Capital at Play February 2014 by Capital at Play Magazine

Duncan & York Falling into Place

Mast General Store

Beyond the Candy Barrels

The Free Spirit Of Enterprise

Accidental Luthier The Couple Behind Lichty Guitars

Volume IV - Edition II complimentary edition

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February12014 February 2014 | capitalatplay.com

| February 2014

Morena Baccarin f o r H e art s on f ire . heartsonfire.com 877-PERFECT

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Publisher’s Thoughts Chapter 6

Practical solUtions

Practical solUtions For YoUr BUsiness

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This isn’t exactly an entire issue about art, but considering that there are over 20 pages devoted to artist-entrepreneurs, to galleries to visit on those grey days, and to various artistic elements about this edition’s featured capitalists, this edition has grown into something that lends color and life to what can be an aesthetically lifeless time of year.

t just so happens that the artists dedicating their efforts and passions to create these lively works, also have some of the strongest entrepreneurial spirits we have ever seen. They are often completely engrossed in their work, consciously oblivious to the financial risks they take, and (at times) completely ignore their own health and well-being in order to create something beautiful—which sounds like most of the (successful) entrepreneurs we meet. We know how important it is for any business to develop the right image, and to grow a powerful brand. It isn’t simple. It often seems to be impossible. It takes a lot of trial and error, the ability to focus on what matters most to that organization, as well as to its clients and customers. We also know how difficult it can be for a business to connect directly with artists, and vice versa. Coincidentally, according to the NC Small Business & Tech Development Center (SBTDC), there are around 3,200,000 businesses in North Carolina alone, not including nonprofits and other “branded” organizations. They have spent (and will continue to spend) millions of dollars to craft and update their image to reflect their intentions, product and services, and to attract the right audience. None of this is without the help and specific direction from someone with a creative mind—an artist. We want more illustrations, and art in general, in Capital At Play; and what better way to source the complex, eclectic and vast artistic community in Western North Carolina, than to simply ask everyone. If you’re interested, email me. I’d like to hear from you.

Sincerely,

Harley O. Morgan 4

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The Free Spirit Of Enterprise

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Harley O. Morgan associate publisher

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“It’s such a creative, fulfilling process with tangible results. It’s just exciting.” jay licht y

F E AT U R E S VOL. IV

ED. II

LICHTY GUITARS

MAST GENERAL STORE

DUNCAN & YORK

ACCIDENTAL LUTHIER

BEYOND THE CANDY BARRELS

FALLING INTO PLACE

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com

Contents 4 P U B L I S H E R S N OT E

•

F E B R U A R Y 2 014

6 M A S T H E A D & I N F O R M AT I O N

•

S U B S C R I B E O N L I N E AT C A P I TA L AT P L AY . C O M

lo c a l i n d u s t ry

columns

26 Art as a Business

32 Mike Summey

Selling your art isn’t selling out

New Year’s Resolution: No IOUs For Christmas Next Year

62 Bill Fishburne

l e i s u r e & l i b at i o n 41 Art is Just Around the Corner Lend some color to a gray winter day

Real Estate Recovers (somewhat) in 2013

80 Camille Stimach Money & Currency

keepin’ it brief

c a p i ta l a d v e n t u r i s t

36 Carolina in the West

88 The Asheville Marathon at Biltmore Estate

66 The Old North State 84 National & World News

events 94 Get out of your Office See what’s going on in your community this month

on the cover

A tenor ukelele, handcrafted by Lichty Guitars, out of out of sinker redwood (salvaged from the bottom of a river), Wenge, mahogany, and ebony. See article on page 12. 10

| February 2014

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FROM THE

Workshop Web to the

The Couple Behind Lichty Guitars written by anna r addatZ

photos by anthony harden

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com

jay licht y in his

workshop

| February 2014

ay Lichty’s workshop is not a high-tech place. Sure, there are things that plug into the wall—buffers, sanders, drills, and saws. But the simple wood-paneled building is also home to more hand tools than you can shake a hammer at. And there’s not a bit, byte, laptop, or desktop in sight. As far as this workshop is concerned, the digital revolution never happened.

That’s the way Jay likes it. He’s a luthier, a maker of stringed instruments—in his case, acoustic guitars and ukuleles. He’s following a path that began centuries ago, using techniques that have been honed over generations. He trusts his intuition and sensory judgment—not scopes and digital equipment—to lead his process toward a visually stunning and aurally delightful instrument. However, to make a living by handcrafting one-of-a-kind, custom instruments, you need a lot of individual customers— and these days, the wide marketplace is online, not on Main Street. This is where Jay’s wife, Corrie, comes in. Corrie’s role at Lichty Guitars is to make sure the world knows about Jay’s beautiful products. And her tool belt holds decidedly more modern tools. Using her digital camera, SEO skills, and online marketing instincts, she has rapidly brought Lichty Guitars front and center in the world of custom acoustic instruments. “Without her,” says Jay, “I would be surrounded by dust and instruments that nobody knew were available.” This business is a testament to the couple. They bring their wide range of life experiences and complementary skill sets to bear on a shared venture. They demonstrate a commitment to constant improvement and learning within their respective roles. And they show how essential it is to connect with the right people, in life and in business—from spouses and friends, to mentors and partners. wenge tenor Each individual contributes a voice, ukulele with a melody to a song that exists for redwood top the pure pleasure of its making.

The Luthier in the Workshop Jay Lichty is a likeable guy. Easy to smile and warm in his demeanor, he dresses simply and speaks calmly with a subtle Southern drawl. It’s easy to imagine him spending hours focused at a workbench, or strumming a toe-tapping tune on a front porch. It seems natural that this would be his profession, that he should spend his days making beautiful things in the workshop next to his house, on a peaceful wooded lot outside of Tryon. So perhaps one of the most surprising things about Jay’s vocation is how recently he came upon it. Up until a few years ago, Jay was a builder of a different kind—a general contractor for nearly 30 years. He got into construction in the late 1970’s when he was living in South Carolina. “I was trying to sell real estate,” says Jay. “But interest rates were at 22%, so to supplement that I ended up getting a part-time job with a fellow that did remodeling.” The man he worked for wanted to get into speculative building, so he hired someone to train Jay on how to build a house. “I started building houses for the realtor, who I quickly saw was making all the money,” he says. Jay built a few more houses on his own and moved to the Tryon area. Due to a stroke of luck (hitting that market at the right time) and his own dependability (“At that time if you had a driver’s license and you knew how to call when you couldn’t show up, you were the best around,” he says), he found his skills were in high demand. He started his own contracting business, which he ran

photo courtesy of Corrie Woods

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com

from 1985 to 2009. As a hobby, Jay played music. Over the years he had learned to play the guitar, banjo, and mandolin, and he performed from time to time with a bluegrass band. Playing stringed instruments came naturally to him. “The first time I ever picked up any instrument with strings at the age of 13 or 14,” he says. “I could play a melody. I always assumed that everyone could. It just seemed like swimming if you’re a fish.” Then one night in 2009, Jay had a vivid dream. In that dream, he was playing a small-bodied guitar on stage with his band. “I woke up really excited about that instrument, but

could build his own. He made his first ukulele in his garage using his construction equipment. After that, he was hooked. He went on to learn how to build guitars as well, and studied under several master luthiers including Wayne Henderson and Charles Fox. At first, Jay worked on his instruments when things were slow with the construction business. “I thought, I’ll build guitars until the phone rings for houses,” he says. But due to the mortgage crisis and ensuing economic downturn, the phone stopped ringing for houses altogether. So he shifted over to working on instruments full-time. Jay explains that his constr uction experience has influenced the work he does now. It taught him how to work to a high quality standard, communicate with clients, provide good customer service, and plan and execute a project. He says that as a luthier, he has the same method of working, but “without the hassle of subcontractors not showing up.” A self-proclaimed introvert, Jay enjoys the fact that the work he does is mostly self-sufficient and solitary. His daily schedule involves waking up around six a.m., walking a few yards from his home to his workshop, and then working until dinner with a break for lunch. He does this six days a week. And he loves every

“Some woods want to be a guitar or ukulele, and some don’t. A lot of things happen because the wood didn’t do what I wanted it to do. Things you think are disasters are usually some of the best learning experiences.” not sure what it was,” he says. After some online research, Jay recognized his dream instrument as a ukulele and immediately bought a baritone ukulele from eBay. Then he purchased a tenor version the same week. He quickly realized that this new obsession was beyond his means, so he decided to see if he 16

| February 2014

minute of it. “It’s such a creative, fulfilling process with tangible results. It’s just exciting,” Jay says. “I cannot get enough of it.” Which is not to say that it’s a process without its challenges. Each instrument requires painstaking attention to detail, over 100 different steps, and about 14 days to construct. But Jay speaks of the building process in terms of levels of love, not in terms of love/hate. “I love the building process more than the assembling and playing,” he says. “The most difficult part is assembling everything without damaging the finish.” Almost all of Jay’s instruments are custom orders, so a good portion of his time involves working with customers. After doing this for a few years, he knows right away if a caller is going to turn into a customer. Surprisingly, it’s based on how long they spend on the phone. “If somebody calls me about a custom instrument and our initial conversation is more than ten minutes,” says Jay, “I know they’re not going to buy anything.” For a product with a fairly substantial price tag, this might seem counterintuitive. But Jay says he sees a pattern. “It’s a certain demographic of clientele,” he says. “If they can afford a $4,000 ukulele, they’re not trying to call you up to justify whether they should buy it or not.” (Lichty’s instruments range in price from around $4,000 for a ukulele up to $6,200 for a guitar, which Jay explains is near the higher end of the market, but certainly not where it tops out.) Jay also makes room in his schedule to create a few of his own designs every year. While this is his chance to do anything he wants, he brings Corrie into the equation during the design stage because he finds it so much fun to have her involved. He’ll

start with a piece of wood that he has on hand—“one that I’ve had a fancy for from the beginning,” he says—and he and Corrie will add other pieces of wood and hardware to the mix until they come up with a satisfying combination. As Jay describes it, they “pick stuff until it works.” From there, he starts to work—cutting, planing, piecing, sanding, and gluing. Jay notes that during the building process it’s important to remember a lesson that he learned early on: Have as much fun fixing the mistakes as anything else. “Some woods want to be a guitar or ukulele, and some don’t. A lot of things happen because the wood didn’t do what I wanted it to do. Things you think are disasters are usually some of the best learning experiences.” Whether he has built an instrument on his own, or with input from Corrie or his customers, Jay believes that every instrument carries each contributor’s energy within it. Jay is a modest man who’s quick to give credit, not only to those who have taught him and collaborated with him, but also to a higher spiritual power that gave him an aptitude for this work and imbues all of his creations with an energy beyond his own. “I tell all of my customers that their guitar or ukulele has a part of them in it because the energy that we exchange in conversation becomes that instrument,” he says. Seeing how much care Jay puts into the creation of each instrument, it’s not hard to understand the difference between his products and those manufactured in a factory. A fit with a guitar is extremely personal and is based on numerous factors and variables—from the way it looks and sounds, to how it February 2014 | capitalatplay.com

photo courtesy of Corrie Woods

koa tenor ukulele

photo courtesy of Corrie Woods 18

| February 2014

feels or even smells. While an off-theshelf guitar may be more affordable, and the factory’s output may be consistent, a luthier making a customized instrument can hit all the right notes for their customer, and do so in a more holistic way. “Any custom instrument you buy from someone who knows what they’re doing is going to be better than a factory-produced instrument by a lot,” says Jay. Whereas in a factory, each person on the line is contributing one piece or process to the instrument, a custom builder is paying attention to each element as part of a whole. As a result, “the end product is a more thought-out and congruent thing,” he says. On the business side, this means that luthiers must recognize that they’re not meant to compete with the factories whose customers represent a different market altogether. Rather, luthiers cater to the musicians who want custom, handmade work specifically, and then find their niche within that group—people who enjoy the special style and sound their instruments offer. Of course, if your aim is to make a living from your craft, none of that will work unless people know that your products exist. That’s where Corrie comes in.

The Marketer on the Web Jay’s relationship with Corrie started at a mutual friend’s New Year’s Eve party. They had known each other for years and had each had previous marriages, but that night something else clicked—to their chagrin. “We were both on the ‘I don’t want to meet someone’ crusade,” says Jay, holding his fingers up in the shape of a cross, as if warding off vampires. “But that’s the best time to meet someone.” Jay refers to Corrie as, “the smartest person I’ve ever met.” Due to her diverse background, she brings a variety of skills to the table. She home-schooled her kids, has worked for nonprofits and in corporate management, wrote a book, has lived

corrie woods February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 19

“A fit with a guitar is extremely personal and is based on numerous factors and variables— from the way it looks and sounds, to how it feels or even smells.”

photo courtesy of Corrie Woods 20

| February 2014

jay licht y teaches a student

to build a guitar.

corrie & jay licht y make

the perfect duo.

off the grid, and is also a painter. She takes bits of all of these experiences and brings them to Lichty Guitars, where her role is to do all of the marketing and PR. She manages the website, writes blog posts, photographs Jay and his guitars, and does anything she can to get the brand’s name out into the world. “We’ve said so many times,” says Corrie, “that we know so many guitar builders who are out there who build absolutely beautiful instruments, but nobody knows about them because they’re one person in their shop building guitars.” In a nutshell, not every Jay has a Corrie. Jay is the first to admit that marketing just isn’t his thing (“I’m not the type to Tweet every fifteen seconds,” he says) and he lauds Corrie’s ability to draw people in. “She’s really savvy about how to do things in a quality way where people notice, without pretension.” As Corrie puts it: “Even if you forced Jay to do the marketing, he wouldn’t do it. That’s not what he enjoys or where his strength is. I’m the opposite; I don’t have the fine motor skills or the experience in the shop. From a business standpoint, that’s why it works so well. We’re not competing at doing the same things.” One of Corrie’s greatest successes has been search engine optimization (SEO). Today, if a potential customer Googles, “custom acoustic guitars,” Lichty Guitars appears on the first page of results, alongside huge names like Fender and Martin. “We went from not ranking on any Google terms at all,” says Corrie, “to ranking on the first page of Google for lots and lots of our keyword phrases.” How did she do it? Through a combination of trial and error and expert advice. As Jay was building his luthier skills, marketing was the farthest thing from his mind. But Corrie recognized his talent and potential and saw a way to contribute. “After he built a few instruments, I realized that I needed to at least take pictures of them to document what he was doing,” says Corrie. So she put together a simple WordPress website and taught herself the basics.

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com

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As time went on, Corrie realized that the business would only grow if she increased its web presence. She hired Jim Magary of Boomient Consulting, a digital marketing consultancy in Boston, to do some coding for Lichty Guitar’s new website and to teach her how to improve its rankings. Corrie took this training and ran with it. She’s been so successful with organic SEO tactics that to date, Lichty Guitars has not had to purchase any online advertising. In fact, Magary has been so impressed by Corrie’s SEO achievements that he has asked to use LichtyGuitars.com as an example for his other clients. But getting a business on the first page of search results doesn’t necessarily mean that it will stay there. Smart optimization means always doing more to ensure a good ranking. “It’s a moving target,” says Corrie. “There’s always something more I can do and more I can learn.” To that end, Corrie aims to understand what Jay’s customers want from their online experience, and then give it to them. “From the very beginning my goal has been, how can I show people how beautiful the instruments are?” she says. “Because a guitar is such an experiential thing. How do I convey how it feels and sounds through a photograph or website?” In a word? Thoroughly. LichtyGuitars.com is full of photos, videos, and sound recordings that are the next best thing to picking up the ukulele or guitar and trying it out yourself. Each product listing includes about 20 photos highlighting every detail, from the inlaid head to close-ups of the polished wood grain; one or two sound recordings that demonstrate the instrument’s tone qualities; and a video of Jay or another musician playing the instrument. Corrie also photographs the building process and maintains a blog that features each new instrument along with other news from the workshop. While Corrie does most of this work, Jay’s input is essential. The couple realized early on that the target market they are trying to reach is made up of people like Jay. For Jay the question became, “How do I market to myself?” He paid attention to what caught his eye and ear, what he expected when he went online to purchase instruments. “I need instant gratification when I go to a web page,” he says. “I need to know how much it’s going to cost from the start, things like that.” Blending Jay’s instincts with Corrie’s online skills is proving to be a successful combination; the proof is in the orders. In a few short years, Jay has built and sold around 80 guitars and 65 ukuleles. These days, he’s building about 25 instruments a year and has a pipeline of six to eight months worth of new orders. And as his skills grow, so do Corrie’s. “Every instrument he builds is better than the last,” she says, “and I bring that same challenge to what I do. How can I make each post or photograph a little better?”

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 23

Reaching Out & Giving Back While Lichty Guitars is only made up of two individuals, Corrie is adamant that one of the best things they’ve done for the business is to encircle it with good people, from consultants and mentors, to musicians and students. She and Jay have learned that having a network leads to a cycle of solutions. “It’s surrounding yourself with people who you admire, who you like their work ethic, and you like the work that they do,” says Corrie. “Generally a handful of those people can get you in front of anybody you’d want to work with who could help you with a problem.” Jay has built his skills by reaching out to other luthiers, and Corrie brings in advisors like Magary and Erik Olsen (a Tryon photographer and videographer) to help on the marketing side. In return, budding luthiers contact Jay for help, and he feels it’s his responsibility to pass on what he’s learned. In fact, a few times a year Jay hosts individuals or small group classes in his workshop, guiding enthusiastic learners as they build a guitar or ukulele from scratch. And it’s a pretty amazing deal, considering that the cost for the class is equivalent to the cost of having Jay build that specific ukulele or guitar himself. “The reality is that there are a lot of people who want to build

their own instruments,” says Jay, “and there’s nothing more satisfying than watching them put those strings on and play it themselves.” It turns out that those folks will travel a long way for a ten- to twelve-day course; Jay has had students from as far away as British Columbia. The teaching process also sharpens Jay’s own skills. “If you do something all the time the same way, it becomes a rut,” he explains. “If you bring external stimuli into the equation, like a student who asks you why you do something a certain way, finding the way to articulate the answer is extremely enlightening. Or you see someone use a tool differently and think, aw hell, that’s awesome!” Aspiring luthiers aren’t the only people attracted to Jay’s work. Professional musicians, who recognize high-quality instruments when they see them, are making a beeline to Lichty Guitars—and becoming promotional partners. Kimo Hussey, an acclaimed Hawaiian ukulele player, features Jay’s ukuleles in performances, and also helped Jay determine how much his instruments were worth. “Kimo has given me a lot of input on sound and design, and I’ve implemented a lot of his ideas,” says Jay. “He has been a huge gift.” Other popular musicians who own and help promote Lichty’s Guitars include Geoff Achison, an Australian blues/roots

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musician; Tom and Mike Gossin of country music band Gloriana; Jody Porter of pop group Fountains of Wayne; and Shohei Toyoda, winner of Japan’s Finger-Picking Guitar Championship in 2012. The Lichtys hope to build more of these types of relationships in the future. Not only is it great exposure for the Lichty brand, it’s also a personal thrill for the couple to see musicians they love playing instruments made by Jay. For both Jay and Corrie, an important part of the mission of Lichty Guitars is giving back to the community where they live and contributing to important causes. Every year, the business donates a few of Jay’s instruments to organizations that are close to the Lichty’s hearts, and 20% of every instrument sale is donated to community non-profits. Past recipients of the Lichtys’ support have included Lake Eden Arts Festival (LEAF), Wind River Cancer Wellness Retreats,

Livestrong Foundation, Tryon Arts & Crafts School, Big Brothers Big Sisters of Western North Carolina, and the Rainforest Alliance. So what’s next for Lichty Guitars? Jay and Corrie agree that staying small is best. “We’re not looking to be a factory,” says Jay. “As long as I can build 20 or 25 instruments a year, that’s all we’re after.” But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to leave a legacy. “Towards the end of my career, I would like to get someone in here and teach them everything I do and sell them everything I have,” he says. That day should still be many years away. In the meantime, Jay will work on sharpening his craft while bringing joy to discerning musicians in North Carolina and around the world. “This is a skill set that will always challenge,” he says. “There’s always room for improvement.”

