Second Acts: Taking the plunge from finance to iguanas
Plus: Teen Talk; The top news of the week: Could a mask mandate be coming? — Covid outbreak at Pineville hospital — CMS readies for back to school — new nondiscrimination ordinance passes
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Bored with financial sales, he leaped into a career selling frogs and snakes; Harnessing a passion for reptiles
Do you ever daydream about starting fresh, with a new career or a new calling you’re passionate about? In this occasional series — “Second Acts” — we’ll introduce you to Charlotteans who who decided to make huge life changes to follow different paths in pursuit of their dreams. Have a Second Act story of your own to share? Email us!
Michael Edelen sought advice from a non-profit that advises small businesses and tapped into what he’d learned as an entrepreneurship major in college when he made the career transformation to start the Cold Blooded & Bizarre reptile shop. (Courtesy of Cold Blooded & Bizarre)
by Lindsey Banks
Michael Edelen spends his days surrounded by iguanas, tree frogs and even a two-headed corn snake, plus any supplies a reptile amphibian or invertebrate could ever need at his exotic pet store and animal rescue, Cold Blooded & Bizarre, on Central Avenue.
It’s a world away from the job he had just a few years ago which kept him behind a stuffy office desk, dreaming of finding a career he could be passionate about.
Six years ago, Edelen was working as a sales representative for payment processing companies in his hometown of Chicago, and as one of the top reps in the country, he was offered a management position in Charlotte.
So he moved here with his wife and newborn baby, but couldn’t manage to get excited about his work. He switched to a job selling insurance, but he was still uninspired.
Outside of work, though, there was one thing that could always get his blood pumping — his fascination with reptiles. And he had so many reptile and amphibian pets that he noticed a hole in the Charlotte market for supplies for those kinds of animals.
His wife, Shay, encouraged him to figure out a way to turn that into a living, so he called up his best friend from college to start a business plan.
That’s when Cold Blooded & Bizarre was hatched.
The Ledger sat down with Edelen, 32, on a set of concrete steps in front of his shop to learn how he made the transition from selling insurance to selling animals, and the advice he’d give to others following their unusual passions. The conversation has been edited for brevity and clarity.
Q: What was the motivation behind leaving your former career?
The main reason for leaving the merchant service industry is that while I sold with integrity, a lot of people did not. It was disheartening. I really wasn’t interested in continuing in that industry. I started selling insurance in my next job. It only lasted for three months because it was hard to be passionate about what I was selling. I was looking for other jobs and my wife said, “‘Why don’t you do something with your reptiles?” I give a lot of credit to my wife in making the switch.
Q: You haven’t done it alone. Where did you meet your business partner, and how did you convince him to join you?
I graduated from DePaul University with a degree in business management and with a concentration in entrepreneurship. Patrick Kamberos (his business partner) was the first friend I made on campus. He was an environmental science major. In 2017, Patrick was still in Chicago and he had a handful of reptiles and a bunch of oddities, I had a lot of reptiles and a handful of oddities.
I said it would be really cool if we put our collections together and made a one-of-a-kind store. We finalized our business partnership agreement in the summer of 2018, leased the space in August 2018, and we officially started operating in February 2019.
Q: Why exotic animals?
I grew up next to a reptile store. Chicago’s second reptile store, called Curious Creatures, opened up down the block from where Patrick and I were living at the time after we graduated college. Then, I moved in with my girlfriend — who is now my wife — and there was a store a couple of blocks from where she was living. I moved to Charlotte with 27 animals. Every Saturday morning, I would go out with my toddler and make six or seven stops to get everything I needed to take care of my pets. I noticed there was a lack of specialty stores in Charlotte, so I started working on this business plan.
Q: What were some of your first steps?
I started by going to the Small Business Administration and talking with SCORE Charlotte, which is a nonprofit that works with the SBA to coach people on starting a business. Plus, I was an entrepreneurship major, so I had an idea on how to create a lean startup.
Q: What was the biggest challenge you faced starting up?
The biggest challenge was procuring funding. It took seven (or) eight months to figure out all the funding for the business.
Q: Tell us about your business. What would surprise people?
We have one of the most extensive collections in the Carolinas, maybe even the country at this point. We operate a rescue as well and received almost 18 animals just during the first week of this month.
