Buzz Issue October 2018

Where are the most productive workers?

At home.

Page 4

OCTOBER 2018 • THE CSRA’S MONTHLY BUSINESS MAGAZINE

DEADLY ADDICTION OPIOIDS TAKE A TOLL ON BUSINESSES AND THEIR PEOPLE

BY WITT WELLS

Opioid addiction is a serious issue in the United States, and its impact is spilling into the business world. Terry Childers, a local representative for Alabama-based recovery program Bradford Health Services, has seen it firsthand.

“I went to do a presentation like this, it was a big company in Augusta,” Childers told the Augusta Metro Chamber of Commerce on Sept. 20. “The girl that met me up front, I was just like, ‘Oh my God, she’s high as a kite.’”

The numbers are shocking — opioids are the leading cause of death among Americans under 50 years old. In 2017, 72,000 deaths

“As employers we need to be more proactive. Maybe more lunch-and-learns with your staff. More preventions, more awareness. Maybe look at your ... wellness programs. Are they really looking at stressors? Are they talking about this topic?”

– Terry Childers, of Bradford Health Services

were attributed to opioid overdose, 60 of them in Augusta alone. Childers thinks the numbers are likely too low, given the stigma surrounding addiction and drug overdoses.

It’s a crisis fueled by the ease with which people in all kinds of workplaces can access and become addicted to opioids and other prescription drugs.

It’s further perpetuated by the isolation and despair addiction creates in the lives of a growing number of Americans. Thus, the vicious cycle continues.

“I know a young man who died a few months ago,” Childers said.

“They said there was enough Fentanyl (an opioid) in his system to kill a hundred people.

Twenty-two years old, right here in Augusta … didn’t even have a chance.”

Not only does

THE

the opioid epidemic have a massive impact on the functionality of businesses, but it also calls into question the relationships (or lack thereof ) that companies have with employees who have slid into addictions and aren’t receiving any help.

Childers said that the most common concern employees have with reporting their own struggles with addiction is the fear of losing their jobs. Two-thirds of people who abuse opioids for nonmedical purposes report that coping with stress is the most prevalent reason to self-medicate.

People aren’t just feeding addictions when they’re off the clock. They’re often incapacitated at work, and their employers don’t even realize it. Businesses have a long way to go in fighting the epidemic effectively and giving their employees a chance to get back on track.

“It’s a real battle for companies to figure out how to manage it,” Childers said.

The perfect storm

Childers described the rise of the opioid epidemic as a “perfect storm” of lax regulations, a presumption that the products weren’t addictive and aggressive marketing from the companies that sell them.

With the lives of vast swaths of Americans — many of them Georgians See OPIOIDS on Page 2

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— at risk every day, Childers advised that accessibility, affordability and quality are of the utmost importance for businesses’ ability to create a path to recovery for their employees.

“A lot of y’all are in positions of supervision and things like that,” Childers said.

“For the manufacturing sector in this country, the opioid epidemic no doubt is the biggest threat to the manufacturing (sector), because they just can’t keep up with the labor demand.”

Safety issues and medical costs tend to rise with opioid addictions, but it’s difficult to monitor. It’s common for companies to have a zero-tolerance policy with drugs such as marijuana, cocaine and heroin, but prescription drugs can be a gray area.

“As employers we need to be more proactive,” Childers said. “Maybe more lunch-and-learns with your staff. More preventions, more awareness. Maybe look at your (employee assistance program) and wellness programs. Are they really looking at stressors? Are they talking about this topic?”

According to a survey published by WebMD, 70 percent of workplaces are being negatively affected by opioid abuse.

“How do we deal with addictive workers, people that are applying here?”

Childers said. “When somebody else is drinking, using on the job, they have to go to treatment. It puts more stressors on the people still on the job.”

Childers didn’t have any specific figures related to the effects of opioid addiction on company theft, but he said the effects are “astronomical.” Furthermore, opioid addictions cost almost $800 per employee per year, Childers said.

“People are robbing the company blind because they’re feeding their habit,” Childers said. “It happens all the time.”

When asked whether he thought opioid addiction was one cause of the increase in the suicide rate in the U.S., Childers said, “I do, definitely.”

“So many people feel like there’s no way out, you know?” he said. “They feel hopeless. And suicide’s an option for them.”

Dr. Patrice Harris, president-elect of the American Medical Association, said in an interview with The Augusta Chronicle that only 2 in 10 patients have access to medicated assistant treatment for opioid use disorder, which she described as the “gold standard.”

“Most people call me and they all work for big companies, and they have no clue what to do when they or a family member needs help,” Childers said.

“People have no idea a lot of times where to even turn, so as employers, we can be a

2 Buzz on Biz October 2018

By the numbers According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, in 2016 (the latest year for which there is complete data):

W E A LT H M A N A G E M E N T P L A N S F O R g e n e r at i o n s

11.4 million People abused prescription opioids

2.1 million

People reported as having an opioid use disorder

42,249

People who died from overdosing on opioids

17,087

Number of deaths attributed to overdosing on commonly prescribed opioids Sources: 2017 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, Mortality in the United States, 2016; NCHS Data Brief No. 293, December 2017; www.hhs.gov

big start for that person getting their life together, and you keeping a valued employee, too.”

Proactive is better than reactive, especially when lives are on the line. Symptoms including flushed skin, withdrawals from family and social activities, dramatic mood swings, and a tendency to fall asleep at unusual times are all pretty typical symptoms of addiction.

As hopeless a situation as addiction often seems, Childers finds bits of encouragement here and there.

For one, he knows that even a basic dialogue about the nature of opioid addiction in workplaces can create positive change and save lives.

He also knows through his own experience that there is a way out. But it isn’t easy.

Even now, Childers said, there is a “sleeping tiger” in the back of his head, always reminding him of the powerful effects that even a small amount of medication can have on his brain.

On the other hand, every day is another victory.

“Our bodies were made wonderfully,” Childers said. “It’s amazing how a body can heal itself.”

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MAKING YOUR BUSINESS BETTER

B2B EXPO PROVIDES EXPERT ADVICE, NETWORKING IN ONE LOCATION

BY GARY KAUFFMAN

Running your own business can be tough. There’s so much more to it than simply creating your product or offering your service.

I know: I had my own business for nearly 18 years. There’s all the behindthe-scenes stuff to take care of, like finances, payroll and expenses. But you also need to know something about branding and marketing, how to hire good employees and how to get along with those employees. You need to know how to turn a profit and how to take care of the money you make.

And these days, you also need to know how to protect yourself from cybercrime.

On top of that, you want your company to work for and with other businesses in the area.

If only there was one place you could go to get all that.

Well, there is — the third annual Buzz on Biz Business to Business (B2B) Expo, which is taking place from 10 a.m to 4 p.m. Oct. 2 at Savannah Rapids Pavilion.

The B2B Expo started three years ago in an effort to bring businesses together to showcase their products and services.

But it was designed to be a learning experience as well.

Local business experts will give short presentations throughout the day on a va-

The B2B Expo will be held Oct. 2 at Savannah Rapids Pavilion. File photo

riety of topics. Everything stops so both visitors and vendors have the opportunity to hear the expert advice.

This year’s speakers include Mark Alison, branding and marketing; Jeff Annis, best hiring practices; and several other speakers, including a cybersecurity expert.

This year’s expo is sponsored by TaxSlayer and Be Still Displays.

Not only will you learn valuable advice from the speakers, but you’ll also be able connect with other businesses in the area.

You might find someone you want to partner with or exchange services with — or simply someone with whom you can share ideas.

The B2B Expo offers opportunities to those who have been in business for a long time, those who are newbies and to entrepreneurs looking to start a business. Even if you’ve been in the CSRA for a long time, you’ll still probably meet someone new or find a business you didn’t know existed.

“I was really impressed with the quality of the speakers and the number of vendors,” said Jeff Asselin, of Loop Recruiting, after last year’s event. “I’ve been in town forever and I still met a handful of new people.”

Last year, TaxSlayer used the B2B Expo to introduce Workful, a new em-

Features Home Sweet Home......................................4 Studies find that employees who work from home are happiest and most productive.

Businessperson of the Month.................. 18 Neil Gordon has followed his childhood passion into his newest project.

Buzz Bits................................................... 6-7

Entrepreneur Launching Pad.................. 26 A new campus begins the next phase for theClubhou.se.

Death in Augusta.........................................9 100 years ago, the Spanish flu closed businesses and caused 118 deaths.

Openings, Closings............................. 12, 13 Upcoming Events................................ 14, 15

Ageless Comedy....................................... 29 Harlem’s annual festival celebrates the comedy genius of Laurel and Hardy.

Columnists Mark Alison: Don’t argue with ducks.................................................. 8 Tim Dalton: Hidden goal of smartest business owners............10 Tammy Shepherd: What can advocacy and PAC do for you...16 Dagan Sharpe: Life is more than just working to make money........................................................................................................20 Christine Hall: Plan ahead to save money on next year’s taxes............................................................................................................21 Tony Creighton: Keeping your roof clean has lasting benefits......................................................................................................21

Russell Head: Deadline nears for Part D coverage notices......22 Ed Enoch: The ghost of things you should have done..............22 Witt Wells: Five Spots to get your football fix................................24 Susan O’Keefe: The Southern Salad offers fresh face for lunch...........................................................................................................28 Samantha Barksdale: Fall is time for fun Halloween movies........................................................................................................30 Ben Casella: Enjoy a good brew among good friends..............30

ployee management program. Other vendors were encouraged by the number of new contacts they made, especially smaller businesses who often struggle to get recognition.

When I had my business back in Indiana, I attended a few shows as a vendor but never one like this that is designed specifically to help businesses connect and grow in their knowledge. I would have jumped at the chance to attend something like this.

So, if you’d like to know more about how to make your business successful, I urge you to go to cityspintickets.com right now to purchase your tickets to the B2B Expo. It’ll be some of the best money and one the best days you’ve ever spent.

In addition to serving as editor of Buzz on Biz, Gary Kauffman is a Christian life coach working from an office in Martinez. Contact him at 803.341.5830 or kauffmancoaching@gmail.com or visit kauffman coaching.com.

The Buzz on Biz mission is to act as an inspirational tool for those in the workplace and those who are entrepreneurs, and to provide useful, practical information to increase their companies’ bottom lines.

To order a 12-month subscription mailed to your home or office, please mail a check for $49 (includes sales tax) to cover postage to the address below.

Publisher Ashlee Duren, ashlee.duren@augustamagazine.com Editor in Chief Gary Kauffman Assistant Editor & Layout Amanda Holahan Multimedia Journalist Witt Wells, witt.wells@buzzon.biz Photography Witt Wells, Gary Kauffman Sales Manager Lisa Dorn, lisa.dorn@augustamagazine.com Sales and PR Leslie Whitney, leslie.whitney@augustamagazine.com, 706-823-3719 Ad Building Michael Rushbrook Distribution Ken Brown Opinions expressed by the writers are their own and their respective institutions. Neither Morris Media Network nor its agents or employees take any responsibility for the accuracy of submitted information, which is presented for informational purposes only.

For the latest news, visit us at buzzon.biz Like us on Facebook at facebook.com/buzz-on-biz Follow us on Twitter @BuzzonBiz 643 Broad Street, Augusta GA 30901

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

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HOME SWEET HOME

EMPLOYEES WHO WORK FROM HOME ARE HAPPIEST, MOST PRODUCTIVE

BY GARY KAUFFMAN

The idea of an open office plan sounds appealing — no barriers between employees, which results in better collaboration, more connectedness through socialization and lower building costs since you don’t to pay for a lot of extra walls and doors (or cubicle dividers).

But there’s one problem, and it’s a big one — employees hate it.

In fact, the open office plan, according to a Harvard Business School study, drastically reduces teamwork and interaction.

The study found that teamwork decreased by 73 percent in an open office plan, and the amount of time spent emailing and instant messaging co-workers increased by 67 percent and 75 percent, respectively. It turns out that employees like their privacy. They prefer to communicate one on one.

A study by the Journal of Environmental Psychology found that employees prefer their own private office by a 2-to-1 ratio over any other option. Second is a private office shared by just two or three co-workers.

(The open office plan did rank just slightly ahead of the cubicle farm.)

But before you begin building walls, there is another option that has ranked high in several studies for increased productivity, fewer sick days and lower building costs — letting employees work from home.

As an employer, your first thought is probably, “Yeah, right, if I let them work from home they’ll sleep until noon, watch TV all afternoon and I’ll never get any work out of them.”

Well, your first thought is wrong.

Numerous studies have found that working from home has actually increased production. One two-year study of a Singapore company found that employees working from home produced as much in four days as employees who came to the office did in five days.

A big factor in the increased productivity is the employees’ mental state. They are 33 percent more likely to feel engaged in their work than in-office employees.

Because they’re not engaging in social chit-chat and attending often pointless meetings, they also are able to concen-

Allowing employees to work from home can lead to more productivity and might help a company attract millennials, who often prefer more flexibility in their work environment.

trate more on their work.

Plus, since they’re already doing much of their communication via email and texts, they still feel connected to their coworkers.

that might keep them out of the office often are still willing to do some work if they can do it in sweatpants while lying on their couch.

Some employees are even willing to

veteran employee, can be costly. Various studies have shown that it might cost as much as two years of the employee’s salary to train a replacement.