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wendy whitson

Selling Your Art isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t Selling Out

WRIT TEN BY JIM MURPHY

PHOTOS BY ANTHONY HARDEN

At first glance, the terms artist and entrepreneur might seem contradictory, or at least incompatible. But as any successful artist will attest, business savvy is just as important as creative talent. Artists must make business decisions for which they seldom have any education or training. They must perform business tasks for which they seldom have any inclination or enthusiasm. The real world intrudes on their romantic ideals with a stunning lack of subtlety. Yet they persevere, pursuing their artistic muse through the thickets of commercial nuts and bolts.

We spoke to four artists about their experiences with the world of business. 26

| February 2014

love is

forever W

Wendy Whitson

THE FIRST BUSINESS DECISION WENDY Whitson had to make was to answer the question, “Can I still paint?” Graduating from college with a fi ne arts degree as a painting major, “I had no idea how to continue that in the workplace. How do you just start a business? I had no idea.” So she put away her painting ambitions and went to work as a newspaper photographer and a graphic designer for more than 20 years until she and her husband, John, moved to Asheville in 2002. That’s when she began to wonder if she could still do it. Conversations with John led them to that first business decision: a year-long studio lease in the River Arts District. “The bottom line was that Wendy has to try this or she will never know if she can still paint. We’ve got a year; let’s see what happens.” It took that entire year before she produced a painting that she liked enough to put on display. That led to another business decision: How much to charge? “Pricing things is very difficult. Where do you start?” Those early sales were 10 years ago, and sitting in her studio now she says pricing is still a thorny question. “It’s a very scary thing for an artist to keep going up on prices because you cannot go back down. And to keep going up, it’s scary. Kind of a rule of thumb that I’ve learned along the way is when I don’t have any originals to sell, it’s time to go up in prices.” The pricing quandary becomes even stickier when an artist is represented by a gallery, where they take a percentage of the artist’s sales. “I made that jump pretty quickly,” Wendy says. “Because it’s just business. The gallery spends a lot of money advertising my work. They get it in front of people who would never see it. And it’s worth it. It’s absolutely worth it.” Wendy is represented by the Greene Gallery on Kiawah Island just outside Charleston, South Carolina. “I wanted to expand my presence beyond Western North Carolina, but it had to be someplace within a comfortable driving distance. I looked around and settled on Charleston, because John and I love to go there.” Despite what the gallery does to promote her work, she must tend to facets of her business that have very little to do with painting. “I enjoy updating the website. I like it all. I like the marketing and dealing with the galleries. I like people, so it gives me a chance to interact that just standing in here painting does not.” One chore she’s not so fond of is transporting her paintings. “Schlepping is hard,” she says. “I don’t ever paint anything that won’t fit in my car.” It even dictates the kind of car she can buy. “We take a tape measure when we’re buying a car. We measure

Her grin reveals both the proud artist and the savvy businesswoman as she waves the catalog. “This is like gold.”

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the height of the rear opening, we measure it diagonally, the length of the storage space with the back seat folded down. That’s important.” Another important—even vital—consideration is publicity. Wendy opens a recent Ballard Designs catalog to a page that shows one of her paintings in a room setting. “Look, they mention my name in the caption,” she says. “People have seen this, Googled my name, found my website, and come in here, excited to meet the artist mentioned in the catalog. And they’ve bought paintings.” Her grin reveals both the proud artist and the savvy businesswoman as she waves the catalog. “This is like gold.”

jim parmentier

shirl parmentier

Jim and Shirl Parmentier

ACROSS A BIG SIDE LAWN AT THE PARMENTIER’S HOUSE, past the vegetable garden and fruit orchard, a box truck and trailer sit tucked behind a building that houses a working studio, a kiln, and a stock room stacked with finished pottery. The garden and orchard are leisure pursuits. The truck, trailer, and building are all part of the cost of doing business. The Parmentiers have been doing business for 35 years now, and Shirl recalls the moment when they realized they could make a living at it. “We had been working at it part-time for about five years, and one weekend Jim did a show in Maryland and I did one in Buffalo, and between the two of us we made more that weekend than he did for the whole year teaching.” She laughs. “Back then teachers didn’t make much money.” Jim can’t hide the grin as he finishes the story. “The next day I went into the school superintendent ready to resign. He talked me into taking a sabbatical. I guess I’m still on sabbatical.” Did he have any fears about striking out on his own? “I was 28, and when you’re 28…” the thought trails off, but the message is delivered. Ji m says leav i n g h i s teaching job was their first real business decision, but it was soon followed by an avalanche of others. They found themselves dealing with everything from deciding which shows they should book to buying bigger vehicles for their stock and all the other details that go with the business of art. “Back then there weren’t as many shows and there weren’t as many potters,” Shirl says. “We used to put up a sign on our front

“We made more that weekend than he did for the whole year teaching.”

justin watson

| February 2014

lawn that said, ‘Pottery for Sale’.” As she talks, she is working two slabs of clay together, forming the body of a piece. From his worktable, he adds, “We didn’t have a plan.” For their first brochure they needed a picture of one of their pie plates—with a pie in it. “A neighbor baked the pie,” Jim says. “And a friend of ours took the picture.” Shirl adds, “We didn’t have anything, and we didn’t care.” Flash forward 35 years: They are partners in the Ariel Gallery on Biltmore Avenue and they appear in top-of-the-line shows, including the Smithsonian Institute’s exhibit next spring, which touts itself as “Widely regarded as the country’s most prestigious juried exhibition and sale of fine American craft.” Doing shows, having clients visit their studio, and meeting people in the gallery are all part of the business, but Jim says those duties seldom feel like work. “We enjoy meeting people,” he says. “And at the shows and the gallery we meet clients who appreciate pottery and often want us to make a custom piece. For us, this is all part of the design process, collaborating with clients to create a new form or a new look.” As he is talking, Shirl is busy at her worktable, working strips of clay into an eventual lamp. She nods her agreement as she picks up Jim’s thought. “It all comes together. If we didn’t do the shows, if we weren’t part of Ariel, we wouldn’t meet those new clients. We wouldn’t have those interactions.” They set up a booth at about 10 shows a year, stretching from Florida to Denver. It adds up to a lot of miles, a lot of days on the road. They also spend three days every month greeting customers at the Ariel Gallery. It all requires time, energy, and money. “But if we didn’t do them, we wouldn’t have those contacts,” Shirl says. “It’s all part of the business.” Jim looks up from the piece he is shaping. “The business means a lot more than just making pottery,” he says. “And for us making pottery is more than just a business. Over 35 years, it has become a way of life.”

Justin Watson

WITH TWO NOVELS SITTING IN HIS COMPUTER FOR MORE than seven years, Justin Watson decided it was time to let go of his dream. “I thought someone would sweep in, a Prince Charming publisher, and make me known to the world. Ain’t gonna happen.” So he turned to the treacherous alternative: self-publishing. Justin has a resume that sounds like the concoction of some famous author’s publicist. He grew up on Bourbon Street in New Orleans, did some hitchhiking, worked as a deckhand on a fishing boat, then as a security guard, returned to school for

his PhD in religious studies, taught college, had two academic books published, moved to Asheville and began to write fiction. That was in 2004, nearly 10 years ago. He gradually grew tired of waiting for his Prince Charming publisher and began to read e-books about how to publish e-books. He decided to try it with his first novel, Marching As To War. “I’m still not sure whether it was an act of hope or despair,” he says. “I had always said I want to go the traditional way because I’ve been published, and that first book was reviewed in the New York Times. (The Christian Coalition: Dreams of Restoration, Demands for Recognition. 1997.) When my editor called me to say that the Times was going to review my book, I literally could not stand up. I sat down on the carpet.” He pauses, perhaps recalling that moment of disbelief and remembering that it was a favorable review. “So the despair is in the notion of, ‘I’ve given up, I’ll never have that again.’ But it’s also an act of hope because I can do something here. It’s a new landscape, a new reality.” And it requires new skills. First, unlike authors who have traditional publishers, Justin had to decide how much to charge for his Kindle book. “What I wanted was a price that makes it easy for people to say, ‘What the hell, I’ll try this one.’ I decided on $2.99.” And once the author sets a price, his work is just beginning. “You have to find a way to attract some kind of attention. My book is on Amazon, but nobody knows it’s there. It’s just one more e-book in a sea of e-books.” How many others are out there? “Well, Amazon ranks the books according to sales. When my book fi rst went on, it was ranked somewhere around 150,000.” So, yes, attracting attention is imperative. And in this age of social media it requires a different mind-set than someone in his mid-50’s might be ready for. Justin warms to the challenge. “I’m reaching out on Facebook and exploring what you can do on Twitter—which I had always dismissed as the most trivial thing. But the whole process of Twitter is a mechanism for self-promotion. And it requires a different kind of writing. To create a statement in only 140 characters that interests people enough to send it out to others? That’s a challenge of creativity on a smaller scale that demands something new of me. So I’m discovering both to my joy and dismay that it all relies on me to keep trying stuff.” He leans back in his chair, sips his drink and tries to put his experience in a larger framework. “If you look at the history

“The last artist who wasn’t also an entrepreneur was drawing pictures on the walls of his cave.”

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 29

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of art broadly—painters, sculptors—they also had to be entrepreneurs. They worked at attracting patrons, securing those relationships, selling themselves and their art. It has been a reality for centuries.” And finally he sums it up for all artists in whatever medium. “The last artist who wasn’t also an entrepreneur was drawing pictures on the walls of his cave.”

robert lock

Robert Lock

SOMETIMES THE BUSINESS SIDE OF A CREATIVE ENTERprise takes on a life of its own. Robert Lock was enjoying a notable career as a fi ne woodworker, dating back to his early years in Chicago where his clients included Michael Jordan and Oprah Winfrey. “I did the make-up table in her dressing room.” He also restored the classic Art Deco lobby of the Tribune Tower and did commissions for the Art Institute of Chicago. The man was in demand. He balks at the term, “artist,” with a modest, “I’m just a woodworker.” Considering his resume, one is tempted to meet him half-way with the description, “very skilled craftsman.” Robert’s other enterprise was making furniture in the Arts and Crafts style for a gallery, which took it to the annual show at the Grove Park Inn. In 1999, he recalls, “I went to the show for the fi rst time and saw what my stuff was selling for.” Soon after that he decided Asheville might be a good place to live. N ow, s t a n d i n g a t the router in his River Arts District workshop, Robert’s beard is flecked with gray and his sweater vest is flecked with wood shavings. He is still busy, but he no longer has time for fancy interiors or furniture. His days and his order book are swamped with requests for a product that nobody really needs but everyone seems to want: The Tequila Buffet. Two years ago in a moment of idle creativity, Robert came up with one of those “Why-didn’t-I-think-of-this-years-ago?” ideas. He explained the origin of his hot product. “I was watching TV and decided to have some tequila. I went to the kitchen, got my bottle of Patron and a plate with salt, another with limes, a knife and a shot glass. It took three trips to get everything I

Robert’s beard is ﬂecked with gray and his sweater vest is ﬂecked with wood shavings.

the teQuil a buffet

| February 2014

needed. Then it hit me. What I needed was some way to organize all this stuff. On a paper napkin I drew up what I thought it should look like.” It took off faster than the proverbial better mousetrap. The buffet is essentially a rectangular tray with pockets cut to fit all the ingredients that go into the tequila ritual. It is made of wormy chestnut, a hardwood that became rare when the trees were attacked by a blight more than 100 years ago. His choice of wood was more pragmatic than artistic. “I had a lot of wormy chestnut—small pieces—and this was something to do with it,” he says. Robert began marketing the buffet on the website, Etsy. From there it found its way to Pinterest and other websites. Orders began flooding in. “I couldn’t believe the demand. And it hasn’t let up. Now I’m selling retail online and wholesale to some major outlets. I just sold some in London to the Park Lane, Dorchester, and Ritz hotels.” But success brought some new challenges. “I include shot glasses when I send them out, and I now have an inventory of about 10,000 shot glasses ready to go. I cleaned out just about every restaurant supply place for a hundred-mile radius.” He had to establish a website, put out a press release, figure out an efficient way to ship his product, and deal with all those other details that separate the craftsman from the entrepreneur. He says he doesn’t mind the added challenges. “First of all, my wife takes care of all the paperwork. That takes a big load off my shoulders. Other than that, it’s no big deal. I’ve been in business as an independent contractor for 20 years. All that stuff goes with the territory. I’m fine with it.”

The bottom line of the artist’s entrepreneurial experience was summed up by the painter, Wendy Whitson. “If you’re an artist, you also have to wear that business hat. You’ve got to do everything. You’ve got to do it yourself.”

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by MIKE SUMMEY

M mike is an

New Yearâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Resolution:

No IOUs For Christmas Next Year

entrepreneur, author of several books on real estate, and also an avid pilot and philanthropist.

At the beginning of each New Year, the joy of holiday giving is quickly replaced by the pang of regret for many people as bills start rolling in and the scramble begins to find money to make the payments. All one has to do is listen to the discussions that co-workers and friends engage in about how they didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t realize they were overspending until the credit card bills arrived and they saw how much the balance had increased. Unfortunately, holiday giving is one of the biggest annual expenses for many people and the one they plan for the least. 32

| February 2014

uring the second half of the Twentieth Century, the advent of credit cards and electronic media combined to produce an over commercialization of the holiday giving spirit and wreaked havoc on the finances of many Americans. Credit cards provided consumers with a euphoric sense of having free money and merchants used a barrage of electronic advertising to hype them into spending it. As a result, millions of Americans start the New Year buried in consumer debt. The lucky ones are able to pay off this year’s debts just in time to start the process all over again next year and the credit card companies love it as they rake in billions in interest. Invariably, it’s the ones who can afford it least who pay the most. Why? Why are people so susceptible to the money drain of this cycle of borrow, spend, borrow, spend into which they put themselves? In an effort to answer this question, I asked a number of senior citizens who grew up during the years before credit cards and electronic media what they did. Their answer was consistently, “If we didn’t have the money, we didn’t buy.” This reminded me of the push banks made when I was a youngster to get people to establish Christmas accounts. These were accounts established early in the year, in which deposits were made throughout the year and the money could not be withdrawn without penalty until September or October. It was a simple way for people to save for Christmas, earn a little interest on their money and not have to go in debt to give gifts during the holidays. How long has it been since we’ve seen any advertising for Christmas accounts? The answer is simple, why would banks encourage consumers to save for Christmas when they earn outrageously high interest rates if they buy on credit? My research disclosed that most credit unions still offer Christmas accounts, but few banks do. Those that do, promote them very little. The point is our nation has slowly been led away from the save-then-spend state of mind of our elders to a borrow-and-buy way of thinking that can be financially destructive. Most everyone enjoys giving gifts during the holiday season, but when doing so causes financial distress the rest of the year, is it really worth it? Think of it this way: When you go in debt to give a present, is it really a gift? Aren’t you actually giving something you don’t yet have? The money to pay for it has yet to be earned. When viewed from this perspective, the gift you buy on credit is only a promise. A promise that will fall on someone else to fulfill should something unfortunate happen to you or it will become a loss to the lender who loaned you the money. Imagine the impact it would have if your neatly wrapped Christmas packages contained neatly folded IOUs instead of presents. After all, you gave a lender IOUs to obtain the presents, why not just cut out the middleman? Do you think you or the recipient would feel the joy of giving or excitement of receiving if you gave a $100 IOU that said I will give you $10 a month until next October? But, isn’t that exactly

Think of it this way: When you go in debt to give a present, is it really a gift?

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what you are doing when you buy a gift on credit and then take most of the year to pay for it. The only difference is the gift hides what you are really doing from the person who receives it. It’s the first of a new year and a good time to resolve to make things different in the coming year. The Christmas accounts used by our elders may be an old idea, but it’s still a good one. Not only is it a good idea, but it lets you buy more with the same money. Think about this! If you plan to spend $1,200 next Christmas, you only have to save about $97 per month in an interest bearing account to build up that amount, but if you charge it on a credit card you’ll have to pay back about $110 per month for a year to pay it off. That $13 per month difference may not seem like much, but it’s more than enough to buy a $25 gift for six additional people or an even nicer gift for those already on your list. You could even use the money to buy yourself a nice $150 gift as a reward for having the discipline to save-then-spend rather than borrow-then-pay. If your bank doesn’t offer a Christmas account, no problem; a simple passbook savings account works just as well. It’s not the type of account that’s important; it’s the level of discipline and commitment on your part that determines whether you start the New Year feeling good about the gifts you have given or kicking yourself because of all the debts you incurred. As each year ends and a new one begins, millions of people promise, pledge, vow, swear, declare, assert or whatever else you want to call it that they will do better in the coming year than they did in the last. Unfortunately, most New Year’s resolutions quickly fall by the wayside, firm goals become good intentions and even these are soon lost as old habits return and with them more of the same behavior that prompted the resolution in the first place. Why? Why are New Year’s resolutions so hard to follow? Is it because too many Americans have lost the concept of delayed gratification? As a nation, we’ve developed an I-want-it-now-attitude that results in more and more debt and the misery that eventually comes with it. Decide today how much you want to spend next holiday season. Divide it by the number of times you will get paid between now and then. Deposit that amount each time you get paid. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? But as simple as it sounds, most Americans aren’t willing to make the commitment to do it and as a result consumer debt continues to grow. I’ll leave you with this thought. Try it for one year and you will do it for the rest of your life. The feeling that comes from giving what you’ve already earned rather than giving a promise to pay later is one of the most rewarding things you will ever do… for both yourself and for others.

