A NEW BEGINNING BY RYAN PITKIN

NEWS & OPINION FEATURE other tenants. The campus will anchor what Flywheel co-founder Chris Hostetler plan to build on 6,000 square feet of adjoining space in the warehouse.

“This is hilarious; we’ll use it,” Coppedge says as he hops up the three steps, his mind swirling with ideas. “You’ve already got the stairs so I don’t have to build them. We’ll turn this trash into treasure!”

On Jan. 15, the Oso trio will close their original location at Hub 933 in Charlotte’s Belmont neighborhood and begin their move four miles north to Raleigh Street, where they will join Charlotte Art League, Aerial CLT, and Charlotte Film Society’s new three-screen artdevelopers are calling the A NEW BEGINNING Trailhead District, located just north of the Sugar Creek Road light-rail Oso Skate Park enters new territory after three years of station. It’s a big expansion for Oso, which opened setting the scene its original location in November 2017, as the BY RYAN PITKIN park will expand its indoor

Traversing the empty north-Charlotte feet to 6,000, then add warehouse that will soon be home to a number of another 12,000 square feet local arts venues, Oso Skate Park co-founders Brett of outdoor space in Phase 2. Coppedge and Phillip Gripper come to a space that The team will be a great will soon house Charlotte Art League. The remnants fit in the campus, as the of a long-abandoned church still sit in the space, Oso space has never been with three bright blue, velvet-carpeted steps solely about skating. The leading up to a stage that looks like a set piece from team has regularly hosted the HBO series The Righteous Gemstones. They’re trailed by three reps with Flywheel art shows and live music performances in their FREE SKATING BETWEEN ROUNDS AT A 2019 COMPETITION IN OSO SKATE PARK. Group, which owns the large property at 4327 933 Hub space, and looks physical activity. We also provide a space for art to Raleigh St. and is spearheading the creation of this forward to continuing to do so once it becomes safe be displayed and sold and for live music to be played north-Charlotte arts and entertainment hub. One again. for all ages and audiences. And so, in the time of the men tells Coppedge that the stage will be “Our goal was to make a positive impact in the we’ve been open we’ve been able to connect with dismantled and discarded if nobody wants it, but community using skating as our conduit to do so,” kids, we’ve been able to connect with families and Coppedge won’t hear of it. Once the carpet is stripped Gripper says of the first three years at Oso. “So with adults alike, and just spread positivity as best we can from the stage, he points out, it’s a perfect plaza- Oso, we were able to have a space where people through the walls that we have.” style stair set for a skate park, which he, Gripper and could come and have positive influence through We catch up with the Oso crew at their Belmont

space from 4,500 square house cinema, along with OSO CO-OWNERS (FROM LEFT) PHILLIP GRIPPER, BRENT COPPEDGE AND CHRIS HOSTETLER. PHOTO BY GRANT BALDWIN

PHOTO BY GRANT BALDWIN

location on a Saturday morning as they prepare for the last Community Unity Day at the space. The team has partnered with outdoor adventure company Issa Vibes Adventures to host the monthly event since October 2018, gathering dozens of volunteers to make sandwiches for local homeless services organization Roof Above.

I ask each of the ownership group their favorite memory from the location that they’ll be vacating between Jan. 15-31, and the range of responses gives a glimpse at how varied the activities within Oso have been.

Coppedge looks back fondly on a specific show in 2018 that featured Venezuelan refugee rock group Zeta, during which the guys got to skate a portion of the park while the crowd danced around them.

Hostetler reminisces on popular art events like the annual Fried Chicken Art Party, but also on a broader scale, the feeling of watching a kid finally pull off a trick or drop-in on a quarter pipe for the first time — “after busting ass all day, finally sticking it.” Gripper will remember competitions like Queen City Kings, bringing people in from all over the country and watching them push themselves to land tricks they had never done before.

“My experience, it’s been greater than what I had dreamed it could be. Just seeing the look on someone’s face when they do something for the first time like dropping in or even playing their first show,” says Gripper, who plays drums with local

garage rockers Modern Primitives. “We’ve been able to facilitate people in all these ways, so to see the feeling of enjoyment and self-con dence that they gain in themselves from being able to do these things, it’s just amazing to be a helping part of that process.”

A new home wasn’t hard to nd

As with most small businesses, the Oso team has struggled through the pandemic, closing for six months in 2020 and recently reopening to host a limited capacity of skaters. After the space was ooded in a November rain storm, the 12th such occurrence during their three-year stay according to the trio, they knew it was time to nd a new spot.

