind of stuff. We want to bring a hype man to the in-game experience to the fans. And what do you think? And I'm like, are you kidding me? And then COVID hits so no crowds and nobody to hype up, and I was like, man, well, I guess it could have been worse. COVID was a pretty tough period. If this is the only thing that happens, then, OK. Fast forward a year, he calls me back and says you wanna run it back? I said sure, Mike. And so they actually just called me last week, and it will be season four. It's been a ton of fun. I’m super excited."

Do you get nervous when you do these kind of things or does it just come naturally? It seems like it’s so easy for you.

“Oh, I appreciate it. Now you're getting to the personal stuff. I get nervous for sponsor hits. Because from all of my jobs here, I now get the amount of money that goes into these investments for companies. At the end of every season, we're giving away a truck, and it's like Daimler, Chrysler of Charlotte GMC 2500 Lt. — they want all that stuff. I've been fortunate enough to just do a handful of little mini social media brand deals and, again, the perspective of working for a big company but then being on that side and they're like, you need to say this and do this, I mean it's serious. That's when I get nervous. But the stuff in the crowd with the fans and that side of things, that's the best. I give the Panthers credit, too, because they let me just be me. Most of the time, it's them saying you've got a minute, and we've set you up with this guy – have fun, and there's no script. That is the best, I thrive in that. I like that when it's like here is the truck you're giving away. I'm like, OK, I need to look at this a couple of times.”

Are you a goal driven person when it comes to things that you want to?

"I'm not a big write this stuff on the board kind of guy, and I don't know what that says about me. I am detail-oriented and task-oriented. I really like to do a good job. I like to make sure I do a good job. Of course, you know you have strategy and vision and a role like I'm in here, but I’ve have never really been into writing a goal on the board."

What is your biggest struggle in life right now?

"The biggest struggle in life is something that I would say, well, there's the micro and macro. The struggle right now is that the mortgage industry is tough. I mean everybody, whether you own or rent, the price and cost of living in Charlotte is going up like crazy. So, we have to be aware of that as a mortgage company. But then we're also in a high-rate environment, so we are supporting our loan officers in an environment where many borrowers are locked into the 2’s and 3’s. It's a really weird time, and people are getting out of the industry, and we just have to continue to support those loan officers with the best possible service and with the best possible solutions to try to close more leads and that's tough. Macro, Page and I talk all the time, I think this is like a Tony Robbins thing but work-life integration. We're big believers in work-life balance. It's like, good luck with that. I mean, that's tough to pull off. We try and involve our kids in everything. We brough the kids to Movement yesterday for some of the events that we're doing. Finding that balance of they are so busy with their sports and school, Page and I are so busy with our jobs so making it work so we can both be in each other's lives versus this must stop, so I can now start this. That's just not realistic. And fortunately, neither of us put pressure on ourselves, but integrating it is equally tough.”

Is there a proud moment in your life that sticks out to you that has shaped you into the person you are today?

"When you think about parenting, we're out there on social, and we've seen other parents or people do that, and they try to integrate their kids, or they try to hide their kids from it. And some people like to block their kid's faces on social media and all that kind of stuff. I am hyper-cognizant of that and want to be sure that the kids are always comfortable with it. We think about that a lot and we think about if we are too much out there. I have volunteered for the last two years to do chaperoning on the DC trip for the kids, and I do it because I want to be around them, I want to be the whole thing and see our kids want us to be around and our kids tell us everything. Last night, we went to a Movement networking event, and my son Ford, I took him there after goalie training, and he could have been no, take me home, and he was sitting there at one point, talking to one of our loan officers from Atlanta for like 15 minutes about college recruiting. And I think those are the proud moments of where we definitely are trying to be our kids friends but we want to be parents and we want to lead them and be strict and we need to be and and give them freedom when they need it. But at the same time, you want them to want you around too and so I don't know, I've never been asked that and I've never really thought about that answer. That's the first day it came to me; we’ve got a really cool thing going with our kids, where we all genuinely like to hang out with each other. The work I do at Movement makes me proud, the work I do with the Panthers makes me proud but watching our kids grow, mature and develop and have other people like being around your kids too. That probably makes me the most proud. We definitely want to be parents first, but it’s amazing how that earns you the respect as a friend.”

"Interesting timing. If you asked me that because I was like literally saying it to Ford when we were driving home; this is going to sound like I'm overreacting, but you were awesome tonight. I mean, there were like 40-year-olds, 50-year-olds. That was a work event. And we just stopped in there for a quick second because we had just a lot of people from out of town that are not normally here and you were acting like an adult and it was awesome."

Anything that sticks out that you're really proud of, of your time here with Movement Mortgage?

"So I inherited an amazing team, an amazing brand and the culture here was already in place, which is just what I've found over the last seven years here that that's increasingly rare. We've gone through changes. You know, people have come and gone, but what's happened recently is we've had people leave, which is frustrating, but they're leaving to go to big jobs in the mortgage, and this almost sounds like the same conversation as the kids one but two years ago, one of my top directors went and took a CMO role in a small company and then he just took a CMO role at like a monster company, bigger than us and we talk all the time and it's just the coolest thing. I think that's it for me. The fun part of this thing is leadership and growing people. I'm always going to dance and have fun on social media. I just. I love that stuff. But you know, that's kind of fleeting and it's not what it's all about. It's about putting people in homes. It's about building more schools and putting kids in schools. All that is important, and I'm happy to talk about it. But I also just care about these guys. I hope they're here for forever. And if they're not, just make sure that they have an amazing gig after this."

Growing Charlotte’s best kept secret

Killer Coffee, Resident Culture - SouthEnd — Charlotte, NC

Let’s start a bit earlier on, how did you make your way to Charlotte?

"I'm from a town called Anderson, SC. It's about two hours from here, and I went to school at Clemson after I graduated high school, and after that, I was living down in South Carolina. It was 2008, so the economy was less than stellar, to say the least. There weren't a lot of job opportunities down there; I was just bouncing around doing random stuff, and then a friend of mine from school had moved up here right after graduation and was working for the financial company Vanguard. Things started getting a little better, and they started hiring people again, and my friend was like, hey, you need to apply; I can get you a job here; you're a college graduate, you've got some experience, and I can get you a job here. Multiple of my friends through avenues had ended up in Charlotte; I just wasn't there yet, so that was kind of how I ended up here. I was just moving here for that job. I think when you're 24, you never really think about the long term, like where am I gonna be in five years and much less 15? So, here I am, and it's become my home now."

How did Killer Coffee come to light? Where did that passion for coffee kick in for you?

"I was working at a couple of different financial places for about 8-9 years. Ironically, once I moved here, I took a trip to Thailand. I was really unhappy with my job, and I took a trip there. I had this epiphany that in the grand scheme of the world, Americans have it better than almost everybody in Thailand, right? But from all the people I was interacting with, who were Thai, they just seemed so much happier than me, my friends, and everybody that I knew. I started to question how that could be. While I was there, I just kind of picked at that idea, and I realize that, oh, they're doing something that they love. For example, this guy loves serving this dish at this restaurant; this person loves being a cobbler fixing shoes; this person loves that occupation. So there was less pressure for them to do something they didn't want to do to make money; their culture doesn't have it. I thought that the biggest thing that I was missing was that I was not doing something I loved. And that's kind of what got me on this journey and Trying to figure out what it is that I want to do with my life. The first thing I knew I needed to do to do is get out of debt (laughs). I got a side job working at a coffee shop and just really fell in love with it and realized how much hard work it actually is. You're on your feet all day you're running around, you're up early hours. For the last decade, I didn't really do a job where I was up on my feet, doing stuff with my hands. I really fell in love with that portion of it, but then you begin to see the community-building side of it. And I really do like being able to connect with people and be the reason that they come in the morning because I may only have 45 seconds to a minute to talk to somebody, but I can set their day up in a better path because I might be the first person they're seeing in the morning. So, for me, I take it as an obligation. My job is to make sure that your day starts off right. The rest of the world will try to interfere with that, but I can do something in this minute and a half, whether it's just saying good morning and giving you the product you want or asking you how you are and building that rapport. So that's why I fell in love with it. Then, as a goal, how do I do this and have it be a career? That's when I started working at Undercurrent Coffee for a while just because at the time, they were one of the most, in my limited view of the industry; they were the most professional, and they were also paying the best honestly, so I started working there, and just through that job, I fell in love even more with the art and the craft of coffee and was exploring this idea of opening my own cafe. My goal was to do every job. I don't want to just get a bunch of money, go do it and not understand what it is I'm trying to do. I started at the bottom and worked my way up to become a manager in that company. So then I was trying to take that next leap to the next level. That's when this opportunity came up to basically build this coffee program for Resident Cultire. Where we are sitting, believe it or not, this was a this was a broom closet when they hired me. It was a lot of work to envision how I want it to look. How do I want it to feel. Just building it from the ground up. Ironically, now that I've become the Director of Operations for this cafe, everything comes full circle. I'm realizing a lot of the education that I got at Clemson was in operations management, and I'm actually using my degree. Look at that. My dad was right. Damn it. (laughs) So yeah, that's the start of all of this."

My first time here, I was on my way to work and you guys were pretty busy and you acknowledged me and asked how I was doing and made me such a great coffee and gave me a free coffee card for my next visit for the trouble when there wasn’t trouble at all. That made me come back and it’s now a routine that I stop here when I’m in the office.

“For me, it's about serving coffee at a really, really high level. But what we're serving at the end of the day, whether it's this part of the business or you're a bar serving beer or your at McDonald's serving a hamburger, you're serving hospitality. That's what it is. You could offer someone the greatest cup of coffee they ever had, but if you're a jackass and just give it to them; that's what they are going to remember so my big goal with building this place is a lot of specialty coffee to people who are new to it — is it can feel really intimidating. There's a lot of words you don't know. I mean, the cafe can be loud, there's a grinder, there's machines with steam. It can be a lot if you don't know what you are looking for or if you're trying to like come to this space for the first time and I don't want people to feel intimidated here, I want people to feel like they can come in and talk to my staff and ask questions, and that's one of the things that I've been very, very proactive on when I've had to hire new people. I'm very focused on that, more than how well they know coffee, because I can teach what you need to know about coffee, but I can't teach you to care about the customers when they come in and to want to talk to them and learn about them. The example that I use for my staff is the pretentious barista is a trope for a reason because there's a lot of them and we don't want that here. We want people to be able to come in if you drink Starbucks every day for the last 15 years. I want you to understand what we're doing but be comfortable enough to ask a question, and that I feel like we do a really nice job of balancing that here while also bringing that attention of the craft and care that you would get a cocktail bar.”

Are you a goal-driven person?