As a nation, we’ve developed an I-want-itnow-attitude that results in more and more debt.

Got an opinion? Share it on our website by scanning this QR code or visiting capitalatplay.com/christmas-money

| February 2014

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news briefs

NCNR announces 61-acre easement ashe county

The National Committee for the New River (NCNR) recently declared the protection of a 61-acre property in Ashe County, not far from the community of Todd. Barbara and Stephen Benson voluntarily donated a conservation easement on their family land to protect, in perpetuity, its “unique open space character,” as well as more than 3,700 feet of streams, wildlife habitat and abundant forestland. The property also ties into a network of previously conserved land in the Todd area. The Bensons said they have always had a love for the land and a desire to keep it as it is and protect it from development. That desire is now a reality. The protected streams on the property,

Katuah Market Now Open biltmore village

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which eventually flow into the South Fork (of the) New River, will allegedly further enhance the water quality in the river for future generations. The N.C. Division of Water Resources designates the South Fork as high-quality waters. According to NCNR, “Due to its clean water and rural charm, this section of the river near Todd is very popular for recreational activities, such as canoeing and fishing.” The Conservation Trust for North Carolina (CTNC), the statewide organization that supports North Carolina’s 23 local land trusts, made funding for the project possible. CTNC provided $1.5 million in grant funds to local land trusts to help with the completion of conservation projects that take advantage of the expiring N.C. Conservation Tax Credit. The funds come from Fred and Alice Stanback, an anonymous donor and CTNC’s reserve funds.

Katuah Market, Asheville’s new natural foods grocery store and café, is officially open for business. The 14,000 square foot store, located in historic Biltmore Station in Biltmore Village offers a wide selection of ready-to-eat foods and an extensive variety of natural grocery offerings. The market specializes in wholesome foods, vegan and allergen-free options, local products and scratch made dishes. Features available at the food store include a “Katuah Kitchen,” 120 dine-in and outdoor seats, produce and meats, a full grocery department, and a wine and beer section. A 5% discount is given to customers over 60, active members of the military, current students of AB Tech, Warren Wilson, UNC Asheville and WCU, employees of Mission Hospital, fi refi ghters, police officers, EMTs, and the staff and faculty at AB Tech. Some additional features to look forward to in the future include live café shows, on tap drinks, a catering program, and a Katuah branded charcuterie line. There will be a grand opening celebration on Saturday February 22 from 11am- 9pm. Any vendors, performers or community groups

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Appalachian Trail Hall of Fame seeks inductees for 2014 western north carolina

Nominees for the Appalachian Trail Hall of Fame Class of 2014 will be accepted through Friday, February 28. This hall of fame recognizes those who have made a significant contribution toward establishing and maintaining the 2,185-mile footpath that passes through 14 states from Maine to Georgia. The 16 Hall of Fame inductees chosen in the fi rst three years include Myron Avery, Gene Espy, Ed Garvey, Benton MacKaye, Arthur Perkins, Earl Shaffer, Emma “Grandma” Gatewood, David A. Richie, J. Frank Schairer, Jean Stephenson, William Adams Welch, Ruth Blackburn, David Field, David Sherman, David Startzell, and Everett “Eddie” Stone. Those eligible to be selected include anyone who has made an exceptional and positive contribution to the Appalachian Trail or Appalachian Trail community, either by leadership, inspiration,

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Walker College featured in best business schools edition boone

According to The Princeton Review, the Walker College of Business at Appalachian State University is one of the nation’s most outstanding business schools. The school is featured in the new

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2014 edition of the Review’s book “The Best 295 Business Schools.” The company does not rank the schools in the book hierarchically. According to Robert Franek, Princeton Review senior vice president-publisher, “We recommend the Walker College of Business as one of the best institutions a student could attend to earn a business school degree.” Franek explained: “We chose the schools we profi led in this book based on our high regard for their academic programs and our reviews of institutional data we collected from the schools…We also solicited and greatly respect the opinions of students attending these schools who rated and reported on their experiences at them on our 80-question student survey for the book.” The Princeton Review’s survey asks business school students about their school’s academics, student body and campus life, as well as about themselves and their career plans. “The Best 295 Business Schools: 2014 Edition” has two-page profiles of the schools with write-ups on their academics, student life and admissions. In the Walker College of Business profile, it reads that the school “offers a small, efficient, and affordable MBA program to a largely local student population. For many, the fast-paced course schedule is a major benefit of this program. Here, the entire MBA, including

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service, achievement or innovation. Factors include pioneers who conceived of and developed the trail; those who organized or directed major trail organizations such as the Appalachian Trail Conservancy and Appalachian Trail clubs; maintaining clubs; longtime trail maintainers; leaders who promoted and protected the AT; hikers who have made significant accomplishments and other persons who have enriched the culture or community of the Appalachian Trail by their association with it. Nominees can be living or deceased. The emphasis will be on people who have made their contribution to the Appalachian Trail during a long period, whether or not they are still active. The easiest way to submit a nomination is by using the online site, www.surveymonkey.com/s/YKZ5ZSY.

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an optional internship, can be completed in ‘only one year.’” The profile also noted the college’s focus on international business and its study abroad opportunities in China, Hong Kong, Turkey, Cuba, France and Poland. The school profiles in “The Best 295 Business Schools” have rating scores in five categories that The Princeton Review tallies based on institutional data it collected during the 2012-13 academic year and its student survey for the book. The ratings are scores on a scale of 60 to 99. Rating categories are academic experience, admissions selectivity, career, professors interesting, and professors accessible. The Walker College of Business received a rating of 79 in the academic experience category, 80 for professors interesting, and 77 for professors accessible.

Buncombe Charter Schools approved for 2014 buncombe county

The North Carolina State Board of Education gave final approval to 26 charter schools scheduled to open later this year, including two in Buncombe County. The state approved plans for

the Franklin School of Innovation, the county’s first charter high school, and INVEST Collegiate, which launched a charter school in Charlotte in 2013. The schools will initially have permission to operate for five years. Their ability to continue will be based on the academic results in their first few years of existence. Both schools are scheduled to open in August. According to Franklin school founder, Michelle Vruwink, “We hope to announce our location and begin accepting applications for enrollment within the next few weeks.” In 2014, Franklin School will include grades six through nine but will eventually serve all high school grades. The future enrollment is expected to reach 700 or more students. The school will be built on the “Expeditionary Learning model,” a program derived from the Harvard Outward Bound Project that emphasizes hands-on, project-based learning expeditions. Asheville’s Evergreen Community Charter School currently uses the same model. Although the group’s location is still in the negotiation stage, Vruwink said they are focusing on the Enka area. The buildings would initially be paid for out of private funding, and the school would not use buses for the first year. Vruwink said the school expects to employ nearly 30 teachers and staff at first, but potentially

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70 total staff in the future. According to the INVEST Collegiate school’s website, the program will “provide an exemplary college preparatory program including an integration of fine arts, physical health, and a commitment to engagement through service and learning within the greater community.” Since charter schools are publicly funded but operate under independent boards, they are able to experiment with curriculum, instructional practices and teacher pay as long as they meet state standards. Buncombe currently has three charter schools with students in kindergarten-eighth grade, which combined had 938 students in the 2011-2012 school year.

Asheville Company C3L Associates takes Urban Farming to the UAE and Africa asheville

C3L Associates, the parent company of Asheville Urban Farms, has been asked by the organizers of The Global Forum for Innovations in Agriculture in Abu Dhabi to conduct a pathway to controlled environmental agriculture solutions sessions for 12 African nations. The

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Africa keynote session is one of several programmed items at the Global Forum for Innovations in Agriculture held February 3-5, 2014. The multi-faceted event will also feature the following: an exhibition and conference; an Incubator zone; an Innovation Zone curated by the University of Arizona, where working models of some of the most inspiring innovations in agriculture today will be featured; Technical Tours to a range of sustainable agriculture projects in the UAE; a Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Farmer Focus, where a dedicated program will educate GCC farmers on the benefits of sustainable agriculture; and an NGO Zone, where NGOs, development agencies and charitable foundations can meet and share ideas. Traveling together to Abu Dhabi for the conference are: Anthony and Sherrye Coggiola, the developers of Asheville Urban Farms; Dr. Elizabeth Porter, an agricultural economist at UNC Asheville specializing in development, humanitarian assistance and sustainability; John Wear, president of Trident Environmental Services and Technologies Corporation, whose nature cooperative bioremediation designs have proven effective in marsh restoration deployments along the U.S. Gulf Coast, where he met Anthony while developing solutions for the BP oil spill in 2010.

Anthony said his ultimate goal for this conference is to “return to Asheville with an even greater understanding of the most efficient ways to feed the world and our neighbors.” Anthony and Sherrye will spend 2014 traveling the US and Canada seeking the most innovative companies to join them at the 2015 event.

ASG (AGI Shorewood) Reveals $8.5M Expansion & 50 New Jobs henderson county

ASG (AGI Shorewood), a global packaging company that specializes in the development of innovative solutions for the consumer products segment, plans to expand the company’s Henderson County, NC facility. It is expected for the expansion to add 50 new jobs, with average wages exceeding $40,000 per year, exceeding the county’s annual average of $34,528. New jobs will include positions in pressroom, die-cutting, gluing, digital pre-press, customer service, production planning, and shipping and receiving. The company hopes to invest $8.55 million in new, real and business personal property over a period of two years.

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Real property investment is expected to expand the physical footprint of the existing 136,000 square foot manufacturing, distribution and office operation, which was originally built in 1959. The expansion will ultimately help the NC facility reach heightened production efficiencies, increase manufacturing volume and boost existing packaging offerings to help serve customers in the entertainment, personal care, health care and pharmaceutical segments. Bob Lennon, vice president and general manager of Supply Chain, explained, “This facility continues to demonstrate an unrivaled customer focus and drive for continuous improvement. Our work gives us tremendous pride. We have the opportunity to be involved in packaging solutions for the world’s most recognizable consumer products, which often include household headache medication, toothpaste containers, even specialty-embossed Blue-ray ™ disc covers.” “Henderson County is home to 135 manufacturing operations that support a workforce of over 5,250 employees and a combined payroll of more than $259 million annually. Interested candidates may forward complete resumes with salary history to Laura Lampkin, human resources manager, at Laura.Lampkin@ asg-worldwide.com.

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L leisure & libation

JUST AROUND

the Corner BY PAUL CL ARK

Winterâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s chill doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t have to keep you indoors. The winter months are great times to visit local art galleries, many of which are less crowded when the weather is chilly.

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 41

leisure & libation

he beauty of Western North Carolina’s mountains have long attracted professional artists, helping build one of the nation’s largest communities of creative professionals. Many are known internationally but choose to show their work locally. Here are some suggestions of galleries to visit.

Bender Gallery

12 S. Lexington Ave., Asheville 828-505-8341 bendergallery.com 10:30 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Saturday, 12-5 p.m. Sunday The morning light is dazzling at Bender Gallery. The downtown Asheville glass gallery faces east, and the early light bounces off the white walls to set the glass pieces on fire. Colors frozen in molten glass burn with a special intensity when subjected to light, making a visit to Bender Gallery a kaleidoscopic experience. Refraction conjures up reflection. Miles Bender, co-owner of one of the few glass fine art galleries in the United States, is attracted to glass sculptures that have stories to tell. Color, shape, and texture that combine in representational and abstract forms are what he and many of the gallery’s fans like. A piece “has to make you think,” he said. He has operated the gallery since moving to Asheville in 2005. The city’s reputation as an arts destination brings many people into the gallery, but much of its sales are to high-end collectors who never walk through the door. Others make appointments for private viewings and leave with their purchases without visiting other galleries in this gallery-rich city. Such is the small 42

| February 2014

world of high-end glass sculpture collecting. Bender Gallery represents about four dozen glass artists from around the world, including Katherine Bernstein, a Burnsville crystal artist who was inspired to work in glass by Harvey Littleton, a Spruce Pine resident considered to be the father of the studio glass movement. The glass fine arts community is so small that artists come to Bender Gallery for representation. And Bender goes to them. “We look for work on a regular basis to change things up and to find emerging artists,” he said. “That way the gallery always looks fresh.” People love glass sculpture for its fragility and for fluid forms that come from a hard medium. Glass is a study of contrasts— born of fire, yet seemingly set in ice. It amazes people, which makes Bender Gallery such an amazing place in an amazing arts city. “We are a destination within a destination,” Bender said. In February 2014, it is featuring new work by Michelle Knox and David Patchen.

â&#x20AC;&#x153;We are a destination within a destination,â&#x20AC;? Bender said. inside Bender Gallery in the heart of downtown Asheville. February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 43

leisure & libation

the bascom center for the visual arts main museum.

photo by Jonathan Hillyer

The Bascom Center for the Visual Arts 323 Franklin Road, Highlands 828-526-4949 thebascom.org Monday-Saturday 10 a.m.-5 p.m., Sunday 12-5 p.m.

The Bascom Center for the Visual Arts in Highlands sits on a six-acre plateau and looks a lot like the horse farm that used to occupy the land. Large swathes of grass lay between buildings made of unpainted barn wood. There’s a feeling of airiness and peacefulness to the campus. A stroll between the six buildings on campus literally feels like a walk in the park, and a historic one at that. The entrance to the center is through the Will Henry Stevens Covered Bridge, an 87-foot-long span that was built in the early 1800’s and trucked to Highlands from New Hampshire. The road into campus leads to the main museum, built from a large 1838 hand-hewn postand-beam barn. The Studio Barn nearby is a rebuilt rough-hewn barn that houses clay studios in one huge room. The old-growth white pine floors in the Bascom’s main building are from several historic barns. Marked by the tools that farmers used to thresh wheat, the floors and their warm patina reflect the rural nature of a campus full of meadows, gardens, forests, walking trails, mountain views and sculpture gardens. 44

| February 2014

The Bascom has five galleries and provides opportunities to take classes. Exhibits change every three months, and there are always three or four going on. The Bascom recently had a photography exhibition of landscapes curated by Jane Jackson, who curated Sir Elton John’s extensive photo collection. Through March 2014, it will stage a show that features people choice award winners of art guilds and organizations in the area. March through May 18 it will have an exhibit of handcrafted, non-powered river and lake boats. The show will also feature antique rods, reels, and flies to coincide with the Three River Fly Fishing Tournament in Highlands. “Our curator has been looking all over for these beautiful boats. It’s going to be amazing,” said Bascom membership coordinator, Pat Turnbull. “Our exhibitions are world-class. We have a lot of people from the Asheville area who go through the galleries, take a class and spend the day in downtown Highlands shopping and eating. It’s a nice way to spend the day.”

drew de ane gallery

in Brevard.

Drew Deane Gallery 114 West Main Street, Brevard 828-877-5272 drewdeanegallery.com 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday

Back before there were franchise motels, motor courts dotted the country, hoping to attract weary guests with neon signs that sent warm signals into the night. Most of the motor courts are gone, and nearly all of the neon signs that advertised them are. Drew Deane has been painting the signs for years as part of her “Route 66 project.” “It was the American dream to travel,” Deane said. “These signs were hand-created. The metal was cut by hand. The neon letters were all hand-built. They made a statement of individuality that you don’t see in modern travel. They’re dead, or they’re dying.” Deane’s love for the signs developed early on. As a girl, she used to visit her three great-aunts at the motor court—the Camelia Court—that they owned in Silver Springs, Florida. The most exciting part of Deane’s day was turning it on.

A former architect, she happened upon her work in oils one day while walking with her daughter in the snow and seeing a big, red neon sign that said “Sunset Motel.” Captivated, she started searching out old signs for motels, bowling alleys, drugs stores and cafes. Drew Deane Gallery is housed in what used to be the Brevard Fire Station, built in 1926. A large neon sign (naturally) directs visitors into its large, open space hung with Deane’s work, much of it in her preferred 24-by 48-inch format. She also exhibits

“These signs are art in and of themselves,” she said. “I’m trying to document them before they disappear.” hand-blown glasswork by John Geci and pottery by Courtney Martin, both former students at Penland School of Crafts. February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 45

leisure & libation

Brevard has several art galleries, such at Bluewood Photography, Gallery on Main, Hunters & Gatherers and Red Wolf Gallery. Helping develop Brevard as an arts destination is Brevard Lumberyard Arts District, an emerging compound of galleries and performance spaces created near Drew Deane Gallery out of the old lumber warehouse. Deane continues to paint vintage signs along Route 66, as well as throughout the southeast. A painting she did a few years ago of the Arby’s cowboy hat that stood in Greensboro (since torn down) was purchased by Arby’s national headquarters in Sandy Springs, Georgia. Her oil paintings are so evocative of travel in America that the Asheville Regional Airport has twice exhibited her work. “These signs are art in and of themselves,” she said. “I’m trying to document them before they disappear.”

The Art House Gallery & Studio

5 Highland Park Road, East Flat Rock 828-595-9500, 828-808-3594 arthousegalleryandstudio.com 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and by appointment Artists find the coolest places. Drawing upon the creativity that inspires them to make something out of nothing, they turn spaces that others reject into studios and galleries that pioneer communities. The Art House Gallery & Studio may be that place in East Flat Rock. Susan Johnston Olivari has turned an old arch-topped cabinet shop by the railroad tracks into a contemporary gallery that delights visitors with its airiness and artwork. She shows the work of a few artists at a time, including herself. She opened last summer in what she considers “an odd location.” “East Flat Rock has some great buildings, but this one is a bit out of the way,” she said. But it’s worth the drive to see what she’s done and to see the work that hangs on its walls. Olivari is particularly taken with the work of Veronika Hart, who grew up among the leopards and tea fields of what is now Tanzania. Raised in a farmhouse that lacked electricity, running water and telephone, she was as fascinated by the wildlife and human life around her as

It’s worth the drive to see what she’s done and to see the work that hangs on its walls. the art house Gallery and Studio features the work of Veronika Hart. 46

| February 2014

her neighbors were of her, the only white child, other than her siblings, for miles. Hart’s drawing skills, honed as a girl in the sand of the beach near her home, helped her get into art college in Europe. Abstract work was not for her, however, so she returned to drawing the zebras, lions, and giraffes that she always loved. Olivari started drawing at age five and continued until a job in finance took her to Los Angeles. A young mother, she moved back to her home state of Louisiana and started painting murals and furniture. She later started painting on canvas and, after Hurricane Katrina, moved with her husband to Saluda. Her work is realistic, largely of landscapes caught in arresting light. “I paint on big canvases, so I needed a big space,” Olivari said of how she came to create The Art House from a building built by a cabinet maker in the 1950’s. Heavy beams support the rounded top. Exotic woods cover the floor. “This is a great space,” she said. “Everyone who walks in says how beautiful it is.” Other current artists at The Art House include oil and acrylic artist Heidi Mayfield, painter Mary Gardner, pastel artist Kate Thayer, and folk painter and filmmaker Patrick Shanahan.