The constant ooding mixed with the upcoming increase in rent made it unfeasible for them to stay.

“We’re very thankful to be in this space,” Gripper says of 933 Hub, “because this is the rst place that actually accepted us. Everywhere else did not want a skate park because of the ri ra ; they were afraid of the crowd that we would bring. We’re very thankful to the owners of 933 Hub, but at the same time, after three years, our roof still leaks … and after being closed for six months, hearing an increase in the lease rate is kind of a slap in the face, because they know that we don’t have savings, they know that even now we’re not seeing our full amount of business, so we’re literally barely hanging on.”

The move will also bring new expenses, and the team has launched a crowdfunding campaign to help with the build-out, which can be accessed through their website at ososkatepark.com.

On Jan. 24, Oso’s 933 Hub neighbors Catawba Brewing Company will partner with Sweet Lew’s BBQ to hold a barbecue fundraiser bene ting the skate park, while also donating $1 from each pour of its new High Sea Fruit Punch Imperial Smoothie Sour, to be released on Jan. 21.

The Oso crew didn’t have to search long for their new space. In fact, they didn’t have to look at all. Fortuitously, they were contacted right about that same time by Jim Dukes, the new executive director at Charlotte Art League, the rst tenant to sign on at Flywheel’s Trailhead campus.

Dukes regularly brings his son in to Oso to ride

Join Queen City Nerve in discussions about local news topics over cocktails with featured guests on the Queen City Podcast Network.

COPPEDGE AND GRIPPER TALK TO TONY KUHN (CENTER) AND OTHER FLYWHEEL GROUP REPS IN THE NEW SPACE. PHOTO BY GRANT BALDWIN

his scooter, and he had built a relationship with the team there. He suggested they should look into potentially moving into the Trailhead building, as there was still plenty of space for them. Dukes set up a meeting with Flywheel’s leadership, including president Tony Kuhn, and the synergy was instantaneous.

According to Kuhn, one of his designers had already suggested a skate park would make a great addition to the campus, so when Oso came calling, it was serendipitous. Kuhn’s nephew had attended a week-long camp at Oso while in town for the holidays in 2019, and he had visited the spot a couple times over that week, so he was aware of the vibes and the mission there. www.queencitypodcastnetwork.com/noozehounds

“They’re just cool people, and they’re trying to do the right things, and that’s what we’re trying to do,” Kuhn says. “Our development company is really about making a place, and these guys fit right into making places and community and that type of thing. We don’t want to do the next whatever just to make money, we want to build communities and build places, and so their work and ambition and their ideas all helped to make this great place.”

The learning curve is sharp for the Flywheel team, which has never overseen the construction of a skate park before.

Before coming across the old church stage, Coppedge and Kuhn went back and forth about a number of different details ranging from air conditioning and temperature control (a luxury Oso hasn’t enjoyed in its first three years) to where the new door will be (Coppedge has created 12 layouts for the new space so far and will have to create a 13th if the door is moved even a few feet from where it currently sits).

“Flow and dimensions are all different, materials are all different, roof planes and heights are all different and all that, so yes it’s a big learning curve,” Kuhn says, “but we’re really kind of asking them to solve a lot of those issues. Like, ‘Here’s the box that you have to deal with, design the best thing you can.’ Whatever we can do to help them build a cooler space, we’re going to say yes to.”

Big plans on campus

In the coming weeks, expect more announcements about additions to the Trailhead campus, including a local brewery, deli, and a major arts institution that’s set to claim the 150-seat black-box theater.

Kuhn says the original goal wasn’t to create a hub for arts and entertainment, but it happened that way thanks to the connections that Dukes and the Charlotte Film Society team had.

“Everything’s been just kind of one foot in front of the other in building off each other, with Charlotte Art League and then just the arts community getting the word around,” Kuhn explains. “We haven’t even really marketed it for that, it just started when the Charlotte Film Society and Charlotte Art League were both doing it, then people they knew in the industry all kind of came together, and it filled up really quickly.”

For the Oso team, the first six months of 2021 will be spent building out Phase 1, the indoor portion of the park and a pro shop. Phase 2, the outdoor portion, will come sometime in 2022 or 2023, and will consist of a mix of street-style skating and concrete bowls.