And in today’s booming job market, finding a suitable replacement might require an employer to increase the salary. So, it makes sense to keep an existing, trained employee happy and employed with you for as long as possible.

Allowing employees to work from home might also help a company attract millennials, who prefer more flexibility in their work environment.

The idea of allowing employees to work from home might take some getting used to. It will probably require some shifting of job responsibilities, setting up reporting protocols and an assessment of just what constitutes productivity.

The practice obviously won’t work for every business, but it could mean a boost in productivity and a decrease in costs if implemented correctly. And what employer doesn’t want that?

As an employer, your first thought is probably, “Yeah, right, if I let them work from home they’ll sleep until noon, watch TV all afternoon and I’ll never get any work out of them.” Well, your first thought is wrong. Numerous studies have found that working from home has actually increased production.

4 Buzz on Biz October 2018

Other experiments have shown that focusing on the employees’ production rather than the number of hours they work makes them more task-focused, especially if the reward is a three-day weekend.

Working from home also decreases the amount of productivity lost to sick days.

For starters, the sick employee isn’t spreading germs to co-workers, leading in a domino effect of losing people to illness.

But employees who have a mild illness

take a small pay cut in exchange for working at home, which creates a win-win situation for employer and employee.

The employer saves on payroll, and the employee saves in commuting and wardrobe costs.

Probably the biggest plus of all is that employees who work from home are happier, which means they’re willing to stay with the company longer.

Replacing an employee, especially a

buzz bits AUGUSTA TECHNET KEEPS GROWING, GAINING VALUE The name change from Augusta Warrior Project to ForcesUnited helps better define what the organization is about.

AWP CHANGES ITS NAME TO FORCESUNITED The Augusta Warrior Project officially changed its name several weeks ago to ForcesUnited.

The name change will help eliminate some of the confusion the organization has had with the Wounded Warrior Project and reflects the fact that the group is present in more places than just Augusta.

The name change also helps communicate that ForcesUnited helps military veterans integrate into the local community by connecting veterans with the resources they need to improve their everyday lives.

ForcesUnited does that in several ways: By helping veterans translate their military skills into civilian occupations; assisting veterans in achieving educational goals; helping find housing for homeless veterans; and assisting them to receive the benefits and health care services for which they are eligible.

The nonprofit began in 2007 to serve the local community. According to its website, ForcesUnited’s mission is important because “Every day Warriors return home to find their lives in chaos and crisis, putting them in even greater risk for depression, drug addiction and suicide. There are 66,000 veterans in the greater AugustaAiken area who desperately need our help.

[ForcesUnited] provides the needed support and guidance to deliver comprehensive Warrior care. We recognize that when our community thrives, we all thrive.”

USC AIKEN IS TOP REGIONAL COLLEGE The best public regional college in the South is in the CSRA, according to a prominent news organization.

U.S. News & World Report has ranked USC Aiken as the No. 1 public regional college in the Southern region. This isn’t exactly uncharted territory for the college — it has earned the top spot 14 times and has

6 Buzz on Biz October 2018

been in the top three 21 times. It competed against 500 other public institutions in the South.

USC Aiken was founded in 1961 and offers both bachelor’s and master’s degrees.

AIKEN COUNTY LOOKS FOR WAYS TO EXPAND ITS INTERNET Reaching out via internet to Aiken County residents could prove frustrating.

According to a study by the Center for Applied Innovation and Advanced Analytics, nearly 12,000 residents of the county do not have access to basic internet services.

This isn’t the result of a lack of money to subscribe to a service; the service simply isn’t available in some rural parts of the county.

The lack of availability might be because areas don’t have the population density to justify the cost of running cables. Installing internet fiber cables costs about $30,000 per mile.

With more businesses and schools relying on customers and students having access to the internet, reaching those people is important. But there is a potential solution — repurposing existing towers, tanks and other infrastructure for use with the internet. That will require a number of companies partnering to make the access happen.

STUDY FINDS AIKEN NEEDS MORE HOUSING The city of Aiken needs more housing, according to a 175-page study of the local housing needs.

The study, done by Novogradac & Co. for several Aiken organizations, cited a need for 125 affordable rental units and 314 marketrate rental units by 2022. The majority of those are needed in the downtown area.

That number could rise, depending on continued employment at Savannah River Site and growth from cyber companies.

Retirements at SRS mean the company will be bringing in many new, younger employees. That will increase the number of people in the area, and many younger people prefer living in thriving downtown areas.

Even after five consecutive Augusta TechNet conferences, something about this year’s visit stood out for Mike Warlick, vice president of defense for AFCEA International, a nonprofit that supports national security in communications and cyber.

“The big change this year is the entire city of Augusta is behind this movement of cyber,” Warlick said.

According to Warlick, the conference continues to gain value as Augusta grows as a cyber hub.

The new cyber center and the imminent move of Army Cyber Command to Fort Gordon have shifted Augusta closer to the center of not just cybersecurity discussions, but also a wide variety of technological innovations relating to the military, cybersecurity and academia.

“New industry is coming to town for the business opportunities, I would say principally for the cyber center of excellence, the movement of Army Cyber Command,” Warlick said.

He also mentioned an educator and industry forum focused on STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) as one of the highlights of this year’s conference. Teachers ranging from kindergarten through 12th grade were exposed to the 250-exhibit showcase.

Warlick pointed out that the percentage of people with STEM degrees in China, 41 percent, is almost three times higher than that of the U.S., at just 13 percent.

Just weeks before the conference in August, 118,000 square feet of classrooms and STEM labs were unveiled at the new Belair K-8 School, which will hold technology-focused courses that involve 3D printing and computer graphics courses, among other STEM-focused curriculum.

AFCEA’s six years of sponsorship of TechNet have also seen major cyber business growth in the area, including the launch of outfits including EDTS Cyber.

“The infrastructure inside the

city of Augusta has dramatically changed in six years from being for lease or for sale to sold or leased,” Warlick said.

Augusta TechNet regulars who take part in the conference’s massive showcase said that the conference has only grown in quality and relevance.

“It’s the home of the signal corps,” said Anthony Tabler of Perkins Technical Services, which sells modernized power supply docking stations. “It comes out in force to support this show. You just have the gathering of the right mix of people. Occasionally students from Fort Gordon will also have the opportunity to come.”

For some attendees, every year brings more opportunities to connect with the right people in the heart of Augusta.

“I’ve been coming for seven years,” said Joe Reminder, vice president of sales for T&C Power Conversion Inc. “You have to be here every year. If you’re only here once, it kind of defeats the purpose.”

Everyone in Augusta has grown familiar with cyber-boom talk. But like TechNet, the city is also showing real signs of its dedication to becoming a center for technological innovation, both in business and education.

“I know with TechNet in particular, you have government contractors who are going to be doing business in Augusta, and they might not know anybody socially, because they’re just here for business,” Grace Belangia said. “So, we became a social hub for them.”

It never hurts to close out a massive, three-day TechNet conference with a few drinks, a view and some Southern hospitality.

“We help spawn business,” Belangia said. “And that relates to economic development, and so that helps the economy. So, it’s like this full circle of entities, and I think that with cyber coming to Augusta, that’s another sliver of the pie.”

buzz bits

The golf course at Jones Creek opened in 1986. It is closing indefinitely after several years of ongoing litigation over flooding issues.

JONES CREEK GOLF CLUB CLOSES ITS COURSE An ongoing court case has forced Jones Creek Golf Club to shut down its golf course indefinitely.

The court case between Jones Creek and Columbia County involves a dispute over flooding issues and who is responsible for the solution. At issue is silt buildup in Willow Lake, which has flooded the golf course and nearby homes. The two sides can’t agree on how to fix the problem. The case has been ongoing for seven years.

Because of the cost of litigation and operating the course, Jones Creek decided to suspend its golf operations. All golf memberships will be terminated, and there are currently no plans to reopen the course.

Jones Creek opened the course in 1986.

Homeowners fear the closure of the course will affect property values of the homes that line the course. The closure could also affect rentals during Masters Week.

ENROLLMENT AT AUGUSTA UNIVERSITY HITS RECORD Augusta University is setting records this fall.

According to AU President Brooks Keel in a presentation to the Augusta Rotary Club, the university has the largest freshman class in its history this fall. Total enrollment has topped 9,000 for the first time.

AU has experienced growth for three years in a row. That trend is expected

also approved the deal. It still needs the OK from the public service commissions in South Carolina and North Carolina.

SCANA is a subsidiary of South Carolina Electric & Gas Co. Dominion is based in Virginia.

SCE&G customers have already seen some rebates on their bills and lower temporary rates.

to continue with the addition of the school’s Cyber Security program.

SC UTILITY MERGER NEARS COMPLETION The deal to merge energy companies in South Carolina took another step forward recently, and that could mean some money in the pockets of utility customers.

Dominion Energy is working to purchase SCANA, which needed a buyer after abandoning its plans for two new nuclear reactors at V.C. Summer. Dominion is offering more than $1 billion in rebates to customers and would cut rates by 7 percent. SCANA shareholders have voted to approve the deal, and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and Georgia state regulators have

ACCELERATOR HELPS LOCAL ENTREPRENEURS GET STARTED A year ago, Angel Andino was a retired U.S. Air Force cryptologic language analyst.

Now he’s the owner of local startup Dino’s Arcade, a mobile virtual reality entertainment service that brings VR experiences to companies, organizations and schools for corporate team building, large audience and festival entertainment, and arts and science education experiences.

Dino’s success was largely thanks to a program called StartUp Life, a business accelerator launched last year by theClubhou.se, a local innovation center and technology incubator.

Now in its second year, StartUp Life is taking applications from disadvantaged entrepreneurs in the CSRA

looking for help launching a successful startup. The yearlong program will provide up to 10 entrepreneurs with basic living expenses, mentorship and connections to allow them to focus entirely on developing a successful startup and new career. The program was funded by a $500,000 grant from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.

“Based on our experience, the success of a startup is directly proportional to the amount of time an entrepreneur is able to focus on it,” said Eric Parker, cofounder, chairman and innovation architect at theClubhou.se. “In Augusta, we also face the challenge of limited capital markets and higher unemployment than the state average.”

Potential beneficiaries of StartUp Life include displaced workers, veterans, underemployed individuals, immigrants, women and other minorities who might otherwise not have access to networks that encourage or develop new business ideas.

“It’s a fact that most entrepreneurs — particularly those who are disadvantaged — aren’t able to leave work to focus on and pursue their vision,” Parker said.

TheClubhou.se has helped grow nearly 60 sustainable businesses in the Augusta area, contributing 155 jobs and more than $7 million in economic activity.

The program provides furnished dormitory housing, locally sourced meals, a bike-sharing program, sponsored industry field trips, computer lab access, co-working space and connections to the business community.

The deadline to apply is Sunday, Oct. 7.

SC PEACHES PRODUCE WELL AFTER EARLY FROST

South Carolina’s Peach crop is at an 85 percent yield this season, while Georgia’s is only at 30 percent.

Despite some dicey spring weather, the South Carolina peach crop has turned out well.

Peaches are an important piece of the economy in local areas of South Carolina. A March frost, though, had growers concerned about how the crop would turn out.

Although not at its optimal level, the crop is still yielding about 85 percent of normal. Overall, production for the entire state is expected to be about 11,000 tons more than last year’s crop that suffered even more from cold weather.

Georgia, however, hasn’t had quite the same results.

It was hit harder by late frosts, and while the harvest is more than twice the 2017 amount, it is still less than half of what South Carolina harvested. The crop yield was about 30 percent.

Other states, such as New Jersey, Michigan and Colorado, enjoyed good crops of peaches this year.

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

7

DON’T ARGUE WITH DUCKS AVOID FRUSTRATION BY DEALING WITH THE PEOPLE IN CHARGE

BY MARK ALISON

Wayne Dyer, author of Your Erroneous Zones, tells a story about when his sleep in a hotel was interrupted by a well-meaning early morning cleaning crew.

He constructively tried to help the front desk clerk understand that there should be some way for the hotel to let the crew know when a guest checks in very late and won’t be getting up early.

The clerk told him it was his responsibility to put a “Do Not Disturb” sign on the door. Dyer realized his suggestion was falling to deaf ears.

Later, he was having dinner with a friend and the friend asked the wait person for a small change in his order.

When his request was met with resistance, he asked to see the manager and said, “Quack, quack.”

“What was that? Dyer asked.

“That is the sound a duck makes,” his friend replied.

“Ducks can’t make decisions.

I need to see an eagle.”

Dyer said the manager came out and the change was made effortlessly.

So, Dyer used the same tactic the next time he was faced with a duck.

He needed to change flights because of the airline’s delay, and the attendant wasn’t trying to help. He asked to see an eagle — a manager. Not just any manager, Dyer said, but the managers who have offices on the top floor, because everyone knows that “Eagles don’t live down here with the ducks.”

The manager came down the stairs and his issue was worked out to his satisfaction.

I’ve run into a few ducks lately. You’ve seen them. They conscientiously put their job first … instead of the customer.

My latest experience was getting a spray-on bed liner for my truck. I noticed the duck right away. He wasn’t taking notes when we detailed what was to be done and when it was due.

I should have called his attention to it.

That’s what my gut said, but I thought he might know his business better than I.

So, when I arrived a week later to pick up my truck, I wasn’t surprised that it wasn’t ready.

As I raised Cain at the clerk, he just stared at his computer screen. He had no answer.

He was a duck. I needed to talk to the eagle.