Before we even opened the store, people were dropping off turtles. Our primary focus is to be a reliable resource of information for the proper care of reptiles, amphibians and invertebrates. A lot of the time, it’s ultimately a lack of education, like proper lighting, that could have prevented this animal from ending up at our rescue.
Q: How’s business? Are there that many reptile and amphibian owners in Charlotte?
We see about 350 returning customers a week, usually buying food. We’ve had a lot of blessings. One of the big corporate pet stores I used to visit closed on our grand opening day in April, so they were referring people to us. It gave us a little influx of extra people. There are also a lot of hobbyists and people passionate about reptiles that work for big corporate stores, so sometimes they recommend their customers to us if they can’t find what they are looking for there.
Q: What advice do you have for other people looking for a career change?
Be patient. Be thorough. Make sure that you are making intelligent decisions. Don’t do everything on a whim, like don’t go sign a lease if you don’t have funding. I 100% suggest the SCORE counselors and reaching out to the SBA if you are thinking about starting your own business. Have a backup plan and do your research. Get as much experience in front of what you’re trying to do as you can.
Lindsey Banks, a senior at UNC Chapel Hill, was The Ledger’s summer reporting intern.
Also in our Second Acts series:
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Teen talk: Build your vocabulary
Impress and delight the young people in your life by using the words they use. The Ledger shows you how in this occasional Saturday feature.
Today’s phrase: Main character
Definition: a person who lives like they are the protagonist in a story
Used in a sentence:
“See that lady dancing in the rain? She’s giving me major main character energy.”
“You wore a prom dress to McDonalds? You’re such a main character.”
Ledger analysis: The term is used to describe someone who sees themselves as the center of a story, that everything else revolves around. Teens typically don’t see this as a negative trait or term, however, which speaks to their generation’s use of social media and how they portray their personal brands online.
—Cecilia Bolling, age 16
This week in Charlotte: Covid outbreak at Pineville hospital; mask mandate could be coming; nondiscrimination ordinance passes
On Saturdays, The Ledger sifts through the local news of the week and links to the top articles — even if they appeared somewhere else. We’ll help you get caught up. That’s what Saturdays are for.
Education
CMS plans for back to school (Ledger 🔒) Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools leaders presented their back-to-school plan to school board members Tuesday night, including a new quarantine policy, new recruitment and retention bonuses and plans for in-school Covid testing.
Cooper urges masks in schools: (Observer) Gov. Roy Cooper sent a letter to school board chairs on Friday asking those that aren’t requiring masks in schools to do so. “Because children under 12 cannot yet get a vaccine and the percent of children 12-18 years old who are vaccinated is low, all students, teachers and staff in grades K-12 should wear masks in school regardless of vaccination status,” he wrote.
UNCC brainiacs: UNC Charlotte has been approved for a chapter of Phi Beta Kappa, the country’s oldest and most prestigious academic honor society. Nationally, chapters invite just 10% of students in the liberal arts and sciences to join.
Politics
Nondiscrimination ordinance: (Ledger 🔒) Charlotte City Council this week passed a new nondiscrimination ordinance adding new protected classes and employment protection for those protected classes. The Ledger broke down what steps it takes to lodge a complaint. The new ordinance applies to businesses with 14 or fewer employees, which closes a gap on existing state and federal laws.
Local news
Mask mandate ahead? Boone, Durham, Chapel Hill and Raleigh have resurrected requirements to wear masks indoors. Will Charlotte? Mecklenburg County is holding a meeting of its Covid policy group on Monday, which could be asked by health officials to make a decision on the issue. The county has scheduled a 2:30 p.m. news conference with county health officials afterward. Mayor Vi Lyles, who would need to approve any mandate for Charlotte, gave no clear answer when asked about it twice this week at a news conference. On Friday, 13 local media organizations, including The Ledger, wrote to county officials arguing that Monday’s meeting should to be open to the public under the state’s open meeting laws.
Covid outbreak at Atrium Health Pineville: (WFAE) At least 50 employees and nine patients at Atrium Health Pineville have tested positive for Covid, state health officials said Friday. No hospital employees had been hospitalized as of Friday afternoon. A preliminary investigation found that 35 of the 50 employees had been vaccinated, officials said.