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crimson l aurel gallery

in Bakersville.

inside Crimson Laurel Gallery.

| February 2014

all over the country, many of whom moved to the area and settled in the hills around the school. Today, the flats of the Toe River Valley and the mountains that surround it have one of the highest concentrations of ceramic artists in the country. Inspired, two working artists opened Crimson Laurel Gallery in a historic building in Bakersville that had been a silent movie theater, a bowling alley, a general store, and (for two days only) a place to legally buy alcohol. The artists renovated the longempty building into a showcase for the jewelry they created and quickly took on studio ceramics. Since then, the gallery has added handcrafted furniture, glass, sculpture, paintings, and antiques. Under new ownership, it now represents more than 200 artists, many of them local. The biggest draw, by far— the one that attracts buyers from Japan and Australia—is ceramics, said gallery manager, Niki Coverstone. “So many ceramic artists settled in Mitchell County that it’s safe to say that we’re more saturated with artists than just about anywhere else in the country.” Crimson Laurel Gallery represents artists who work in a wide variety of ceramics techniques, and it’s always looking for new groundbreaking artists, she said. That constant push forward has given the gallery a national reputation that brings collectors to Bakersville from all over the country. (Its online sales attracted a worldwide audience.) In the past, they and the gallery’s many casual visitors have seen work by renown local ceramicists such as Marshall’s Alex Matisse, the great-grandson of the famous French painter Henri Matisse; Bakersville’s Courtney Martin and Michael Kline; and Asheville’s Josh Copus, founder of Clayspace Co-op, a ceramics cooperative and gallery in Asheville. Like a lot of Bakersville, Crimson Laurel Gallery shuts down for the winter, opening again in April. Which makes it all the more tantalizing to visit. “We’re really remote and definitely a destination to visit,” Coverstone said.

“So many ceramic artists settled in Mitchell County that it’s safe to say that we’re more saturated with artists than just about anywhere else in the country.”

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Here are some area art galleries, as listed by the N.C. Arts Council

APPALACHIAN ARTISAN SOCIETY & GALLERY

48 E. Main St, Old Fort, NC 828-668-1070 www.taasg.com

APPALACHIAN CRAFT CENTER

10 N. Spruce St, Asheville, NC 828-253-8499 www.appalachiancraftcenter.com

APPALACHIAN STATE UNIVERSITY CATHERINE SMITH GALLERY

Department of Art Wey Hall, Boone, NC 828-262-7344 www.art.appstate.edu/cjs/index.htm

ARTISUN GALLERY AND MARKETPLACE

16 S. Andrews St, Hot Springs, NC 828-622-3573 www.artisungallery.com

ASHEVILLE GALLERY OF ART

16 College St, Asheville, NC 828-251-5796 ashevillegallery-of-art.com

ASHEVILLE MUSEUM OF ART 2 S. Pack Square, Asheville, NC 828-253-3227 www.ashevilleart.org

BELLA VISTA ART GALLERY

14 Lodge St, Asheville, NC 828-768-0246 www.BellaVistaArt.com

BLACK MOUNTAIN COLLEGE MUSEUM AND ARTS CENTER 56 Broadway, Asheville, NC 828-350-8484 www.blackmountaincollege.org

BLOWING ROCK ART AND HISTORY MUSEUM

159 Chestnut St, Blowing Rock, NC 828-295-9099 www.blowingrockmuseum.org

BLUE SPIRAL 1

38 Biltmore Ave, Asheville, NC 828-251-0202 www.bluespiral1.com

BURKE ARTS COUNCIL GALLERY

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115-E Meeting St, Morganton, NC 828-433-7282 www.burkearts.org

BURR STUDIO & GALLERY

136 N. Main St, Waynesville, NC 828-456-7400 www.burrstudio.com

CARLTON GALLERY

10360 NC Hwy 105, Banner Elk, NC 828-963-4288 www.carltonartgallery.com

CEDAR MOUNTAIN ARTWORKS

450 Cedar Lane, Brevard, NC 828-884-5258 www.judithduff.com

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CLAYSPACE CO-OP

119-A Roberts St, Asheville, NC www.clayspace.org

CONN-ARTIST STUDIOS & ART GALLERY

IAGO

Penland School of Crafts, Penland, NC 828-765-6211 www.penland.org

IT'S BY NATURE GALLERY

QUALLA ARTS AND CRAFTS MUTUAL

611 Greenville Highway, Hendersonville, NC 828-329-2918 www.conn-artist.com

678 W. Main St, Sylva, NC 828-631-3020 www.historicdowntownsylva.com

DEJA VIEW GALLERY & FINE YARNS

JOHN C. CAMPBELL FOLK SCHOOL GALLERY

34 N. Main St, Waynesville, NC 828-452-9787 www.dejaviewgallery.com

GALLERY MINERVA FINE ART 8 Biltmore Ave, Asheville, NC 828-255-8850 www.galleryminerva.com

GROVEWOOD GALLERY

111 Grovewood Road, Asheville, NC 828-253-7651 www.grovewood.com

HAND IN HAND GALLERY

2720 Greenville Highway, Flat Rock, NC 828-697-7719 www.handinhandgallery.com

HANDS CRAFT GALLERY

543 W. King St, Boone, NC 828-262-1970 www.handsgallery.org

HIGHSMITH GALLERY AT UNC ASHEVILLE

1 University Heights, Asheville, NC 828-251-6585

| February 2014

PENLAND GALLERY

1165 Main St, Blowing Rock, NC 828-295-0033 www.iagoblowingrock.com

One Folk School Rd, Brasstown, NC 828-837-2775

JONAS GERARD FINE ART

240 Clingman Ave, Asheville, NC 828-350-7711 www.jonasgerard.com

MOUNTAIN ARTISANS

155 N. Womack St, Franklin, NC 828-524-3405 www.mountainartisans.net

NTH DEGREE GALLERY AND STUDIOS

683 W. King St, Boone, NC 828-264-7919

OLD DEPOT ASSOCIATION GALLERY 207 Sutton Ave, Black Mountain, NC 828-669-6583

S. TUCKER COOKE GALLERY IN OWEN HALL AT UNC ASHEVILLE

1 University Heights, Asheville, NC 828-251-6559

645 Tsali Boulevard, Cherokee, NC 828-497-3103 www.quallaartsandcrafts.org

RIVERSIDE STUDIOS GALLERY

196 Riverside Drive, Asheville, NC 312-520-9229 www.riversidestudiosgallery. blogspot.com

SOUTHERN HIGHLAND CRAFT GUILD GALLERY

930 Tunnel Road, Asheville, NC 828-298-7928 (other locations can be found online) www.southernhighlandguild.org

SPIERS GALLERY AT BREVARD COLLEGE

400 N. Broad St, Brevard, NC www.brevard.edu/art

TC ARTS COUNCIL GALLERY 349 S. Caldwell St, Brevard, NC

THE DESIGN GALLERY 7 S. Main St, Burnsville, NC 828-678-9869 the-design-gallery.com

THE UPTOWN GALLERY

30 E. Main St, Franklin, NC 828-349-4607 www.uptowngalleryoffranklin.com

L TREE HOUSE POTTERY

148 Front St, Dillsboro, NC 828-631-5100 www.treehousepotterync.com

UPSTAIRS ARTSPACE

49 S. Trade St, Tryon, NC 828-859-2828 www.upstairsartspace.org

WESTERN CAROLINA UNIVERSITY FINE ART MUSEUM

Fine & Performing Arts Center, Cullowhee, NC 828-227-2553 fineartmuseum.wcu.edu

HANDS ON! A CHILD'S GALLERY

318 N Main St, Hendersonville, NC 828-697-8333 handsonwnc.org

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The Riddle Institute, Morganton, NC 828-433-0056 www.studioeleven.org

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M Looks

Past

to the

Build

its

Future Mast General Store

When a 31-year-old John Cooper first laid eyes on the Mast General Store back in 1976, he had a vision for his family’s future that involved going back into the past. “I fell in love with the store as soon as I stepped inside,” says Cooper, who had traveled from his home in Florida with a friend to scout out potential real estate. “They literally had to carry me out.” written by darren dahl 52

| February 2014

photos by ellen gwin & courtesy of mast gener al store

v in the logistical center for

Mast General Store.

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com

| February 2014

W the original mast gener al store as it

appeared between 1910 and 1916.

the e arly ‘70 s look of the original store.

as it appe ars today, the same timeless

store in Valle Crucis.

alking into a Mast General Store feels like you’ve stepped back through time. It might be the creak of the wooden floor as you walk across it, the scent of something piney in the air, or even just the fact that you might see iron frying pans on display next to woolen outerwear, rosebud salve, and barrels fi lled with rock candy. You just don’t see stores like this anymore. Big-box retail this is not. And that’s exactly the kind of vision that engulfed John Cooper when he came upon the original Mast General Store in Valle Crucis, North Carolina—a bucolic little valley town tucked into the Blue Ridge mountains named for its three creeks that form a cross. It’s the kind of place that you might blow through without realizing it since its “downtown” is made up of just a few stout buildings that seem to date back to Antebellum. They don’t even have a stoplight there. But the place was magnetic enough to draw Cooper’s thoughts back to the valley even after he returned to St. Petersburg, Florida, with his wife, Faye, and their two children, John and Lisa, ages 13 and 11 respectively. Eventually, the Coopers learned the building was for sale, which led to some soul searching. “I wasn’t really looking for a new lifestyle,” says Cooper. “I was managing a sales force for an insurance company at the time and had been interviewing to take on a new position at a different company. But the more I thought about the store, the more it looked like an opportunity to give us a different life and for me to be my own boss. I had always liked history and I had once worked for Montgomery Ward for a while, so I had some retail experience. I also sold ads for a newspaper for three years. My wife ran a small bookstore for our church so she had some familiarity with accounting. We thought we had enough business experience to make it work.” The Coopers then researched the history of the store, which was noted in the National Register of Historical Places as

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com

the le adership te am ( left to right ): Jeff Meadows, Fred Martin, Roger Maxey,

Lisa Cooper, Dave Cliett, Angela Warren, Mark Gould, Paula Finneron.

“We never had plans to grow into more than one location,” says Cooper. “It just happened.” a prime example of a country general store. They also took a trip to Maine to visit famed outdoor retailer L.L. Bean to see what kind of merchandise they may want to sell. It took a few more years, but in 1979, they made the decision to buy the store. Final price: $45,000 (which would be about $152,615.14 today), as is, plus some dusty inventory which included a few pairs of overalls. “We didn't go up there with a big bag of money,” says Cooper. “We had to be frugal with every dollar we spent.” The Coopers sold their Florida home and most of their belongings, packed their two children up in a rental truck, and made the long winding journey up into the mountains before officially opening the store in June 1980. “It was never just about making money,” says Cooper, who had a friend keep renewing his insurance license for him for a few years until he knew the store had really made it. “It was about saving an old general store that was like a living museum.” You could say that Cooper and his family have fulfilled that mission and then some. 56

| February 2014

Building Up the Business When you fi rst meet him, Cooper, now 68, seems like he always has a smile on his face. Clean-shaven and gray on top, his ruddy face has a welcoming warmth all of its own. He’s also exceptionally good with names. When you walk with him through the original Mast store, which was opened by Henry Taylor in 1883 and later bought by W.W. Mast, it’s impressive to see him greet everyone from staff to customers by first name, some of whom have been shopping at the store for 33 years. Cooper can point out the trap door in the floor behind the knife display. Underneath is a dark pit that used to serve as a chicken coop. Since chickens were used as currency to barter, shop-keeps of the past used to drop them down into the pen to keep them from being stolen. Cooper will also show you how the original floors slope at crazy angles and where they’re patched with old license plates nailed into the wood. Look up and you’ll see rows and rows of hooks that used to hold merchandise

or cured hams. Over there is the ancient, yet operational, post office the Coopers petitioned the government to re-open inside the store. Make sure to heed the signs warning tourists not to open the mailboxes; that would be a federal offense. When you head up the staircase—watch your head, the ceiling is low—Cooper can show you where his family lived after they moved into the building: living and dining room on the second floor; bedrooms on the third. Today, instead of a couch or TV, there are Amish-style wooden rocking chairs for sale in front of an old coffin, a remnant from the store’s earlier days when it’s slogan was: “Cradles to Caskets—if you can’t buy it here, you don’t need it.” While it may seem romantic that a family of four was living out their version of the American Dream, it wasn’t always that glamorous. “I thought they were crazy for what were they doing to me,” says Lisa Cooper, now 44, about her parents who took her away from her friends and the warmth of Florida for a life living above a creaky old store. “From that perspective, I didn't love the business at first.” “We certainly struggled hand-to-mouth for the first few years,” says John Cooper, who had to contend with a 17.5% interest rate and 60-hour workweeks among other obstacles. “We made some mistakes early on in terms of the kind of products we bought. But what began to work for us, and what our vendors helped us with, was focusing on the kinds of seasonal clothing, tools, and gifts you would expect to find in a general store. You won’t find any electronics or flat-screen TVs in a Mast store.” It’s true. When you walk into any one of the eight Mast stores spread throughout a three-state region of North Carolina, Tennessee and South Carolina, you’ll feel a sense of déjà vu, that somehow the store you’ve entered is just as friendly and cozy as any others you have shopped at. Each time you enter, it’s like taking that same step back in time. “We want people to feel at home when they come into our stores,” says Cooper. “We want them to have a different kind of experience that’s fun. We learned that the three essentials to setting yourself apart from other retailers is to deliver fair prices, good quality merchandise, and great customer service. In this age of centralization with chains and malls, we’ve lost real genuine customer service. But it’s one of the hallmarks of our business. We have a warmth that’s not contrived. It’s why our floors are made of wood and not plastic.” And yet, hidden behind the rustic hominess of the stores lies the infrastructure of a modern, cutting-edge company that has become an integral part of the communities it operates in. Today, Mast General Store is a thriving business with 450 full and part-time employees. The business has grown substantially over the years, albeit in a thoughtful and organic way. The first turning point came in 1982 when the Coopers were offered the opportunity to lease another building in Valle Crucis, just two-tenths of a mile down the street from their other building, which used to house a competing business in the old days. Feeling an itch to expand, they pounced on it and created what’s now called The Annex, which sells clothing, outdoor gear, and lots of candy. “We never had plans to grow into more than one location,” says Cooper. “It just happened.” Eventually, as the business began to find its groove, the Cooper’s moved out from above their store into a proper house. That didn’t last long, though. The business community in nearby Boone, some seven miles away, had noticed how well the Mast stores were doing in Valle Crucis. They wanted the Coopers to save an old downtown department store in their town by opening up a third Mast store in it. Cooper demurred. It seemed risky and there wasn’t enough parking. But when another merchant in town offered to work together to improve parking in the downtown, Cooper finally agreed. But, to help finance the acquisition, the Coopers sold their house and moved into an old farmhouse in Valle Crucis to help the new store get started. “Opening that store February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 57

john & fay cooper

effectively doubled the size of our business,” says Cooper, who has since moved again but still lives in Valle Crucis just a few minutes away from the original store. As word began to spread about Mast’s success—helped in part by the popularity of a nationally-syndicated story written by Charles Kuralt in 1986 about the store—other towns came calling, too. They were spurred on by the Main Street program, which was driving the revitalization of downtowns throughout the country. That led to the next expansion in 1991 into Waynesville, into Hendersonville in 1995 and Asheville in 1999. “One of the things Faye and I did early on in these communities was that if someone asked for money like a nonprofit or a school we gave what we could,” says Cooper. “We have always been very intentional about giving back to the communities we are involved in. In addition to giving, we or staff members have also served on boards that dealt with the economic development of the towns we were moving into.” The business eventually expanded outside of North Carolina in 2003 when it opened a store in Greenville, South Carolina, and then again in 2006 when it opened a store in Knoxville, Tennessee. Another store followed in 2011 in Columbia, South Carolina, with the newest store slated to open in Winston-Salem in 2015. In each case, the business has bought the building it moved into—something that Cooper says has proven to be a great strategy over the years. “We only have to pay for it once rather than having to see increases in our rent based on how 58

| February 2014

well we do,” he says. Not every store the Coopers opened fared well, however. The store they started in Chapel Hill didn’t last a full year before the Coopers sold the building that now houses the Carolina Brewing Company. Similarly, a candy store in Blowing Rock that opened in 2005 has since been closed. “It's been an interesting ride for us,” says Cooper. “We've learned from our previous experience about how to treat employees well and also to give back to the community. But we also want to grow conservatively, because we don’t want to overstretch the brand. We don’t want to be perceived as some chain operation that’s only trying to make as much money as we can.” One of the key reasons the Coopers continue to expand is because in 1995, they formed an Employee Stock Ownership Plan, or ESOP, which gave their employees an ownership share in the company, which today exceeds 20% of the stock. “Even though we grow conservatively, we want to be moving forward not backwards,” says Cooper. “We need to increase the value of the company so that our employee owners will see growth in their ESOP. It took a few years before everyone really understood what it was, but it has been a great decision for us and for the business. We want to provide good benefits to our employees and they, in return, can be responsive to the guests in our store.” Introducing the ESOP was a key milestone in the growth of the company, says Fred Martin, who began working for the

Coopers in 1984, married their daughter, became the father to their three grandchildren, and took over as president of Mast five years ago. “There were 14 of us when I started working for John and Faye,” he says. “Each of us had an intimate relationship with them. We killed ourselves, because we saw how they were killing themselves to get this off the ground. But when the organization became too big for John and Faye to have a close relationship with every member of the company, they knew they had to change gears and launch something that would give everyone a feeling that they owned the company. I was in a store recently and a guest walked up and asked, ‘Who owns Mast?’ And two of the associates on the floor replied, ‘I do.’ That’s why our guests tell us there is a feeling in every store that everyone owns it, which is true.”