Two days past deadline I got the truck.

Guess what?

The liner wasn’t perfect, the windows weren’t tinted and the wire harness wasn’t done.

I listened to some excuses — quack, quack, quack — and it dawned on me that I had gotten about all I could expect from this place. It was a duck pond!

series, said, “You can’t teach someone to serve; you can’t teach someone to smile; you can’t teach personality. But you can hire people who have those qualities and teach them your product and culture. (Check out what he has to say at youtube.com/ watch?v=fc0gRHEU44A&frags=pl%2 Cwn) As an entrepreneur, I made the mistake of thinking I could train a duck.

Oh, don’t get me wrong; he was not just any duck. He was a great duck. I thought he had the potential to be my ticket out of the business. My successor! He talked a good game.

But I was wrong, not

help our blood pressure. But nope — that’s not what eagles do.

We find the eagle in charge of the ducks and get done what we need done.

Placating a duck only reinforces the “quack, quack, quack” sound they make when they have to do anything that is out of the ordinary or go the extra mile or simply do what makes the customer happy and the business successful.

I’m not suggesting we fire the duck.

The world needs ducks.

I’m suggesting we recognize a duck when we see one and, when we’re served up mediocrity, ask for an eagle.

That’s what I do.

But beware. I recall a comment from my friend and mentor Dr. Joe Beam when we traveled together. He said, “I am sure I have eaten a lot of spit in my food because of you.”

Find the eagle in charge of the ducks and get done what we need done.

Placating a duck only reinforces the “quack, quack, quack” sound they make when they have to do anything that is out of the ordinary or go the extra mile or simply do what makes the customer happy and the business successful.

8 Buzz on Biz October 2018

Ducks don’t hire eagles. Ducks hire ducks.

Here is a simple truth. Good people are not trained, they’re found. Jim Rohn, famous motivational speaker, explains the fallacy of trying to train someone for the job when the best way to get the job done is to hire someone who can do it.

“Don’t send your ducks to eagle school,” he said.

Mac Anderson, on his YouTube

once but several times. I should have known then that ducks quack and eagles fly.

He had the motivation. I paid him well. He just didn’t have the dedication, inspiration, appreciation and all the other “tions” that an entrepreneur has, to stay with the business in good and bad times and see it through.

So, do we lower our standards and accept mediocre service, crappy attitude and lack of attention to detail? It might

Mark Alison, the Business Accelerator, is an independent marketing counselor. He can be reached at mark9226@me.com.

DEADLY VIRUS IN AUGUSTA

100 YEARS AGO, SPANISH FLU CLOSED BUSINESSES, CAUSED 118 DEATHS

BY GARY KAUFFMAN

A hundred years ago, the streets of downtown Augusta were mostly empty. The reason was quite literally a matter of life and death.

In 1918, World War I was still raging in Europe. While bullets and bombs killed thousands of people, an even worse death threat was the flu.

It was known as the Spanish flu, so named because newspapers in Spain were the first to report it. It spread rapidly around the globe, eventually infecting about 500 million people over two years.

It was such a strong virus that it killed nearly 1 out of every 5 people who caught it. Some estimates are that it killed more soldiers in the war than the battles did.

By October 1918, the flu pandemic reached Georgia, and the hardest-hit city was Augusta. It probably started in Camp Hancock, the forerunner of Fort Gordon. The first report indicated that 13 newly arrived troops had the flu, a major concern since deaths from it were already being reported around the country.

Soon, the number of cases among soldiers reached 700. By Oct. 6, there were 47 cases reported among civilians in Augusta. Health officials prohibited people from traveling in the area of Camp Hancock and warned people to avoid big

Emergency hospitals, like this one in Kansas, popped up across the country — including in Augusta — in 1918 to help take care of the victims of the Spanish flu. Photo from Otis Historical Archives National Museum of Health & Medicine via Wikimedia

crowds, practice “scrupulous cleanliness” and “hunt piles of fresh air.”

A quarantine order was issued for the entire city, which closed schools, churches and theaters, and seriously impacted businesses. But it couldn’t stop the flu from spreading.

In October alone, 80 deaths from the flu were reported in Richmond County.

Among those most affected were nurses, which resulted in a shortage of people to care for the sick. Nursing students and teachers stepped up to serve in the local hospitals. An emergency hospital was set up at the fairgrounds.

The quarantine was lifted after the war ended on Nov. 11, but there were still a few more cases reported. By the end of 1918, Augusta had recorded 1,400 cases of the Spanish flu resulting in 118 deaths.

Camp Hancock, in a separate tally, had 7,800 reported cases with more than 500 deaths.

The quarantine might have helped, since predictions were that Augusta could have 12,000 cases with more than 800 deaths.

In a three-week period, Oct. 19-Nov. 9, 1918, Georgia reported more than 20,000 cases of Spanish flu with more than 500 deaths.

About 28 percent of the U.S. population was affected, resulting in more than 500,000 deaths.

Most Augusta businesses were able to recover after the six-week quarantine. The loss of income, though, proved to be too much for the new Wells Theatre, which had opened just eight months earlier. The owner, Jacob Wells, was forced to sell it to an out-of-town group, which renamed it Imperial Theatre.

RELATIVELY LOW COSTS HAVE HELPED UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL THRIVE FOR 200 YEARS

BY WITT WELLS

University Hospital has been active in Augusta for 200 years, and Jim Davis, president and CEO of University Health Care System, thinks that’s due to a successful evolution over two centuries of medical advancements.

“Augusta is very blessed to have the health care that they have here in Augusta,” Davis said at the Augusta Metro Chamber Economic Luncheon on Sept.

12. “You’ve got a lot of great providers here.”

Davis pointed out that health care in Augusta has a comparatively low cost and has been rated favorably in various publications. U.S. News and World Report, for example, ranked University Hospital the sixth best hospital in Georgia this year, while Becker’s Hospital Review ranked it

“Augusta is very blessed to have the health care that they have here in Augusta.”

– Jim Davis, president and CEO of University Health Care System 15th nationwide in customer loyalty this year.

University Health Care System includes University Hospital downtown, University Hospital Summerville, and University Hospital McDuffie in Thomson.

While health care spending has con-

tinued to rise, Davis said that University Health Care “has managed to keep it pretty low” in Augusta.

“I think that’s a ticket that we have not pushed enough when we’re recruiting businesses to Augusta,” Davis said.

He also spoke at length about the difficulties faced by a $3.3 trillion health care industry that spends more money than any other in the world.

“We have not made, as an industry, a Medicare margin since 2002,” Davis said, pointing to a graph that illustrated U.S. hospitals’ increasing losses for the last 16 years.

As baby boomers get older, the longterm survivability of Medicare has become a looming question mark, Davis said. Around 10,000 people join Medicare every day.

This year, the World Health Organization ranked the United States 37th in its most recent ranking of the world’s health systems.

“I will tell you, our raw materials aren’t as good as some other countries,” Davis said. “So, you might think about that. We lead the world in opioid addictions, we lead the world in obesity, all that kind of stuff. That all adds up in health care costs.”

Davis said 22 percent of hospitals in America are “upside down on an operating margin,” meaning a recession could spell trouble for many of them.

“The big issue for us is as an industry, we just cost too darn much,” Davis said. “And you won’t hear many guys say that in my position. What we have to figure out is how to create scale to reduce cost.”

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

9

READY TO SELL

THE HIDDEN GOAL OF THE SMARTEST BUSINESS OWNERS

BY TIM DALTON

What are your business goals? If you’re like most owners, you have a profit goal you want to hit. You might also have a top-line revenue number that’s important to you.

While those goals are important, there is another objective that may have an even bigger payoff: building a salable business.

But what if you don’t want to sell?

That’s irrelevant.

Here are five reasons why building a salable business should be your most important goal, regardless of when you plan to push the eject button.

1

SALABILITY MEANS FREEDOM. One of the fundamental tenets of salability is how well your company would perform if you were unable to work for a while. As long as your business is dependent on you personally, there’s not much to sell.

Making your company less dependent on you by building a management team and creating “just-add-water” systems for employees to follow means you have the ability to spend time away from your business.

Think of the world of possibilities that would open up if you could choose not to go into the office tomorrow.

2

SALABLE BUSINESSES ARE MORE FUN. Running a business would be fun if you were able to spend your days on strategic thinking and big-picture ideas.

Instead, most business owners spend the majority of their days on the minutia: the government forms, the employee performance reviews, bank reconciliations, customer issues, auditing expenses.

The boring details of company ownership suck the enjoyment out of owning a business — and it is exactly these tasks that you need to get into someone else’s job description if you’re ever going to sell.

3

SALABILITY IS FINANCIAL FREEDOM. Each month, you open your brokerage statement to see how your portfolio is doing — not because you want to sell your portfolio but because you want to know where you stand on the journey to financial freedom.

Creating a salable business also allows

10 Buzz on Biz October 2018

you peace of mind, knowing that you’re building something that, just like your stock portfolio, has value that you could choose to make liquid one day.

4

SALABILITY IS A GIFT. You might be planning to pass your business to your kids or let your young managers buy into your company over time.

These are both admirable exit options, but if your business is too dependent on you, and it hasn’t been optimized to run without you, you might be passing along an expensive liability.

Success and continuation of the business without you needs to be a major consideration before thinking the transfer of your business is a gift.

5

NINE WOMEN CAN’T MAKE A BABY IN ONE MONTH. There are some things in life that take time, no matter how much you want to rush them.

Making your business salable often requires significant changes, and a prospective buyer is going to want to see how your business has performed for the three years after you have made the changes required to make your business salable. Therefore, if you want to sell in five years, you need to start making your business salable now so the changes you make have time to gestate.

Are you curious about how salable your company is and what you would need to tweak to sell it when you’re ready?

If so, it’s time to get your Value Builder Score via the questionnaire on our website. It takes about 13 minutes, and your responses are kept confidential.

You can complete the questionnaire at integrabrokers.com.

Tim Dalton is president of Integra Business Brokers and has more than 19 years of experience in the Augusta area assisting business buyers and sellers. He is also a Certified Business Value Builder. Additional services include targeted business acquisitions, business valuations and financing assistance. Dalton is a licensed real estate broker in Georgia and South Carolina and can be reached at 706.650.1100 or tdalton@integrabrokers.com. Visit Integra’s website at www.integrabrokers.com.

OFFERING SERVICES FOR BUSINESSES FOR SALE IN GA & SC • SELLING A BUSINESS • BUYING A BUSINESS • BUSINESS CONSULTING

• VALUATION CONSULTING • MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS • BUSINESS ACQUISITION RESEARCH

Mordecai Evans Michael Reagan Tim Dalton mreagan@integrabrokers.com tdalton@integrabrokers.com mevans@integrabrokers.com

4468 COLUMBIA RD, SUITE B MARTINEZ, GA 30907 | 706-650-1100

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

11

Openings, Closings and Moves

OPENINGS

Andre Leon, the owner of Ubora Coffee Roasters, says he wants his new Jones Street shop to be a place where people connect with one another.

Ubora Coffee Roasters A new coffee shop and roastery is preparing to open in what tends to be an unexplored part of downtown.

While new restaurants and other businesses often gravitate toward Broad Street, the owner of Ubora Coffee Roasters chose the largely undeveloped Jones Street a block over as the location for his new coffee roasting company and shop, which he plans to open in October.

The 3,300-square-foot space is at 1128 Jones St. and is owned by Bryan Haltermann.

Ubora started as a coffee truck in Jacksonville, Fla., where its success prompted owner and Naval officer Andre Leon to open the company’s first shop in Augusta, where he recently relocated.

“I wasn’t looking for it,” Leon said. “I guess Augusta looked for me.”

Leon said he was largely influenced by his time living and traveling in countries including Italy, Australia and New Zealand, all of which “were approaching coffee in a different way.”

The coffee will be roasted in-house and sourced from Brazil, Costa Rica, Colombia, Honduras, Ethiopia, Rwanda and Indonesia. Customers also will be able to purchase bags of coffee at the shop.

“We roast on demand,” Leon said. “By the time you get it, you get it less than five days from roast. We wanted to make sure you get very distinct flavors.”

As far as the shop itself, Leon envisions an environment that goes against people’s instinct to isolate themselves.

The seating arrangement will be designed to create connections among people in the shop. He hopes that seats around tables that are perpendicular to the walls will encourage conversation among customers.

12 Buzz on Biz October 2018

“Ubora is about connecting with people,” Leon said. “Ubora is about using coffee as a medium to communicate, to share ideas, to learn, to plant.

“We live in a time that everybody’s on their phones, everybody’s just on social media. I want to bring it back a little bit, bring that human factor again. It’s kind of sad that we’re losing it. I want to bring it through the craftsmanship of coffee.”

Visitors will find a wall full of cases of green coffee beans, an open atmosphere and a large coffee bar with a minimalistic design so customers can watch their coffee as it’s made.

“Everything’s about teaching the art of coffee,” Leon said.

A Broad Street building that is nearly 100 years old will house an office for Aiken-based Security Federal Bank.

AIKEN BANK TO OPEN 2 AUGUSTA OFFICES

Fast-casual eatery Pita Mediterranean Street Food is opening a location near Sprouts grocery store in Augusta.

Pita Mediterranean Street Food An Atlanta-based Mediterranean restaurant chain is preparing to open its first location in Augusta.

