Winners named in Time Warner Cable's small-business contest

Time Warner Cable Business Class is honoring 25 Charlotte-based small businesses as winners in its first-ever "Small Business, Big Impact" contest.

Winners, who submitted essays on how they've used the cable company's Internet, Wi-Fi, phone, TV and/or cloud services, will be recognized at an awards breakfast Friday. Charlotte Chamber president Bob Morgan will be keynote speaker, and Rob Boisvert, Time Warner Cable News anchor, will be the host.

Here are the winners:

Accelerate Solar: Residential and Commercial Solar Energy Installers
Anointed Flooring, Inc.: Commercial and Residential Flooring
Baker-Pegram Insurance Agency: Personal and Business Lines – Risk Management
Bignon's African Hair Braiding & Weaving, LLC: Full-Service Hair Salon
Carolinas Metro Realty: Real Estate Sales and Property Management
Charlotte Engineers, LLP: MEP Design Engineers
Cloud 9 Smokeshop: Tobacco Accessories and Smoking Supplies
The Dog Knowledge: Service Dog Trainers
Gat3 Productions: Multiple Grammy Award-Winning Recording and Production Studio
Gaylord Bralley Agency: Auto, Home and Life Insurance
HD Products, Inc.: Auto Detailing Supplies
Homes of Hope: Transitional Housing for the Homeless
Martin Holdings, Inc.: Mini Storage Movers and Rentals
Mill Grove United Methodist Church: Methodist Church and Preschool
Minit Maids, Inc.: Professional Home Cleaning Service
Monroe Sewing & Vac Center: Sewing Machine and Vacuum Sales and Service
R.M. Beasley & Assoc., Inc.: Insurance Health Agency
Rochelle Salon Suites, LLC: One Stop Beauty Salon
San Marco Coffee, Inc.: Fresh-Roasted Coffee to Order
The Secret Chocolatier: Chocolate, Confections and Cake Shop
Southern Blossom Florist: Floral – Wedding – Gift Baskets
SPARK Publications: Creative Design and Content for Magazines, Books, Catalogs and Marketing Promotions
Spice Cafe: Indian Food Restaurant
The Ultra Running Company, LLC: Specialty Running and Apparel
US Tax Express: Tax Preparation and Planning

Doing the hustle: Here's why these Charlotte entrepreneurs are always working

In Wednesday's print edition of ShopTalk, you'll meet business owners who work day or side jobs while making their business dreams a reality.

There's a name for it: the side hustle.

Blogger Nick Loper describes it as something you to do earn money outside your day job.

How do they do it, and what drives them? Here's a closer look at three:

Alexandra Zsoldos

FirstDanceCharlotte

Alexandra Zsoldos' side gig took shape at a young age. She grew up dancing, and choreographed dances for the student dance company in college.


By day, Zsoldos, 27, works for a Charlotte marketing firm. At night and on weekends, she runs FirstDanceCharlotte, which she uses to teach private wedding dance lessons out of her home.

"Everyone does a first dance, but it's probably one of the most dreaded or least considered part of the wedding these days," she said. "I want couples to rediscover how fun and special it is to dance together."

Much of Zsoldos' free time is spent listening to each couples' wedding music, working out the timing and steps that work with the music, writing practice notes and working out the choreography. She works by appointment only, she said, so she doesn't overload herself.

"As to whether I will sleep in the future, who knows," she said.

ShomoLive

Scott Jermyn

Scott Jermyn can say the same. 

"Sleep is hard," said the 41-year-old Jermyn, who has spent the last five years creating ShomoLive, an online service that streamlines booking events for local artists and venues.

To stay afloat, he runs a real estate business with a friend and tends bar two nights a week.

"When somebody's entrepreneurial like that, you kind of have it in you to go, go, go and keep pushing it," he said.

Kelly Jo Jefferis

Rodan & Fields

Hard work was bred into Kelly Jo Jefferis, a 31-year-old mother to a 16-month-old toddler and a self-admitted overachiever. She grew up watching her father work 60 to 80 hours a week at a corporate job.

"I wanted to follow in his footsteps so I started working at 15 years old," she said.

She now works full-time as a marketing agent for a national contractor. Earlier this year, she began selling skincare products for Rodan & Fields after meeting a neighbor who decided not to renew her CPA license because selling for the company paid her monthly daycare bills.

Jefferis spent less than $1,000 to get started. She juggles 12 regular customers, and fits in calls and emails around her day job, often when she's in the bathroom or waiting to pick her daughter up from daycare.
"I have my rough days, but I am so glad I did it," she said. "I just need a few years to work my business and provide great service and my success will come to me. I'm sure of it."

Working your hustle

ShopTalk asked Loper and Jullien Gordon, a New York employee engagement consultant who gave a TEDx Midwest talk on side hustling, about how entrepreneurs should work their hustle. Here's some of what they had to say:

Know what you like: Loper advises aspiring entrepreneurs to take inventory of their skills.

"If you've had a job ever you, by definition, have a skill worth paying," he said.

Scan your resume, he said, and figure out which skills interest you the most. Ask yourself: "Which of those am I particularly interested (in), or can I imagine turning that into a side business?"

The important thing is to make sure you like what you're doing.