Appearances Can Be Deceiving While the Coopers honor the past through the way their stores look and feel, as well as their commitment to their staff, the truth is that they have been able to grow the business steadily over the years because of their respect for technology and modern business processes. “I’ve had so many people over the years tell me they want to open a general store like ours,” says Cooper. “But I’m not sure that you could. It took us a long time to get the kind of buying power you need to make a diversity of merchandise like we have work. You need to order enough volume from manufacturers to make it worth their while. It would be near impossible to duplicate what we have done without a lot of money and people.” At the logistical center of the business, for example, is a 25,000-square-foot distribution facility located a few miles from the original store where all the boots, gloves, beeswax candles, sourwood honey, ceramic mugs, potato mashers, hammocks, and dog toys sold in every Mast store arrive, get unloaded, checked and priced, and then sent back out to the store they will be sold in. The facility houses some 90 full and part-time workers who form the nerve center for the entire business. It’s where merchants come to peddle their wares to the team of buyers who report to Lisa Cooper, who is now vice president of the company in charge of merchandising. Her mission has been to stock more locally-produced goods on shelves. “We’ve had a drive for years to source more product made in the U.S.A.,” she says. “About 20% of our products are made domestically at the moment, which is a huge difference from most other retailers out there.” Lisa Cooper also played a lead role in opening Rivercross

Market, a store that sells only goods made in the U.S., which sits directly next to the original Mast store in Valle Crucis. As the business as a whole has expanded, she adds, they’ve also had to adjust and customize merchandise at their stores to meet the needs of customers in their new markets, especially those in South Carolina, who live closer to the coasts than the mountains. Back at Mast HQ in Valle Crucis, there is also a large accounting department, the number crunchers who keep the company’s cash flow humming; the marketing and creative staff, who design advertising and print up many of the signs inside the stores; and then there’s the IT staff, a growing part of the business. The company has invested heavily in a revamped website, due to be released in 2014, that will include enhanced e-commerce capabilities. At the same time, it will also strive to capture the same look and feel a customer gets from walking into a Mast store. “We offer our customers an authentic experience,” says John Cooper. “But we know there are people who want to shop online. I remember recently that we had a customer call up and ask if we had a certain product in stock, a shirt I think. So our sales associate used an iPad to take pictures of everything we had in all the different colors and then emailed it to him. The customer then called back and said he wanted one of each. We look at online as a part of customer service. I believe it will never really extinguish retail sales completely.” While Cooper acknowledges that other brick-and-mortar stores like Blockbuster, which recently began closing all of its remaining stores, have struggled in an era of e-commerce, the only decline Mast has seen in its 33.5 years came in 2009 during

“Recently and a guest walked up and asked, ‘Who owns Mast?’ And two of the associates replied, ‘I do.’ That’s why our guests tell us there is a feeling in every store that everyone owns it, which is true.” the Great Recession. Sales dipped 4% that year, yet, by 2010, sales had rebounded to the point where the company posted record results. “The downturn in the economy was almost perfect timing for us because it gave us a chance to refocus and to cut down on selling things people didn’t want or need,” says Martin. “We’re now positioned to really take off if and when the economy ever completely recovers. Our systems are state-of-the-art and our training will be where it needs to be. We’re still a thriving retail company, and there aren’t many of those in the world right now.” February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 59

The Future of Mast When you walk into John Cooper’s office, which sits just outside the lobby in the Mast distribution building, you might be surprised by how small it is. It’s maybe about 100 square feet. There’s a window on one wall with a bookcase on another, which contains a mix of regional works by authors like Charles Frazier as well as an assortment of business texts by forward-thinkers like Jim Collins. There are lots of papers stacked on the desk along with his computer and a bunch of pictures and posters on the floor propped up against a leather armchair. When you’re there, he might pull out one of those pictures: It’s of a handsome man, still young, though the picture is old. The man in the picture is John Henry Adams Cooper, John Cooper’s great-grandfather who was born on July 4th, 1851. Cooper has recently connected with distant relatives living in the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia, who had sent along the picture along with a story. Apparently Cooper’s great-grandfather had also tried his hand at opening a general store likely around the same time that Henry Taylor did. “I hear he didn’t make out so well,” says Cooper with a grin. Whether retail success was in his veins or not, John Cooper certainly worked hard to find it. He now considers himself semi-retired from Mast, though he retains the title of Chairman of the Board and still comes to work in his office most days that he’s not tending to his latest entrepreneurial effort: Leading a group that’s renovating the Art Deco theater located in downtown Boone. He also continues to work to preserve the quality of life he holds so dear back in Valle Crucis, where he has protected a lot of the land around the original store with a conservation easement to help prevent any Big-box retailers coming to town and spoiling the view. In that sense, the store is never really that far away physically or mentally. Cooper says his wife still handwrites birthday cards for each employee and that they as a couple remain active in working within the communities that are home to Mast stores. Even the license plate of his Nissan 4X4 pick-up truck reads: “MAST.” Cooper has ceded the day-to-day operations and decision-making involved with the future of the company to Fred Martin and his daughter Lisa. (The Coopers lost their son in a tragic accident more than 20 years ago.) Martin and Lisa Cooper were married for 20 years but recently divorced in as

| February 2014

amicably a way as you could ever hope to hear about. They still talk all the time and, when Martin recently went on vacation, Lisa Cooper even watched his dog. Both Cooper and Martin say they remain great business partners and will work together to make a prosperous future for the company. “My dad was never one to give you something you hadn’t earned,” says Lisa Cooper, who worked her way up through the company one rung at a time to earn her spot in the business. “My dad actually asked me if I would be OK if he offered the president position to Fred. I said he was perfect for it.” “I am more of a marketing person, and Lisa is a number cruncher,” says Martin. “That’s a great combination. I think our relationship isn't much different than what John and Faye have. They complement each other really well. John is the consummate entrepreneur, and Faye took care of the details to make him look good.” Cooper stresses that Martin and his daughter earned their positions in the company—each has worked there for 30 years—but that they had to be good at what they did to move up the ladder. “Fred was not chosen as president, because he was part of the family,” says Cooper. “He had earned the right and showed great skill and talent throughout his entire career.” There are also seven other non-family members of the organization who compose its “Leadership Team,” like the CFO, head of HR and the head of IT, who contribute to the future direction of the company. “It’s not just family making decisions,” says Cooper. “No one can do it all by themselves, you need to rely on others to make good decisions.” More recently, Cooper has been thinking about his three grandchildren and if they will want to play a part in the future of the business—if his family, like the Masts before them, might pass the business to future generations. The answer is murky. “There is a very real possibility that in 10 years, the president of this company may not be family,” he says. His oldest grandson is currently studying mechanical engineering at Columbia University, while the middle grandson is headed to college to study engineering as well. The last hope might be Cooper’s granddaughter, who is currently in 8th grade and, like her middle brother, may end up working at the store during the summers. But this year, she picked out what turned out to be the No. 1 selling item in the outdoor department. “Maybe there is hope she has retail in her blood after all,” says Cooper.

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February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 61

by BILL FISHBURNE

Real Estate Recovers (somewhat) in 2013

bill is the

President of the Henderson County Board of Realtors.

So, how’s the real estate market? Realtors hear that question at least twice a day. For the past five years, from early 2008 through the end of 2012, the answer was generally depressing. The economy went from great to “oh my gosh” and the realty bubble popped big-time. Now, things are better. Much better. 2013 was the best year since 2007 with more than 7,289 homes sold. In 2007 a record 7,772 homes were sold through the Western North Carolina Regional MLS system. The average price back then, however, was $278,799 and a sales volume of $2.166 billion was recorded. 62

| February 2014

o are we back to 2007 levels? Not by a long shot. The average sales price for a house throughout the area in 2013 was $229,986, an increase of just 4% for the year. MLS dollar volume will be just over $1.676 billion when all the last-day transactions are recorded. Still, compared to 2012 and the other bust years, buyers have come back into the market and sales are up significantly. In 2012 the entire MLS sold only 6,127 units at an average price of $221,579. The two prior years, 2010 and 2011, sales didn’t even reach the 5,000 unit mark. But comparing 2013 to 2012 shows unit sales increased 19%. Charts 1 and 2 below show unit sales and prices from 2007 through 2013. Obviously, with sales plummeting from 2008 through 2011, this was a market designed for buyers, if they had any money. Buyer’s markets exist whenever the available inventory in any price range exceeds a six month supply. Below that level it is a seller’s market. A scarcity of inventory means that new listings that are nice homes, well priced and well maintained will receive offers immediately upon listing. Sometimes there will be multiple offers and sometimes the offers will be higher than the MLS price. We saw some of that in 2013 in certain price ranges and, in particular, in the Asheville market. MLS data shows we have entered 2014 with just a 7.8 month supply of homes throughout the region in every price range up to $200,000. In Asheville there is just a 3.8 month supply between $50,000 and $200,000. Prices in our region increased a modest average of 4% in 2013, following on the heels a very slight increase in 2012. CHART I

Housing Sale Prices 2007-2013, IN THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS

Buncombe and Henderson counties both saw 5% increases in 2013. Buncombe’s sales volume, however, shot up 23%. At the opposite end of the spectrum Transylvania County saw an 8% reduction in the average price, from $255,048 in 2012 to $233,886 last year. Transylvania also recorded just a 6% increase in unit sales. The mitigating factor in this regard is that Transylvania is a relatively small market with just 485 homes being sold vs. more than 3,400 in Buncombe. That also helps explain why the Brevard Board of Realtors late in the year decided to merge into the much larger Asheville Board. With low sales and just 154 members, Brevard was on the verge of becoming unviable as a separate business entity. It made good business sense for them to find a merger partner. The Residential Absorption Rate Comparison for the first 10 months of 2013 is found on the next page in Chart 3. Transportation and the inconvenience of commuting to and from Asheville/Buncombe County no doubt helps justify the $26,000 price differential buyers are willing to pay in the region’s largest city. Also, no other community can match Asheville’s variety of neighborhoods, wealth of cultural resources and vibrant downtown. Those factors draw people whether they’re working or retiring. Asheville, as always in Western North Carolina, is at the center of it all. It is the junction point of two major Interstate highways, the location of the regional airport and the undisputed economic capital of the region. The city’s River Arts District is a significant attraction for tourists who have already seen the Biltmore Estate and are looking for something unique to CHART 2

Housing Units Sold 2007-2013

Average Price Median Price 9000

300

8000 250

7000 6000

200

5000 4000

150 2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 63

Year End Inventory Comparison CHART 3

COUNTY

2012

2013

% CHANGE

Buncombe

11.1

7.4

-33.3%

Haywood

19.4

17.4

-10.3%

Henderson

12.4

9.3

-25.0%

Madison

27.55

23.2

-15.8%

Polk

27.5

18.8

-31.6%

Rutherford

23.1

-3.8%

Transylvania

25.9

23.7

-8.5%

Avg. Sales Price by County CHART 4

COUNTY

2012

2013

% CHANGE

Regional MLS

$221,579

$229,986

Buncombe

$247,150

$259,791

Haywood

$182,181

$179,845

-1%

Henderson

$200,880

$211,202

Transylvania

$255,048

$233,886

-8%

Median Sales Price by County CHART 5

COUNTY

2012

2013

% CHANGE

Regional MLS

$175,000

$183,900

Buncombe

$195,000

$205,115

Haywood

$155,000

$151,000

-3%

Henderson

$168,000

$179,000

Transylvania

$174,000

$180,125

| February 2014

take home. Of course, that could be one of more than 100 local craft beer offerings; but since there are too many brews and not enough time, we modestly suggest they just buy a house and stay. The buying/selling prices by county can be found to the left in Chart 4; similarly, the median prices (half higher, half lower) are shown in Chart 5. Another key factor in pricing is the size of the house. All things are not equal. Asheville has more commerce and industry, by far, than any other city or town in the area. This means more jobs, more younger people, more young families, more children, and a need for larger houses. Buncombe’s profusion of larger homes, old and new, generally means working families who can afford larger homes and want to be close to their work. Last year, 19% of all sales in Buncombe County were homes with four or more bedrooms (Chart 6). The other communities each have their own charm and attractiveness. Haywood County has become a retirement community with great mountain vistas and, in Waynesville, a unique downtown that is an absolute magnet for folks escaping to their mountain dreams. The mid-summer Folkmoot Festival set for July 18 - 27 in 2014 is an international music festival featuring folk musicians and dancers from around the world performing in the traditions of their native lands. About five weeks later each year, Hendersonville puts on the region’s longest-running street festival when the four day Apple Festival takes over downtown on the Labor Day weekend. It’s a family friendly, alcohol-free celebration of just about everything it means to be American and working. Each local mountain community has its own charm and traditions. All offer mountain environments for those seeking escape from the hustle and bustle of lives lived elsewhere. Hendersonville’s serpentine Main Street is a unique, pedestrian-friendly five block area that offers everything from crafts to Irish pubs, jewelry to unique hiking boots and even a very knowledgeable music store where you can learn to play a guitar or a violin. Unit sales of residential units (houses, condos and townhouses) increased significantly in 2013 (Chart 7). Buncombe County Realtors sold nearly twice as many houses as did their counterparts in Henderson County and nearly half

The old saying goes that when the leading markets get a sniﬄe, Western North Carolina catches pneumonia.

of all sales within the Western Regional Multiple Listing Service were in Buncombe. But Henderson County Realtors were the most productive with an average of 3.87 sales per member vs. 2.86 in Buncombe (Chart 8). Now, having started this unnecessary controversy, let us hasten to add that sales per Realtor are misleading because Realtor members sometimes maintain their licenses and membership even though they are not actively working in the business. Also, as the market has improved many new, young Realtors have gotten their real estate licenses and joined realty firms in the younger areas of the region, specifically Asheville. It takes time for a new person to fi nd their way and get established. And while Hendersonville Realtors do score high on this chart, the same chart shows that in the past year Asheville’s Realtors increased their business five percentage points more than their Hendersonville compatriots. Finally, there is the entire issue of the housing slump. Are we done with it? Will the economy continue its modest recovery? Will mortgage money and interest rates continue to be favorable enough for non-cash buyers to continue buying homes in our area? That’s a big unknown. Our modest 4% price recovery is less than half the national average of 10.9% according to Clear Capital, a national provider of real estate data. Western North Carolina is a trailer, not a leader. With a high percentage of retirees and second-home buyers, we trail national trends. If the economy is good in New York and Florida, it is probable that many residents of those areas will have the resources to buy homes here. The old saying goes that when the leading markets get a sniffle, Western North Carolina catches pneumonia. I am loathe to predict what will happen in 2014. While my Realtor side wants to be as Pollyannaish as possible, my dark side has a hidden economic pessimism. Still, the facts on the ground are that markets are doing well elsewhere, the economy is growing and we have many reasons to be optimistic. So I’ll go with that, borrowing lines from Jackie Gleason along the way. First, “How sweet it is” after these long, dismal years. And second, no matter what the future may be, “Away we go.”

Unit Sales of 4+Bedroom Homes CHART 6

COUNTY

2012

2013

% CHANGE

Buncombe

6127

632

19%

Haywood

6127

12%

Henderson

6127

202

13%

Transylvania

6127

13%

Unit Sales Totals by County CHART 7

COUNTY

2012

2013

% CHANGE

Regional MLS

6,127

7,289

19%

Buncombe

2,772

3,416

23%

Haywood

724

778

Henderson

1,611

1,361

18%

Transylvania

385

408

Unit Sales per Member Realtor® CHART 8

COUNTY

2012

2013

% CHANGE

Buncombe

2.32

2.86

23%

3.13

3.37

3.27

3.87

18%

2.50

2.65

(1196 unit sales)

Haywood (231)

Henderson (416)

Transylvania (154)

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February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 65

THE OLD

NORTH

STATE [

news briefs

Horsehead Holding to add up to $110M to gross profit rutherford & cleveland county

According to Horsehead Holding Corp., its Rutherford County zinc-refining plant will enhance gross profits for the Pittsburgh company by as much as $110 million. That new plant, located in Mooresboro and near the Cleveland County line, is expected to begin production by mid-2014. When in full operation, the $490 million facility will employ 250. Horsehead is also establishing a joint venture called ThirtyOx near its Mooresboro facility to acquire raw materials for the Rutherford plant. That operation is in cooperation with Imperial Zinc Corp. Horsehead anticipates to have less than $2 million invested in the joint venture. The Mooresboro facility site is nearly

]

55 miles west of Charlotte, along U.S. Highway 74. Horsehead, the largest U.S. zinc producer, obtains its raw materials from steel plants, including Charlottebased Nucor Corp. When the recycling process is complete, the zinc is sold primarily to companies that galvanize steel.

‘Jerry’ economic impact awards charlotte

This year’s winners of the Charlotte Regional Partnership’s annual Jerry Awards are the Electric Power Research Institute and Time Warner Cable. The awards, given to the chosen winners for their contribution to the regional economy, will be presented at the Charlotte Convention Center on May 20 during

an awards lunch. Although based in New York, Time Warner has its largest cooperate campus in Charlotte. As the private sector winner, it employs 3,200 people across 13 of the partnership’s 16 counties. One of the company’s two new national data centers is located at the Charlotte campus. It handles television, Internet and phone services for millions of customers nationwide. EPRI, the public center winner, is an independent research and development organization. The organization’s headquarters are in Charlotte, employing 200 at its campus in University Research Park. Contributions from the electric utility industry support the nonprofit. The Jerry Awards are named in honor of the first recipients, Carolina Panthers owner and founder, Jerry Richardson, and, Jerry Orr, former aviation director at Charlotte Douglas International Airport. They are awarded for ongoing economic contributions to the regional economy.

General Parts finalizes $2 billion sale raleigh

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Inc. (GPI) is official, according to GPI’s new owner, Advance Auto Parts Inc. The transaction boosts Virginia-based Advance Auto into the No. 1 position as the largest automotive after-market parts provider in North America, bypassing former market leader, Memphis-based AutoZone. The Advance Auto acquisition of GPI creates a company with combined annual sales of $9.3 billion, 5,264 company-owned stores and more than 70,000 employees. AutoZone reportedly has 5,210 stores, 42,000 employees and $9.25 billion in annual revenue. The Advance Auto announcement, however, did not examine the impact the deal will have on General Parts’ headquarters operations in Raleigh where it employs nearly 500 people. General Parts owned 1,246 company stores that operated under the Carquest brand. The combined company will continue to provide services to the 1,418 independent Carquest store locations in the U.S. and Canada. In addition, Advance will add Worldpac, GPI’s import company with 105 facilities across the U.S. and Canada, to its operations. The company previously stated that GPI president and CEO, Temple Sloan III, would remain as president of General Parts and was expected to join the Advance Auto Parts board of directors. GPI founder

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Time Warner closes $600M deal for Duke Energy venture charlotte

Time Warner Cable has closed its $600 million purchase of Duke Energy’s fiber-optic joint venture, DukeNet Communications. Based in Charlotte, DukeNet adds 8,700 miles of fiber-optic cable in the six southeastern states to the 21,000 miles Time Warner currently has in the Carolinas. DukeNet had been wholly owned by Duke until 2010, when it sold a 50 percent share of the company to Alinda Capital Partners. That was a step to raise capital and prepare DukeNet for sale. Duke had developed the company as a potential adjunct service for its electric utility, but gradually came to see it as not fitting in with its long-term plans. Last spring, reports that the venture was up for sale appeared. Time Warner was not initially considered a likely buyer. However, changes in the cable industry, most notably the loss of customers to online streaming services, has created a shift in the market and led traditional

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cable companies to become more aggressive buyers of fiber-optic companies. Time Warner intends to use the additional fiber for business customers who need services such as voice, high-speed Internet and cloud-enabled hosting. The additional cable also allows Time Warner to further expand its carrier business, which provides network access to wireless providers. In the summer of 2013, Time Warner passed the milestone of providing services for more than 10,000 cell towers around the country.