Pita Mediterranean Street Food, which has nearly two dozen locations in and around Atlanta and locations in Columbus, Ga., and Greenville, S.C., will soon open in Augusta, too. The fastcasual restaurant will be located in the Sprouts-anchored Crane Creek shopping center.

Pita Mediterranean Street Food serves Mediterranean staples including shawarma, gyros, falafel and small dishes such as hummus and baba ganoush.

The restaurant will open at 630 Crane Creek Dr. Top Sushi Top Sushi Restaurant is expected to open its doors this fall in a familiar location on Washington Road, across the road from Gerald Jones Automotive.

Top Sushi has renovated the former Sidetrack Bar and Grill, a CSRA staple for more than 20 years. The owners also own the Top China brand of restaurants in the area.

An Aiken-based bank will soon be a part of downtown Augusta’s revitalization.

Security Federal Bank has acquired two properties that will add to its 16 branches in the region. One is on Broad Street and the other on Walton Way. The bank has plans for two major renovations, one that will show off Augusta’s historic beauty, and another that will display an edgier aesthetic.

The new Broad Street branch, which might not be completed until 2020, will be located at the Augusta Genealogical Society building, which is nearly 100 years old. The new branch at 1607 Walton Way, which was previously occupied by Georgia Power, will have a more current feel and will house a new corporate training center. The two branches will be the bank’s first locations in Richmond County.

Tony Ateca, chief administration officer for Security Federal Bank, said he expects the Walton Way branch to open next spring. The renovation downtown will be a significantly larger undertaking.

“It has a great history, it’s on a great corner,” Ateca said. “We’re excited about the possibility of renovating it.”

Historic renovations can be a long, difficult process. The best way to go about one depends on the structure.

In the case of 1109 Broad St., certain characteristics of the building will make it difficult for Security Federal Bank to decide whether it wants to act in accordance with preservation guidelines or deviate from them.

For example, drop ceilings were installed in the building in the mid20th century to accommodate air conditioning, but the bank wants to remove them and expose the original high-vaulted ceilings. Ateca said the bank will have to make a case that such a renovation would be of more value than the 1948 renovation that put the drop ceilings in.

Regardless of architectural decisions that will have to be made, Ateca said the goal is still to create a strong sense of history.

“We’re hoping to bring in some local documents and memorabilia in banks from that era,” Ateca said.

“You’d get a whole sense of the history of the building when you’re in the building, as well as when you drive by.”

One of Security Federal Bank’s primary motivations for the expansion was the opportunity to serve a more densely populated area and the vibrant communities that fill it.

“As a community bank, we’re trying to serve a variety of demographics,” Ateca said. “We’re really trying to reach all segments of the community and make sure we are reinvesting.”

Openings, Closings and Moves Catch the Buzz! Follow business and economic news across the CSRA at buzzon.biz. us the opportunity to meet with more clients at one time.”

Kerr and the four other attorneys previously associated with Warlick, Stebbens, Murray, & Chew LLP, joined Turner Padget in February.

“We just joined back with the chamber. We’re trying to become more involved and more known in the community,’ Kerr said.

The Diablo’s Southwestern Grill on Washington Road, in a former Quick Serve Oil Station, has been in the works for a few years.

DIABLO’S LOCATION NEARS OPENING It’s been a few years in the planning stages, but Diablo’s Southwestern Grill will soon open another restaurant on Washington Road.

The new restaurant will be in the retrofitted Quick Serve Oil Station next to Ephesus Restaurant. The building has been transformed with a brick exterior, but it will maintain a little of the automotive feel — one of the large garage doors has been retrofitted with glass and can be rolled up on nice days to allow access to a small patio area.

No exact date for an opening has been set but it should be within a few weeks.

QC Nails Spa While most nail salons are tucked into small spaces in strip malls, a much larger version will soon be coming to the Augusta Mall.

QC Nails Spa will encompass a 4,500-square-foot space on the mall’s upper floor near Macy’s. QC Nails Spa offers manicures and pedicures, permanent cosmetics, facials and spa packages.

The new nail salon is scheduled to open in December or after the first of the year.

QC Nails Spa is planning to open in a 4,500-squarefoot space on te upper level inside Augusta Mall.

EXPANSIONS

Turner Padget A South Carolina-based law firm has opened a new office in Martinez.

Turner Padget, which also has offices in Charleston, Greenville, Columbia, Florence and Myrtle Beach, moved to a new office at 3730 Washington Road next to Wells Fargo. The firm’s former office was in the same area.

“This has a fresh look, and it has a better layout for us,” said Jennifer Kerr, an attorney at Turner Padget. “It gives

Kelley Appliance Martinez-based Kelley Appliance Center has expanded its footprint in the CSRA by opening a new location in Aiken.

The appliance retailer, owned by Joyce Kelley, sells products made

by General Electric, Samsung, LG, Whirlpool, Maytag and more.

“It’s been a work in process for about a year,” said Kelley Zapata, manager of Kelley Appliance in Martinez. “We finally got everything together. We wanted to fill a void in that market.”

The new showroom opened Sept. 1 at 1551 Whiskey Road. Zapata said a significant portion of the store’s customers are from that area, and Kelley Appliance wanted to be able to better cater to them.

Zapata said that the new store is about 7,000 square feet in size and has a larger showroom than the Martinez location.

McAlister’s Deli McAlister’s Deli opened its third location in the CSRA recently. The new location is in the second phase of Mul-

lins Crossing in Evans, which is anchored by Belk.

McAlister’s is known for its soups, sandwiches, salads and baked potatoes.

The new location will be open from 10:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily.

This is the 75th location for McAlister’s Deli. It also has locations at the Augusta Mall and near Gateway Plaza in Grovetown.

NAME CHANGE

Peachy Rolls The Peach Wave Frozen Yogurt store in Fairway Square Shopping Center on Washington Road has a new addition and a new name.

In addition to its frozen yogurt, it also now offers rolled ice cream, and it has changed its name to Peachy Rolls and Frozen Yogurt.

Rolled ice cream is a popular trend in which ice cream is mixed with popular add-ins, flattened and frozen in a thin sheet, then scraped into small rolls.

Rolled ice cream is also available in stores at West Town Shopping Center and in Sprouts Plaza.

MOVES

Jay’s Music The former location of Jay’s Music is now part of the Augusta National Golf Club complex, but the music store is back in business in the former Piccadilly Restaurant at 3110 Washington Road, near Ephesus Restaurant.

Jay’s Music is located in one part of the renovated building. Plans are to renovate and subdivide the rest of the building to add other businesses.

Jay’s Music is filling part of the space that was left vacant after the closure of Picadilly Restaurant. The rest of the building will be renovated for other businesses.

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

13

Tuesday, Oct. 2

UPCOMING BUSINESS EVENTS

Buzz on Biz B2B Expo, 10 a.m., Savannah Rapids Pavilion, 3300 Evans to Locks Road, Evans.

A premier networking event for businesses. Speakers will be presenting throughout the day on several topics, including networking, business planning, marketing, best hiring practices and more. A variety of exhibitors will show products and services.

For more information, visit cityspintickets.com.

North Augusta’s Cyber Ecosystem, 4 p.m., Palmetto Terrace Ballroom, North Augusta Municipal Building, 100 Georgia Ave., North Augusta. An event to introduce small and mediumsized businesses in the CSRA to the cybersecurity resources offered by universities and other South Carolina providers.

For more information, visit northaugustachamber.org.

Friday, Oct. 5

First Friday Means Business, 7:30 a.m., 117 Newberry St. NW, Aiken. Informative breakfast meeting with a keynote speaker.

For more information, visit aikenchamber.net.

SCORE Seminar: Getting a Business Loan, 10 a.m., North Augusta Community Center, 495 Brookside Ave., North Augusta.

At some point your business might need financing. This workshop will share the ins and outs of applying for various loan programs. Presented by Brent Hoover, business consultant for the South Carolina Small Business Development Center. Registration required. For more information, visit northaugustachamber.org.

Thursday, Oct. 11

SCORE Seminar: Plan for Business Success, 10 a.m., North Augusta Community Center, 406 West Ave., North Augusta. To have success in business, your business needs a plan. This workshop

14 Buzz on Biz October 2018

Ribbons cuttings scheduled Oct 1: Mayo & Associates CPAs, 2907 Professional Pkwy., Augusta, 4 p.m.

Oct. 4: CounterSync, 2014 Westside Court, Augusta, 4 p.m.

Oct. 11: W alton Rehabilitation Center, 1355 Independence Drive, Augusta, 3:30 p.m.

Oct. 12: C&C Automotive Martinez, 4014 Washington Road, Martinez, Noon Oct. 17: Augusta Scottish Rite Center, 2553 Washington Road, Augusta, 11 a.m.

Oct. 22: Gerald Jones Subaru, 4022 Washington Road, Augusta, 4 p.m.

Oct. 23: Trinity Hospice, 1501 Anthony Road, Augusta, 4 p.m.

fireworks. For more information, visit columbiacountychamber.com.

Monday, Oct. 15

Catch the Buzz! Get more on events and follow business and economic news across the CSRA at buzzon.biz. introduces such concepts as a 30-second elevator speech, costs, pricing and profit, identifying customers, and test marketing.

Presented by Certified SCORE Business Counselors of the Greater Aiken SCORE chapter. Registration required. For more information, visit northaugustachamber.org.

Friday, Oct. 12

Good Morning, North Augusta, 7:30 a.m., Palmetto Terrace Ballroom, North Augusta Municipal Building, 100 Georgia Ave., North Augusta. Dominion Energy will share an update on its plans for bringing South Carolina a brighter future. Registration required.

For more information, visit northaugustachamber.org.

CSRA Light the Night, 6 p.m., Evans Towne Center Park, 7016 Evans Town Center Blvd., Evans. A series of events to raise funds for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

The evening includes kids’ activities, food trucks, a local band and

Columbia County Chamber’s 14th Annual Golf Tournament, 7 a.m., West Lake Country Club. Two flights for teams of four. Executive, corporate and hole sponsorships available. Registration required.

For more information, visit columbiacountychamber.com.

Wednesday, Oct. 17

Quickbooks (Basics and Beyond), 9 a.m., Conference Room, Small Business Development Center, 2907 Professional Pkwy., Augusta. This all-day class includes step-by-step instructions for beginners or more intensive instruction in intermediate or advanced training. Registration is required. For more information, visit georgiasbdc.org/augusta-office.

Thursday, Oct. 18

Third Thursday Business Builder, 11:30 a.m., Augusta Metro Chamber office, 1 10th St., Augusta.

“Marketing Strategies: Getting Others as Excited as You are About Your Business,” presented by Tony Robinson, site Director for Rural Sourcing. Registration required by Oct. 15. For more information, visit augustametrochamber.com.

Monday, Oct. 22

Chamber After Hours, 5 p.m., Gerald Jones Automotive Group, 4022 Washington Road, Martinez.

A networking opportunity to meet and build relationships with other local businesses.

For more information, visit columbiacountychamber.com.

Wednesday, Oct. 24

Business Planning Essentials, 1 p.m., Conference Room, Small Business Development Center, 2907 Professional Pkwy, Augusta. This 3-hour class guides participants through the specific components of a well-written and comprehensive business plan to position a business for stability and growth. Registration is required. For more information, visit georgiasbdc. org/augusta-office.

Thursday, Oct. 25

Networking for Leads, 3 p.m., Columbia County Chamber office, 1000 Business Blvd., Evans. A structured program designed to cultivate meaningful business relationships. The goal is to give and receive leads.

For more information, visit columbiacountychamber.com.

Business After Hours, 5 p.m., Honda of Aiken, 550 Jefferson Davis Hwy., Warrenville, S.C. Learn more about what the Honda dealership has to offer. For more information, visit aikenchamber.net.

Friday, Oct. 26 Women in Business Signature Event, 6 p.m., Legends Club, 2701 Washington Road, Augusta. “How to Be Elf-Sufficient,” presented by Christa Pitts, co-CEO of Creatively Classic Activities & Books, the company behind The Elf on the Shelf. For more information, visit augustametrochamber.com.

Tuesday, Oct. 30

WHAT’S NEW

Meet.Mingle.Mesh, 5:30 p.m., SRP Park, 187 Railroad Ave., North Augusta. An event to meet new connections and industry partners, to mingle with business community professionals and to mesh for success. For more information, visit augustametrochamber. com.

Friday, Nov. 2

First Friday Means Business, 7:30 a.m., 117 Newberry St. NW, Aiken. Informative breakfast meeting with a keynote speaker. For more information, visit aikenchamber.net.

At theClubhou.se • Augusta Locally Grown has its downtown pickup at theClubhou.se’s Telfair Street location every Tuesday, 5-7 p.m.

• Entrepreneur members of theClubhou.se meet every Wednesday morning for Founders Circle, 9-10 a.m.

Oct. 3: 1 Million Cups offers a couple of entrepreneurs from the area a chance to share their stories with the community.

8-9 a.m.

Oct. 10: Lunch & Learn: Finding Funding: Keep Your Equity with Connie Casteel.

Casteel will provide an overview of the federal Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs.

Noon to 1 p.m.

Oct. 10: Beer & Bytes is our time to bring together our entire community of entrepreneurs, makers, techies and creatives for a bit of new-fashioned networking. This month we have Peter Mourfield, CTO of TaxSlayer, sharing about his role. 5:30-7 p.m.

Oct. 11: The Augusta Developer is kicking off Hacktoberfest, presented by Digital Ocean! Come pick a challenge and prepare to present next month! 6-8 p.m.