“I wish I could take it day by day, honestly. Those people seem to be a lot more chill than me. I'm a very goal-driven person. I don't like to put things in time frames because I feel like that's an unnecessary anxiety that I can avoid, but at the same time, if I don't have a plan, then what am I doing? I feel kind of rudderless. Aim it that way, and let's go that way. And if it takes us seven months to a year to get there, that's fine. But if it takes us seven days, that's even better. So I think for this, our real goal has been to just build the community around it. When we first opened, there was another gentleman running the kitchen, Hector Gonzalez and he and I essentially opened this first part of the day here at Resident Culture and in our heads because I had known him through working in cafes because he frequented them regularly; we were kind of brainstorming. We're like, alright, we're going to open a cafe. It's going to be great. Your food's awesome, my coffee is great, and we ran through the soft opening, but that is not what this is. The space is way too big. What are we like? How do we figure that out? That was our first real big goal, which was to figure out who we were. I think we kind of found the groove of what we are, and that is we are an interesting hybrid of a restaurant, cafe, a coffee shop and a co-working space. So we have the room to come in and do your work. If you want to get away from all of this noise because, like I said, this is a noisy area over here, you can turn the corner and can go sit and you can study, do your work, whatever, but if you want to hang out and get that cafe feel, you can, you want to go sit at the bar and have lunch and have a beer, you can do that. So, in this area of the neighborhood that's really just now beginning to form, even though we are in SouthEnd, we're kind of on the outskirts a little bit. Being that gathering space for this neighborhood as it grows, that was our goal to determine what it is, and I think that's what we are. The variety that we offer allows for anyone to walk in the door, and that's really our big goal, to come in and feel comfortable wanting them to come up and be willing to ask a question or just enjoy the space. Yeah. It's really kind of evolved into that and we're happy to find that we found that groove. I think we're just now looking at how we grow this and how we let the best-kept secret in Charlotte out.”

What is your biggest struggle with life right now?

“I would say my biggest struggle is work-life balance. I have a one-month-old daughter at home, so it's learning the balance of how that looks with her being here. As before, you have to work longer hours and you stay and do it. It's like, hey, you've been gone a real long time, and you're missing precious moments. Your wife's exhausted from dealing with the baby for all that time. So, learning that new balance is really my biggest struggle right now. From the work side of it, luckily, I've got great staff that have been with me a long time and are able to run this place without me. For me, I think that's the ultimate testament to any sort of management relationship if you can teach somebody to do it and not you be here. And in fact, I feel like sometimes I get behind the bar, and I'm in the way. We're actually less efficient with me here.”

What is a proud moment in your life that has shaped you into the person you are today?

“It's a really interesting question. The thing that probably shaped me to where I am today, realistically, was when I decided to get serious with my wife. She was a really big factor and gave me the encouragement to take the leap moving from Finance into something that I cared more about and without her holding my hand on the way down that jump, I don't know that I would have ever done it, and I would have been just a miserable 50 year old in a suit and tie that I probably should have tossed out 15 years ago. But it's the biggest thing that's kind of taken me from the time I was in to the place I am now. Realistically, if I'm a smart man, it'll be the thing that takes me from where I am now to where I need to go. So it's that support, I think, is really important. Now that I'm thinking about it, it’s really underappreciated in the grand scheme of things.”

Whats next?

“With this place, I mean, we just love our customers. What we want to do is just continue to grow. We've got a lot of room to grow. It's a good spot to be in, and we've got the ability to grow and bring more people under the tent to evangelize coffee. What we have to offer and what we have to teach them. I think that's our big goal here, which is to feel like we've got a lot of customers, a lot of regulars and that they are comfortable and understand what we do and trust us. My hope is that over the next year or so, we can begin to expand some of the higher-end coffee stuff that we do, like potentially bringing single origin coffees and get that educational piece about the coffee as a larger product. Having people maybe branch out and like teach them a little bit about coffee. That's one of my goals, how do I get people to trust me in that? Because I think the want is there, and it's ironic that I technically worked for a brewery because I feel coffee is where beer was at 15 years ago, right? Where there is a subset of people who understand the product and the craft that goes into in the care and they want to learn more. They'll sit down at a bar and drink 15 IPA's to tell the difference between all the different hops. Why would they not be willing to learn more about coffee as well? That is one of our longer-term goals here. My short-term goals I'm hoping I get a nap this afternoon (laughs).”

If you do the legwork, not only will the doors open, but you'll be prepared to walk through them

Restaurant Constance — Charlotte, NC

I always start these conversations understanding the person’s path to Charlotte. Everybody's journey to the city is so different, and I know you've lived in New York City, D.C., and Myrtle Beach. So, what was the journey like to Charlotte?

"Food. Well, I mean, I got here because of food, really. Also, my children's mom wanted to get back into the workforce, and she had a job offer here. So, there are a couple of different factors at play. Those are the primary ones, that was in 2004."

It was chosen for you, and you had to pay attention to it. Was it always food that sparked a passion for you, or did you have something else that you thought would be your career path?

"Yeah, a couple of serendipitous culinary moments. I grew up in the restaurant business, but it wasn't something I thought about doing while I was in the business, you know? Growing up, it was just what we did. It was just part of the family fabric. I'm one of five, and we all worked in my Dad’s restaurant, busing tables or washing dishes or, in my case, sometimes I got to cook. My cousin did the same thing, too, and it's just something that we did. I guess my experience in high school wasn't great; I don't know; I didn't have very much interest in it. When I graduated, my Dad actually sent me to culinary school. I went unwillingly (laughs), I was told, and then I wound up in this hotel. My Dad's friend's son was the chef there, but my Dad also knew the owners of the hotel. This is back in Myrtle Beach and in the early 90s, so everybody still knew everybody, and he just sent me along my way. Once I got into this hotel, I found that this restaurant was kind of fine dining. It was an Inn, and it was grounded in European tradition. So if you got a room, you got breakfast, and then you got a dinner option. The menu changed every single day, and they were focused on local foods; they were focused on great European traditions when it came down to the style of food, and they were focused on technique. Soon after I arrived there, I realized I was in the right place, and I loved it. Fresh basil and peaches are available in the summertime, as well as soft shell crabs. Do you know what I mean? As a young cook and kid I had so many questions, and I was just super excited about it. Of course, I had no idea what I was doing at the same time, but they held on to me, and that meant a lot."

Did you have that moment where it just hit you that this was where you were meant to be?

"Yeah, definitely. It was the summertime, and there were a lot of African American cooks there; it was such a cool environment to be in. I remember one of the ladies that was one of the chefs there for like 20 years, like her tenure was 20 years, and she was prepping fruit in the morning time; she and I just had a little 10 to 15-second conversation about why fruit is so much and why the fruit we were having and prepping was so much sweeter in the summertime. It was like the light went on, and I thought, this is different, and I wanted to learn more."

What was the experience like at your other restaurants or other places?

"Well, I just worked for my Dad at that point, and I had a dishwashing position at Outback Steakhouse. That wasn't exactly glamorous, you know? There were no culinary breakthroughs to speak of during my time there other than that bread that they served, whatever it was. So my Dad's restaurant was comfort, it was home, it was a craft that created connections in the community, and when I say the community, like Myrtle Beach, all of our friends worked there, but also we had repeat customers every single year come from all over the country to my Dad's restaurant. As a kid, you can't really pick up on what's going on. But there's an undercurrent of energy going on there that if you stay open-minded enough down the road, at some point, it'll make sense, and soon after, I landed at the selling end and continued my career there.”

You are really big on locally sourced products from local farms in the state. Did that kick off at that point, or was it when you were here in Charlotte?

"The seed was definitely planted there. The seed was 100% planted there. Even then, we would have fishermen come up well before, like refrigerated trucks and all that stuff; these guys from McClellanville almost always African American fishermen would come up and bring the crab, the shrimp and whatever else they caught on the back of this beat up pickup truck in a cooler full of ice, and it was just a handoff. It was such a cool thing to witness as a kid in such a cool time and in our hospitality industry era, where things were just very simple."

And then you built that here with folks and farmers, bringing people together.

"Yeah. Well, then you learn when fresh shrimp are available. You know what I mean? So then you have this clock that's ticking within you and like, okay, springs coming, soft shell crabs and soon after that fresh shrimp, and the shrimp would reappear at the end of summer once the waters cooled down a little bit and Mother Nature was good to us so the seed was planted there. I guess it all had always been a part of me, but I have to say that I worked for some really, really committed people with lots of great experience who were willing to share their knowledge and, coupled with the childhood I grew up with is how I got to where I am today."

Are you a goal-driven person?

"No. I don't think there is anything wrong with setting goals. It can be productive and it can be counterproductive, right? My job at this point is to stay out of the way as much as possible and let whatever happens happen as long as I play my part. I view my role here in the restaurant we're sitting in now and the company that I own in this life as a spoke-on-the-wheel thing. Nobody's really in charge. I also believe in doing the right thing and continuing to do the right thing, and I think whenever you put that good energy out there, it comes back. So, this restaurant was never in the plans; there were never any plans for this. I just had an idea, whenever I was laid off in March of 2020, to get out there myself and into service and use my platform to help support the farmers. Then, I would go back to work whenever COVID left. Two weeks into that, I would do ten meals a day out of my apartment and then go back to Upstream, my previous employer. Two weeks into that venture, I delivered unknowingly to a food writer, who wrote a glowing review of the food she ate. And then the rest is history, man. I went from doing 10 to 30 to 40 meals a day.

It's one of those things that I'm a big believer in if you do the leg work, the doors will open. If you do the legwork, not only will the doors open, but you'll be prepared to walk through them. That's nothing I made up. It's just what I'm taught. A lot of this is recovery-based. I've been sober a long time. So that's just what I did. That's what we continue to do. Then we moved in over here. I was in the back corner. It was like a little wedge in September 2020. Then, a random phone call from a guy from the Carolina Panthers, Christian McCaffrey, said he was looking for a personal chef, breakfast, lunch and dinner, five days a week, 365. That became our Personal Chef Division, and then a lady called who said that she had lost two deposits and was just trying to get her daughter married. This is May 2020, and she needed somebody to come to her house and cook in the backyard to get her daughter married. So that became our Events Division. It's all just putting it out there to the next right thing, and whatever happens, happens, and here we are. The restaurant we're sitting in now became a thing because the previous tenant had seen some success in 2021 and 2022 and was looking for a larger space. And so he was walking down that hallway, and I was walking the other way. He was staring at his phone. I was probably staring at mine. He goes, hey man, if you know anybody that wants to sublease this restaurant, let me know we're going to move on, and I said, well, I'm opening up a restaurant.

From a goal standpoint, you know, it's a one-day-at-a-time thing for me, and that's to attack the day like literally attack the day and, you know, try to meet as many moments that present themselves as challenges as I can and also give myself and those people around us as much grace as that moment requires as well. We try to learn from it."

Is there a struggle that you're currently dealing with right now?