NCSU and Johns Hopkins team up to stabilize power grid raleigh

Small disturbances in power transmission lines can steadily disrupt a power grid, and when wind turbines are in the mix, problems escalate. Researchers at N.C. State University and Johns Hopkins University have found a way to minimize those disruptions. According to the researchers, wind farms produce power erratically, because power production is dependent on how hard the wind is blowing. Controllers inside the power generators generally mitigate the

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disturbance in the power flow. Aranya Chakrabortty, N.C. State University assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, explained, “Disturbances in power grids can be caused by anything, starting from small faults that are caused by trees falling on the ground shorting the transmission lines to birds getting killed by sitting between two live wires.” However, if the power generator is not strong enough to reduce the disturbance, the oscillations can lead to widespread outages. The NCSU and Johns Hopkins researchers developed algorithms that match control efforts between wind farms and energy storage facilities. An increase in power output can be siphoned off to charge batteries rather than being pumped into the power grid. “By matching the behavior of the two controllers, we can produce the desired damping effect on the power flow and restore stable grid behavior,” Chakrabortty added.

| February 2014

As a result of this development, North Carolina could witness an increase in wind power establishment.

Cisco wins contract for 2014 Winter Olympics research triangle

A Research Triangle Park giant is nearing a global audience again. Cisco Systems has been chosen to provide video hardware and cloud software for NBC’s Olympics coverage. Cisco, which employs 4,800 in Research Triangle Park, will once again be providing NBC with cloud architecture to support the streaming of live and cloud-enabled on-demand Olympics sport content for on-site production in Sochi, Russia. The 2014 Winter Olympics begin on February 7 and last through February 23.

Kate B. Reynolds Trust backs Wake Forest Baptist’s FaithHealthNC initiative triad & northwest nc

The Kate B. Reynolds Charitable Trust has awarded a $477,499 grant to Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center for its faith-based FaithHealthNC intiative in the Triad and Northwest North Carolina. The Kate B. Reynolds Charitable Trust, based in Winston-Salem, has among its missions the goal of promoting wellness statewide by investments in prevention and treatment. The grant will be used to expand the rather new initiative that is led by Gary Gunderson, vice president of faith and health ministries at Wake Forest Baptist, who joined the medical center in mid-2012. FaithHealthNC was established in 2013 to create covenants

between faith communities and health care providers through which health care liaisons will be chosen to help clergy and faith community leaders make certain that the health care needs of their congregations are being met. The program is based on a model Gunderson made while working as vice president of the faith and health division at Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare in Memphis that received national recognition. Gunderson discussed what has come to be known as the “Memphis Model” and how it can be applied in the Triad and the state. The basic concept is that those partnerships will help improve preventive health and keep people out of the hospital, with a specific focus on highrisk people such as those with chronic conditions, isolated elders and those with untreated behavioral health conditions. With the additional funding, the

increased almost 9% and job growth rose FaithHealthNC program will expand in Forsyth, Rockingham and Surry counties nearly 3% from 2007 through October of in the Triad as well as a majority of the 2013. Over awork similar for period, population We make water you. counties in Northwest North Carolina. growth increased by 15%, but that does The support will help train individuals not mean that only one of every five that will then work to connect faithpeople who have gone to NC’s capitol in based organizations with community the past half decade found employment. resources and local health care providers. Firstly, the population growth counts all newcomers, children and retired adults alike, and the population figure could include those who live in Raleigh but work in Research Triangle Park, for example, which are left out of the job growth category. Cities in Texas, particularly Austin raleigh and Houston, score very closely in these kinds of rankings. With a job growth of Although the median household income nearly 12%, Austin ranked as Forbes’ in Raleigh has decreased 6.3% since No. 1 Region to Watch. San Antonio was 2007, other economic factors were strong second with a job growth rate of 6.2%, enough for the city to rank No. 9 among and Houston was fourth with job growth the top “U.S. Regions to Watch in 2014” of 9.2%. by Forbes magazine. From 2007 through 2012, the region’s gross domestic product

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( left to right ): Lindsay York Woodruff &

Stephanie Duncan Wilkinson 70

| February 2014

Duncan & York stephanie

lindsay

wilkinson

woodruff

Falling into Place After searching in all the wrong places, two friends turned business partners finally stumble upon what just might be the right location. written by toni sherwood

photos by anthony harden February 2014 | capitalatplay.com

t was a balmy Labor Day weekend when friends and business partners Stephanie Duncan Wilkinson and Lindsay York Woodruff left for the beach to celebrate. They had just signed the lease on a retail space in a fabulous Art Deco building in downtown Asheville. They had spent months negotiating the letter of intent with the owner. They had collected bids from contractors on the improvements needed and had even hired a designer to create their logo. The business cards were printed, and $30,000 worth of inventory was heading their way. Everything was moving toward the big October 15th opening. Finally all their work had paid off, and they could take a moment to breathe.

| February 2014

Their commercial realtor, Burns Aldridge of Beverly Hanks remembers, “So I know they’re celebrating at the beach, and they’ve ordered all this stuff. Saturday I get a call from the landlord’s broker, which is weird because commercial brokers don’t work on weekends. And he’s like, ‘We’ve got a major issue, the landlord doesn’t want to lease to these girls.’” Aldridge hung up the phone, knowing the next call he had to make would change everything.

Taking flight Wilkinson says she has no clue exactly when or how the concept for a modern general store sprang to life. After she and Woodruff met through their husbands, they started spending more and more time together and connecting on a soulful level. Wilkinson recalls, “We realized we had both studied public relations in college. We talked about our paths and where we’d gone. She was a teacher, and I had gone into textiles and buying and retail. Yet we were both feeling slightly unfulfilled and had a yearning for something else.” Wilkinson’s search for fulfillment took her in many directions. Her first job out of college was as a graphic designer. She spent almost seven years working in her mother-in-law’s shop, Yesterday’s Tree, which offers furniture, accessories, and interior design services. She even attended Asheville’s Privai Academy in 2010 to study Esthetics and skin care. Woodruff had struggled to jumpstart her teaching career in Asheville. “I was a second grade teacher in Atlanta, and when I moved here, I couldn’t land a full-time teaching job. I got really frustrated.” Woodruff felt this was a sign that she should move on to do something different. “I have my masters in education, and I can’t find a job? Not to mention the pay here is $10,000 less a year than I was making in Atlanta. I did part time, I did substitute teaching, and finally I just got over it.” Perhaps it was fate that led her to work at Tops for Shoes when she first moved to Asheville. “That lit the fire under me as well, enjoying retail. I think they have a model business over there. It’s a well-oiled machine, and they really take care of their employees and their customers. They are who I look up to when I think about business.” She credits Alex Carr of Tops and her sister-in-law Jennifer Woodruff, who owns Build It Naturally in Asheville, as her influences. “I feel like I was surrounded by business owners, and it made me think that’s something I would like to do also.” Wilkinson always wanted to own a gift shop, and Woodruff aligned with that idea, “I’ve always loved giving gifts, and I felt like I was good at it growing up.” As they began dreaming and conceptualizing what their ideal store would be like, they tossed around store names. Wilkinson and Woodruff sounded too much like a law firm. Coincidentally, both women had dropped their middle names for their maiden names when they married, so formerly they were Stephanie Duncan and Lindsay

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 73

( left to right ): Lindsay York Woodruff &

Stephanie Duncan Wilkinson

York. Duncan & York had flair and seemed to fit the modern general store vibe they were going for. A friend even commented it sounded both ‘British and southern,’ which were Wilkinson’s two favorite things. They added the tag line, ‘Modern Market,’ envisioning a novelty feel that was still mindful and tasteful. Now that they had their concept, all they needed was the perfect location.

Starting to soar When Wilkinson and Woodruff first approached Aldridge in January of 2013, they had their eye on the main floor of the Windsor Hotel across from Mellow Mushroom, which was Aldridge’s listing at the time. “They were dying to get in there,” Aldridge recalls, “That was their first choice.” There were going to be 14 high-end vacation rentals above and retail on the street level. But the Windsor owners were looking for national name type franchises. Aldridge wanted to convince the owners, who are not from Asheville, that a mom and pop business could be perfect there, but he needed help from the novice entrepreneurs. “These owners are going to want to see a business plan, pictures and concepts of what your space is going to look like, because it’s their building, and they want to see if it’s going to jibe with the other three commercial spaces. It’s a whole synergy type thing,” Aldridge says, “Anything to help me sell you, because right now it’s two girls starting a business.” That’s when Woodruff decided to take the eight-week “Foundations” course offered at Mountain BizWorks. “I knew I 74

| February 2014

wanted to open a store but I didn’t feel like I was really prepared,” Woodruff admits, “The course took you step by step, every week you would work on a different part of your business plan. I really think that was one of the best things I did because we estimated our cash flow, and it made it more real. I thought, this is doable, it’s not just some dream.” Russ Towers, co-owner of Second Gear, a consignment shop specializing in outdoor gear, clothing, and footwear, was Woodruff’s instructor. He recalls she made a strong impression on him. “Lindsay came in with a very well thought out concept that she enhanced that much more. She came in with some good business savvy behind her and an idea that seemed like it would have success from the start.” But there was something else that struck him about her. “Lindsay was very open with helping other people out and engaging with other folks. Some people just sit back and focus on their own plan, but she would ask people questions about theirs.” Towers also notes that having a partner in a retail business can be very helpful. “Lindsay knew from the start that Stephanie was going to be her partner. I think that takes some pressure off somebody starting a business, particularly a retail business. A lot of people come through Foundations starting something that might be a service business like a therapist that has pretty low start-up costs or overhead. And that’s different from starting a restaurant or a retail business with a physical location. With brick and mortar you’ve got much more investment, and it’s much riskier when you’re laying a lot more on the line.” When Woodruff had her final one-on-one consultation with Towers

at the end of the course, she brought her partner in. Behind the scenes they had collaborated on the business plan all along. As their business plan became more concrete, the women started seeking out unique merchandise for the store. Woodruff explains, “We want everything in the store to be really special, not something you’re going to toss later. We’re thinking mindful in the way of local, or handmade, or sustainable. Luxurious but justified as far as why you would spend so much on that. You can buy something that’s not going to last, or you can buy something made in the USA of really great quality that’s going to last you for years.” Wilkinson elaborates, “We wanted gifts that were thoughtful, things that we had carefully selected. Things that were special and different. If you could find it down the street, we didn’t want it here. Not because we’re trying to be super-exclusive. But what’s the point of going shopping if you see the same things over and over again in every store?” Rather than sourcing out of Atlanta as many retailers in the southeast do, the women decided to make buying trips to New York, as well as to browse smaller craft markets and flea markets. Although they highly value products made in the USA, they don’t limit themselves as long as it falls under their guidelines of fairly traded, unique, and high quality.

Falling feels like flying (for a little while) Despite a strong business plan, Aldridge was unable to convince the Windsor Hotel owners to take a chance on Duncan &

York. So they set their eyes on an Art Deco building located on a main thoroughfare in downtown Asheville heavy with tourist traffic. “Any tourist who comes to Asheville is going to come downtown at some point in their stay,” Towers says. But he insists tourist traffic can be misleading. “One of the things I conveyed to the Foundations class is that a lot of tourists are just browsing. They’re going around, taking in the downtown vibe, looking around.” This insight is one Towers learned from personal experience, “At first I thought, look at all these tourists! I saw dollar signs. I figured they’re all spending. But they’re not all spending. They’re here for the dynamic and the chemistry of downtown and all the cool little shops. I do the same thing if I go somewhere.” Regardless, the women felt exposure was important, and they began negotiating for the highly visible Art Deco space and designing it to their specifications. One of the biggest issues with the building was the cracked asbestos tile flooring, which did not fit with their concept. Aldridge recalls, “They got an estimate on a new floor, it was going to be $12,000 to $15,000. We had asked the landlord to contribute $5,000, and she wouldn’t. We asked her to split the floor, and she wouldn’t. She would only give a $2,000 credit.” They finally agreed to this, and focused on moving forward. Although generally they have the same aesthetic, Woodruff admits, “We had a little bit of conflict on our logo.” The process of distilling their business concept into a logo was more laborious than she expected, “I thought it would be easy and February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 75

| February 2014

fun but it ended up being really tedious, and I thought, can we just pick something already?” But the desire to get this off their list diverged with her perfectionism, “We got a designer and she gave us some of her ideas, and we picked the one we liked the best. But I was thinking, are we just settling for the one we don’t think is the worst? Is there something better that we can do?” Finally they did settle on a design that reflected the Art Deco era of the building and ordered up business cards. They had found some amazing new-to-market items on their trip to New York and started purchasing products to be delivered. The lease was drawn up and they had their attorney look over it. Based on his advice they made some minor adjustments, signed the lease and wrote checks for the rent. All the details had come together. They were off to the beach to celebrate.

Free fall Meanwhile Aldridge presented the lease to the landlord and her broker. He detected some early signs of discontent on the part of the landlord, who was miffed that the lease was delivered later than expected on a day when she planned to leave town for a religious holiday. Aldridge recalls, “I delivered the lease explaining they wanted the $2000 credit for the floor, but they might not put in a new floor. They would definitely put it towards the floor, toward improving her building.” Aldridge says the estimate they got for repairing the floor was $5000, although they were also considering installing a bamboo floor and wanted to get more estimates. Regardless, the landlord lost faith in the deal, and it was suddenly off the table. “We were devastated,” Wilkinson admits, recalling that portentous phone call from Aldridge informing them the deal would not be going through. Aldridge explains the letter of intent both parties had labored over is a non-binding agreement. “Basically it’s a verbal agreement on paper. Sometimes that can be misconstrued for having a signed lease, or like, hey we’ve got a deal, but it’s just a template to go to lease.” Woodruff did her best to set things right by penning a two page letter to the building owner apologizing for any unintentional offense they may have caused, but this just seemed to be the nail in the coffin. All of the time, hard work and money spent was down the drain. They were left with a ton of merchandise arriving soon with no place to go, and the big holiday shopping season fast approaching. “They were devastated, and I’m riding this emotional roller coaster with them,” Aldridge says, “It’s my job.” “The space was really the bane of our existence,” Wilkinson remembers. The partners were forced to go back to the drawing

board and seek out a suitable location. “The real estate professional in me says picking the right location is the most important,” Towers says, having been a commercial real estate broker before and after starting Second Gear. “And right doesn’t always mean the most expensive or the one with the most traffic. On the flip side, some people will pick the cheapest location, and it can backfire; you get what you pay for. It’s finding that right thing that’s affordable for your business, and that can be hard to predict for a start up company.” Towers speaks from personal experience. His first store location was too small and they quickly outgrew it. They were limited in how much they could sell because they didn’t have room for more merchandise, especially clothing which takes up lots of space and which they had not realized would be such a big seller. But where one can set up shop depends on availability. “It’s kind of hard to find good space right now, there’s not that much available downtown.” Aldridge says. So he went back to the Windsor Hotel hoping to convince them Duncan & York would be a good bet. Meanwhile, the two partners were completely sideswiped. “We had to take a step back and not take it personally,” Wilkinson says, adding, “We were all baffled.” But it also gave them a chance to rethink everything. The Tuesday after Labor Day they happened upon an unassuming little space on Rankin currently occupied as an office. It sat across from the Rankin Avenue parking garage and next to the backdoor of Tops. There was something special about it even though it had far less exposure than the locations they had been considering. Wilkinson recalls seeing the place, “It’s kind of tucked away and we had been looking at main thoroughfares in Asheville. But we started thinking more and more about it. Yes, we want tourism, why wouldn’t we? We want to be smart business people.

Aldridge notes, “To be successful you’ve got to appeal to the locals in such a way that you become so popular that when the tourists hear about it they come there. The tourist industry then becomes cream on the top.” But we want to service the locals; those are the people that are going to help spread the word and come back time and time again, so we want to be convenient to them. The parking garage started looking better and better.” But suddenly their luck had changed; Aldridge finally managed to convince the Windsor Hotel owners to lease to Duncan February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 77

& York. A national retailer would be occupying the corner space, and that helped sell a well-designed mom and pop to round things out. Now they were in the driver’s seat. They could be in the exact place they had desired from the start. But now the women were more cautious, and far savvier. “They started thinking who their customer base was and who they’re going after, and they’re not just going after the tourists,” Aldridge notes, “To be successful you’ve got to appeal to the locals in such a way that you become so popular that when the tourists hear about it, they come there. The tourist industry then becomes cream on the top.” Aldridge points to The Admiral restaurant as a perfect example. Despite its West Asheville location, it quickly became a favorite destination for locals. The tourists started hearing about this unassuming place with amazing food, and now it’s practically impossible to get a reservation there. The major benefits to 34 Rankin were that the rent was almost half of the Windsor space, and they did not need to do construction. Aldridge confirms, “The Windsor needed construction, it was a warm shell. You’ve got to think in your head as a business person, is it worth that much more, are you going to be able to do $2000 a month more in revenue in that space? And I guess they thought, no.”

Time to fly Wilkinson admits even after everything they went through, “We felt led here.” They credit property manager Nathan Best of Rankin Press Lofts for rolling out the red carpet for them. “There were no attorney fees and no jargon; the lease was four pages, not 20. And the place was turnkey,” Wilkinson says. “That’s the difference between the right thing and the wrong thing.” Rankin Press Lofts are happy to have them there. Best says,

| February 2014

“Duncan & York really completes the retail part of the project on Rankin.” According to Best, a new hair salon will soon be setting up shop on the other side of the residential loft entrance, which is adjacent to Duncan & York. This could mean even more foot traffic on Rankin. Woodruff will never forget the week they got the keys to their new storefront, “We got the keys to the store, and I found out I was pregnant all in the same week.” She admits her former teaching career was less conducive to starting a family, “I would have to take a leave, and then I would have to give my baby to someone to watch everyday while I went to work, and here I have the luxury of bringing the baby in for a couple hours, so I’m really happy about that.” Even before Rankin was decided upon, they hired a new designer to recreate their logo. They felt the current logo fit the old space, but now they were starting fresh. They went for former Asheville resident Catherine Ray, “I think their prior engagement with another designer helped them refine their vision. They secured the beautiful space on Rankin Avenue shortly after we began working together, so there was a lot of momentum and excitement about moving forward and getting our hands dirty.” Ray set about understanding what the business was all about so she could accurately represent it. “The premise of Duncan & York is an elevated general store, a modern market, and I immediately loved their vision of a well-curated, thoughtful assemblage of quality goods and American-made treasures.” Ray researched the classic general store, shapes of antiques and heirlooms, textures, colors, and typography of old American storefronts and ephemera to craft their brand. “The design of their logo nods to the classic handmade quilt: a thoughtfully-crafted piece that is functional and beautiful. I aimed to design something that felt both nostalgic and new, timeless yet modern.” Wilkinson notes proudly that the design incorporates a heritage symbol.