Oct. 16: Our Gathering of We Who Make Stuff is regrouping after Arts in the Heart and searching for a new project. 6-8 p.m.

Oct. 18: PyAugusta is a monthly meetup of Pythonistas focusing on Python programming and its applications to data science. 6-8 p.m.

Oct. 23: Agile Augusta will meet to learn about “Agile Estimation” with Nick Stevenson. 6-7 p.m.

Oct. 26: Join Kim Hines of Augusta Locally Grown as Growler Gardening gets together the horticulturally minded for some garden maintenance and good beer! 5-7 p.m.

OCTOBER

AUGUSTA’S INNOVATION NEWS

OUR CYBER CENTER LOCATION IS OPEN

THE

ACCELERATOR

STARTUP LIFE APPLICATIONS OPEN

10.01.18

FALL CODE BOOT CAMP SESSION STARTS

ENTREPRENEURSHIP: 12. What does a typical day involve for you?

In the office by 9am, identifying potential customers, making sales calls, and engaging with potential users.

Michele Heyward FOUNDER, CEO

1. What is the business?

PositiveHire is a Software as a Service (SaaS) company in the Human Capital Management market, which is focused on experienced women of color professionals in STEM. 2. When and where did you found it?

CSRA in May 2017.

3. What were you like in school?

I was a nerd girl.

4. Any significant experiences/ skills that influenced your business?

My experience in corporate America as a civil engineer working in construction.

5. Any lessons learned from previous entrepreneurial experience?

Yes! Just because you like an idea does not mean people will pay you for it.

6. What appealed to you about entrepreneurship?

That I could be like my mom who had her own business for over 30 years.

7. How did you get the idea?

I read an article about just writing down ideas you were passionate about solving.

I kept coming back to this one.

13. Favorite books?

Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Others Don’t, by James C. Collins and Freakonomics, by Stephen J. Dubner and Steven Levitt.

MICHELE HEYWARD 8. How has your idea progressed over time?

I know what I want it to look like, which is saying a lot, considering I’ve always focused on the mission.

9. How do you market your business?

Social media, speaking events, conferences, and conventions.

10.

Who are your main competitors?

Jopwell, National Society of Black Engineers, LinkedIn, Glassdoor, Fairygodboss 11. What have you learned from your competitors?

They all started in one niche, were very specific in the initial stages, and then broadened their services over the years. Jopwell has struggled to obtain traditional VC funding but has been able to raise over $5MM.

14. Favorite entrepreneurs?

Angela Benton, Founder & CEO of NewME Accelerator, and Daymond John, the founder, president, and CEO of FUBU. 15. Best piece of advice?

Just because you do not know how to do something does not mean you cannot do it.

16. Common misconceptions about your business/entrepreneurship in general?

That it’s so easy!

17. What is next for your business?

Launching software with clients and users onboarded in Q3 2018.

18. How has working out of theClubhou.se benefitted your company?

It’s great to engage and interact with entrepreneurs in different markets. We all share our successes, struggles, and ideas to move forward in our businesses.

Startup Life is a free, year-long live-in business incubator.

LEARN MORE AND APPLY TODAY | bit.ly/SupLifeApply

TO BECOME A MEMBER VISIT www.theclubhou.se SCHEDULE A TOUR heythere@theclubhou.se

check out new rates for our new (cyber) space. www.theclubhou.se theClubhou.se at the Georgia Cyber Center 100 Grace Hopper Lane, STE 3700

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

15

COLUMBIA COUNTY CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

WHAT CAN ADVOCACY AND A PAC DO FOR YOU?

BY TAMMY SHEPHERD

The Columbia County Chamber of Commerce is taking advocacy to a whole new level!

You might ask “What is advocacy?”

According to Wikipedia, advocacy is an activity by an individual or group which aims to influence decisions within political, economic and social systems and institutions.

Advocacy can include many activities that a person or organization undertakes, including media campaigns, public speaking, commissioning and publishing research, conducting an exit poll, or the filing of an amicus brief. Lobbying — often performed by lobby groups — is a form of advocacy in which a direct approach is made to legislators on an issue which plays a significant role in modern politics.

The Chamber has been involved with advocating on a variety of issues for a decade, including the development of a new or revised policy, such as Columbia County’s sign ordinance last year. After opposing the original ordinance draft, the Chamber continued to work with the commission to find a resolution that appeased our business members.

On a state level, the Chamber has supported legislation to have more transparency in the collection of sales taxes. This legislation assures customers that the sales tax they are paying goes to the county in which they purchased the product. Shopping local keeps our sales tax money in our own county and helps pay for the services provided by our local government.

On the federal level, advocacy might be through letters written to various federal agencies asking for new missions at Savannah River Site. Through such advocacy, our county protects the 1,400 jobs of the people who work there, and those paychecks come home to our local businesses.

Soon, voters will be presented several bills for consideration on the November ballot. First, and most important to business owners, will be the formation of a business court system. Business lawsuits would be judged in a court of business peers instead of a jury of summoned citizens. Cases will be heard by legal professionals with expertise in the business world and adjudicated in a much timelier fashion than if they were processed through the traditional legal system.

Another ballot question posed to voters concerns the “Brunch Bill.” Currently,

16 Buzz on Biz October 2018

The Columbia County Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors has approved the creation of a new organization, the Columbia County Chamber PAC, to help the Chamber better advocate on issues of importance to businesses.

restaurants may not serve alcoholic beverages until 12:30 p.m. on Sundays. The ballot question — if passed — would allow restaurants to serve alcohol starting at 11 a.m. on Sundays. Although the Chamber did not take a position on it, we supported getting the question on the ballot for voters to make the ultimate call.

So, what’s new in advocacy for the Columbia County Chamber? The Board of Directors recently approved the creation of a new organization called the Columbia County Chamber PAC (Political Action Committee).

This organization allows the Chamber to move some items to a higher level of educating and advocating, in addition to fundraising in support of a particular issue or candidate through advertisements, signage and more. The PAC allows us to have a mechanism to raise funds while using the influence and strength of the organization to support or oppose a position.

The main focus of the PAC will be on the local and state level. One example is when the Chamber supported the passage of the TIA (or T-SPLOST) in 2012.

We educated and advocated; however, we

were unable to purchase advertising or signage through our Chamber. Fortunately, the Georgia Transportation Alliance handled the legality of those needs since it was a statewide vote.

The PAC will allow for those activities, while keeping them separate from the Chamber organization.

Under the PAC, this mechanism will be used to support the ballot question establishing redevelopment powers for Harlem and Columbia County. The redevelopment powers would promote privately funded redevelopment and establish a special fund that can be used for redevelopment costs, such as land assembly, organization and professional service costs, along with debt service and capitalized interest. The PAC Board of Directors fully supports this issue based upon these advantages: There is not a property tax abatement or a property tax increase; it leverages private investment; it creates a strategic financing tool; and it is not a general obligation debt to local governments or loss of current property tax revenues.

The PAC’s Board of Directors, which

consists of representatives from local businesses, includes Chair Reagan Williams, Meybohm Real Estate; Vice Chair Pat Goodwin, Marvin United Methodist Church; Treasurer William Cleveland, Cleveland Group CPAs; Robbie Moore, Blanchard & Calhoun Insurance; Ed Burr, University Hospital; Aubrey Nesbitt, Zaxby’s; and Brandon Haddock, Textron Specialized Vehicles.

Join the PAC Board of Directors by supporting and voting for the establishment of the Business Court and the redevelopment powers of the tax allocation district (TAD).

Tammy Shepherd is president of the Columbia County Chamber of Commerce and has worked at Disney World, Savannah Rapids Pavilion and Columbia County Magazine. Email tammy@columbiacounty chamber.com.

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

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BUSINESSPERSON OF THE MONTH

BORN FOR THIS: SINCE CHILDHOOD, GORDON HAS FOLLOWED HIS PASSION

BY GARY KAUFFMAN

Entrepreneur Neil Gordon has had several roles in his professional life, but each one had a singleness of purpose — doing something unique, something that inspires him and helps others. Photo by Gary Kauffman

Some people wait until well into adulthood before they find their passion. But a few, like Neil Gordon, discover it before they’re teenagers.

Gordon has long been the face of business news and information in the CSRA, first as a TV news reporter/anchorman, then as the creator of the Buzz on Biz brand and now in a new venture, CrossTalk, a program for area churches to tell their stories that will air on local television later this year.

Neil Gordon Producer, CrossTalk TV But his career as an entrepreneur, marketer and broadcaster began much earlier, while he was growing up in upstate New York. He spent hours listening to the play-by-play announcers describe the action of his beloved Mets, Jets and Knicks on his clock-radio, enthralled by how they painted the scene with their words.

“I would try to emulate them,” he said.

“It seemed so exciting to me. I never got into the sports side of broadcasting, but that put me on my way to broadcasting.”

In the meantime, he would pitch story ideas to publications such as Baseball Digest, oblivious that they wouldn’t be interested in the musings of a 10-year-old.

Then, at age 13, he began the sales side of his career, going door-to-door to sell newspaper subscriptions — a job he maintained through high school and college.

At Buffalo State College, Gordon majored in communications with an emphasis on broadcasting, but after graduation he worked for four years in sales and marketing. Then, in the late 1980s, his father’s death changed his perspective.

“When Dad passed away, that was the kick in the pants I needed, that we never know how much life God gives us,” he said.

He began applying at television stations from New York to Florida, and he landed a job at a Macon, Ga., TV station.

He was laid off after three months, which brought him to Augusta and Channel 12 in 1990. Most of the next 12 years were spent in Augusta, with brief stints at stations in Spokane, Wash., and Elmira, N.Y. He won awards for his role as a troubleshooter — news reports about issues that people needed help to resolve. It satisfied his desire to help people.

In his final year at Channel 26 he served

18 Buzz on Biz October 2018

as news director, an administrative job that was ill-suited for his entrepreneurial spirit. So, Gordon launched his own marketing and public relations business.

In 2005, he felt the itch to tell people about new businesses, so he approached Channel 12 about doing an early-morning business segment titled Buzz on Biz, which continues now as Business Minute.

Two years later he partnered with Beasley Broadcasting to do a Buzz on Biz radio show with John Patrick, which continued until the end of 2017.

It was in 2009 that he began producing the print edition of Buzz on Biz, first as an insert in the Medical Examiner, then as a stand-alone publication. In 2010, he added a website.

The Buzz on Biz brand grew and, although initially he had no plans of selling it, in 2016 he accepted an offer from Morris Communications. After working for Morris for 18 months, the entrepreneurial itch struck again.

“I longed to create something else,” he said. “I realized I had more to do.”

Gordon’s next project had divine guidance. At a church service during Memorial Day weekend in 2017, he listened to a sermon about finding your purpose in life and pursuing it with reckless abandon.

“I felt like God spoke to me in that service,” he said. “Since I was a little boy these parallel gifts have been given to me in broadcasting and marketing. The name ‘CrossTalk’ came to me in that service.”

For the next six months, as entrepreneurs are wont to do, he scribbled notes on napkins and scraps of paper until his wife, Melissa, showed him the note-taking app on his smartphone.

CrossTalk, which will launch in December on Saturday evenings on Channel 26 and Sunday mornings on Channel 49, will contain short news-type items about activities at local churches, practical advice from Christian counselors and “mini-sermons” from area pastors.

Gordon has partnered with videographer Bryan Williams of Bryton Entertainment on the project.

“This is my way to invite people to church,” Gordon said.

Churches can view the pilot episode and get more information at crosstalktv. com.

In his own words

What are you passionate about in your business?

“I’ve always followed the path less traveled. Everything I’ve done, whether in the troubleshooter role, which had never been done in Augusta, or Buzz on Biz or now CrossTalk, it’s something that’s never been done. It inspires and excites me to create something unique, that serves some niche and touches people in different ways. At one time I thought about getting a real estate license, but an uncle told me that there are thousands of people who can sell real estate. He said, ‘Try to find your own way and do something different.’”

What advice would you give to other entrepreneurs?

“I’ve heard it said that you should follow your passion, and I agree with that one million percent. The people who are so invested in what they’re doing that they would do it for free, they’re the ones who push through and become successful. The reason people fail is often because they chose something that’s not their pas-

sion. So, do what you would do for nothing and try to make a living at it.”

How do you handle the stress of starting a new venture?

“A lot of entrepreneurs stress out all the time, but I’ve always felt it was like the stock market — there will be ups and downs, but if you stay the course, if you believe in what you’re doing and do it with integrity, you’ll be OK. When I started CrossTalk I started with a blank piece of paper, and that can be very scary.

But I’ve had peace about it from the beginning that this will happen. I’m giving it all to God and trusting him.”

How did you first learn about the peace of trusting God? “In April of 2009, our daughter Fia died after just 13 days (she had Trisomy 13, a rare chromosomal disease that was diagnosed while she was in the womb). A lot of control-oriented doctors said that we should abort the baby, that it would cause too much stress and difficulty for our family. We prayed and left it in God’s hands. That was the turning point in my relationship with God and feeling that God has given me gifts and that it would all work out. I hadn’t done many issues of Buzz on Biz at that point, but there were a number of people aware of what we were going through that decided to advertise to help me and take a little of the financial edge off.”

How do you give back?