"No, because, look, I used to be homeless. I used to live on the streets. I was homeless for a year and a half. I nearly died right around the corner. I was strung out. I was an addict. I've been served; November would be ten years, God willing. So that's my perspective, and bad days for most people aren't necessarily bad days for me. Plus, I stay connected to the recovery community that writes the wrong between the ears on a regular basis. Are there struggles? No. Do we have challenges? Yes. I'm a small business owner, and I have 40 employees. It's election season, and the business is up and down. You know what I mean? I have challenges, but I don't have struggles."

What is a proud moment you can look back on that has shaped you into who you are today?

"Yeah, I have to lean into sobriety, and that's one day at a time. What I love about sobriety is I tried to do this life thing on my own for 38 years, and I failed miserably, so whenever I surrendered to my reality and the consequences of substance abuse and let other people into my life, everything changed."”

The belief in getting one more shot

Charlotte Motor Speedway — Charlotte, NC

This was one of those photo essays that remind me how lucky I am to be doing this and how special people are. Alan Cavanna is a Motorsports Reporter for NASCAR and a passionate journalist who has been through all of the ups and downs to make his dream come true. Hard work and dedication to do his best work is at the forefront of Alan’s mindset to continue to be the best at what he loves. Being able to watch him work his magic and interact with fans, drivers and coworkers was incredible and you immediately saw how special his talent truly is. Besides being a great human, Alan keeps the belief in himself in knowing this dream will become reality.

What was the journey like for you on how you ended up in Charlotte?

"Well, my journey starts with racing and all the way to my family of racers. My grandfather was a professional. But growing up in Connecticut I was fortunate enough to race cars called Quarter Midgets, which are like go-karts. That's what a lot of the professionals started driving when they're young. And I was fortunate enough to do that up in New England. There comes a time in racing when you are not going to be pro, probably because you ran out of talent or money. I always say that's the joke, right? You just ran out of money, not talent. Being an only child, I had this love affair with television and wanted to be on TV and entertain. I grew up in that Sports Center generation. That was me every morning before school, I was just watching Sports Center. I wanted to do that. I wanted to be on television and stay in racing, and ultimately, professionally, I knew that to do that in NASCAR, you had to be in Charlotte. It’s the home of racing. Charlotte is like this Mecca. When you're from Connecticut in terms of racing it's this racing Mecca because everything is based out of here. So that led me here - I knew if I wanted to do NASCAR coverage professionally at some point, I'd have to get to Charlotte. That was the goal. So every step of the ladder and every step I made was focused on how to do this like a chess game to get there. The first job you just have to get on somewhere. So that didn't matter. I ended up going to a small town in Missouri. Joplin, MO, and covered some racing out there, but I was a news guy. I was a news reporter covering murders, fires, city council meetings, and all that stuff. So that's job one. Then, I went to Evansville, IN. And that was kind of job two, but always thinking, how am I going to work my way to Charlotte and back then, the Charlotte news market really was, like, third job territory. That was a prestige thing. Charlotte was a top 25 market, it took a little bit to climb that ladder and get there. It worked out - when the third job time came around, and I was climbing the ladder, and I applied to all the Charlotte stations and channel 9, WSOC said yes and boom, man, I was in. I was in Charlotte. So that's step one, right? Then when you get to Charlotte, NASCAR isn't just a sport, it's a business. It's an economy, right? There are thousands of people who have their jobs and their livelihoods tied to the sport, not just racing and driving. That helped me do economic stories. This was 2008 where the economy was kind of going down. That meant sponsors were leaving; teams were shutting down. So I could do NASCAR stories from a news perspective and little things like that helped get me ingrained with meeting people, going to teams, talking to them, being at their shops. That stuff helped. Then my, I hate to say big break because it was bad for him, but this guy named Jeremy Mayfield, he tested positive for using meth, and it became this huge news story. So you mix news and NASCAR; who are they going to call on in the newsroom? They're like, Alan, how can you help us here? I was the first one to get an interview with Jeremy Mayfield on camera, and that not only got good news attention, but the NASCAR world picked up on that. This was right at the forefront of Twitter when it was kind of getting big. So on Twitter, I was a NASCAR guy, so all of a sudden, people following were like, this guy who we don't really know, what does he do? Who is this guy? Oh, he has the Jeremy Mayfield interview. Then, NASCAR radio started talking about it, and it ended up on Sports Center, like all this stuff. And from there, it was working from the inside, man, you know, kind of noticing people. I used to take my weeks off at the news job, like vacation time, and go cover NASCAR races. That was my vacation, and I just tried to get in with all these people because I could use a press pass from channel 9.  It would get me places and I was able to work from the inside. Once I got to Charlotte, it was awesome."

Did you have a hard time accepting that racing as a career wasn't going to be a thing instead of just covering it for news?

"No, I think you know from a very early age. The haves and the have-nots. I think you can get it very quickly. At age nine, you realize, oh, multi-millionaires become race car drivers right in their families. But I was very much fine with that. Yeah, I retired at 15, and I went out on top as a champion. That's all I wanted (laughs)."

Are you a goal-driven person when it comes to things you want to accomplish, or do you just go with the flow and figure things out along the way?

"I would say I'm goal-driven because I had one dream since 6th grade, and look, I'm doing it. But, knock on wood, I understand how rare and crazy that is. That thing I wanted to do actually happened. Do you know what I mean? It actually happened. It's fun to hear from friends in high school because I was that kid making the morning announcements and doing all that dumb stuff. They're like, wow, you actually went on television like it actually worked all those dumb racing shirts you wore in 6th grade like you were actually covering this guy. (Points at shirt and laughs) This guy's my coworker, my favorite racer, Rusty Wallace - we're going to be coworkers soon. It blows my mind."

What about goals for now? Do you have anything that you want to achieve in this in this aspect of your career?

"100% because I've had an interesting journey; I made it not quite to the top of the ladder, not quite to the tip of the spear, but three years ago, I lost my job with Fox. I hit my goal, everything was awesome, and then I lost it, I lost it. I'm not on network television anymore. I'm not at the forefront of when you turn it on Saturdays. I never made it to Sundays in terms of covering the NASCAR Cup series, like actually doing that, and it's very tough and humbling. It's hard to stick around, and I don't know if I'll ever get that chance again, but that's what these last three years have been about trying to climb that ladder once again. You know, maybe learning a few lessons and just trying to apply that stuff and climb the ladder again because most people don't get one shot, and here I am trying to get a second shot, and I know how rare that is, and it's humbling, and I'm still here. I'm still trying to climb that ladder again and maybe get another chance. And that's not to discredit the stuff I've been doing the last three years because I've had such good opportunities from people to even keep me around, like doing stuff with NASCAR digital and the radio teams,  Performance Racing Network, Motor Racing Network. They've been so kind to me to give me these opportunities. I still get to the track. I'm still part of these legendary broadcast teams, and I'm just so thankful because some people lose that gig and out of sight, out of mind, you're never heard from again. And I've been able to stay in this wonderful community. And you know, it’s because of the relationships you make on the way up. So that's still keeping me in the sport. I'm grateful for that. It's just I have a love affair, you know, with television and the camera, and hopefully, I have at least one more shot at that. We'll see."

What is your biggest struggle right now?

"Professionally, I mean, I picked a profession and a goal where there's literally like six positions on the planet(laughs). I mean, maybe not six, but there are very few positions that exist, and I've had one. And then I lost it, and now I'm trying to get it again. What are you thinking? That's very tough, professionally. There are a few of these jobs, and I'm trying to get one for a second time, but what worked once may work. And that was time, right? I'm not a 26-year-old, nor do I have a huge professional runway in front of me. There's plenty of competition behind me. There are plenty of 28 to 30-year-olds behind me trying to do the same thing. I have to think about more important things now; I have a wife, I have a family and I have to think about that. How long can I chip away at this before I really think I need a nine-to-five with a pension or something? Those things really become real. Fortunately, I have. I'm blessed with an awesome wife, a Sugar Mama, who has insurance and all this stuff (laughs). It's allowing me to keep pursuing these dreams. But at some point, you have to think responsibly. I think that's the biggest thing that comes with age and time is that you can't pursue the dream forever, right? So I think that's the biggest challenge. As time goes on, the self-doubt creeps in and all that, and that can be tough, but it's still there. You then have to make these resume reels of yourself and send them out. And I watch them. I'm like, damn, I can't do this. Like, you wonder sometimes that maybe this wasn't meant for me, but then I watch again, and I really see that I can do it; just give me one more shot. I just believe, and I know it's possible."

What is a proud moment that sticks out to you that has shaped you into the person you are today?

"I'm proud to still just be here, that I'm still on the journey, that I stuck it out, that I did make those relationships. The day it all came crashing down, there were still people there willing to give me a shot and keep me in this community professionally because, without it, you're just out of sight, out of mind, especially in the NASCAR world. I'm proud that I've made those relationships and that people seem to like me, which I hope reflects that I've been a good person and that I've been genuine with people. I hope it's a reflection of the work that I've done and that it's been positive. The whole goal going in was to just be that conduit between racing and the race fan because that's what I was, and hopefully, that passion comes through, and the fact that I'm still here is a reflection that people recognize I still have that passion. I'm proud to have a loving wife who supports me and understands my career path, and she's on a very similar one. I'm proud personally that I have such a supporting wife, and I couldn't do it without her, literally. I wish I could think of one moment, but it's been a heck of a journey. And I've been here in Charlotte for 16 years now, which is crazy, to see that fly by and see all the change in the city and everything and still be here.

I feel people would just give up so easily especially with tough struggles along the way

"I don't know what else I would do; that's the other side of it. I've been doing this for so long. I'm a professionally trained journalist and broadcaster. What the hell else would I do?

Would you have stuck with it if this didn’t pan out the way you thought?

"There was a moment in my last TV contract where I was like, when is it going to happen? When's it going to happen? This was from late 2012 to 2013. There was a moment when WSOC had this contract in front of me. It was another three-year deal, and I was like, what am I going to do? Because if I sign this, am I deferring my dream?  A minimum of three years because contracts can be so tough. I had the balls to think, when not even if but when NASCAR comes calling, how am I going to do that if I signed this three-year deal? I really believed it, man. I was delaying signing it, and my boss at the time was like; what the hell is going on? Why aren't you signing this? I finally just let it out and was like, Julie, if I sign this, maybe my dream is deferred, and I don't know what to do, and she goes, how about this in the contract? We'll have a clause that if you get a NASCAR job, this contract is void; will that make you sign? And I'm like, absolutely. I signed it, and not even six months later, NASCAR came calling, and she couldn't have been happier. That was one of the nicest things that anyone's ever done."