“A logo is the first impression and should accurately reflect the values and spirit of the company it represents.” Ray says. “It has to pack a punch in a simple, durable package. It is much more than a graphic. It should be conceptual, strategic, and unique.” Visiting Duncan & York is like hanging out at a friend’s place—a friend with exceptional and often whimsical taste, who is willing to sell you pretty much anything she owns. From the exposed brick walls and ductwork, to the hardwood floors and picture window, it’s welcoming and homey. Huge wooden cabinets are employed for displays, while comfy sofas and chairs invite guests to stay a while. Every nook and cranny holds some new find to discover. It is so perfect that it’s hard to believe there was ever another place to consider. Towers says they may need to do more advertising to pull in the customers, “I think downtown is the right spot, but I’m concerned about that location for them. Unless you’re parking in that deck, or going in the backdoor of Tops, there’s not a big reason to be walking on Rankin. They’re also going for people who live in the downtown area who can pop in and pick up something, but that market’s not all that deep. There aren’t thousands of people living in downtown Asheville.” But Wilkinson observes that Sweet Peas Hostel is nearby, and several Airbnb vacation rentals. People can stop in for sundry items and one of their signature Hostess Giftbaskets. Wilkinson has even thought about carrying growlers (refi llable glass bottles) and having a beer tap. But she curtails that with, “It’s not what ‘I’ want to expand on. A customer asked about face wash; we should have it.” Aldridge predicts, “I think those girls are going to get that nice little niche in North Asheville, the moms, with their gifts. And the gift basket industry is getting real big now. I think they’ll do a good business, plus they’re right by the parking garage. They need to play that up.” “I’m excited about meeting the people who walk through the door and learning who our customer is,” Wilkinson says. “Everything is constantly changing and evolving and that’s how I want to be as a person.” Woodruff agrees, “I’m really excited about the store and finding new products and helping people get gifts that are special, that’s our main thing. We want it to be more than something where someone is like, oh, thanks… and just throws it in their closet. I’m so lucky and feel so blessed that everything worked out the way it did.” But her former instructor cautions, “As a small business owner it’s easy to be overly optimistic about how well your business will do on the financial side, and it takes a lot longer. I was overly optimistic in this location,” Towers says of his Second Gear store at 15 Walnut. But he admits, the attitude comes with the territory, “If you didn’t have a positive outlook, you wouldn’t start a business anyway.” So far so good. Duncan & York opened their doors on November 22nd and soon after started selling out of merchandise. “We worked so hard to get it open, we get all these products in, and it’s not a complaint, it’s wonderful, but we’ve been selling out, so it’s almost like starting over again,” Woodruff observes. The book, “Gluten Is My Bitch: Rants, Recipes and Ridiculousness for the Gluten-free” by April Peveteaux, sold out in five days. They have only one Handbag Butler left, a purse that also charges your cell phone. “We’ve got to reorder and re-label everything,” Woodruff says, “It’s like you can’t get too comfortable. We had our store ready and now half of our stuff is gone. It’s constantly keeping up. I didn’t really think about that so much.” A recent ‘Holiday Drop In’ party advertised only on Facebook brought forty people into Duncan & York to shop and browse while sipping wine and munching on holiday treats. Wilkinson says, “It was our best day yet.”

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 79

by CAMILLE STIMACH

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Money & Currency?

camille is Founder and Executive Director of Dollars and Common Sense.

Salt, elephant hair, tobacco, owl coins, cattle, and the list goes on. You are probably wondering what all these items have in common. They were all forms of currency used throughout history and throughout the world. What is currency though? Is it money? The answer is â&#x20AC;&#x153;no.â&#x20AC;? Money and currency are not the same thing. Money has no real value whatsoever. We only believe it has value because someone said it has value. Currency on the other hand is whatever we say it is. The accepted form of currency around the world today just happens to be money. 80

| February 2014

will admit it is not ordinary behavior for your average citizen to sit around contemplating money and currency. Rarely do I think to myself, “What is currency and how does it affect me?” What most people DO sit around and think about is, “Why are things so expensive? I wish I had more money. I wish I could get my head above water; I wish I could save more.” I believe in order to answer these questions, that keep people up at night, it is important to understand how money works and be able to understand the bigger picture of this financial machine we are all part of. How can I learn algebra if I don’t understand the basic fundamentals like addition, subtraction, multiplication and division? The answer is, I can’t. Understanding money doesn’t have to be hard, if you understand all the moving parts and start from the beginning. Most of us learned about barter and trade in elementary school, and the next step we learned in the financial process is that to buy and pay for things we use money. Quite a jump I would say to go from cattle and animal skins being used as currency straight to the dollar bill. There has always been wants and needs that had to be met: food, clothing, weapons, animals and much more. We know these things as commodities. Barter and trade was effective as long as you had something the other person wanted, and they had what you wanted. This became more and more difficult as trade flourished around the world. Can you imagine all of us lugging around TV’s and Xbox’s as forms of currency? Buyers and sellers had to agree upon a system of payment for goods and services, and this is where money became an accepted form of currency. What happened in between though? As far back as 2500bc metals, such as gold, silver and copper, were used as the most popular form of currency. The actual minting of metal coins began as early as 700 bc. What made this form of currency so popular is the fact that it was easy to transport, and the coins were durable unlike currency that could rot or die on the way to market. Metal coins became so widely used that all currencies around the world were measured against metals like gold and silver. Just as coins were being minted back in 2500bc, the idea of paper money was already being developed by the Babylonians. Although the developmental process of the banknote started in the 7th century, the actual paper money was not introduced until the 11th century by the Song Dynasty of China. In 1661, the first European bank notes were printed by the Bank of Sweden. The popularity and success of bank notes spread through Europe and these paper notes were issued by multiple European governments. America, up until shortly after the end of the Revolutionary war, was still using the currency of England, Spain and France. However, before the U.S. actually became the United States of America, the Massachusetts Bay Colony issued the first form of paper money in all the colonies which would later form the United States of America. What led up to the U.S. dollar is actually quite interesting. I myself had quite the history lesson in researching how the U.S. dollar came about. The use of bank notes was practiced throughout the 19th century in the United States. At one time in our

Can you imagine all of us lugging around TV’s and Xbox’s as forms of currency?

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com

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country there were actually 5,000 different types of bank notes issued by various banks in America. It was only the largest banks, considered creditworthy, where these notes were actually accepted. What made these bank notes different from the money we use today in this country is that the bank notes used then could be exchanged for gold or silver. With the mass production of bank notes, there was not enough gold and silver on deposit so that the people became nervous and would start taking their bank notes out of the banking institutions where they held their notes, and this would cause a bank bankruptcy. In 1863, the United States of America created the National Banking Act which established a uniform currency for our country. Up until 1963 our U.S. bills were referred to as silver certificates. Even still, all the money being printed here in America and in other parts of the world was to be backed by gold. What I found most fascinating though is that currency was one of the major causes of the market crash of 1929 taking this country into the Great Depression. Investors realized allwww.ashevillecottonco.com the dollars in circulation couldn’t possibly be backed by gold, which caused masses of people to sell off their stock, and hence the market crashed. In fact, in 1932-33 Roosevelt signed an executive order to confiscate all gold privately owned by Americans to cover the shortage in the U.S. Treasury. The Treasury realized that too many gold backed American dollars had gone overseas, and if other countries decided to cash them in for gold, the Treasury would not be able to honor that debt. So in 1971, President Nixon told the world that the U.S. dollar would no longer be backed by gold. The currency of our country today is the USD (U.S. dollar), England has the GBP (Great Britain Pound) and of course there is the Euro which is the currency used by 18 countries of the European Union, not to mention the many other currencies that exist around the world. Every day in this country we use dollar bills and coins, but it is money that is created by and authorized by our government. We call today’s currency, FIAT currency. FIAT meaning, “Faith In and Trust” of the U.S. government. This is also true for other foreign governments of the world. Our money today is worth something because we are told it is, and people accept it as forms of payment for goods and services. Some might ask though how do we know our money will always have value? That, my friends, is where economics comes into play and that is an entirely different article.

Our money today is worth something because we are told it is, and people accept it as forms of payment for goods and services.

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UPDATES FOR

NATIONAL WORLD [

& news briefs

T-Mobile to buy spectrum licenses from Verizon nationwide

T-Mobile has reached deals to purchase spectrum licenses from Verizon Wireless for $2.37 billion in cash, permitting it to improve certain kinds of cellular service in markets across the nation. In addition, the agreements include the transfer of other kinds of spectrum licenses from T-Mobile to Verizon Wireless that the companies value at about $950 million. The deals, combined with T-Mobile’s current holdings, will give T-Mobile lowband spectrum in nine of the top ten U.S. markets. Low-band spectrum enhances cellular coverage inside buildings and in rural areas. It is also able to travel greater distances than high-band spectrum, making it a more efficient way to provide

]

coverage at the edge of cities and in less densely populated areas. Combined with T-Mobile’s existing holdings, the low-band spectrum will cover nearly 158 million people in U.S. markets including New York, Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Washington, D.C., and Detroit. Germany’s Deutsche Telekom AG owns T-Mobile USA, the No. 4 U.S. carrier. It said it intends to roll out service and compatible phones as early as the fourth quarter of 2014.

$1.1 billion, this year. Nakheel said that strong real estate growth and improved economic conditions in Dubai boosted its finances. The company says it plans to pay another three billion dirhams, or nearly $817 million, in 2015 when the original first installment of 6.8 billion dirham was due. The company owes $2.15 billion in bank debt and vows to repay trade creditors $1.23 billion in Islamic bonds that mature in 2016. Nakheel’s credit problems were a primary trigger of Dubai’s 2009 financial crisis, which provoked multibillion-dollar bailouts by the Abu Dhabi-based federal government.

Internet-connected toothbrush makes CES debut worldwide

Dubai developer Nakheel to pay debt in 2014 dubai

The indebted builder of Dubai’s islands says it intends to make early debt repayments of four billion dirhams, or

The makers of what is known as the world’s first Internet-connected toothbrush are encouraging us to brush smarter. A device from French-based startup Kolibree, recently unveiled at a preview event for the Consumer Electronics Show, strives “to reinvent oral care,” according to co-founder Loic Cessot. “The idea is not to brush stronger,

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but smarter,” Cessot explained. The Kolibree toothbrush includes a sensor that detects how much tartar is being removed during a brushing session. It also records brushing activity so users can have a consistent cleaning each time. According to Cessot, the device sends the information wirelessly to a smartphone app, an especially useful factor for parents who want to monitor the teeth cleaning efforts of small children. “When you use a normal toothbrush, you never really know what you’ve cleaned. It might be 30 percent. The only person who really knows is the dentist.”

Remotely Park your car with Smartphone worldwide

In 2015, Bosch will debut its Automatic Parking Assistant that will allow vehicles to automatically pull into a tight parking spot with or without the driver at the wheel. When outside of the vehicle, the system can be activated by a driver using either a button on his or her fob, or through a connected app on their Smartphone. The Automatic Parking Assistant works in the other direction, too. Therefore, the vehicle can be remotely started and will

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automatically pull out of the spot. The process can also quickly be cancelled at any time if things start to go awry.

Houston-to-Dallas high-speed rail study progresses teXas

The proposal to link Dallas to Houston with a high-speed rail line that would take 90 minutes has been discussed for years, but could make some progress in 2014. U.S. Secretary of Transportation Anthony Foxx made some progress in the project’s path by announcing a three-way partnership that includes public and private dollars. Fox recently said: “Today, I’m proud to say that the Federal Railroad Administration, TxDOT (Texas Department of Transportation) and the Texas Central Railway have come to an agreement to prepare two environmental studies that will lay the groundwork for high-speed rail between Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston…Of course, there’s much more work to be done before the tracks can be bolted down. But we’re thrilled to see that our grant money is being leveraged by private funding. And it’s my hope that,

national & world

through the cooperation of pubic and private sectors, we can one day link Texas’ major cities with state-of-the-art passenger rail.” According to transportation experts, Texas is the best potential market for high-speed rail due to its flat geography and the ability to connect two major metropolitan areas. The estimated $10 billion project is proposed by Texas Central Railway, a Dallas-based company. Its parent company is U.S.-Japan High Speed Rail based in Washington D.C. The primary investor is Central Japan Railway Co., which owns the high-speed rail system in Japan.

GM to outfit Chevy vehicles with 4G nationwide

GM plans to start outfitting most Chevrolet vehicles with 4G cellular capabilities in partnership with AT&T. The technology will allow drivers to make phone calls and permit passengers to surf the Web without using up the voice and data limits on their phone plans. General Motors Co. said that the 2015 model year Chevrolet Corvette, Impala, Malibu and Volt will be the fi rst to come equipped with the capabilities this year, followed

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by the Equinox, Silverado, Silverado HD, Spark and Spark EV. While the hardware will be standard, pricing plans have not yet been announced. The cellular capability will be integrated with GM’s OnStar roadside assistance service.

Boeing sets record and ends speculation nationwide

The Boeing Co. recently revealed its 2013 numbers. Last year, it delivered 648 commercial aircraft, which is its most ever in one year. It also recorded 1,355 net commercial orders in 2013, the second-largest tally in company history. The number of unfi lled orders at the end of the year, totaling 5,080, was also reportedly a company record. Last year’s 648 deliveries were an increase from 2012’s

601 deliveries. Total defense deliveries for 2013 were 171, up from 154 the year before. Boeing has also officially secured its location in Washington state’s Puget Sound region to build the latest upgrade of its biggest twin-engine yet. Conjecture as to where it might move manufacturing operations for its new 777x aircraft was put to an end after its largest union accepted a contract extension through 2024. The machinist’s union voted for a deal that freezes pensions in place but guarantees jobs for the next decade. Various sites in North Carolina participated in proposal submissions for the operation, which was expected to bring a $10 billion investment and 8,500 jobs to the chosen location. There was also speculation that Boeing might choose North Charleston, S.C., currently home to a major manufacturing operation for the aerospace giant, for the 777X plant.

New venture will hear your Internet gripes buffalo, new york

GripeO, an Internet- and mobilebased complaint service and Z80 Labs Inc. tenant, is nearing its launch. The Buffalo-based company’s website and mobile application are scheduled to be fully activated in February. A launch event is potentially scheduled for Buffalo in March, with intentions to roll out in New York City and the northeast before seeking broad national traction. According to Mike Klanac, the company’s CEO, fundraising has been somewhat modest so far, including a $25,000 round mostly from friends and family. However, the company’s model could hit the ceiling if it gathers interest from just a few major businesses. It also has access to Z80’s pot of Innovate NY Fund money, which will

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require matching funds from elsewhere. The concept of GripeO involves gathering consumer complaints through its website, www.gripeo.com, or iOS7 mobile app, and promoting them on various popular social media sites. The “gripes” can include a picture and a caption, and will serve a variety of functions. There will be a method to publicize complaints, but they are also intended to be usable information for companies, which can resolve immediate consumer issues as well as analyze the data. If companies ignore the complaints, competitors can purchase the data and target users with communications to attract them. GripeO recently accomplished several beta tests, including a consumer beta involving 250 people and a business beta with four companies. According to Klanac, the company learned valuable lessons about its concept, user interface and core business model.

Lumiata, a new 12-person startup that aims to use Google- and Facebook-like algorithms to turn health data into personalized treatment recommendations, has raised $4 million from Khosla Ventures. Its goal is to discover pieces of relevant information to inform patient care decisions in oceans of health care data. The company, launched in 2013, said its software is being tested at various major hospitals and insurance companies. The Series A funding will be used to refine and market what it calls the health industry’s “first medical graph-based predictive analytics engine.” In other words, that means the software combs massive amounts of data to help doctors and other caregivers ask the right

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capital adventurist

THE

Asheville Marathon AT BILTMORE ESTATE WRIT TEN BY ERIC CRE WS

with breathtaking views , meticulously preserved forests , and activities for everyone among the 8,000 acres of property surrounding the biltmore estate , it ’ s clear that “america’ s largest backyard ” is an outdoor enthusiast ’ s paradise . 88

| February 2014

n addition to offering fly fishing excursions, guided hiking and biking tours and a wide range of other activities, Biltmore is quickly gaining a reputation for being a near-perfect destination for runners looking to head out on the seemingly endless number of trails and carriage roads found on the property. That reputation was solidified all the more last year when Biltmore played host to the inaugural Asheville Marathon, an event that was hailed as being widely successful, even though temperatures hovered near 20 degrees throughout the blustery March day that brought additional hardships to the runners in the form of a frigid wind. Despite the bitter conditions, the event drew high praise from participants and this year’s event, scheduled for March 16, is on pace to again sell out well ahead of race day. This year, race organizer Daphne Kirkwood hopes the weather will provide more favorable conditions that can shine a light on just how great a destination the Biltmore Estate is for a marathon. how it all b egan

Meeting her today, it would be easy to assume that Kirkwood has always had an affi nity for racing and running, but that isn’t the case.