“Once a year Melissa and I spend many hours helping the Alzheimer’s Association with their Dancing with the Stars event. It’s one of our favorite nights of the year. I also speak at civic clubs and help people connect with the media. I help with the publicity with the Trendz Salon’s annual cut-a-thon to raise money for sick children.”

What does the future hold for you?

“CrossTalk is a long-term mission. Bryton Entertainment has national connections, so we’ll save the stories of faith and redemption that can play anywhere and see if we can get them placed nationally.

I’m still marketing for a small handful of clients, I still do the Law Call show on Sunday nights and I’m doing Augusta Business Profiles that produces independent projects for clients. Any mentors I’ve had always told me to never put all my eggs in one basket. I have a 5-year-old that keeps me young, and I have a lot of grandchildren now. I’m trying to balance and enjoy my family, and I’ve committed to regular date nights with my wife.”

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

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THE ART OF BALANCE

LIFE IS MORE THAN JUST WORKING TO MAKE MONEY

BY DAGAN SHARPE

Our work matters, but so often we can lose sight of the greater things in lieu of the lesser when our perspectives go askew.

For example, I recently heard some of the best advice shared on how a young person, or even an older one, can determine the type of work he or she should go into.

Quite simply, consider what need or problem exists in the world. Then, consider what gifts and skills you possess that can directly help meet this need and contribute to reducing the problem.

Good advice. Yet how many of us instead consider the work we go into simply based on the amount of money we can make?

An old proverb says that only a fool wears himself out solely for work. This is not to say we don’t give our best to our work, but rather that it is foolish to live for our work and money. Life consists of far greater things than money. However, money seems to rule our lives in many ways and often dictates how we live our lives. It calls the shots far too often.

Wisdom says we should invest our time, our lives, our gifts and our skills for something greater than money. Money is important, without a doubt — but it is not the most important. To identify a problem in the world we care about and to then invest our time to work that helps make a difference contributes to energized days we can get excited about.

Some people might be thinking it’s too late or that you are trapped in a dead-end job, but most of us can find, or start to build, meaning in what we do — if we look beyond measuring our impact simply in monetary terms.

For example, whether a person is a secretary, a janitor, a manager, a business owner, or even a retiree or someone who stays at home, we can all begin contributing to causes that allow us to offer our skills to matters we care about and that address problems in the world. This keeps us from feeling trapped by our work and unfulfilled, because no matter how much money we make, if that is the only thing we work for, more is rarely enough. Typically, striving only for money creates a

lingering emptiness that can never be satisfied.

I need only to think back on the countless people I have met who are miserable in their jobs and feel trapped because of the volume of money they make. Even though it’s a lot, it still doesn’t satisfy — it rarely does, but most people will most always prefer to try and figure that out for themselves.

The balance in work-life dynamics is more an art than science. The goal is to align our passions with a purpose.

I was fortunate to migrate into the financial industry and am forever grateful for it. I migrated into it, because I didn’t plan on making it my primary work initially. It wasn’t my first choice — writing was.

Yet, my passion for financial literacy, communications and helping people improve their lives unified in a way that allows me to contribute to a cause I believe in, one person at a time.

Money issues have been shown to be a leading driver in marital issues and poor health. So, I love working to help people

improve their families, health and overall well-being through teaching, writing and building teams that help establish sound financial disciplines.

This can be true for all of us. We might not all achieve the highest platforms and be made famous for our work, but our work can matter and can make a difference one person a time. This is the power of our work when it catapults us into interacting with others and with the world, thus providing great opportunities to make a difference with the days we’ve been given and have left.

Dagan Sharpe is senior vice president of Queensborough National Bank & Trust and the author of Highways End and Full Disclosure. Email him at dagan. sharpe@qnbtrust.com.

We might not all achieve the highest platforms and be made famous for our work, but with the right balance, our work can matter and can make a difference.

20 Buzz on Biz October 2018

SAVING STRATEGIES

PLAN AHEAD TO SAVE MONEY ON NEXT YEAR’S TAXES

BY CHRISTINE HALL

If you want to save money on your tax bill next year, consider using one or more of these tax-saving strategies that reduce your income, lower your tax bracket and minimize your tax bill.

Max out your 401(k) or contribute to an IRA

You’ve heard this before, but it’s worth repeating, because it’s one of the easiest and most cost-effective ways of saving money for retirement. Many employers offer plans where you can elect to defer a portion of your salary and contribute it to a tax-deferred retirement account.

For most companies, these are referred to as 401(k) plans. For many other employers, such as universities, a similar plan called a 403(b) is available. Check with your employer about the availability of such a plan and contribute as much as possible to defer income and accumulate retirement assets.

If you have income from wages or self-

employment income, you can build taxsheltered investments by contributing to a traditional (pre-tax contributions) or a Roth IRA (after-tax contributions). You may also be able to contribute to a spousal IRA even when your spouse has little or no earned income.

Take advantage of employer benefit plans

Medical and dental expenses are generally only deductibles to the extent that they exceed 7.5 percent of your adjusted gross income (AGI) in 2018. (This number is rising to 10 percent in 2019.) For many individuals, particularly those with high income, this could eliminate the possibility for a deduction.

However, you can effectively get a deduction for these items if your employer offers a Flexible Spending Account, or FSA (sometimes called a cafeteria plan).

These plans permit you to redirect a portion of your salary to pay these types of expenses with pre-tax dollars. Another

such arrangement is a Health Savings Account, or HSA. Ask your employer if the company provides either of these plans.

Bunch your itemized deductions

Certain itemized deductions, such as medical or employment-related expenses, are only deductible if they exceed a certain amount. It may be advantageous to delay payments in one year and prepay them in the next year to bunch the expenses in one year. This way, you stand a better chance of getting a deduction.

tions can lead to overlooking them as well. You also need to maintain records regarding your income. If you receive a large tax-free amount, such as a gift or inheritance, make certain to document the item so that the IRS does not later claim that you had unreported income.

If you’re ready to save money on your taxes this year but aren’t sure which taxsaving strategies apply to your financial situation, be sure to contact your tax advisor.

Keep good records

Unfortunately, many taxpayers forgo worthwhile tax credits and deductions because they have neglected to keep proper receipts or records. Keeping adequate records is required by the IRS for employee business expenses, deductible travel and entertainment expenses, charitable gifts and more.

But don’t do it just because the IRS says so. Neglecting to track these deduc-

Christine Hall is a partner in Hall, Murphy & Schuyler PC, a full-service accounting firm. For a complimentary accounting, tax or business consultation, call 706.855.7733 or email cmh@hmandscpas.com.

WHAT’S EATING YOUR ROOF?

KEEPING YOUR ROOF CLEAN HAS LASTING BENEFITS good. Without the proper cleaning detergents and low-pressure equipment, a homeowner can damage shingles and create permanent water damage to the home. The homeowner also can damage surrounding landscaping.

There’s also the added risk factor of falling due to not having the proper roofing equipment.

Using a licensed and insured roof cleaning company such as AllClean Pressure Washing ensures a high-quality, safe and effective roof cleaning is done in a timely and professional manner per Asphalt Roofing Manufacturers Association (ARMA) recommendations.

BY TONY CREIGHTON

Do us a favor: The next time you’re outside, take a look at your home’s roof.

Chances are, you’ll notice at least some dark spots.

Unless it has rained very recently, these dark spots aren’t condensation, but a much more serious problem: algae.

In a humid climate such as the one we live in, especially in neighborhoods with plenty of shade and trees, algae such as Gloeocapsa Magma, more commonly known as blue-green algae, attaches to your roof and begins to spread and thrive.

Having algae on your roof is an unattractive attribute, but it’s also more than that, and it’s not something you can put off taking care of.

Here’s the thing: Roof algae is a living thing, and it’s feeding off of the natural components used in shingle production.

If your roof isn’t cleaned regularly to treat and remove algae, that algae can lead to rapid deterioration of your shingles, which can have unwanted effects.

Roof shingles covered in algae are no longer able to efficiently reflect sunlight.

The algae-covered shingles absorb heat, superheating your attic and increasing your cooling costs.

If you have bright green algae growing on the roof of your home or business, a professional cleaning by a licensed company is in order.

Algae growth can also compromise the integrity of your roof. This type of growth on your roof will absorb the moisture from dew and can penetrate the shingles, allowing moisture to get into the sheathing and causing wood rot.

When the wood rots in a home, moisture gets in through the cracks and creates an environment hospitable to mold growth. And mold growth in a home can

pose health risks to people and pets.

In addition to this, the smell of wood rot and mold growth on your home can attract wild animals to your home and ultimately into your attic.

While it might be tempting to set aside a weekend to make your roof cleaning a DIY project, this may not result in the safest, most effective cleaning possible and can actually cause more harm than

Tony Creighton is the owner/operator of ALLCLEAN™ Pressure Washing LLC and its subsidiary, Augusta PROCLEAN™ — committed to providing high-quality cleanings for the CSRA’s commercial properties and homes. Call 706.651.8089 or email allcleanaugusta@gmail.com.

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

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MORE ABOUT MEDICARE

DEADLINE NEARS FOR PART D COVERAGE NOTICES to pay on average for prescription drugs for covered individuals in the applicable year is less than what standard Medicare prescription drug coverage would be expected to pay on average) • An explanation that an individual may only enroll in a Part D plan from Oct. 15 through Dec. 7 of each year • Clarification of the importance of creditable coverage and that the individual may be subject to higher Part D premiums if the individual fails to enroll in a Part D plan when first eligible.

BY RUSSELL HEAD

Employers with group health plans providing prescription drug coverage to individuals eligible for Medicare Part D are required to provide certain disclosures about their drug coverage.

Specifically, such plans are required to let affected employees know each year whether the plan’s prescription drug coverage is at least as good as the Medicare Part D coverage (in other words, whether their prescription drug coverage is “creditable”). The deadline for the disclosure is Oct. 15.

Providing the disclosure notice

Why the disclosure is needed

In order for Medicare Part D eligible individuals to make informed, timely enrollment decisions, group health plan sponsors must disclose the status (creditable or noncreditable) of the plan’s prescription drug coverage. If an individual’s enrollment in Part D is to be considered timely, the individual must enroll before the end of the Initial Enrollment Period.

In general, after the Initial Enrollment Period, the individual may only enroll in a Part D plan during the Annual Coordinated Election Period or under certain circumstances that would qualify the individual for a special enrollment period.

The Annual Coordinated Election Period begins Oct. 15 and goes through Dec. 7 each year.

An eligible individual who fails to enroll in Medicare Part D during the Initial Enrollment Period must maintain “creditable coverage” or pay a late enrollment penalty. Thus, the disclosure notice is essential to an individual’s decision on

Group health plan sponsors must disclose the status of the plan’s prescription drug coverage so that eligible individuals can decide whether to sign up for Medicare Part D in time for the annual enrollment period.

whether to enroll in a Medicare Part D prescription drug plan.

Content of creditable coverage disclosure notices

When the prescription drug coverage offered by a plan sponsor is creditable, the disclosure notice must contain: • A statement that the plan sponsor has determined that its prescription drug coverage is creditable • An explanation of creditable coverage (that the amount the plan expects to pay on average for prescription drugs for covered individuals in the applicable year is the same or more than what standard Medicare prescription drug coverage

would be expected to pay on average) • An explanation of why creditable coverage is important and advice that, even though coverage is creditable, an individual could be subject to higher Part D premiums if he or she has a break in creditable coverage of 63 continuous days or more before enrolling in a Part D plan.

When the prescription drug coverage offered by a plan sponsor is determined to be noncreditable, the disclosure notice must contain the following information: • A statement that the entity has determined that its prescription drug coverage is not creditable • An explanation of noncreditable coverage (that the amount the plan expects

Disclosure notices must be provided to all Part D-eligible individuals who are covered under the plan’s prescription drug coverage. The disclosure notice requirement includes active and retired employees, disabled or COBRA-enrolled, as well as Medicare beneficiaries who are covered as a spouse or dependent.

To simplify plan administration, plan sponsors often decide to provide the disclosure notice to all plan participants.

And because the notice can be provided at any time before the Oct. 15 deadline, some plan sponsors simply include it with annual open enrollment materials earlier in the year.

Russell T. Head is CEO of Head Capital Advisors, an Acrisure agency partner and Augusta’s largest employee benefits brokerage. He can be reached at 706.733.3459 or rthead@headca.com.

DON’T LET PREPARATION SCARE YOU THE GHOST OF THINGS YOU SHOULD HAVE DONE

BY ED ENOCH

It’s Halloween season, so let’s talk about something spooky! Not make-believe monsters under the bed, but really bad things that happen to people frequently.

Sudden accidents and unexpected deaths create hardships beyond the obvious. Unfortunately, a lack of planning frequently makes the situation even more difficult.

All adults need three basic documents at a minimum: a will, a financial power of attorney and a health care power of attorney. Without these documents, incapacity or death means your loved ones get to spend much of their time dealing with lawyers and judges.

These documents express your wishes

22 Buzz on Biz October 2018

about things such as end-of-life treatment decisions and who should oversee handing out your stuff. Ensuring financial and health care powers of attorney means no one must go to court to get appointed to oversee your medical treatment or your stuff.

Anyone with children needs a will. This document accomplishes several very important functions.

First, it allows you to decide who should take care of your children in the event something happens to you and the child’s other parent (contrary to popular demand, you cannot appoint someone else as your child’s guardian if the other parent is still alive).