Realizing the bigger impact

One of the nicest people you’ll meet, Jonathan Mustich has been an asset to the Charlotte community and the city since he arrived. Jonathan has one of the most unique stories, in my opinion, that demonstrates how you never know what can happen and just stick to your primary purpose and meaning in life and pivot when needed. Jonathan has had an incredible journey, starting in the suit business to designing custom suits and jackets for Hall of Fame pro bowlers to now being an advocate for community gardens and spreading the knowledge of food and the importance of recycling material and where it comes from. How did it all start?

“I was living in Los Angeles and had started my custom suit business out there called Evolution Style. And at the time I really enjoyed Los Angeles and the city was great and was doing really successful with the custom suit business, but also started traveling couple of months out of the year abroad. And every time I came back, I got a little less interested in the city, but a little more interested in Charlotte. So a good friend of mine was working for the Panthers here, Joe LaBue and we come to visit every year and finally after six or so years I was like well let's give it a try. We just packed up our stuff and moved across the country, didn't even see our apartment. I just moved across country. I think the way I could put it, in Los Angeles, I was like a needle in a haystack and when I saw the opportunity here, you can actually move the haystack here. You really can make an impact and change people's lives. My suit business was doing well in Charlotte and then COVID happened and obviously no one was wearing suits, and I had to transition my factory over to make medical gowns because everyone needed those and I happened to have some of the fabric. We did that, got a contract with Atrium at the time and realized how much plastic waste was being generated by these medical gowns. As a gardener, I saw a droplet of water roll off a broccoli leaf and realized that if nature can stop water from getting through, why can't we? I worked with the polymer center here in Charlotte. Luckily they were here and worked with them to develop this fabric that was both compostable and met all the barrier protections of the healthcare industry. Since the last four years we've been developing this and growing it and now we've got land in Concord that we compost the gowns on and we bring that soil down to Charlotte to our community gardens and up to Hickory to community gardens that we work with and with Atrium, it's going to really open us up because they have community gardens on each of their hospital sites. We don't have to go in and build them we're just helping to provide the soil. Realistically with Hickory or Atrium they use about 200,000 gowns a year. That saves them in plastic waste — it reduces plastic waste by 40,000 lbs a year. So when you think of Atrium which uses 10 times that amount, you're really like 4,000,000 lbs of plastic waste out of the local community and not only that — it turns it into like something else that's positive.”

All they were doing was just throwing them out? “They just throw them out. Yeah, just thrown straight to the landfill or incinerated if they had, blood on them. It's been a really cool thing. And now we we won this contract with Premier, which is like a big GPO, called the Breakthrough Technology Contract so that just opened us up to all the hospitals in the US so that was a huge win for us and that now gives us the opportunity. I was on a call right before this saying we were trying to figure out how to get some hospitals out west that don't really know about us yet. So it went from like zero to 100. We went from zero to like nothing over four years and then it's like zero to 100 in like the last two weeks. It's been it's been really cool and fun.”

This is wild, so it's a whole business now? “Yeah, it’s good. I’m just trying to take what I'm doing with the compost thing and the gardening and actually now, me and the two friends thought on a bigger thing to create local plots of land to sell food to restaurants so that they can really, truly be locally sourced and for the communities because if you really think about it, Sam uses like 60 heads of lettuce a week just for that tiny little restaurant. It's amazing when you really start to think of how much food is needed. We've been planting lettuce so much we can't even keep up, I think it was 22 heads of lettuce this week, so it's really interesting to sort of grow that side of the business and see where that can go. It's interesting. I love opportunities here. You meet people. There's not a huge barrier to entry, but we want to make a big impact.” 

With your history of design and sewing now growing vegetables and providing that to local restaurants was that in the cards at first? “Yes. That’s always been our mission — is not just to deliver gowns and get out of the community. We want to be part of the community and actually part of the health of the community. Part of our profit share, we always put part of our profits back in to create community gardens. Thankfully Atrium has community gardens but let's say they didn't, we would take a portion of those profits to put community gardens in local areas and in North Carolina, there's actually a budget for this in the state. So for that one we went to on the west side of the city, they paid for that one. There's another one they're building for us for next year. It's all part of the budget. A lot of times we don't have to do it, it's just part of the state and they need people to run it. We take over that and say; we can do that and generate the community interest and a lot of the times the nurses and the staff at the hospital want to manage themselves. This is something we want to get behind, so it really kind of runs itself but we're getting to that point now.”

Are you a gold driven person when it comes to, how do you manage your business? Because I feel like this is just a perfect example of what you're doing something you love and then another opportunity comes that you didn't really see coming. Like, did you see this coming at all? “I didn't see Terraloam like the business coming at all. It sort of came out of more of a necessity, and I've always, as someone who grew up in New York, I don't see problems as problems. I see them as opportunities a lot of the times. I saw an opportunity here that there was a very big void to fill and I was like well this was an opportunity and I got lucky because my friend at the time is now my business partner really was in the same mindset as me, same entrepreneur mindset and he was like; I think we have a business here, let's see how we can do this. Now we certainly have certain goals that we want to try to hit this year and in the future and next year and over the next 10 years to sort of build the impact of this because a lot of the information that we have to do now is basically just informing people what composting is. A lot of people don't even know what that is. People describe us as biodegradable. We're actually not. We're better than biodegradable. A lot of that is educating people how to turn something that is a waste product into something that is actually useful. Dirt right now is being lost all over the world so that we can generate actual good compost that can be used for farming. And then that's where these gowns basically turn into — so we mix them with food scraps and fallen leaves and over three to six months, that's a pile we take to the garden.”

Just put the like perspective for me, like building an impact. I think that's your biggest goal with this “Yes, I want to make an impact not only in the Charlotte community starting off in Charlotte but then North Carolina and then we want to like really make an impact across the country because there is a huge need for this especially the cost of food right now, if we can provide anything for free or especially underserved communities like that's a huge opportunity for us. And just healthy food, like people aren't eating healthy, so having that and educating them, where does lettuce come from or whats this carrot or what's this tomato like? I'm growing a tomato that actually — it's only been grown on Mount Vesuvius and a few other places, but so when you when you pick it, you can hang it because it has an enzyme in it that allows it to last for like six months. In Italy they give them as gifts around Christmas in a box. So this is me, as a business person — a pound of tomatoes in the middle of the summer is worth like $5. A pound of these tomatoes at Christmas is worth $50. One of my business partners has a big house, so we're gonna use his house for the storage. It's where folks don’t really know much about the importance.”

What is the current struggle that you're going through right now? “I would say, part is breaking into the healthcare industry that is very old school, has a bureaucratic mentality. That's been a real struggle because it's — I didn't come from that history of business. So that's been a really tough learning experience to have to keep pushing and pushing and pushing until you make the right connections and get with some people that can help push you along. We got lucky a couple years ago meeting someone that was able to do that, Patrick Bruce up in Hickory, but that's been a big struggle. My business partner gets more frustrated than I do. I think as a growing up in New York like we have a little bit more of like, OK no? On to the next one. So I think that's been the biggest struggle for us has been getting through all these walls and no, we can't do this but then not really realizing we're just basically doing the same thing, just better. It's just the educational part of it.”

Is there a proud moment that sticks out to you that has shaped you into the person you are today? “I would say when COVID happened in my business that I've been running for 12 years stopped overnight. It went to zero and there was nothing on the horizon. We were in the house for less than a year, so you got bills to pay and things to do, and I had a staff member in California. I had two showrooms and they all went to nothing. The ability to stop, focus for a second, take it in what was happening and readjust and transition to a completely new business overnight and then fight through all of the bullshit artists around the world that we're trying to sell fake stuff and, you know, luckily I had built up a reputation in Charlotte and got a contract with Atrium that was pretty significant so that I would say would was the biggest hurdle because I thought at that time I was in real trouble and it was the mindset of what am I going to do and something you've been working on for 13 or 14 years just done overnight and by no doing of your own. I think having the perseverance to get through that and the drive to just keep going — I would say that's probably at the moment my proudest moment.”

Do you think you'd be as happy if nothing happened with COVID and you were still doing jackets now? “No! It was the best blessing. As sad as it was COVID was actually good for me to say because with the suits I would have two-three thousand clients and I was getting text messages all hours of day and night. “Hey, can you give me this? Can you give me that” so I had no boundary or personal time. Now with this I have 5 big customers that I work with. Basically it's me manufacturing stuff out in Wadesboro and I could work from 7:00 to 3:00 or 4:00. I go garden in the afternoon and meet friends after. That honestly has been the best thing for me. I have so much more freedom of time I own. And I always tell people; the most important thing in life, in my opinion, is to own your time or own as much time as you can for yourself, because that gives you a lot of freedom and gives you a lot of opportunities to develop and grow on your own.”

Are there any important lessons that you've learned along the way that you take with you every day? “This is going back to our conversation from 9-11. After that day I don't take any day for granted. Enjoy every day to its fullest. You'll have sad days and really exciting days, but don't take any day for granted, cause you never know you. You literally never know.”

Finding the hook in life

Well, this was a real treat. Singer, songwriter, producer, Grammy-nominated artist, and overall great human, Kevin Garrett, was on the start of his latest tour with Gavin Degraw as they made their way through Columbia, South Carolina, not too far from Charlotte. He was nice enough to make some time for an interview and photos. I will take you back to 2015 when a friend and I traveled to Austin, Texas for SXSW. I heard one of Kevin's songs the day before our flight on my Spotify discovery weekly playlist called "Refuse" and was hooked. Looking at the lineups at the festival, he was playing a few times, and we made it a point to see him live. I've been following along since then, and Kevin is just an artist who plays and writes music for the love and passion of it. To hear him speak on it and truly see him play for the crowd that night, you saw what it meant to him. So saddle up, this is a good one, let's get into the early years of Kevin's life and how music came to light — 

Take me back to the earlier years of life, where did music come into play? “I started playing violin when I was four. I loved sports, loved messing around and playing games, and my parents wanted me to try something creative too. I’m so glad they pushed me in that direction because it's the only thing I was good at. I gravitated to the violin, it actually got me into college. I was playing guitar and youth symphony stuff through high school and took that to auditions for college. I went to NYU for audio engineering. More than being there for the school, it was something about being in that city. I made a couple of connects to start playing some real shows outside of the dinner sets and random local things I did in Pittsburgh. My first show, actually after high school, I took a one-week trip to Nashville and played a bunch of open mics, but my first proper show was at 3 p.m. on a Sunday afternoon at Rockwood Music Hall. The very second show, I got a call from the promoter there and asked if I wanted to open for Norah Jones. I skipped a couple of steps, I think, to get that gig, but the rest was history on the Rockwood scene. It was such a vibrant community. The Lower East side area was really the hub for me for a long time. It wasn’t until I was out of college, really, that I finished in 2013, I didn’t know how the business side of music worked; all I knew and wanted to do was have my indie band at the time just wanted to play shows. We went to Pittsburgh and other tri-state cities. It never really had the umph to build it beyond that, and we ended up going our separate ways, and a buddy of mine from school said just give it a year. Almost a year to the day of when I graduated, I get a text from this artist, James Vincent McMorrow, asking for my band to go on tour and open for him but we broke up, so I sent him a demo of a song called ‘Colouring’ I was working on which was one of the first songs I put out and he said alright, come on out. Actually, recently, I was on my computer doing a hard-drive purge, and I used to be a Photoshop wizard, and by that I mean I knew how to put text on pictures (laughs), but I just saw that old show poster from that tour, and it was fun to reflect on. It was a great time. He ended up taking me on a few other shows on and off after that. I started to put songs out in 2014, and lucky it got to the ears of peers of mine who brought me out on tour over the years and led me to do shows on my own, and I’m just really thankful.”

