Category: Entrepreneurs

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Entrepreneurs Features Giving Back Kindness in Action

‘Don’t Forget the Poor’

Children play outside their house in Colonia de Carton in Piedras Negras, Mexico, on July 8, 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

Sky Cross is a nonprofit, strictly volunteer-led charity organization that operates along the Texas–Mexico border. Its mission is to provide food, clothing, medicine, and first-aid supplies to impoverished children, families, and orphanages. The organization works closely with missionaries of various denominations who offer education to the poor, primarily in Mexico, in substandard villages called colonias, which lack basic living conditions such as running water, sewers, and electricity.

The organization was founded in 1995 by retired U.S. Air Force Col. Terry Bliquez and his wife, Kathy. David Young serves as the current president, having been a board member and mission pilot since 1998. Before that, Young worked for the Civil Air Patrol (part of the U.S. Air Force), another nonprofit organization, which performs search-and-rescue missions.

When Bliquez first discussed Sky Cross’s mission with Young, it sparked a keen interest. Young would often accompany Bliquez on aid missions to the U.S.–Mexico border to deliver clothing, medicine, and nonperishable food to the needy. Together, they flew multiple times to migrant centers and orphanages, such as those in Nuevo Progreso, Mexico, and Matamoros, which is across the river from Brownsville, Texas.

Young said Sky Cross used to dispense secondhand clothing as well, but those deliveries have slowed down exponentially due to the pandemic. The organization has, however, distributed about 15,000 masks and more than 600 gallons of hand sanitizer across the migrant communities it serves.

The Importance of Helping the Needy

David Young, president of Sky Cross, unloads boxes of masks from his aircraft in Eagle Pass, Texas, on July 8, 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

“The primary purpose of Sky Cross is to help provide food for the needy people, the poor on the other side of the border—they’re very, very poor. Many of them come up to the border hoping to be able to come across, and they end up being in the colonias on the border, such as the one in Matamoros,” Young said.

Years ago, people in colonias such as Matamoros would dig holes in the ground, scavenge coverings for the holes, and live in the burrows. Young remembers “being over there one time and looking at what they had on a grill that they were cooking outside—it was fish heads that they had scrounged for,” he said. “I was amazed that people could even survive with that type of food.”

Sky Cross delivers nonperishable food in the form of beans, rice, cornflour, noodles, and more. “I feel like God has placed in my heart a love for the poor and for their plight,” Young said, after being asked why the mission at Sky Cross resonated with him so deeply. “It’s such a blessing to me personally to go out and be amongst these people and, with my resources, be able to help them live a better life.”

Young said that when he was growing up, his parents instilled in him a deep desire to dedicate time and effort to helping those in need. “My dad was a homebuilder, and he would donate his time to work around the church. He had me help paint the back end of a church building one time—it demanded stacking scaffolding because it was so tall. He and I donated our time and efforts to that when I was just a 14- or 15-year-old boy. My father enjoyed giving himself to the community, and that carried over to me.”

Making a Difference in the Lives of the Poor

Children play outside their home in Colonia de Carton in Piedras Negras, Mexico, on July 8, 2021. (Charlotte Cuthbertson/The Epoch Times)

Through donations, Sky Cross also helped the Matamoros colonia develop to a point when residents could build a school. To support efforts like this, the Mexican government will provide water and electricity once a school is built, in turn helping the colonia become a sustainable community.

Many children in poverty-stricken communities such as Matamoros suffer from malnutrition. According to Young, children’s hair will often show signs of this. “Normally it would be black, but they would have red streaks in their hair, which was showing that they were not getting good nutrition. With time, those red streaks went away,” he said. “It’s a blessing to be able to do that and witness that as time goes on.” For Young, results like these are important, highlighting the difference Sky Cross makes in the lives of needy children.

Young said that his time at the organization is completely voluntary. Nobody who works there is a paid staff member, and 100 percent of the donations go straight to helping the poor. Young’s personal assets, including airplanes, fuel, and other equipment, are also put to charitable use for the organization, transporting volunteers to the border.

Aside from filling his role as president at Sky Cross, Young serves as a board member for a school in northwestern Peru that has 200 students. Together with his wife and family, he also helps more than a dozen children at any given time along the Texas–Mexico border. The Youngs provide money each month to keep those children in school rather than out scavenging the dangerous fields in search of food and money.

“We sent a couple on to the university; one of them became a dentist and came back. They are now practicing within one of the colonias there in Mexico,” Young said.

Sky Cross helps upwards of 30,000 people each year. It has supported six orphanages and helped build clinics in several Mexican colonias along the Texas border, providing quick access to medical care for families in need. “We’ve built a school in Nuevo Progreso where they would train the women to sew and work on computers. We have seen the results of that, to where the people will get out of the cycle of poverty and actually begin to have the skills to go out and earn a living,” Young said.