Second, with a will you can establish a

trust to hold assets for the child until he or she is over 18 or beyond. If you die with minor children and without a will in Georgia or South Carolina, the child or children will inherit your property, and the court will have to appoint someone to be their guardian until they are 18. At 18, your children will get the property whether they are ready to handle it or not.

Trusts and wills and all this other stuff sounds scary. Just rich people need trusts, right? But the truth is that a good estate planning attorney can help you decipher all the lingo and make sure you have an understandable, practical plan that fits your needs and your family.

J. Edward “Ed” Enoch has practiced law in Augusta for more than 20 years, mostly focusing on helping business owners and companies to include formation, transition, business planning, contract writing, employment law and other areas of the law. Email jenoch@ enochlaw.com.

You Just Blew $10,000!

Better Hire PJ Campanaro

W E A LT H M A NAG E M E N T The total direct costs of just one DUI charge can easily run you over $10,000.

▪ High-risk insurance ($4,500) ▪ Alcohol evaluation ($150-$200) ▪ Alcohol treatment ($250 – $2,000) ▪ License reinstatement fee ($60 – $250) ▪ Ignition interlocks ($60 a month for two years) ▪ Loss of Employment

▪ Towing ($100 – $1,200) ▪ Impound fees ($200-$1000) ▪ Bail ($150 – $2,500) ▪ Legal fees ($2,000 – $25,000) ▪ Fines ($300 – $1,200) ▪ Expert witnesses ($2000-$25,000)

But PJ Can Help!

Expert DUI Defense: Qualiications: ▪ Review of Officer’s Report ▪ Review of Video of Incident ▪ Payment Plans Available

▪Licensed in Georgia & South Carolina ▪Member of Augusta Bar Since ‘04 ▪Former Prosecutor

Call PJ today!

706.821.2222 601 N. Belair Square, Suite 16, Evans, Ga www.csralawyer.com

Attorney PJ Campanaro

Keep your pet happy and healthy with vaccinations!

Vaccinations Behavioral Consultations

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Office hours Mon-Tue, Thur-Fri 8 a.m.-6:30 p.m. • Now open on Wed 8 a.m.-4p.m.

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

23

NO MORE SAD BACHELOR NACHOS FIVE SPOTS TO GET YOUR COLLEGE FOOTBALL FIX THIS FALL

BY WITT WELLS

We’re entering the thick of the college football season and I’m feeling hopeful, despite the odds of my Missouri Tigers getting curb-stomped by the Bulldogs (as of press time, the game was just hours away).

On the other hand, fall is a nice reminder that if you’re a college football fan, it’s a good time to be in Georgia.

I’ve never had strong feelings against the Bulldogs, so I’m genuinely happy for all of you. Seriously, I am.

If you don’t believe me, just know that college football in Missouri is a fun thing people do on Saturdays, not a religion offering a special kind of spiritual transcendence to carry you through another soul-sucking workweek.

Also, I know that last national championship was crushing, but take it from a former Vanderbilt fan that experiencing the highs and lows of love and heartbreak is way better than a childhood of infinite despair marked by emotional numbness in the early stages of adult life. Not that you need any convincing.

Still, I’d rather watch a sorry excuse of a team lose over a few beers with friends in a packed bar than watch my team win from a dark bedroom over a plate of sad bachelor nachos.

You might say that’s because I’m not a true college football fan. Maybe you’re right. But it could also be because I took one too many three-hour drives to Nashville, Tenn., just to watch the Commodores get their doors blown off by the likes of LSU. Maybe it’s because what’s left of my heart is already too damaged, and I’m not all that confident the remains are even worth putting back out there.

What? Am I using this column as selftherapy? Ha! No! This isn’t about me! This is about the community of college football fandom!

But seriously, if the nachos weren’t doing it for you during the first few weeks of non-conference pushovers, this is the perfect time to check out a few spots in Augusta that are perfect for game day. In fact, we compiled a list just for you. And me. Okay, mostly for me. The sad bachelor nachos have got to go.

Garden City Social

What used to be music venue Sky City just weeks ago is now a no-brainer destination for football fans, from pre-game mimosas to a literal field. The “drinkery and beer garden” opened the weekend after Sky City closed at the beginning of the month. The front of the house still

24 Buzz on Biz October 2018

Ah, World of Beer: My trusty, justaround-thecorner spot for watching sports. You can’t beat the number of great beers and screens here. File photo

contains a casual bar, but instead of a music venue, the back room, now known as Garden City Park, is a scene created for fall Saturdays. Turf covers most of the room, and cornhole games abound. TVs line the walls above sets of picnic tables, while the bar starts serving drinks at 10 a.m. Augusta might have lost a beloved music venue, but it gained a pretty solid spot to tailgate.

Southbound Smokehouse

Southbound has become a favorite barbecue joint among locals since it opened in 2015, and there’s already another on the way. A new location will overlook SRP Park from the southwest corner of the stadium, where fresh barbecue will abound and SweetWater brews will flow.

For now, you can head on over to Central Avenue to watch the Bulldogs or Gamecocks or whichever team you like to watch inevitably disappoint you year after year.

That doesn’t necessarily make for a bad day though, because Southbound’s menu is kind of ridiculous and has basically everything you could possibly want to consume on game day — pulled pork, pimento cheese, wings, you name it. And nachos. Nachos that are so, so much better than the ones I was talking about earlier.

Bodega Ultima

I discovered Bodega far too late after moving to Augusta last summer. It’s only a five-minute drive from my place, so I plan to spend a few more Saturdays there now that conference play is underway.

Bodega Ultima closes at 2:30 p.m. every

other day of the week, but they’re open until midnight on Saturdays, and that’s what matters here. The European-style brick walls, wood tables and arched doorway that leads to a beautiful patio make it a stellar weekend visit, from coffee to lunch to beers at halftime. Football isn’t the focus here; it’s just one more thing that adds to the atmosphere.

Think of Bodega Ultima as the responsible student-athlete who always seems to have his or her life together. Even if that was you 30 years ago, Bodega’s the perfect spot to watch your team of model student-athletes get punished for four quarters while you console yourself with thoughts of your own superiority.

Savannah River Brewing Company

It had been a few months since I wandered into Augusta’s biggest brewery, so I stopped in recently to see what new beers it had released of late. The bartender didn’t leave me hanging, offering me five different samples off the bat, including some of Savannah River’s old favorites and a couple of new drafts.

The Savannah River IPA has always been one of my go-tos around town, but the coffee-flavored Wired Blonde was a rich, smooth delight that I will definitely be back for. The popular No Jacket Required is one of the better pilsners I’ve had recently, and the tropical yet subtle Blanc-y Kang is the perfect IPA to try if you’ve never really been into them.

If you’re looking to test out a few new brews in a fun environment while you watch the game, the vibrant SRBC is the

place to do it.

World of Beer

Oh, you thought I wouldn’t throw World of Beer on this list of hip, local eateries and social scenes with strong vibes you can get behind? I absolutely will! This is the end of the list! World of Beer has always been there for me, so I’m going to come through for it right now.

Not that World of Beer needs me at all.

But it’s right around the corner from me — and probably many of you as well — and was a lifesaver for the entirety of the NBA Playoffs this year when it was late and I had nowhere else to turn.

I’ll probably be doing more of the same this fall, especially when the NBA gets going again next month. It’s hard to beat the sheer number of great beers and screens that establishment has, and when you consider the central location, it’s an obvious candidate for the “Old Faithful” game day spot you can rely on.

And perhaps most importantly, it has this machine that imprints a photo of literally anything you want directly onto the head of your beer. How could you not?

Witt Wells is a Memphis-born writer with a love for comedy, the written word and the outdoors. He lives in Augusta, where he reports on business news in the CSRA. Contact him at witt.wells@buzzon.biz.

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ENTREPRENEUR LAUNCHING PAD NEW CAMPUS BEGINS NEXT PHASE FOR THECLUBHOU.SE

BY WITT WELLS

The past few months have brought big rewards to Augusta’s business and technology incubator theClubhou.se.

When the Hull McKnight Georgia Cyber Center opened this summer, among the center’s wide variety of resources and organizations was a new campus for theClubhou.se, which is now in its seventh year of connecting, accelerating and enabling local entrepreneurs and innovators.

The new campus offers a wide array of new opportunities for theClubhou.se, but it’s also just one part of a new phase in Augusta, one full of promise for innovators in technology and cybersecurity.

Weeks after it opened, Eric Parker and Grace Belangia, co-founders of theClubhou.se, testified before Congress about the model that theClubhou.se has created for innovation in a small city like Augusta.

I talked to Belangia about how theClubhou.se benefits from such valuable opportunities unique to Augusta and what a new chapter for theClubhou.se means for the future.

What was the origin of theClubhou. se?

“It was created because there were all these clubs of people that were meeting, and we wanted them to intersect. If somebody had an idea for a mobile app and they needed a programmer, there was no way to find them.

“And so, theClubhou.se became a bunch of meet-ups, became a bunch of Hackathons, and then we had these networking events and educational events where they could meet the people, where they could possibly form a company or even just take an idea and brainstorm about it. It’s really the people. It’s really just finding the right person that wants it.

“The city can be innovative, but at the end of the day, you need to have a person that’s thinking, ‘I’m going take that risk.

I’m going to work evenings and weekends to make that happen as a startup.’ I think that’s partly what we do. That’s why theClubhou.se has been successful as it is, because we help spawn business.

“And that relates to economic development, and so that helps the economy. It’s like this full circle of entities, and I think that with cyber coming to Augusta, that’s another sliver of the pie, so to speak.”

When did theClubhou.se take off?

“TheClubhou.se really got birthed in 2012. It was Eric Parker who founded it. It started out as an LLC, and then we moved to a nonprofit. Being at the Geor-

26 Buzz on Biz October 2018

Chase Lanier of theClubhou.se checks his computer while other entrepreneurs work on their businesses at theClubhou.se’s new facility in the Hull McKnight Georgia Cyber Center in downtown Augusta. Photo by Witt Wells

gia Cyber Center is now our third location. We’ve grown to over 150 members now. They come and they pay dues, or they are sponsors of our space. It’s a collaborative workspace, too.

“So, if you’re a freelancer or a telecommuter, again, it’s an opportunity for you to co-mingle with innovators and freelancers. We have some students, we have some veterans, we have some soldiers. It’s meant to take you a little bit out of your comfort zone.

“If you’re working from home, you need to come to theClubhou.se and work and then you’ll see the other people and you can share ideas. If you have a problem you can throw it up on the whiteboard and somebody will answer it.

“I think events like TechNet, making the announcements of a fire company, a national AFCEA organization, a nonprofit, a statewide public service organization and another corporate entity that deals with cybersecurity. Those people intersecting in our space … it’s beautiful.”

What is the vision you have for this new campus here?

“There are a couple visions for this. We really want to add depth to our programs.

For instance, we have a Founder’s Circle every Wednesday morning. It’s a peer-topeer network. They can get advice, they can bounce ideas off of each other.

“We want to scale that to maybe make it different niches. So, it could be an internet-of-things founders circle. It could be a cyber founders circle. It could be a lifestyle founders circle.

“If you think about the pillars of what it means to be an entrepreneur, some people really are happy with just the mom-andpop shop. Others are like, ‘I want to scale this, I want to grow it, I want to sell it.’

Others are like, ‘I have no product, I’m selling a service, and it’s on the internet.’

“So, there’s different ways of how you define the entrepreneurial spirit. I think that just scaling all of that stuff in our space is really important. Our partnerships with Augusta Technical College and Augusta University also tap into the students. Students can really get out of their little silos academically and meet industry.”

How does theClubhou.se benefit from Augusta increasingly becoming a cyber hub?

“When you come to a new town and you don’t know anything, and you’re in this sort of ecosystem of innovation and technology, you want to go find likeminded people and companies. We can attract people that are just visiting Augusta.

“But if they have a good experience and have a good time here, then they’re going to go back to their communities or their companies and be like, ‘Oh right, Augusta, Georgia. That’s where I met so-and-so, or that’s where I made that connection.’

So, when the conference comes up again, it’ll be on their radar to maybe have that experience with us.

“I know with TechNet in particular, you have government contractors who are going to be doing business in Augusta, and they might not know anybody socially, because they’re just here for business. So, we became a social hub for them.”

When you and Eric went to Washington, what specifically did you testify

about and meet with people about?

“That was an invitation for our local Congressman Rick Allen’s office to represent Augusta in the national ecosystem.

There were about 30 entities there from around the country, so we all sat on panels at varying times.

“Eric talked a lot about the successes in Augusta and what we do. He was able to get feedback from the rest of the congressmen on the committee about how they might be able to replicate that in their communities and with their constituents. Because a lot of times, people will be in a midsize city and they won’t have a space like ours. They’ll think, ‘How do you do that? What does that look like?

Where do you get the funding? Where do you get the people?’

“So, there was a showcase that allowed us to share our best practices. We met other people like ours from around the state. But it was really meant to sort of showcase, ‘Hey Georgia, hey Augusta, we got it going on.’

“That’s been really beneficial for us.

And then there were other networking opportunities in D.C., obviously, just because it’s the capital.”

Did you talk to any other people who were in your position in other cities who are looking to do something similar?

“Yeah, a lot of times what we do is we find that there might be economic de-

“I like to think of theClubhou.se as very independent. Our agenda is to help Augusta and the greater community. ... So, even though we’re in this building, we still have this collaborative spirit about members and partnership and sponsorships and things.”