Was that the moment you knew that this was what you wanted to be doing? “Yeah, I think it was right around the time I was about to go out with James Vincent McMorrow, and I was starting to talk to Beyoncé’s team about the song I worked on for Lemonade. I didn’t know how anything worked. All I knew was how to get my hands on my parent's car to drive myself to these shows. Still have that car by the way, it's a Highlander, her name is Abigail. But yeah, with the songwriting thing, I've done some sessions before, but it was on a totally different level with something Beyoncé wants to cut. There was just a lot hidden at once there and it just snowballed a little bit. I really just know that I wanted to be on stage. The only reason I’m making music is that I want to sing it for people and that I want to design merch (laughs). Writing for other artists, if I get to work with the artist and we can channel something, I value that a lot. It’s an interesting game and this year I’ve had some great sessions with other artists and writers.”

From the earlier days of your career, is your mindset on how you approach your music the same, or has it changed? "It hasn't changed at all. I would go play those shows all over again if they wanted me back. I think since the pandemic, especially if you're a new artist — you had to gain some perspective to stay employed and find ways to supplement your creativity. I recently moved to Nashville and that's been a new experience that so far has proven to be daunting but I think I've made a somewhat of a good decision. It's nice to sign a lease and uproot your life from Pittsburgh to only go out on tour for a little while (laughs); blessings in disguise. I've never felt like I've made it in any capacity. I haven't even scratched the surface, I don't think, and that's across all facets of music making, and I try to keep that mentality because I already feel like with this business, I'm already grounded because it keeps you on the ground. Since I don't live in New York anymore, Pittsburgh is home and now Nashville its just different so it's all about adjusting and making it work."

Are you a goal-driven person? "Yeah, I mean, the first goal is to pay rent (laughs); second, it's kind of a debilitating industry, I'll be honest. It definitely knows how to cut your legs out and hit you while you're down. I don't think I've gotten good at being told no, but I've been told no so many times that it is like muscle memory at this point, so it's just keeping your head down and figuring it out. My goals haven't changed. I still want to play shows; I would love to do more stuff on my own on a headline level. Ten years in I finally made it to Australia. If you had told me that ten years ago that I would be playing shows there, I wouldn't have believed you. I don't have the words. The goals are the same. If the opportunity to write for someone comes back, I would be honored to be involved. I have so much music I want to put out, and we started rolling out that project, so it's really exciting; write music, play shows, and make t-shirts (laughs)."

What is a proud moment in your life that has shaped you into the person you are today? "I think everything from if you open the liner notes and being the first name on the credits of Lemonade to getting through this nine-hour drive from Nashville to South Carolina, if it's focused or geared towards making progress with my dreams, there is no shame in any of it. Obviously, there are certain moments; getting nominated for a Grammy with that record was amazing. If a song like Colouring gets enough streams to get to one of those status’, that would be really cool because I did that on CD Baby and released that all by myself. To all of the songs collecting dust in my folders on my hard drive, every one of those, I think the thing I'm most proud of is I have gotten through all of the punches that were thrown, especially at the independent level, but just in the industry, in general, to still not get tired of what you're making. I have some songs for this next project that I've been sitting on for four years, and you know, with 2020 feeling like yesterday, I think we did this like weird quantum leap thing; there is no way; I was thinking back at 2019 when I did another proper US run, there's just no way that I'm five years older. I remember moments in 2020 so vividly but I don't remember anything from the past three years. It's strange. I'm just proud to just keep loving what I do when it sometimes doesn't love me back."

What is your biggest struggle to get you to the next steps? “I don’t want to lean too far into the mental side of it, but the last few years have weighed on me a bit heavier. There are some people collaboratively who aren’t dependent on me but we had some plans, that are still plans but are just taking a little longer to execute. I’m okay with letting myself down but feeling like I’m letting other people down, whether its listeners, other collaborators, the venue managers if I show up late, that one I get sensitive to. The timeline of it all and really having to buckle down and having to regroup and figure out what’s next for all of the new music is something that I struggle with a lot, its like a top down look at everything. In the last few years, I’ve had some amazing touring; I’ve gotten to go around Europe and Australia. I played a handful of dates with Dermot Kennedy, and I’ve played Red Rocks twice —these things are just, to go back to your last question, the thing I’m proudest of is that I try to be very present and not take anything for granted and the thing I struggle with the most is that I’m so present on everything and I overthink it all.”

Are there any important lessons in life that you take with you on a daily basis? “Sometimes writers and other aspiring artists ask me for advice, and I say I’m doing the same thing you are. I’m still very much aspiring, and it’s all relative; I’m very lucky to be in the position I’m in. If I would have any sort of tips and something I try to convince myself every morning, gratitude is a real thing similar to listening to music when you try to find the hook in everything, you need to find the hook in life, that keeps me motivated and keeps me going, even when I’m like Eeyore and feeling depressed as it gets. I think creatively, when you start aiming you start losing. A lot of people are putting music out and there is just nothing timeless about it because its just a recycled thing that was a hit last year. At your own artistic level, just be yourself; you just need to trust yourself and trust your gut on the decisions you make creatively. Don’t aim; don’t try to be anyone other than yourself.”

Going the extra mile

Where did it all start for you? How did you end up in Charlotte? “I went to East Carolina University, did five years there, took my victory lap and after that, I bought a one-way ticket to Vietnam, I went abroad. At that time, I was very passionate about video, and I knew that was what I wanted to do. I could have stayed local and done videos for these coffee shops or other local places for free or very little money to build my portfolio. I then thought, what if I did something big and go international, built my portfolio that way and took jobs on upward and fiver along the way, so I was basically a remote video editor. I was building my chops on the video editing side that way. I was also documenting and vlogging my time over there, so I started to build an understanding of storytelling. I traveled through southeast Asia for three months and back through Europe for eight months, and I was trying to figure out what was next and where to set up shop. I was in North Carolina, so I first looked at Charlotte, and I thought it could be a great place to start a business and build connections in a growing city.”

Where did this passion for running and the hybrid aspect of fitness come to light? “I’ve been running more often for probably the last three years. I was like everyone else where you’d go out and run one or two miles to switch it up from your everyday gym routine, and it sucked; you hated it because we really don’t know how to run properly, we don’t know the process and the mentality you should have when you run just to enjoy it. We just go as hard as we can for two miles until we are gased, and it just sucks. COVID happened, and this is a common story with runners now; people were trying to find new ways of getting their exercise in. I mean, do you remember the Light Rail during that time? Everyone was out, and it was great, and slowly, I was starting to run three, four, five miles. It was great because you see yourself get better and you can feel it after every run and that always intrigued me. I signed up for my first half marathon, which I think was the Asheville half - not the best first half because it’s hilly as shit (laughs). I had a buddy of mine who was talking about doing something crazy, and he was like, what if we did a self-supported hundred miler? We realized how difficult that was, so we just figured we sign up for one because they'll be aid stations and everything along the way. Before this, I had only done a half marathon and went all in on this, which was in the Outer Banks of North Carolina, so I started to train for that. I hired a coach to help me figure out how to run and take the learning curve off of years and years of pain, trial, injuries and errors and all of that. I trained for about ten months, and that was the start of everything.”

Are you a goal driven person or do you take this stuff day by day? "I liked to have the goal post for sure. I mean, even for my first one, I didn't speak this publicly because I didn't want to sound arrogant coming into my first hundred, but I wanted to compete, and I wanted to win. If I'm running a hundred-mile race, I don't just want to finish; I want to win. That was my mentality. I understand that I won't compete in marathons. I just ran in Boston and came in 2,500th or something like that. That's fine, that's fun, but I love to compete and try to win them. For my first one, I came in second, won my second, so I'm definitely goal driven and competitive as shit. The hard part for me is remembering why I’m doing this in the first place; it’s just fun. I love running and I love the process. I don’t want to let this consume me where I’m not enjoying the training anymore or to the point where I don’t want to go out and run my miles anymore. At the end of the day, running is much more than a competition, it’s my therapy, its my time and solitude, its my time to think and my time to work on my relationships, my business and all these other things so I want it to always be my solitude.”

What is a proud moment that sticks out to you that has shaped you into the person you are today? “That year abroad, I was an introverted person; going to travel solo for a year was the scariest thing I could think of because I put myself in uncomfortable situations day after day. Doing that showed me that I can take risks and I’ll figure it out along the way. It might not always pay off, but they’ll come back around in the best of ways, and you’ll figure it out along the way. That’s opened me up to taking chances with my business and in life along the way.”

Any important lessons you’ve learned along the way that you take with you each day? “Just do right and be good to people. Whatever you put out in the world is going to come back to you; that’s what I truly believe. I want to put good vibes and good energy — that’s what I like to do with my social channel. I put out these positive running and fitness-related themes into the world to hopefully inspire and motivate others. Even in daily life, I’m introverted, but I try my best to go first, be kind, and give these little acts of kindness to those around you.”

What’s next? “In August, I’m running the Leadville 100. I am sponsored by Asé which is a muscle gel company, their founder Heather, who was dating their Chief Marketing Officer, and he passed away. Mitchel was about 40 years old and healthy as you and I; he was running ultras ran many miles, but he caught the flu, got pneumonia had a lung infection and ended up passing away far too soon, he was such a great person. He had a bid to Leadville, and you can transfer bids. Heather reached out to Leadville, and they reached out and asked if I can do a bib transfer for Mitchel, so I’ll be running Leadville in Mitch’s honor. I’ve blocked out four months to train and do everything I can do well for Mitch.”

Creating my own Disney

Plaza Midwood — Charlotte, NC

One of the nicest humans you’ll ever meet and someone who gives artists and people a deserving chance, Jenny Vallimont pursued her passion and founded Gökotta. The consulting firm which assists others in establishing meaningful connections with their community has become her own little Disney. Jenny takes us on the journey to share how the universe put those experiences and lessons learned along the way to light.