Physically Poor but Spiritually Rich

Through his time volunteering for Sky Cross, Young has learned many important life lessons—especially about how the needy can find happiness in the midst of their poverty. “The children are especially amazing to me. They can take a simple ball and have fun with that and laugh and enjoy life because they don’t want anything else. And what spoke to me is that some of the things we take for granted in our own society are more precious to them,” Young said.

“What I have learned in doing what I do is that the poor will find joy, and have more faith in their poverty than a lot of people that have all the things they would want in life. We in America need to understand that even the poorest of us are probably richer than 95 percent of the world. We place too much emphasis on the material things in life and not enough on the spiritual.”

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Entrepreneurs Features

Escaping Religious Persecution: A Shoemaker’s Journey to America

Uriel Gurgov works on repairing a shoe in his workshop. (Lux Aeterna Photography for American Essence)

Shoemaker Uriel Gurgov immigrated to the United States on Jan. 21, 1993. He was born in 1962 in Bukhara, Uzbekistan—once an ancient trading city situated along the Silk Road in Central Asia. Uriel embarked on a grueling journey out of his hometown in the late 1990s, during the time that former Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev was in power, and emigration among Bukharan Jews was prevalent.

Historically, Jews in Uzbekistan have always been religiously targeted. First, by the Sunni Muslims of the Bukhara Emirate during the late 16th century when they were forbidden from buying horses and forced to wear special clothing to distinguish themselves from Sunni Muslims. The religious persecution continued throughout Russian and Soviet rule. Finally, in the late 1920s, synagogues were permanently shut down and Jews were denied work in their traditional trades. Emigration was thus seen as a last attempt to flee persecution and discrimination in their homeland.

Having no relatives in the United States to support an affidavit application on his behalf, Gurgov was forced to cross over through Moscow. However, his journey was anything but simple and he met with several setbacks. Before his journey even began, he was apprehended in his hometown of Bukhara, Uzbekistan. Gurgov was falsely accused of buying a stolen television.

“I said, first of all, I don’t buy stuff from thieves. Also, from January to March, I was in Israel. How can I buy this?” Gurgov said. The crime allegedly occurred in February, when he was out of the country.

Searching for a Way Out

He was taken to jail and beaten in an attempt to make him confess to the alleged crime. When that proved useless, Gurgov was put on trial in front of one of the biggest judges in Bukhara. He went on to explain in the interview that the country’s government was very corrupt. His only way out of being condemned to a life in jail was to offer monetary payment to the judges and police.

“If you just bribe one, they will tell—so you have to have so much money to give each one now,” Gurgov said.

Many people encouraged him to escape Uzbekistan with his family. The government was well known for using Jews as a scapegoat for other people’s crimes. “Somebody stole this? They put it on you. Somebody hit somebody? They blame you. What kind of life is that?” he said.

This experience drove Gurgov to save money and prepare his family’s paperwork to flee Bukhara together. “But I didn’t tell anybody because everybody, everywhere, you have rats,” Gurgov said.

Before the family departed Bukhara, they paid a short visit to the cemetery to say farewell to their forefathers. Along the way, they paid out a lot of money to border police, guards, and airport security. Eventually, they arrived in Moscow, and from there, they flew to America in search of a new life.

New Shop, New Direction

(Lux Aeterna Photography for American Essence)

For three centuries, highly skilled craftsmen called “ustad” practiced traditional crafts in Central Asia and beyond. Some of this included jewelry-making, armory, carpet weaving, and shoemaking. Bukhara, Uzbekistan, was considered one of the major handicraft centers, often visited by wealthy merchants along the Silk Road. Skilled craftsmen would often take in apprentices who would learn their trade. This is also how Gurgov learned the craft of shoemaking. He explained that his father would often take him to many crafting hubs where he would be taught various skills in exchange for free work. These skills helped Gurgov kickstart his shoemaking business after moving to the United States.

Gurgov purchased his shoe shop in 1994, less than a year after arriving in the United States. With the help of generous friends and a bank loan of $15,000, he started a shoemaking business and has since been working there. His apartment is on the next block. “And what else do you need? I have a family, a wife, children, and grandchildren. I appreciate it, I’m satisfied.”

Shoemaker Gurgov considers shoemaking a real craft, one that requires the craftsman to really know his customer’s problem in order to help them accordingly. He places great importance on wearing the right shoes. “You can have a hundred shoes but none of them feel right. If you wear one shoe and you’re not tired of it, then that’s a good shoe.” He said many people wear the wrong types of shoes. They develop pain and fatigue, leading to serious health problems resulting in thousands of dollars in medical bills. He believes that making even a simple change in your footwear is enough to make a significant difference to your health. For instance, slightly changing the shoe size or purchasing one with good arch support can make a difference.