With the Eastland DIY skate park at risk of being torn down, the team hopes their space can serve as a type of replacement, while continuing to cater to a spectrum of sports such as rollerblades, quads, bikes and scooters, as they always have.

“Over the last three years we’ve really asked everybody what they want, what they thought about the park. You really have to take that into consideration when you’re working on the layout. You have to appeal to all the crowds,” says Coppedge. “We hope that Eastland doesn’t get ripped down; it’s a staple of the community. Although we’re a skate park, [Eastland] needs to survive too in order for the community to grow. We want to be able to incorporate a lot of plaza-style obstacles like Eastland does, but also incorporate bowls and bigger ramps.”

Flywheel designers have greenlit an 18-foot “megamini ramp,” which is still on the drawing board for Phase 2. The new space also offers up more room for bigger concerts, bigger parties, and bigger competitions, not to mention endless collaborative opportunities with the arts organizations that will share the same roof.

In terms of community service, there’s more opportunity for the Oso crew to increase their impact around Charlotte. Hostetler has already been in talks with multiple local schools about launching an after-school program at Oso, as well as an incentive-based “learn-to-earn” program that awards participating students for reaching educational and behavioral goals.

As with so much in the world, the new plans will all depend on how the world looks when they’re set to open Phase 1, which they hope to do in June or July.

“It’s all COVID-pending, because we don’t want to be a part of the spread,” says Gripper. “We want to keep everyone as safe as possible, so as soon as we’re able to, we’ll be able to host much larger and much better events.”

Until then, they’ll be raising funds for the transition while dwelling on new ways to help turn the Trailhead campus into a vital institution for north Charlotte and beyond.

“We try to set ourselves apart as more than a skate park,” says Gripper. “We are an atmosphere. We are a place of learning and positivity … As we continue to be able to grow and more people find out about us, it’s going to be one of the things that really helps us to develop into a community staple for all of Charlotte, not just the neighborhood.”

RPITKIN@QCNERVE.COM

A LESSON LEARNED Carolina Pharmacy provokes response after influencer post promotes rapid testing

BY RYAN PITKIN

As a local small-business owner who recently celebrated 10 years in business, Carolina Pharmacy co-owner Chi Patel has always struggled with how to spread the word about his company, and the pharmacy’s recent addition of rapid COVID-19 testing made that struggle all the more urgent.

With six locations and a seventh set to open in South End in the second half of 2021, Patel has continuously contemplated how to make Charlotteans aware that his company exists. It’s a relatively small-scale operation, as each of his locations is staffed by a pharmacist and just three to four technicians. Going up against national corporations like CVS or his former employer Walgreens is a constant uphill battle.

One recent attempt at promoting his pharmacy’s rapid COVID-19 testing program, however, showed Patel why all engagement isn’t always good engagement.

Carolina Pharmacy offers rapid testing

In late November, Patel and Carolina Pharmacy got into the COVID testing game, offering rapid tests that turned around results in 10 minutes, which could be hard to find elsewhere in Charlotte.

Patel had left Walgreens to start his own pharmacy a decade ago after becoming frustrated with the corporation’s lack of attention to customer service. He saw rapid testing as a way to bring Carolina Pharmacy’s personal touch to a pandemic that required all hands on deck.

Numerous patients had requested COVID-19 testing at the site, and Patel, whose son is severely immunocompromised after being diagnosed with leukemia in May 2020, thought the tests could also be helpful for him and his staff members to ensure the safety of everyone at his pharmacies.

Before Thanksgiving, Carolina Pharmacy began offering rapid antigen tests for $120, accepting insurance reimbursements and payment by Medicaid or HSA/FSA accounts. The demand was high for rapid tests, which are harder to come by than the lab tests offered at free county sites that take 48 to 72 hours for a result.

In fact, the demand was higher than Patel envisioned and soon overwhelmed his independent pharmacy.

Doctors at Atrium and Novant facilities began referring their overflow of patients to him, as they were focused more on testing and treating patients who had already been confirmed positive. He eventually hired off-duty nurses from the two health-care providers and nursing students from Wingate University to help administer tests.

“We started doing it with our patients pretty quickly,” he recalls, “and we were using our own staff to do it. Then quickly I started to realize there’s people coming from all over Charlotte, from Rock Hill, everywhere, that are not even our patients. So how do I help these people? There was no sort of marketing, there was none of that, I don’t even know how to do that.”