Where did this all start for you? “I grew up in Raleigh; it’s so different than Charlotte, especially back then. I was very middle class and ended up attending college in Penn State. I was an engineer so the natural thing would have went to go to State from Broughton High School. I was already going there for a few classes and I really wanted to college experience so that’s why I went to Penn State. I got married straight out of college and then we moved to California, LA, I loved LA and I was doing construction. I wasn’t doing the stuff I am now back then. It’s so interesting because you can look back now and see all of the steps you took in your life to see where you are now. I loved LA but my husband did not. He was driving all over the place for work, like 2-hour drives every day, and we got to a point where we knew that was not going to work. We had two different experiences there. This was in 2005. Later that year, both of my Grandmothers were diagnosed with cancer. One passed and as soon as that happened, it was a moment where I hated being far away from my family. As much as I loved the West Coast, you can’t rewind time. We decided that it was time to come back to the east coast. In 2005 the construction boom was happening so we literally just quit our jobs and decided to move somewhere. Charlotte was that city where construction was booming. I am not sure if that was the smartest decision, packing up and moving without any jobs. Within two weeks, we both had full-time jobs, and they were jobs that set us up for our careers. I was working at Crosland, which was the Charlotte developer. I had no idea why they hired me because I had no development background, but I had done an internship at Disney Imagineering, and the guy who hired me came from Disney as well. He knew how competitive that program was so I knew he thought I was worth taking a shot on.”

“Fast forward 15 years. I went from Crosland to Bank of America and was doing sustainability work. I always wanted to do something special and unique. I tell you, Andy, everything happens for a reason; when everything crashed, I was still at Crosland. In 2009, our son was born, and we adopted him. We used all of our savings. Everything we had went to his adoption. January 1st, I was supposed to go to part-time at Crosland; on December 30th, we got a call that our birth mom was pregnant and she wanted us to adopt another child, and we had no money, like no money. There was another opportunity to go back to full-time with Bank of America, and we had to take that and then take a loan out to pay for our adoption. I had no maternity leave so I had to use all of my sick time so we had about a month.”

Where did this passion for community come from? Did you think this is where you would have ended up? "I love taking my engineering and construction background and seeing what we can do to take these small sculptures and create these monster installations — because I know the architects and the fabricator. I love connecting. I love being that thread that can pull it all together. I love meeting with artists and asking them not to necessarily show me their portfolio but to show me what isn't in that portfolio and what they have never been given the opportunity to create that they have always wanted to. I was finding ways to get there and learning what we can do to assist with leveling them up. My success and our company's success is because of that trust; I feel that we are super humble in terms of knowing nothing about the art world, but we want to create a model that gives everyone that success. I thought this was going to be a consulting company that was going to focus on sustainability work. I want to make sure we are doing good but doing good at all levels. Not just for the earth and our environment but for the people, for mental health, for the arts, you look around our neighborhoods and the art that's there, and everything is intentional."

What is that proud moment you can reflect on that has shaped you into the person you are today? “You got me in an interesting week to ask me this question. I’d say professional my internship at Disney; I had no idea how important that was back then. It opened doors that I never thought would open for me. It set the bar for what success and happiness in a professional environment looked like for me. I feel like I have created my own little Disney for myself. This weekend I’m flying out to LA for a celebration of life for one of my first mentors. She was really special. Most HR people, I don’t know if there is someone who could have touched more people than she did. When I got laid off, she called me and gave me a pep talk, and that gave me confidence. I needed an outside person to put things in perspective and to explain to me where my value was. It was the confidence to start my company. She just lost her battle with cancer a few weeks ago and this house and project we are working on is special because its for Deborah who also lost her battle. Sometimes the universe just puts these things together and in perspective to know that we have to ability to use our passions and skillsets to make everyone else happier and spread joy.”

Studying the game to make a community impact

Charlotte, NC

Christopher Williams, YUNG Citizen, a true gem to the music industry and more importantly his community. I was excited to talk to him more about his early days growing up in Charlotte and how music became such a big piece to who he is. Chris sheds light on how important it is for him to make impacts to peoples lives through his music and overall incredible character.

How did the name YUNG come about? — “I don’t know, man; I’ve been working on music since I was a teenager, and my friends were always like you need a name, bro. You have Young Jeezy, Young Jock, Young Dro, but they always spelled it Young, so I said let’s do YUNG, and that just stuck with everybody.”

Are you from Charlotte? - "Born and raised in Charlotte. There are a lot of us but everyone don't be outside *laughs or they just go to their normal places they go to. I found many Charlotte natives don't flock to the latest and greatest and they'll just go later. There are a lot of people who still live in the city, who were born and raised here." Take me back to the early days. Where did the music passion kick in? “When I was a little kid, my Dad was always shoving Earth, Wind and Fire down my throat. Every time we went on trips, Earth, Wind and Fire were blasting. Shoot, I was introduced to Shade at a young age, so I was introduced to many R&B and Soul before my parents allowed me to listen to hip hop. Actually, the first hip-hop album I listened to is on that shelf, College Dropout. So a lot of soul, r&b, old school, it was just introduced at the right time at an early age. I started to buy magazines and wanted to learn more about these dope cats who were making music and how can I do that. I wanted to be different and started to make beats at 16. When I got to college, I saw they had a music program, and I got my undergrad in music business, and then I really took it seriously. I started to be an artist because I couldn't find anyone to get on my beats, so I figured let me start songwriting and get on my own music, so I took songwriting classes and just studied the game and the craft and kept writing to get better and better at it. That's how I got here today, and I just rap over my own music."

Are you a goal-driven person? “I definitely have goals. I performed at SXSW in 2016; I was on Sway in the Morning. It was a radio show, and he had segments where you can get on live and freestyle. After that, they actually posted my freestyle. I’ve performed at so many great venues in Charlotte. As far as goals, I want to impact the community with my music as much as I can. That’s what it's all about for me, and if I’m not doing that, then this is not for me. So that’s my main goal every time if I’m producing or writing my own music, I want to impact the community in a possitve way. That’s my purpose, and that’s all I’m here for. If I can impact or heal someone with my music, that’s success for me.”

Talk to me about Morning Pages and what things you take away from that for your benefit. “This came to be when I read this book called The Artist Way. The book is almost like a class because it gives you homework after every chapter. One of these assignments was to write three pages in your journal every morning when you wake up and then take yourself out on a date every once in a while. During COVID, I began writing; you see those journals right there? Everyone one of them is full, front to back. I’ve been doing that for about two years now. So every day when you wake up, you write three pages, and the whole point is to get all that clutter out of your mind when you first wake up so you’ll have a clear mind to start filling your canvas. My canvas is right here, in this studio. It helped me not only with my writer's block helped me mentally, and that’s when I started to take my mental health seriously. I had a buddy call me into the studio one day to help write one of his tracks, and in two hours, I finished the song because I had that clear mind. I started therapy and started working on this project called The Morning Pages. It was three songs, and it was almost like a journal entry. I ended up doing a few mental health events to get people to own it and show how it helps. After seeing how it was impacting people, I started to just create this as a brand. I started putting out journal prompts to people who signed up for this so every Monday I put out a journal entry. Then Thursday I do something called Morning talks and just chat about all different things — patience, building a foundation of routine for yourself, how to find a therapist, things like that.”

What is a proud moment in life that has shaped you into who you are today? “I think it is a proud moment for me; well, one of the reasons I got into mental health is because I battled with an addiction. I got over that; I’ve been clean. I haven’t smoked weed or drank for about two years now. I haven’t looked back. I just knew where I was trying to go in my life; I needed a clear mind and focus on everything in front of me. If I can get over all of that, I can get over anything. Musically, taking chances and doing things differently. Taking risks and not being afraid of rejection or failure and just learning from it. Taking chances on the type of music I’m making, just doing different things to learn and grow. I just have to keep going. Some days it’s hard but I know what my purpose is so lets just continue the journey and see what’s ahead.”

What lessons have you learned along the way that you take with you daily? “Patience, man. Things are going to happen when they are supposed to happen. You don’t need to be in a rush, but you do need to be in love with the process of what you are trying to do. Being in the process gives me so much joy because I can see where it’s taking me.”

Creating the domino effect to do good for others

Wooden Robot — Charlotte, NC

Lindsay Hayes, known for her beer content, has turned her account into doing good for the community in Charlotte and folks in the beer and brewery industry across the Carolinas. Lindsay talks about her journey to the city and what got her to where she is now as HoppyHayes and uses that to create a domino effect for powerful change to help others when needed.

Did you grow up in Charlotte? What was the journey like for you to the city? I’m from DC, and I went to East Carolina University, so that’s what led me to the Carolinas in the first place. After school, I got a job in Nashville, and I realized I missed the beach. I missed being closer to family and friends. I visited Charlotte a lot and just thought I’d make the move here, and five years later, here we are.”

Where did the passion for all of your content creation come from? “I didn’t want to be an influencer, I still don’t want to, I didn’t make it to become one. I’ve worked in beer for nine years now. I worked for Miller/Coors in College and learned a lot, but my parents were mad because I got a degree in health care and they wanted me to do something with it, so that’s when I moved to Nashville and got a really cool health care job but I still had a part-time job at a brewery there so I was still around it. 2019 is when I started HoppyHayes, and I created it to get a job here in Charlotte. I knew getting a health care job here was hard, but I knew getting a job in the brewery industry would be quick. I sent some emails just to get some feelers out. I must have emailed a dozen breweries, and no one was hiring. So, I just made the decision to move here and figure it out. I needed to show up and go to these breweries. Most were new at that point, so there was no turnover. That’s when I made the call to start my Instagram and work at that to post beer content, and it feels like I grew to 10k overnight. Reels weren’t a thing, so it was just posting photos — it was easy to keep up with it. Once I reached that point, I started reaching out to breweries on Instagram. I got eight interviews. Isn’t social media crazy? It was a visible photo resume that was a tool to make it. I was still trying to find a job in health care, but I got a bartending job, so I figured I'd give myself six months to figure it out, and then 2020 rolled around. I wouldn’t say I was stuck in it, but it definitely put me more in the industry to learn more. I worked at Catawba Brewing during COVID, so we were brainstorming ideas to keep sales going — whether it was growler deals or if you brought in a receipt from another local place that you supported, you got 10% off, so we wanted to think of ways to support other business and still make a profit. It was a great learning experience. I am such a busy bee, so I needed to work, and if I wasn’t, I would not be sane or be in the position I am now. We did whatever we could to survive.”

Did you think you’d be at this point now? “I love it; even if I left bartending full time, I would still work part-time on weekends. I would never work anywhere else, though. I told Dan, if I had to leave the beer industry, this would be my last one. Wooden Robot is such a big part of me, and it's just a family here. It’s home. My fiancé works here, all of our friends are here and especially with what we are going through lately, we want to be part of this place more than ever.”