Court out of session: The Mecklenburg County Courthouse will reopen Monday at a modified capacity after being closed all week “to prevent or slow the spread of COVID-19 among court personnel and members of the public,” according to a statement by the N.C. 26th Judicial District. Court officials are asking that business be done via email or phone unless lawyers or the public are required to appear in-person. The courthouse had been closed since last Monday, when it was said that said that five employees had tested positive, “a number of others” had reported symptoms, 19 were awaiting test results and 29 were quarantining.
New census data: There were lots of takeaways from new data released by the U.S. Census Bureau Thursday. Among the findings: Wake County surpassed Mecklenburg County; Mecklenburg’s population grew by 21% between 2010 and 2020 and Mecklenburg’s Hispanic population rose 52%. (Observer)
Shows canceled: The Actor’s Theater of Charlotte on Friday canceled the rest of its run of “Rock of Ages” and its next show, “Head Over Heels,” because two members of its production tested positive for Covid. The theater said in a press release that plans are a-go for the “Rocky Horror Show” in October.
Business
Heady time for Charlotte’s big brewers: (Ledger 🔒) Charlotte’s three biggest breweries, Olde Mecklenburg Brewery, Sycamore Brewing and NoDa Brewing, were among the few local beer-makers who increased production in 2020. Craft beer sales nationally were down 9%.
Good reads
Such a good dog: (North Carolina Rabbit Hole) Jeremy Markovich digs into his grief over the loss of his family’s dog, Lucy, and shares a story rich with emotion that will be relatable to anyone who’s ever loved a four-legged friend.
Beer names: (Charlotte magazine) This piece from Charlotte magazine’s Greg Lacour gets to the bottom of how brewers pick the quirky, offbeat names for the concoctions they create — and how coming up with new names is getting harder than you’d think.
From the Ledger family of newsletters
Ways of Life: The deaths of 20-year-olds Robert McElveen Walker and Henry Huntley Melvin shocked the community last month when they died in a car accident in Eastover. Friends and family members said both lived their lives with zest and zeal.
Publisher’s Clearing House scam: (Wednesday) A Charlotte financial advisor saved a client from a scam in which she was asked to send more than $100,000 in “tax money” in order to cash a fake $2M check from a scammer claiming to be Publisher’s Clearing House.
Traffic congestion ahead: (Transit Time) With school about to start and companies making plans to return workers to the office, traffic could get a little hairy in the next few weeks. A look at some of the ways the city is helping reduce gridlock, from better timing of traffic signals to adding turn lanes at some intersections.
Religious exemption loophole: (Monday) With more companies starting to mandate vaccines, the number of workers seeking religious exemptions is on the rise, local employment lawyers say. Is it a loophole?
New scooter: (Monday) Bird is releasing a new version of its e-scooter in Charlotte that it says is eco-friendly and safer than earlier models because of better braking and antimicrobial grips.
UNCC builds pipeline to tech jobs: (Wednesday 🔒) With more and more tech companies moving to Charlotte and expanding here, enrollment at UNC Charlotte’s College of Computing and Informatics has nearly tripled its number of students in the last decade to help meet the increasing demand.
Something built in Ballantyne: (Wednesday 🔒) In our occasional feature answering reader development questions, we figure out what’s going on with the demolition of several single-family homes on Marvin Road in Ballantyne.
Outlook for small business: (Friday 🔒) Bank of America’s business banking market executive for Charlotte, Les Lambert, shares his perspectives on the outlook for small businesses and the bank’s equity initiatives.
Amenities arms race continues: (Friday 🔒) TIAA is planning to revamp its University City-area campus – and add amenities for workers including pickleball, bocce and disc golf. It has about 3,600 employees in Charlotte.
Money for racetracks: (Friday 🔒) Republicans and Democrats in Raleigh seem to agree on a proposal to channel tens of millions of dollars to help support the Charlotte Motor Speedway, the North Wilkesboro Speedway and the speedway in Rockingham. The money would go for infrastructure projects like water and sewer and would benefit the Smith family, which owns and runs Speedway Motorsports and Sonic Automotive.
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Executive editor: Tony Mecia; Managing editor: Cristina Bolling; Contributing editor: Tim Whitmire, CXN Advisory