In the lead-up to Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Eve, Carolina Pharmacy saw a huge increase in rapid-test referrals. It spiked again after each holiday, but has begun to dwindle since, which Patel hoped was a good sign. Yet he saw that COVID-19 cases weren’t decreasing by any measure and wanted to continue to help. But how could he get the word out?

“We developed our brand organically, through word of mouth, through relationships. I never had the budget to go market on TV or pay some big fee,” Patel says. “There’s nothing really out there to help small businesses that will actually help.”

When a mutual friend suggested that Patel talk to Miranda Mounts, a food influencer who runs the @wheretoeatcharlotte Instagram account and has more than 26,000 followers, about a potential social media campaign promoting the pharmacy’s rapidtesting program, he thought, “Why not?” They had their partnership and promotion: a giveaway for free rapid tests to eight @wheretoeatcharlotte followers who liked the post, followed her account as well as @carolinapharmacyarboretum, and tagged a friend in the comments. “Let’s prevent the spread in 2021!” the post began. It stated that winners would be announced on Monday, Jan. 5. The promotion wouldn’t make it that far, however.

The post quickly provoked a backlash. The optics of an influencer dangling free testing in front of followers (and surely being paid to do so) didn’t sit right with many people. Some criticized Mounts and the pharmacy for charging for testing when there are many free sites available (none of those are rapidtesting sites), and others had a problem with Mounts seemingly profiting off of a public-health crisis.

Then again, some people just have a problem with Mounts herself. In fact, Queen City Nerve named her Worst Influencer in our recent Best in the Nest issue due to insensitive comments she made about Mexican and Asian people in 2020 (which may offered friends free tests in the past for similar posts. have been part of the reason she did not respond to

“Anyone we’ve ever used for any of these things, requests for comment for this story). they’re either our friends or people who know us in a The criticisms spread around local social media certain way,” he says. “We say, ‘Hey, why don’t you come channels, with screenshots of Mounts’ picture from get a test from us? You can record it and show people the post — which shows her standing in front of a your experience.’ I don’t think there’s a single thing Carolina Pharmacy door dressed in full PPE — being wrong with that. None of these people have been paid.” shared on Facebook and Twitter. That night, Patel returned home from a trip to A promotional post provokes a the St. Jude clinic at Novant Health’s Hemby Children’s response Patel spoke with Mounts, offering a $400 payment to promote his pharmacy’s testing services, as he didn’t want to ask a stranger to work for free. She turned down the payment proposal, instead offering to donate it to Lucan’s Lions, a charity for Patel’s son. On the first weekend of the new year, Mounts posted a series of videos on an Instagram Story in which she gets the test from her car (and receives negative results). She also put up a post that plugged Hospital with his family to find an inbox full of vitriol. “All the sudden we got back from St. Jude, I’m getting all these messages,” he recalls. “I’m not really on any site except Instagram, I don’t really know about Twitter or anything, but people are texting me and saying, ‘These guys are dogging you about using an influencer for this.’” He tried replying to a few disparaging posts from his personal Instagram account to explain his side of the story, but the responses were overwhelming. Mounts took the post down before a winner could be announced. The idea for a social media campaign

A PATIENT SUBMITS TO RAPID TESTING AT A CAROLINA PHARMACY SITE. PHOTO BY GRANT BALDWIN

was scrapped.

Lessons learned

Looking back, Patel says he couldn’t have imagined the blowback that would come from his first try at influencer marketing. Days later, when asked what lessons he took from the experience, it’s clear he’s still confused by it all.

“I learned that I’m very naïve to it,” he says. “I spend all my time on what I’m doing to help my patients. I don’t know, and that’s the hard part. What are my resources? What are my options as a small-business owner who is a peanut in a big world? We’re nobodies to most people, so how do I really find out who to use or who to get help from? My most transparent answer is I don’t know.”

He’s considered what missteps he might have made, speculating that he should have found an influencer familiar with the health-care industry, or he could have linked to free testing sites for uninsured folks who can’t afford a rapid test, but for the most part, Patel is ready to leave the incident behind him.

It’s unlikely we’ll see much more influencer marketing coming from Carolina Pharmacy, and for Patel, the sooner the whole rapid-testing program can be shut down the better. Until then, however, he’ll continue to offer the service to whomever books an appointment.

“The revenue [from rapid testing] is minimal; it’s the same as what we make on the average prescription,” he says. “But the thing is to help people, and still be able to stop this. Our mission is for this to stop.”