Are you a goal-driven person, or do you roll with the flow? “No, I used to be a goal-driven person. I’m a planner, and I love being organized, but for me, it’s harder to set goals right now because I’m so confused about what I want to do right now. Every time I go in one direction, the universe is like, HAHA, just kidding, I’m very free-flowing right now. I love a good challenge; I’ll try it. But right now, life is just up in the air, and I’m rolling with what comes my way.”

What is a proud moment that has shaped you into who you are today? “There’s not like a defining moment. I’ve always been independent, and I’ve always been a self-driven person. My mom has always been like that — independent and always saying that you don’t need others to do the things you want to do. I love being on a team, but I’m a self-motivator; I moved by myself, went to college by myself.” Did you think those moves helped you? “Absolutely. I’m an extrovert. I’m very outgoing, and I thrive more when I’m places alone. Moving by myself was tough, but I was in my early 20, so I was ready to talk to anyone. I got unique and amazing opportunities because of sparking random conversations with people. You don’t know who you can meet and what can happen.”

Are there any important lessons that you have learned along the way that you take with you daily? “Since starting my account, I’m more careful about what I say and how I act in public because things are taken out of context easily. I’m very protective of people. So just me needing to chill the fuck out *laughs instead of making a change or doing something for this and thinking I’m the only voice. Sometimes, it's not my arena or my place. I’m proud of being authentic, so if you don’t know me, I’m the same person on social media as in real life. A few times a year, I think that there are 22,000 people who are looking at what I do. It’s cool and weird, but it's also a chance to do good. I feel that I was able to help our brewery raise funds, and I’ll do that for any brewery. It just takes one person to make a powerful change and create a domino effect. Then you see 65 billboards with your boss's name on them. I love it, but I see it and approach it differently.”

What’s next? “I’ve been to 24 different music festivals. My Dad was a drummer, and his side of the family was very creative. I grew up always being around music and going to concerts. Warped Tour was big for me; I’m a big emo and metalhead. I used to work at a music venue in Baltimore, and when I moved to Nashville, I did some promo things for different venues. Music is just a huge thing for me. I love all genres; I collect vinyl. My Dad gave me his collection, and it’s so special to me. Every time I look at it, I always hope that my kids can appreciate this as much as I do. I remember trying to play flute for a day in elementary school. That was one thing that just didn’t click *laughs. So what’s next, I don’t know. My big thing is that I want to go to every brewery in North Carolina. I have a spreadsheet on my phone. Then, of course, I need to plan a wedding, then we got a dog, and then the accident happened, and then my cousin passed away, so it’s just one thing after another. Its been hard to make it happen. I have made some progress with places I’ve been, but I will make it happen. I made a goal by the end of next year. I guess that’s a goal of mine, but it's more long-term.”

Cheers to you, Chief

The Peoples Market, Elizabeth — Charlotte, NC

Bob Peters has been a staple to the city when it comes to hospitality and cocktail experiences at multiple spots in Charlotte. Whether you have never met or known him your whole life, you will immediately get that care and comfort from being around Bob. He makes it a priority to give everyone the level of experience we deserve. Whether it's a celebratory night out or you just need to get out and away from the stresses of life, Bob makes you appreciate the moments you are in and all the beauty around you and how special you truly are.

So recently I heard you say sometimes you are a lime cutter, ice go getting, grocery getter, you do it all (laughs)— “Because I’ve been doing this for 100 years, you can see things happen before they happen. You can walk in and see that it's going to be busy tonight; we need to refill the ice and take out the trash; if you see others busy, then do things that will help everybody. Setting up your stations for success, it's the day that you don’t have enough time to cut all the limes for the night; that’s the night you're the busiest, and you need all the limes, so it's just the mindset of always showing up, no matter what.”

Where did this passion for cocktail making and hospitality start for you? "My parents were always great hosts. You come over to our house — my Dad couldn't get a drink in your hand fast enough, and my Mom was cooking something for this big grand dinner. Strong hospitality was ingrained into me early, and the feeling of being welcomed and loved by the time you enter the house that's what I really enjoy. I love conveying that to my guests at the bar whether I've known you for 25 years or just two and a half minutes, its really neat and so cool to see people when you are genially in control of the situation, if you do it in a loving sort of open-handed way and when you can see someone's tough day slowly melt off of them, that's what its about. That’s how I want people to feel like when they are at Chief’s. Taken care of, happy, comfortable, and loved because they matter.”

What is Chief’s? “Chief’s is the new cocktail bar that I’m opening this spring next to the Goodyear House. I’m naming it after my Dad that passed nine years ago. I learned everything about hospitality from him and my mother.”

How do you maintain that mentality and execution all the time? I’m sure there are so many moments that get busy. “Setting the scene for someone to really sit and relax that's what its all about for me. An analogy that I love is that if you can be a duck on water, they look calm and steady above the water, but their feet move a mile a minute. You can have 100 things you should be doing, but when you're with a guest, they are the only person in the world at that moment, and they shouldn't feel rushed. Consistency is key and important, and that's where the service side of it kicks in for me. The other analogy I follow is when you are a kid, and you're bored, you grab a glove and a ball and throw it up in the air and catch it and think, that's not so bad; you do it 10 more times in a row and then 100 more times. That's what I think bout when I'm making drink #76 that night, making sure it's better and tastes just as good."

Are you a goal-driven person? You’ve been doing this for so long. Do you still have things you strive for? “World domination (laughs). I want something Charlotte can be proud of, and I try to set goals outside of myself. I was born and raised in Charlotte, and the city deserves to be on the map for food and drinks. It’s getting there, but I feel that it's been skipped over a lot. I would love to put Charlotte on the map for the hospitality business.”

What is a proud moment that stands out to you that has shaped you into the person you are today? "When I was working for Bryan Li at Pisces. We went way back and worked together previously, and he was a bar back for me at a place called Alley Cat; fast forward, he was opening his own restaurant and asked if I could help. We worked on a cocktail menu, and I asked what kind of menu he wanted, and he said, "I want to be able to charge $15 a drink." This was 12 years ago; those were steep prices, but that would have put us on par with top places in Charlotte. I was a huge fan of Bryan and said that we could just make a drink and charge $15. We need beautiful glassware and a nice selection of liquors, like why is that bottle there? Why is it important to be in your restaurant? Fresh ingredients, different types of ice. Back then, those things were not thought of inside of a cocktail bar. We were kind of on the front end of that cocktail movement in Charlotte. In that process, I helped one of my favorite people in the whole world, and I needed to do my job the best that I possibly could. If I did that then it would bring light to the cocktail program and restaurant. We started to get write-ups on the bar, and top chefs in the city would come to see what the bar was all about. People would schedule longer layovers just to grab cocktails at the bar. That's when we knew we were doing something, and that's when other things started to happen. The Ritz Carlton came knocking on my door. We did some really great things for the cocktail program there. In 2015, I won the Global Bartender of the Year award for The Ritz-Carlton Corporation. I was so shocked and humbled by that honor."

Are there any lessons you have learned along the way that you still take with you daily? “We touched on it earlier; show up and show up on time. If you know you have a bunch of stuff to do, show up and get it done. You’ll spend too much time playing catch up and then one of your guests have a bad experience. Showing up and having a great attitude. Nobody wants to get a drink from a salty bartender. Do everything you can just to put things behind you and try to make someone else’s day better, and that could make you feel better in return.”

Putting in the hard work for the things you love

Independance Park - Charlotte, NC

One of the most beloved athletes in Charlotte and a man who cares about the city’s community and the future of a club that can shine for decades. Brandt Bronico is a veteran MLS midfielder for Charlotte FC. Brandt was kind enough to chat about the start of his career, passions and what it’s like to have the mentality to put in the hard work with anything you do in life.

Where did the passion for soccer start? “I grew up near High Point, NC. I played for a youth club called The Fusion and then went on to UNC Charlotte. It’s been about eight years now in Charlotte. I was in a family where your parents signed you up for four or five sports when you were six years old. One of those sports was soccer. The funny thing is, I liked soccer the least. When they said, “Hey, go out and kick the ball around”, I refused (laughs). I sat there and cried on the bench. I played basketball and baseball, but soccer wasn’t it. Then next year my parents asked me if I wanted to play soccer again and for some reason I said yes. That year, I started to really get into it and was getting pretty good, and by the age of 10, I knew I wanted to become a professional soccer player. My fifth-grade teacher has a video of me when he interviewed every kid in the class and asked what they wanted to be when they grew up, and I said a professional soccer player. Then he asked what if that doesn’t work out and I was like what do you mean?! I didn’t know what to say. When I first got into it, the one thing I loved is that it challenged me in ways other sports did not. Soccer was a different challenge. It was a sport where you needed to use your legs and feet. I need to constantly be moving — I could never stand still so this was a sport that could be a challenge for myself, and ultimately something that I could love and grow into and soccer was it for me.”

I couldn’t imagine what it has to be like to put in all of your chips to go after your dreams and what that mindset has to be to maintain a positive attitude. How did you maintain focus on and off the field to pursue this career? “The journey, no matter what you do, is challenging to achieve what you want to achieve. Soccer was challenging because I was really never rated highly by scouts. I didn’t grow into my body until about 16 years old. I was always the smaller one on the team, wasn’t the fastest, not the most talented but I always worked hard and gave it my best. As long as I did that, then I can always be proud of myself for that. I gave it my all, pursuing what I love, and if I do my best, I feel that things usually work out in ways you want them to. It was tough — I was cut from teams, and people doubted me and told me I wasn’t good enough. When you’re younger, you are more aware of what people are saying to you, so a lot of what they said stuck with me to a point where I started to believe it. I had to blur that out and focus on the mindset that I was doing this for myself. There was no second option. I always like to take action if I let those kind of things get to my head. So it motivated me to learn, work harder and grow as an athlete and person. It’s a long journey, but fortunately, it worked out. Not sure if I believe in luck. I believe in hard work, but maybe there was a little luck thrown in there as well. (laughs)”