"If you're an accountant by day and you're skilled at that, but you hate accounting, that doesn't make for a good side hustle," Loper said. "Though you need money, the last thing you need is a second job you hate."

Adjust your schedule: "We're all dealt the same 24 hours a day," Loper said. His suggestion to making the side gig a little more manageable: Wake up an hour earlier and work in the mornings before your day job.

Gordon, a father and husband, compares running a side business to preparing for a marathon. People who run marathons, he said, often set time in the mornings and over the weekends to prepare. After work, he said, business owners can dedicate an hour to working their side business at a Starbucks.

"It's not a piano": That's what Loper's father told him growing up, stressing that mistakes are inevitable. Setting up the side business, Loper said, won't be a flawless endeavor right out of the gate.

Don't give up, he said, but understand that timing is key.

"Don't try to be put in a position that it's a life-or-death thing, (like) 'I need to make rent next month,'" he said. "For me, it was three years of nights and weekends before I felt comfortable...to quit my day job." 

Do you give freebies? Let us know

Courtesy of The Write Occasion Calligraphy

It's the small things that count.

From complimentary peppermints to handwritten thank-you notes, many small businesses provide something extra that help customers feel special -- and make them want to come back.

Do you use these or other gestures at your business?

Let us know for an upcoming story.

Contact Jonathan McFadden at jmcfadden@charlotteobserver.com or at 704-358-6045.

Dr. Oz to launch community walk at Merinos in Mooresville

Dr. Mehmet Oz

A Mooresville business is the launchpad for a series of events this week in which Dr. Mehmet Oz will throw his support behind free health clinics in the Carolinas.

On Thursday, Oz, who hosts "The Dr. Oz Show" on ABC-TV, will launch a community walk from Merinos Home Furnishings at 500 South Main St., the once-abandoned textile mill that served as the bedrock of the community.

The walk is part of Harmony in Health, a fundraising event hosted by Mooresville's HealthReach Community Clinic and Walgreens.

During the kickoff, Mooresville Mayor Miles Atkins will present Oz with a NASCAR jacket. Participants will walk a mile to the Charles Mack Citizen Center and an optional second mile back to Merinos.

Michal Bay, who owns Merinos, said he's not hoping the walk and subsequent exposure will be a boon to his business.

"I think when you're doing something, you do it because you want to do it, not because you want to benefit out of it," Bay said. "We're doing it without expecting anything whatsoever."

Organizers chose Merinos as the spot to start the walk because of its size, Bay said, adding that he often allows the community to use space at the retrofitted mill. He jumped at the chance to host Oz at his store.

The fact they're both Turkish, he said, is just mere coincidence. Bay was born in Turkey, then moved to London, England and then returned to Turkey before he moved to the U.S. and started selling furniture.

The Turkish-American Oz was born in Cleveland, Ohio.

Michal Bay

"I personally love Dr. Oz," Bay said. "I only know him through the press. I never met him. I don't know him. I love the way he explains medical (things) to everybody."

The walk starts at 10 a.m. in Merinos' parking lot on College and Church streets. Thursday's walk is just one part in a series of daylong activities for Oz that will include a health fair, black-tie dinner and an event at Mooresville High School.

So, what's your side hustle?

Corporate worker by day, busy entrepreneur by night?

Toiling away at your office desk 8 to 5, but selling merchandise out of your call 6 till midnight?

For an upcoming ShopTalk story, we want to talk to small-business entrepreneurs who are working both their day jobs and their side hustle.

What's a side hustle, you ask?

Nick Loper, who runs a blog called Side Hustle Nation, defines it as "something you do to earn money outside your day job."

Previous generations called it "moonlighting," says Loper, who started a footwear comparison-shopping website while working a corporate job.

Eventually, he walked away from his day job in 2008 and went into full-time self employment.

So maybe you're like Loper and have a gig on the side. Or two. Or three.

What did you do to get it started? How are you managing a full-time job and a side gig? Is the business successful? Do you sleep?

We want to hear from you. Tell us your stories about how you bring home the bacon using more than one stream of income.

Contact Jonathan McFadden at (704) 358-6045, or via email: jmcfadden@charlotteobserver.com.

Fast growth spurs tech startup's move to Packard Place

The latest company to take residence in Charlotte's swelling incubator for technology start-ups started two years ago on a trip to the Blue Ridge Mountains.

SpendBoss, which provides businesses and retailers with technology helping them easily order supplies, has moved to Packard Place on South Church Street to accommodate its growth.

The company started in 2012 when a dozen retail executives gathered at the Biltmore Estate in Asheville and began collaborating on how to best develop a solution for managing indirect spend, the purchases a business uses for supplies that are not directly related to the products it sells or services it provides, according to its website.

The group that would make up SpendBoss created a cloud-sharing software that allows business owners to budget, communicate with suppliers and create reports, graphs and spreadsheets on one platform.

Company officials said in a news release that Packard Place has the "right elements to foster the growth of a revolutionary startup." The company has more than doubled its size within the past year, officials say.

SpendBoss is now among more than 100 tech-startups in Packard Place, said Dan Roselli, Packard Place co-founder. The company is one of the largest in Packard Place and has agreed to mentor newer startups in Packard Place's QCFinTech program, a financial services technology incubator.