Kirkwood started running around 10 years ago and chose a 5K for her first official event. While she completed the event, she didn’t meet all of her goals so she kept training and soon found her stride. At the next event, another 5K, Kirkwood picked up an award in her age group. “After that I just got hooked on running,” she said. Over the course of the next few years, Kirkwood recalls becoming enamored with not only the sport of running, but the lifestyle and culture that surrounded it. “I just totally immersed myself in the whole running world,” she said. “I loved the whole race scene, so I started going to a lot of races and it seemed like at the events I went to there were times when I had ideas of things that would make the races better, more fun or more organized.” It was then that a light bulb went off and Kirkwood realized she had a true interest in hosting her own events. But the events she envisioned would be slightly different than the events she’d attended, she recalled. She wanted to host what she refers to as boutique style events, small races with limited availability that cater to the individual’s experience as opposed to hosting as many people as possible. With 20 years of destination-centered hospitality experience, Kirkwood said she realized the importance of client-centered event productions, focusing on the details, and making an event an enjoyable and memorable experience. She kept the overall February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 89

capital adventurist

experience as a focus when she was asked by Open Doors of Asheville to design and direct an off-road duathlon that consisted of a 2.5-mile run through grassy fields and forest service roads, a 12-mile off-road bike course, followed by another 2.5mile trail run. Dig the Du, the name of the duathlon, was wildly successful and since then Kirkwood hasn’t really paused to look back, but instead has consistently added more and more events to her roster at her event racing company, iDaph Events. Last year, Kirkwood and her company hosted over 10 events in Western North Carolina and they are quickly becoming known as one of the top race organizers in the region. r u n n i n g at b i lt m o r e

From the first time she ran on the Biltmore Estate, Kirkwood said she was instantly in love with the setting, the rolling terrain and the quality of trails and roads for running. Around five years ago when she was an employee of the Biltmore Estate, Kirkwood was instrumental in forming a running group for her fellow employees, “ just to have which consisted of post-work the opportunity jaunts around the property. to run on the On those runs, Kirkwood quickly came to realize just estate is almost what a special destination one of those the Biltmore is for those who moments where enjoy running long distances. you feel like “Biltmore is just such an you just need amazing destination for to be pinched ” runners and for the general public to visit,” she said. “Just to have the opportunity to run on the estate at such a historic location is almost one of those moments where you feel like you just need to be pinched.” “Sometimes you just think, ‘Wow, I’m running at Biltmore Estate,’” she said. “There are 8,000 acres there and it is just such a beautiful, pristine location.” During her after-work runs, Kirkwood recalls the excitement of not knowing what great views she might encounter around the next bend or beyond the next hill. It was during those runs that she realized that the Biltmore would be a great destination for a marathon. But first, she needed a plan.

p itc h i n g th e e v e nt

daphne kirkwood

| February 2014

As the race director for the Biltmore Kiwanis 15K and 5K event, a popular event that is now going into its 17th year, Kirkwood got her foot in the door and learned the ins and outs of hosting an event at the Biltmore. It was following the Biltmore Kiwanis event a few years ago that Kirkwood first raised the possibility

2014 Brings Half Marathon Option In addition to the traditional marathon experience, this year Kirkwood opted to add a half marathon option for those who are still interested in exploring the Biltmore during an ofﬁcial race but don’t quite feel up for running the full 26.2 miles.

photo by C. L. Kunst

“We added the half for several reasons this year,” Kirkwood said. “One was really to make the marathon a true destination event so that friends, family members and loved ones could also come along to race even if they aren’t ready to take on a full marathon. A marathon is a life changing experience and to be able to have a companion with you to even experience half the race is such a win-win for a marathon runner. Also, the half marathon is such a sweet distance that it is easier to train for with runners’ busy lives.” Half marathon runners experience the ﬁrst 10 miles running along the same course with the full marathoners, enjoying all the European Gardens, the exquisite views of the Biltmore House, and the manicured grounds. When the full marathoners break for the primitive west side, half marathoners will complete their last three miles along the rustic banks of the French Broad River.

February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 91

capital adventurist

of hosting a marathon at the estate. when you look out over the field and the river. It’s just a really Over the following weeks and months, Kirkwood went to special view.” A view made all the more special because they’ve earned it. work designing what a marathon would look like hosted at the Kirkwood said she hopes participants will take the time to enjoy Biltmore. A few years later, that work paid off when the startsome of the views along the way, ing gun fired on the inaugural even though they may be racing Asheville Marathon. the clock. “I recall just catching my breath “ i don ’ t care if it is a flat “We encourage people to bring and feeling really shocked that it race , 26 miles is still 26 miles their cameras or their phones to was actually coming to fruition,” take pictures along the way and she said. “It’s just one of those and it is a long way, so really just enjoy it and soak it all things that is a total dream, and anybody who gets to that in,” she said. “I know people are for that to come to reality is pretty finish line is definitely a there to break records and qualify amazing.” champion in my opinion ” for Boston and win prize money, “For me it was just such an but the more I think you can go amazing and rewarding experiout there and enjoy the environence; to watch it all unfold and ment that you’re in at Biltmore, to see all of the vision that I had the better your experience is come together on race day,” she going to be.” said. “It was pretty amazing.” Kirkwood hopes participants in the 2014 Asheville Marathon at a m a r at h o n i s b o r n Biltmore Estate come away with The race begins in the wide, lasting memories of running in a open valley near the Swannanoa special place, that everyone runs River near the entrance of the well and they leave feeling a sense estate. From there, runners wind of accomplishment. their way along the eight miles “I want to see everyone be able of the main road leading to the to fi nish and be proud of themEstate. selves,” she said. “But 26.2 miles “It really feels special and almost is not easy no matter what course magical to be able to run on those it is. I don’t care if it is a flat race, roads that you typically can’t run 26 miles is still 26 miles and it is on and then running right in front a long way, so anybody who gets of the large double doors of the to that fi nish line is defi nitely a Biltmore Estate, which is just champion in my opinion.” absolutely awe-inspiring,” she For more information on the said. Asheville Marathon, visit asheThe vistas and memorable villemarathon.com. For more views don’t stop once runners information on other events reach the Biltmore House, they produced by K irkwood, visit continue as the runners take a idaph.net. short trip around the gardens

before heading down toward the French Broad River where different views of the house await. From there, runners make their way across a newly-constructed bridge to the property’s west side where miles of additional trails and roads await what Kirkwood believes are among the most scenic of all the trails found at Biltmore. As they make their way up gradual carriage roads they pass old barns, flocks of sheep and finally reach the vineyard. “It’s really very scenic,” Kirkwood said of the area. “There is a great view of the Biltmore House perched up on the ridge 92

| February 2014

Eric Crews is a writer and photographer who writes about outdoor adventure sports in the mountains of North Carolina. Follow his adventures online at: www.landofskyadventures.com

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events

Feb JANUARY 31-FEBRUARY 2

The Omni Grove Park Celtic Weekend THE OMNI GROVE PARK INN , 290 MACON AVE, ASHEVILLE, NC Passion, artistry and skill collide during this weekend for those who love all things Celtic. You can join the celebration of the Scottish-Irish heritage of Western North Carolina with the finest in music. In addition to the feature concerts with Seven Nations and Gaelic Storm, other weekend activities include Scottish Border Collie sheepdog trial demonstrations, Celtic vendors, a cooking demonstration, chair massages, guided history tours, and live Celtic music throughout the Inn. A two-night minimum stay is required.

ADMISSION: RATES STARTING AT $498 FEBRUARY 2

Groundhog Day at the Nature Center 2PM | WNC NATURE CENTER See a whimsical presentation about groundhogs and explore the folklore of this native rodent species with stories and song. Nibbles, a 9-year-old female “whistlepig” who has charmed the public on several occasions, will grace the audience with her spring-time prediction.

ADMISSION: ADULTS $8 | SENIORS $7 YOUTH (AGES 3 -15) $4 AND YOUNGER ARE FREE 828 -259 - 8080 FEBRUARY 3

Haen Gallery Concert 6:30 MEET THE ARTISTS | 7:15 CONCERT 52 BILTMORE AVE, DOWNTOWN ASHEVILLE Enjoy listening to music of Maurice Ravel, Joseph Hadyn and Hilary Tann. Jamie Laval will play the violin, Franklin Keel will be on cello, and Kate Steinbeck will play the flute.

ADMISSION: $22 ADVANCE | $24 AT THE DOOR $8 FOR STUDENTS AVAILABLE WWW. PAN - HARMONIA .ORG JANUARY 21-FEBRUARY 4

Welcome Table at Table TABLE, 48 COLLEGE ST, ASHEVILLE, NC Dine out and donate to a worthy cause. Local Asheville restaurants and chefs are teaming up with the Downtown Welcome Table, a program of the Haywood Street Congregation, to serve

| February 2014

a fabulous, free hot meal once a month to about 300-400 guests. Nearly 75% of these guests are homeless or living in poverty. The local restaurants furnish all the food, preparing restaurant quality food. The restaurants responsible for each month’s meal are placing envelopes on their tables about a month before their turn to serve, asking for donations to help defray the cost of food. Money collected over and above the cost of food is donated to the Welcome Table.

FEBRUARY 7-MARCH 2

Cabaret at Asheville Community Theatre FRIDAYS & SATURDAYS 7:30 PM | SUNDAYS 2:30 PM 35 EAST WALNUT ST, ASHEVILLE, NC The scene is the Kit Kat Club, a night club in Berlin, as the 1920’s are drawing to a close and the Nazis are beginning their rise to power in Germany. Cliff, a young American writer, visits the sleazy Kit Kat Club and meets an English singer, Sally Bowles. Cliff and Sally fall in love, but when the political climate changes, they are forced to make choices that will forever impact their lives.

ADMISSION: $25 FOR ADULTS $22 FOR SENIORS OR STUDENTS $15 FOR CHILDREN 17 AND UNDER 828 -254 -1320 FEBRUARY 8

Sutton, Holt & Coleman 8 PM DIANA WORTHAM THEATRE AT PACK PLACE, 2 SOUTH PACK SQUARE, ASHEVILLE, NC Grammy Award winners Bryan Sutton, David Holt and T. Michael Coleman masterfully plumb the depths of North Carolina’s rich musical culture with a variety of traditional instruments, threepart harmonies and a mixture of traditional and original songs.

ADMISSION: REGULAR $35 | STUDENT $30 CHILDREN 12 AND UNDER $15 STUDENT RUSH DAY- OF-SHOW ( WITH I . D.) $10 828 -257- 4530 | WWW. DWTHEATRE.COM FEBRUARY 13 & 14

Frogz

8 PM DIANA WORTHAM THEATRE AT PACK PLACE, 2 SOUTH PACK SQUARE, ASHEVILLE, NC Imago Theatre explodes performance boundaries in FROGZ as comedic amphibians, acrobatic larvae, circus boulders,

and metamorphosing humans take the stage in works which tantalize your senses and intellect.

ADMISSION: REGULAR $35 | STUDENT $30 CHILDREN 12 AND UNDER $15 STUDENT RUSH DAY- OF-SHOW ( WITH I . D.) $10 828 -257- 4530 | WWW. DWTHEATRE.COM

MARCH 21-23 @ the U.S. Cellular Center Downtown, Asheville

FEBRUARY 15

Dual View: An Evening of Jazz Piano Originals and Favorites 7:30 PM DIANA WORTHAM THEATRE AT PACK PLACE, 2 SOUTH PACK SQUARE, ASHEVILLE, NC This event is presented by the Jazz in The Forum Concert Series, featuring Pavel Wlosok.

ADMISSION: ADULTS $20 ADVANCE | $25 DAY- OF STUDENTS & CHILDREN 12 AND UNDER $15 828 -257- 4530 | WWW. DWTHEATRE.COM FEBRUARY 14

19th Annual Bluegrass First Class Festival

CROWNE PLAZA TENNIS AND GOLF RESORT, ONE RESORT DR , ASHEVILLE, NC

The festival has some of the best bluegrass acts in the country rocking out all over the hotel, all weekend. Friday will feature different sounds of Bluegrass Music, including harmonies of seven-time “Female Vocalist of the Year” Rhonda Vincent & The Rage, five-time “IBMA Male Vocalist of the Year” Russell Moore & IIIrd Tyme Out, North Carolina’s own Lou Reid & Carolina, Newton & Thomas, the old duet sounds from the ‘30s and ‘40s with the Crazy Water Crystals, just to name a few. Saturday’s entertainment will include top national bands. Dailey & Vincent will perform, share memories of the early days with Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, featuring band members during his seven-consecutive years as “IBMA Vocal Group of the Year.” He will also perform with members of his original band. Seldom Scene will be on-hand, along with the Rambling Rooks, a group that includes Ronnie Bowman, a long-time Bluegrass First Class Favorite.

➡Over 200 Exhibitors ➡Vehicle Test Drives ➡Green Living Seminars ➡Home Remodeling Demonstrations ➡Antique Appraiser

Admission $7 / Seniors $6 Save $1.00 on admission w/ canned food donation for Manna Food Bank

Friday: 3pm - 9pm Saturday: 10am - 7pm Sunday: 11am - 5pm www.homegardenandgreenlivingshow.com follow us on Facebook 828.255.2526

ADMISSION: FRIDAY OR SATURDAY $49 | 2 DAYS $98 SUNDAY MORNING “GOSPEL SHOW ” IS FREE 828 -254 -3211

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Bill Fishburne Broker-Associate Beverly-Hanks & Assoc. 400 Beverly-Hanks Ctr. Hendersonville, NC 828-777-0096

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events

FEBRUARY 18

Deanna Witowski Concert Benefit 7PM RESIDENCE OF DORIS & RALPH LOOMIS , BILTMORE FOREST, NC UNC Asheville presents Deanna Witowski, Internationally Noted Pianist, in a home concert and reception to benefit the UNC Asheville Music Department Performance. Deanna Witkowski, winner of the Great American Jazz Piano Competition, will perform a concert in Biltmore Forest to benefit the UNC Asheville Music Department’s scholarship program. Witkowski’s playing is not limited to one style; she moves with ease from Brazilian to Afro-pop to jazz to classical. Her dynamic playing will appeal to all music lovers and the intimate setting of a home will make for a very special evening. To find more information about Witowski, visit www.deannawitkowski.com. There will be a reception after the program to meet the artist and others from the UNC Asheville music department.

ADMISSON: TICKETS $40 | PATRON TICKETS $50 SALLIE BROACH 232-2407 | SBROACH1@ UNCA . EDU FEBRUARY 23

Dreams Of 8: Igor Stravisnky’s Octet & More 4 PM GROCE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH ON 945 TUNNEL ROAD, ASHEVILLE, NC Igor Stravinsky wrote, “The Octet began with a dream…I awoke from this little concert in a state of great delight and anticipation and the next morning began to compose.” Some say the Octet was destined to influence composers all over the world. Included in the event are Kate Steinbeck on the flute, Fred Lemmons on the clarinet, Rosalind Buda and Susan Cohen on the bassoon, Brad Ulrich and David Ginn on the trumpet, and Mark Britt and Greg Love on the trombone.

ADMISSION: $15 ADVANCE | $20 AT THE DOOR | $5 FOR STUDENTS 828 -254 -7123 | WWW. PAN - HARMONIA .ORG FEBRUARY 23

The Asheville Chamber Music Series Presents The Ciompi String Quartet 4 PM THE UNITARIAN UNIVERSALIST CONGREGATION AT THE CORNER OF EDWIN PLACE AND CHARLOTTE ST “Ciompi Quartet performances reveal the maturity of interpretation from an ensemble which has been together for two decades,” says ACMS President, Polly Feitzinger. The program will feature: Haydn’s String Quartet No. 1 in G major, op. 76; Shostakovich’s String Quartet No. 12 in D-flat major, op. 133; and Brahms’ String Quartet No. 3 in B-flat major, op. 67.

ADMISSION: $35 WWW. ASHEVILLECHAMBERMUSIC .ORG

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FEBRUARY 27

Baroque Vibes 7:30 PM WHITE HORSE BLACK MOUNTAIN , 105 MONTREAT RD, BLACK MOUNTAIN , NC In a spellbinding program transcending the boundaries of the traditional Baroque setting, Baroque Vibes ranges from Elizabethan-era tunes, ravishing works by Baroque masters Johann Sebastian Bach and Georg Philipp Telemann, vintage gems from 20th century songwriters and tangos. Performances include Barbara Weiss on the harpsichord, Kate Steinbeck on the flute, Rosalind Buda on the bassoon and Scottish small pipes, and Byron Hedgepeth on the vibes and percussion.

ADMISSION: $15 ADVANCE | $20 AT THE DOOR | $5 FOR STUDENTS WWW. PAN - HARMONIA .ORG

Your source for Hearth and Patio needs

MARCH 4

“Dine to be Kind” Fund-raiser to Benefit Asheville Humane Society ALL DAY PARTICIPATING ASHEVILLE AREA RESTAURANTS Asheville Humane Society and its Animal Compassion Network Department is gearing up for the 11th Annual Dine to be Kind fundraiser. Families, friends and co-workers will have the opportunity to dine out for breakfast, lunch and dinner at nearly 50 area restaurants on this life-saving day. Dine to Be Kind participating restaurants are donating 15% of all-day food and beverage sales, including take-out orders. This popular dining-out event will help increase awareness of the organization’s lifesaving programs that serve the animals of Buncombe County and all monies raised will help shelter and care for local homeless animals in desperate need.

828 - 606 - 8428 MJORDAN @ ASHEVILLEHUMANE.ORG | WWW. ASHEVILLEHUMANE.ORG JANUARY 27-MAY 18

Be the Dinosaur: Life in the Cretaceous NC ARBORETUM , 100 FREDERICK LAW OLMSTED WAY, ASHEVILLE, NC During this exhibit, you can travel back in time 65 million years. This groundbreaking exhibit combines video game technology and traditional components for an oversized adventure. Visitors take control of their own dinosaur and explore a fully interactive reconstruction of the most complex ancient ecosystem ever created. The exhibit also features full-size dinosaur bones and a paleontology field station. The simulation at the core of this exhibit is, the most complex simulation of dinosaurs and their world ever created. For the first time, artificially intelligent dinosaurs roam across realistic terrain. The dinosaurs have simulated muscle and digestive systems. Virtual winds circulate digital odors, and plants grow and have accurate nutritional values. In order to prepare for a trip into this exciting virtual world, visitors will need to “dig” through other exhibit components to unlock the secrets of how dinosaurs survived and thrived.

Big Green Egg World’s Best Smoker/Grill The most realistic and natural looking gas logs

828-252-2789 264 Biltmore Ave. Asheville, NC

$12 PER PERSONAL VEHICLE 828 - 665 -2492 | WWW. NCARBORETUM .ORG February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 97

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Lewis Real Estate chose a bank that has a lot to offer.

Martin Lewis, Partner, Lewis Real Estate and John York, Vice President and Commercial Banking Manager

As someone involved in commercial real estate management, brokerage and development, Martin Lewis needs a bank that’s as responsive as it is responsible. That’s why he banks with Forest Commercial. “The thing I like about Forest Commercial is its people. They’re professional and very accommodating. And because they’re local, you get answers much quicker. “If we’re doing a new project and looking at obtaining financing, we can often just outline what we’re thinking about, and they say, ‘yes, we think we can do something like that,’ and with that we’re able to move forward. Their rates are competitive and, with their attention to detail, closings are easy.” Discover how much Forest Commercial can offer your business. Talk to us today. Asheville: 828-255-5711 1127 Hendersonville Road Hendersonville: 828-233-0900 218 North Main Street ForestCommercialBank.com

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February 2014 | capitalatplay.com 99

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