So, Chicago. Tell us about how that all went down, being drafted to the MLS. “When you come out of college, there really is no set options. UNC Charlotte — it was a great culture. I had great teammates and coaching staff. It was a culture that had everything you needed to go pro, but you had to work for it. UNC Charlotte offered all of that and I was fortunate that I chose that school. I got invited to the MLS Combine, and that was great, but it wasn’t a guarantee that you’ll get drafted. I went through the Combine and then decided to go home and watch the draft with my parents. At that time, rounds one and two were on Friday, and they were televised — rounds three and four were on Sunday and were announced on the internet. It was me, my mom, my dad and my girlfriend at the time, now my wife, sitting there watching the draft. Picks went by, and my name was never called. We just sat there in silence. It was discouraging and a little scary. I was like hey, let’s not worry about it now, let’s wait until Sunday. I drove back home to Charlotte and went to the college to train and as I pulled into the parking deck, my phone started to blow up and Chicago drafted me! It was the 47th pick, the third pick in the third round. I was so happy. They called me and told me that I had a flight out of Charlotte on Tuesday. What some people don’t know is that you’re not guaranteed a contract after you get drafted. It’s rare for a third-round draft pick to get signed. I didn’t care about that; the only thing I cared about was getting the opportunity, and I got it — now it was the time to prove myself. Two and a half weeks go back, were in pre-season, still haven’t heard anything and the roster was starting to fill up and then one day they pulled me in and told me that they were signing me. It was a big relief… I got it. I got the opportunity and now the real work starts. The next step is to earn that next option of the contract. I just wanted that fair chance at making a team. I was in Chicago for four seasons. Fast forward — during the fourth year, they brought in a new GM and new coach, and they were cleaning the longer-tenured people out. I saw the writing on the wall. I was talking to my agent half way through the year and was like it’s not looking great and then COVID hit and it was just a crazy time. My agent told me that we will get through it and keep things on the radar. A few months later Charlotte announced they are starting an MLS team. Immediately when I heard that, I called Dave, my agent, and said I don’t care what it takes, I want to be there, we need to get back to Charlotte. To share those moments with family essentially where I grew up, I didn’t want to risk passing that up. 2020 goes by and Chicago didn’t want to pick my option up and wanted to trade me. That kind of opened up the possibility of the chance. We were also trying to plan our wedding during that time too in December. I didn’t have a contract, I had no idea what was next. December 15th was a re-entry draft so everything needs to be figured out and signed or any team can pick you up. There were rumors of Seattle, Columbus, I had no idea what was happening. Charlotte came back with an offer and we signed 30 minutes to an hour before that re-entry draft deadline. I was PUMPED. We get married, Charlotte FC announces they are signing me and it was just the best day life that I will never forget. I married my best friend, Charlotte announces the signing, it was crazy. It was just an incredible feeling and moment.”

You get signed, and with everything that happened with COVID, Charlotte announced they are pushing the start back another year. Was that hard to accept, or was it easy to stay in a positive mindset? “It wasn’t too bad, to be honest. I didn’t care because I wanted to be here and back in Charlotte and help build the club from the ground up. We decided that I would go on loan to the Independence. We had a really good team there and the level was high to keep play and staying fresh. It was the right step. Now I played for UNC Charlotte, Charlotte Independence and now Charlotte FC, that also means a lot.”

When the time did come, what was that moment like for you, and what were those emotions when you stepped on the pitch in front of 70,000+ fans? “There was a lot of emotion. Today is actually the anniversary of that match. It was just a full-circle moment. Everything I worked towards has gotten me to that moment and reaffirmed my belief that everything happens for a reason and everything happens at the right time. I was out there playing for the city, the supporters, for that badge on my chest. I take a lot of pride in that — so stepping on the pitch that first match was incredible.”

What is a proud moment that you can go back to that has shaped you into the person you are today? “It has to be when I was twelve or thirteen years old, and there was a soccer league of ODP teams; there were six teams, three on the west and three on the east. I went to that tryout, and I got cut; I didn’t make any one of those teams. I questioned if I was good enough and started to doubt myself. My Dad drove me home, and it was a quiet car ride home. Next year he asked me if I wanted to try out again and I said yes because I knew I could prove it to myself that Im good enough and that I’m one of the best players in the state. I made the C team, it wasn’t great, but I made a team, it was progress. I ended up on the first team with the best players in the state. I had that underdog mentality, played with a chip on my shoulder. That’s what I do the best, when the odds are stacked against me and when I know I need to earn my spot. That mentality has shaped who I am today.”

Are you a goal-driven person? “I’m very goal-driven, I write my goals down. I believe in the law of attraction and I believe that we become what our thoughts are. So always staying positive and focusing on one main goal at a time and that’s what really keeps me going. For soccer, one of my main collective goals is to have Charlotte FC finish in a top four spot in the Eastern Conference. An individual goal — I want to score five goals or more this year for the club.”

You are very involved in the community, whether that’s the supporters or influencers/brands in the city. I think that is such a great thing for folks to see and something you should be proud of doing. “I genuinely care about the city of Charlotte. I love the supporters and I love this club. I want to help this sport grow, the city grow. I always think about how I can immerse myself in the community to make the city a better place and make soccer a more prominent sport in the city.”

Are there any lessons you’ve learned that you take with you on a daily basis? “Knowing that things won’t happen over night. I’m not a patient person. When you put the work in and trusting the process and just giving the best you can give. Like I said before, when you do your best and give all you can, it will work out for you — you just need to be patient and know that the hard work will eventually pay off.”

Finding the beauty in everyday moments

Stewart-Haas Racing — Kannapolis, NC

Justin Potter is a landscape and motorsport photographer in the Carolinas. If you have seen any of his images, you know the emotion and passion that he puts into every ounce of his work. From growing up in California being surrounded by racing and to racing on his own to now being a photographer for one of NASCAR’s biggest race teams, Justin continues to push the limits and remembers to be unique and finding the emotion that surrounds his daily life. So, how did it all start “My mom was a race car driver and I was surrounded by it all at a young age. We lived in Kelseyville. I’ve always wanted to drive and race one day. When I was 16 a friend of a friend — his son wanted to race too and they had this car and they said we will split the time with you. I did all of the work, and the kid never showed up. I raced in April, May, June and July then he wanted to race in August. Well, I was like third in points my rookie year and they were ready to jump in and I told them to not take me out of the car. The kid didn’t really want to race, so the car just became mine. It was like a 20-year-old car — the car that everyone had passed down. There was a race where I was battling someone for second place and they got loose and clipped me and sent me in the wall. I destroyed a car that had never been wrecked before. So you can check that one off the list (laughs). The next year I moved into street stock and ended up winning the championship. That was the limit that I could do financially so I decided to move out to North Carolina and learn how to build cars myself and move back to San Fransisco and do it that way. Before moving out here I got two offers to drive for other people and it was tough to figure out if I should stay in school and learn or just jump into it but ended up coming out here to learn what I could.”

Was the passion always there? Did you want to be a race car driver? “My Mom was just always into it. She was raised to be around motorsports, and I was always around it. I worked at the tracks, sold brochures, and officiated races — I got that all from her and also the camera passion from her. For a woman coming up in the 90s, she was extremely talented. She won races as a female and set records. It was a big deal.”

“I went to a school in Hickory, NC, and they teach you a lot about NASCAR, the bodywork and motorsports in general. The money out here compared to California was drastically different, and there were more opportunities to learn and work. I got to build cars, which still allowed me to be competitive because you see cars you built to win races.” Was that hard to accept you wouldnt race and be more focused on building the race cars? “It was hard to accept that I couldn’t race; I just can’t put in the time, effort and money. I tell Jenn all the time that if we win the lottery, we are buying a dirt late model or a funny car and drag race, one of those things will happen! (laughs)”

“When I got the job at this independent company, we built cars for Richard Childress, a little bit of work for Joe Gibbs and some work for a lot of the lower budgeted teams. Things got expensive, and he shut down, and then I started working as a body hanger for BAM, and we built cars for a race at Atlanta; we qualified 4th and were running top five, and our motor blew with five laps to go. It was tough. I cried. A few months later they shut down and I came here to HAAS CNC Racing — that’s what it was called before Tony signed on in ‘08 when I started. It’s been crazy just learning and growing in the sport. Whatever they needed me to do, I was willing to learn and do whatever I could.”

Is there an important race you always reflect on that you were a part of? “To me, that Kevin Harvick championship was special. That #4 car, my job was to go to 7-10 playoff races in 2014, and I was hands-on every week. Once the car passed tech, we were in there, cheating it up as much as we could. That championship will forever mean the most to me because of how hands-on we all were and how important the team was to that whole playoff run.”

Where did the passion for photography start? “My first published photo I was five. My mom worked for National Dragster Weekly and a few other magazines out west. She would drive to all of these tracks, and I would play with other kids, and she would just hand me her camera, and I would just click it at nothing. There was a point when she was interviewing this announcer, and I snapped this photo of him pointing at me. That got published, I got this $25 check, and I felt like the coolest kid in the world. In High School I worked at Longs Drugs. They had a one-hour photo place, and I worked there with Mom, she taught me a lot about editing and shooting. When I moved out here, I got a Canon Powershot and took pictures of everything anywhere I went. I think I needed an outlet that was for me outside of racing. In 2016 we were traveling all of the time to races. We would land, and we had so much downtime. People would go out and drink but that wasn’t for me so I started to find places near the tracks to hike and take photos. It just snowballed into every track — I would find hiking spots, and those photos started to get better. A few drivers would start to join us and hike. It was fun and the start of something for me. I had the camera at the track, too and would just start taking pictures of the cars and sunsets at the tracks. For years after, it was just hiking, taking photos at the track and learning as much as I could with shooting and editing. It wasn’t really a big thing for teams to have photographers at the tracks following teams or drivers. After COVID, when folks were starting to be allowed back at the track, there was this guy who was in charge of marketing at the time for the team. He asked if I was interested in going to Daytona to just focus on photographing the race and the team. In true Daytona fashion, it was raining so I was capturing different things, the puddles, the reflections, the fans and teams playing in the rain. I was trying to find something different and something that no other photographer was doing. They asked if I could continue to do it so I would be working here building cars at the shop five days a week and then photographing the race on the weekends, so it was just a constant seven-day-a-week work schedule.”

Justin started to explain an important moment during a photography trip. “I went on a Grand Canyon trip with Nation Geographic Photographer Dewitt Jones. We were floating down this river, and he looked at me and said, “I’ve seen your work and see what you do — just quit. I’m saving you time and money.” That was on day two of this trip (laughs). He said, “If you want to do this, then you need to look at things differently to set yourself apart. If you are going to take pictures of race cars, you need to look at the people around them and the emotion.” Ever since he said that I’ve never forgotten it; never in a million years have I thought I’d get paid to work on race cars, let alone make money to take photos. I’ll never take this for granted.”

What proud moment has shaped you into who you are today? “I want to say standing on stage for that 2014 NASCAR championship. Another would be that I posted photos from the clash, and Dewitt commented on this photo and said this was what we talked about. That got me; he never comments on anything, so it meant a lot to me. Also, Kevin (Harvick) using the photo I took of him walking into the sunset with his family after his last race of his career. It goes back to moments, emotion, that’s what drives me.”

Are you a goal-driven person? “I still would love to have photos in National Geographic Magazine. My grandpa got me that subscription when I was eight, and I used to flip through those all of the time and would just dream of seeing some of those places. That’s my one main goal that I have.”

What lessons do you take with you to keep you growing in your craft? “Always find something that’s beautiful. The moments we go through every day have beauty. Seeing those little moments that you feel like you walk by every day and never look at — those are the beautiful moments we sometimes take for granted.”