– Grace Belangia, co-founder of theClubhou.se velopers who are saying, ‘I need to spur small business innovation, so let me help you with that.’ There might be some main street directors who are like, ‘I’ve got an empty storefront. Is this an opportunity?’

“That’s actually how we started theClubhou.se. We were right on Broad Street in an empty storefront, and the landlord at the time gave us a really good deal to be in there, because we were just a scrappy group of people.

“Sometimes you might see an academic institution that wants to open up a space for their faculty and staff. So, there are different elements of what you would call ecosystem builders. I mean, everybody sort of has an agenda. I like to think of theClubhou.se as very independent. Our agenda is to help Augusta and the greater

community. We’re talking to Paine College about doing some things, we’re talking to people in Aiken and North Augusta.

“So, even though we’re in this building, we still have this collaborative spirit about members and partnership and sponsorships and things.”

What’s something going on that’s new for you?

“People need to come see the space, because we’re new (at the cyber center).

We started a 12-week boot camp. It’s a full-time, 12-week, full-stack, programming language school in partnership with Augusta Technical College. They then get job consideration with local tech companies, and then we work with them on soft skills, résumé building, interviews. It’s a

packaged opportunity for people that want to get into coding and programming, like a junior software developer perhaps.

“We have a huge gamut of people who have taken this class, anywhere from homeschoolers to 50-year-olds that don’t want to retire.

“The next thing we want to announce is our cohort for Startup Life. It’s a oneyear accelerator. We provide housing, education, food, and we have a bicycle transportation option. It’s fully funded, so it’s meant for an entrepreneur who wants to start their business or build their business. We take care of ‘all those barriers.’

“The program is funded by the Kauffman Foundation. You can go to our website and apply to the program. We’ll let people know if they’ve been accepted to the next phase during the second week of October.

“The whole point of the Startup Life during our application process is that it’s not just pizzas and ramen. You’re going to learn about medicine, you’re going to learn about financial literacy, you’re going to learn about social skills, you’re going learn about food, you’re going to learn how to clean the house, you’re going to learn how to get along with somebody.

That’s the life part of it, which is why it’s such a unique program. It’s a non-traditional accelerator, which I think is why Kauffman Foundation funded us.”

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

27

CLEAN AND GREEN

THE SOUTHERN SALAD OFFERS FRESH FACE FOR LUNCH

BY SUSAN O’KEEFE

Clean and green. Timeless and tasty.

Fast but not furious.

The latest eatery in the 1000 block of Broad Street in downtown Augusta is unapologetically catering to healthconscience clientele. Its owner, Havird Usry, is a third-generation restaurateur and knows a thing or two about the business.

For locals looking to entertain a client or discuss a deal, The Southern Salad offers a fresh face. With its industrial warehouse feel and subway tile brightness, there’s a nurturing air of progress and refreshment. Eat here, and patrons are bound to be encouraged to clean their plates as the health benefits are plentiful.

Grain bowls, green bowls, toasts, snacks and smoothie bowls are a few highlights of SoSal (that’s what the regulars call it).

With a simple step-by-step method, customers choose a base green (red leaf, buttercrunch, or Tuscan kale to name a few) then have a variety of topping options, including vegetables, legumes, proteins, fruits and herbs.

To continue the topping theme, more accessorizing is available via cheese, roasted chicken, salmon, nuts, avocado and hummus. If the old adage holds true, “You are what you eat,” then here’s to being clean, fresh and delicious.

Intrigued by the combinations of ingredients, my colleagues and I sampled a variety of salad fares.

One highly recommended dish is the burrito bowl that starts with farro and black beans. While farro is unfamiliar to some people, it is quickly gaining popularity among the health conscious as a go-to grain. Red peppers and broccoli, both roasted, are added next.

The Southern Salad offers grain bowls, green bowls, toasts, snacks, smoothie bowls and other items. Diners can customize their orders. Photo by Susan O’Keefe

A healthy serving of avocado and red onions rounds out the rainbow of colors. Creamy cilantro/lime dressing was served on the side.

The eponymous Southern Salad included a base of greens topped with raw pecans, goat cheese, watermelon and Vidalia onions. Pickled watermelon and cornbread croutons made this clever creation complete.

Consider meeting a client at The Southern Salad for a late breakfast or grab a to-go lunch, then return for a business casual discussion on the patio while enjoying entertainment from local bands.

On its website, The Southern Salad calls itself a quick-service restaurant with gourmet selections. It’s farm-fresh with as many local ingredients as pos-

sible. It’s partnering with Clean Greens in the Dirty South and has established a hydroponic greenhouse to do its dirty work. Read more about the restaurant and its commitment to community and sustainability at thesouthernsalad.com.

Networking Noise Level Susan O’Keefe has been reviewing restaurants for Buzz on Biz since August 2015. Her restaurant visits and reviews are done with a businessperson in mind.

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AGELESS FUN

HARLEM FESTIVAL CELEBRATES COMEDY GENIUS OF LAUREL AND HARDY

BY GARY KAUFFMAN

The films might be old, but the comedy of Laurel and Hardy remains as fresh as ever. On Oct. 6, the films will run all day as part of the festivities of the 30th annual Laurel and Hardy Festival in Harlem.

Tiny Harlem gets the distinction of honoring one of the world’s best comedy duos because it is the birthplace of Norvell “Oliver” Hardy, the rotund half of the duo.

The festival, which runs from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., will host about 150 vendors of arts and crafts, plus civic groups, two food courts, a kid’s zone, a parade, live entertainment and people dressed as Laurel and Hardy. The Laurel & Hardy Museum will show Laurel and Hardy films all day on a reel-to-reel projector.

“There’s a little something for everyone to do,” said Harlem Downtown Development Director Kennedy Sammons. “It’s nice to keep their memories alive. They’re still relevant.”

Nancy Morrison, a volunteer at the Laurel & Hardy Museum, said that people come from around the country, and even other parts of the world, to view the collection of Laurel and Hardy memorabilia. The museum has a vast collection, many of the pieces donated by collectors who have downsized. The movies are also a centerpiece of the museum.

Morrison said that frequently people come to the museum with aging parents who remember watching the films when they were younger. But the comedy relates even to the youngest generation.

“We had grandparents in several weeks ago with their two grandsons to watch the movies,” she said. “They liked them.

The grandparents could hardly get them to leave.”

Sammons said the films offer a window to the simpler times of the past.

“They bring a sense of nostalgia that all ages can appreciate,” she said. “There’s a charm that never goes away. It’s good clean fun that anybody can enjoy.”

Oliver Hardy was born on Jan. 18,

“They bring a sense of nostalgia that all ages can appreciate. There’s a charm that never goes away. It’s good clean fun that anybody can enjoy.”

– Nancy Morrison, a volunteer at the Laurel and Hardy Museum

Oliver Hardy was born in Harlem in 1892. Today, the city honors the comedy legend in a museum and with annual festival (at left) that has been attended by hundreds of people from around the world. A statue of Hardy (above right) and his comedy partner, Stan Laurel, is on display in the city. This year’s festival is set for Oct. 6. Photos courtesy of the City of Harlem

1892, as Norvell Hardy in Harlem. His father was a Confederate soldier who was wounded in the Civil War and later served as a tax collector in Columbia County. When Norvell was only 10 months old, his father died. His mother moved the family to Madison and later to Milledgeville, Ga. Growing up, Hardy became interested in acting while working in a movie theater. His talent for singing led him to study music in Atlanta, but his love for acting led him first to Jacksonville, Fla., and then to Hollywood. Although his first name was Norvell (his mother’s maiden

name) he later adopted his father’s name of Oliver. Many people, though, called him by his nickname, Babe.

Hardy and Stan Laurel first worked together in a 1921 film called The Lucky Dog. A few years later, they had bit parts in another movie. But in 1927, they both signed contracts with Hal Roach Studios.

They appeared together in eight short films in the first nine months of that year.

By then, Roach had recognized their comedic genius together and in October released a short film titled The Second Hundred Years that featured Laurel and Hardy, for the first time, as a duo.

That film launched their careers as one of the great comedy duos of all time. They made 106 films together, about 96 as a duo. Most of the films had them in starring roles, although they also made cameo appearances in other films.

Their most famous film, and the only one to win an Oscar, was The Music Box, released in 1932. Their early films were silent, and later films, including The Music Box, were filmed both with sound and as a silent movie with subtitles. Their ability to convey meaning to their words through their exaggerated expressions played perfectly for both silent and sound movies.

A common theme in their movies was Hardy essentially playing the straight man, often the victim of Laurel’s naïvete and his own hubris. A signature line of Hardy’s was, “Well, this is another fine mess you’ve gotten us into.”

Most of their films were made in black and white. At least 20 were dubbed into foreign languages. Their film career ended by 1945 (they made a final movie in France in 1951), but they continued to do stage productions. Both have stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Hardy died Aug. 7, 1957. Laurel (whose real name was Arthur Stanley Jefferson) was born June 16, 1890, in Lancashire, England. He died Feb. 23, 1965.

October 2018 Buzz on Biz

29

VILLAGE PEOPLE ENJOY A GOOD BREW AMONG GOOD FRIENDS

BY BEN CASELLA

Like many Augustans, the Village Deli at Daniel Village is one of those spots that defines the concept of “local” for me. The fries are just the best, and I’ve had a decades-long run with that hot pastrami sandwich.

The other night, while dining there with my family, I saw no fewer than 10 people who we know.

I enjoy that about Augusta: It’s big enough to go and get lost if you so desire but small enough to go somewhere and know you won’t be a stranger. That somewhere, for me, is the Village Deli.

OK, now back to beer.

The Deli has a good beer selection, and the other night was no different.

I decided to do something a little different and go for the steak quesadilla (which was delicious), and, to wash it down, A Night on Ponce IPA from Georgia’s own Three Taverns Brewery.

This beer is a go-to for me these days, and I decided to have it from the can with my quesadilla. The nose conveys as significant of a hoppy note as I’ve experienced.

In today’s craft society, it seems to be commonplace to see how much hops one can cram into a bottle or can. A Night on Ponce stops just shy with a balance that consummates citrus and earth with pine and floral.

Suffice it to say the hops obviously win in the end, but it’s always pleasant to have a beer that maintains a balance while being a more robust member of its craft at the same time.

A Night on Ponce is awesome as a standalone, but it also did well as a complement to my steak quesadilla. I would also recommend enjoying it with gooey fries or, amongst other items, the Hickory burger.

Enjoy!

A Night in Ponce IPA is from Georgia’s Three Taverns Brewery.

Unlike many of his fellow Aquinas grads, Ben Casella did not work at the Village Deli in his younger years. He did, however, have a brief stint making corn dogs at the Brynwood Pool.

TRICK OR TREAT

FALL IS TIME FOR FUN HALLOWEEN MOVIES

BY SAMANTHA BARKSDALE

Let me begin by saying that as an adult, I have mixed feelings about Halloween.

When I was a kid, I loved the costumes and candy; as a teenager, it was the gory films and haunted houses that did it for me.

These days, however, I have no desire to see monsters, blood and guts, much less scare myself half to death with tales of the supernatural.

Lucky for you, I decided to start small and build my courage up. So, turn the lights down, grab some candy corn and get ready for Halloween fun.

‘The Vampire’s Assistant’ (2009)

When I said I had to start small, I meant it. This PG-13 film centers on two teenage boys. Straight-laced Darren and bad boy Steve are the best of friends until Darren’s parents try to put an end to things. The boys sneak out together one last time and end up at Cirque du Freak.

As the name implies, things get a little freaky.

After the show, Darren impul-

30 Buzz on Biz October 2018

sively steals something from one of the performers, effectively endangering his life and the lives of those he loves.

Soon afterwards, he finds himself indebted to a vampire, has become a vampire himself and is entangled in a war between two clans. Let’s just say he’s having a rough couple of days.

While there’s a little profanity and sexual innuendo, The Vampire’s Assistant is little more than a kids’ movie with a heartwarming message. We should all learn to accept each other’s differences and love ourselves, even when we make mistakes.

‘Ash vs. Evil Dead’ (2015-present)

If you’ve been reading my reviews for a while, you already know how much I love campy B films — the original Evil Dead, Evil Dead 2 and Army of Darkness are

some of my all-time favorites. Are they filled with blood and guts? Of course, but they’re also completely ridiculous, and there’s no time to be scared when you’re rolling your eyes at corny jokes.

The Ash vs. Evil Dead series picks up where the original story left off. It’s 30 years later, and Ash is the same overconfident, underachieving lower-class loser he has been since he defeated evil all those years ago. Now, after a night of partying and making bad decisions, he’s back in action.

If you aren’t familiar with the Evil Dead story line, don’t worry, it’s easy to follow. Ash is pretty much a moron, but he has managed to protect the Book of

the Dead for a long time. When he accidently unleashes the forces of evil, he and his unlikely group of followers decide to do whatever it takes to send evil back to the underworld.

Ash vs. Evil Dead might not be Emmyworthy, but it’s fun to watch. The dialogue is witty and filled with figurative language (this English teacher’s dream), and the episodes are short. To put it in terms Ash would understand, if you’re looking for a good time, check out Ash vs. Evil Dead.

Samantha Barksdale, “Sam the Movie Chick,” is on a mission to find the best movies and TV shows for you to stream from Netflix. She loves good flicks, good food and good friends. Her eclectic tastes are sure to give readers a wide range of viewing choices.

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