Today, he crafts sturdy, custom shoes for regular people and celebrities alike. Some of his past customers include Britney Spears and Patrick Dempsey. TV shows such as Boardwalk Empire and Gossip Girl have also commissioned Gurgov to design the cast’s shoes. He also carries out shoe, watch, and jewelry repairs.

Despite encountering many setbacks and enduring much suffering, Gurgov remains grateful and satisfied with life. He believes you can’t always be a winner and that sometimes losing is better as it helps one grow and appreciate things more. As Gurgov would say, “Today you give up, tomorrow you gain.”

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Entrepreneurs Features

Cast in Stone, That Is, Iron

John Truex and Liz Seru converted an old turbine blade factory in Upstate New York into a cast iron foundry. (Photo Courtesy of Borough Furnace)

For a growing number of American households, Teflon-coated pans, copper pots, or anything else for that matter other than a handcrafted cast iron skillet, would be, well, an outcast in the kitchen.

Crazy as it seems, the people who make this heavily weighted and highly popular custom-made cookware are willing to face furnaces burning at 2300 degrees Fahrenheit on a hot summer’s day, inside an old mill building they bought with their life savings, just to put one in your kitchen.

“It can be a little miserable at times,” said Liz Seru, who owns Borough Furnace with her husband, John Truex. About 10 years ago, they converted an old turbine blade factory in Upstate New York into a foundry to pursue their love for cast iron cookware. At the start, Seru, an artist, and Truex, who holds a degree in metal casting, bought vegetable oil off Craigslist to run their blast furnace, before switching to an electric induction oven.

And they’re not alone. Cast iron foundries, once as American as blue jeans and apple pie, have resurfaced all over the United States.

Aficionados say the taste of food cooked on the same cast iron pan gets better with time.

The Cast Iron Collector, a website dedicated to cast-iron-cooking enthusiasts, lists more than 300 cast iron foundries in the country, with a heavy concentration in the Midwest and down south where Lodge, the oldest maker of cast iron cookware in the United States, hosts popular cook-offs and a national cornbread festival in celebration of cast-iron cooking.

What’s driving this trendy revival in cookware all boils down to the simplicities of a highly sought-after taste, unparalleled durability, and old-fashioned made-in-America craftsmanship. Some foodies have quite literally lost their taste for modern lightweight stick-free cookware, which, besides, being short-lived, doesn’t quite offer the same flavorful results of cast iron.

Like a fine wine, the taste of food cooked on the same cast iron pan gets better with time. It’s called seasoning, a somewhat scientific phenomenon that naturally improves the surface of your skillet as you use your skillet more and more.

“Basically, the fat and oils in the food adhere to the pan and polymerize to form a new, smoother cook surface,” Seru said. “It’s better than when it was brand new.”

Forged cast iron cookware is also made out of hot iron poured into a mold and then cooled, meaning it’s all crafted in one piece, with no separate handles or bottoms that may eventually come apart.

Borough Furnace’s cookware is crafted in one piece, with no separate handles or bottoms. (Courtesy of Borough Furnace)

In addition to skillets, cast iron foundries like Golden’s Cast Iron in Columbus, Georgia, have revived an authentic cast iron cauldron-like cooker—yep, the kind that brings to mind a steamy, bubbling witch’s brew.

Cast iron skillets are also popular among campers who want a little more than hot dogs and beans over an open fire. A skillet made by Finex, an Oregon-based foundry that prides itself on being “100 percent American-made,” appears on multiple published lists for must-have camping gear.

“We make our cast iron a little bit thicker than most,” said Michael Griffin, Finex’s brand director. “When you cook over a grill and open fire, you’re going to have hot and cool spots. That thicker cast iron helps even out the cold and hot spots.”

Finex’s other big attraction is its patented stainless steel spiral handles that stay cool longer and cool down faster. Even in the old days, cast iron skillets didn’t have such a feature. Griffin said the company got the idea from old-fashioned wood stoves that had similar handles on their doors.

“We wanted to reinvent the cast iron skillet,” said Griffin. ” It’s a very classic, time-honored American piece of cookware, but it hadn’t changed in design for a couple of hundred years.”

Cast iron cookware is now even topping wedding registries over coffee machines and vacuum cleaners.

(Courtesy of Borough Furnace)

The revival of the beefy, indestructible kitchenware is so trendy that it has inspired blogs with such titles as “Why I’m Replacing My Skillets With Cast Iron” and articles on how to spot an authentic vintage cast iron skillet at a roadside antique shop.

Wagner and Griswold cookware are like the Ming Dynasty vases of antique cast iron skillets. One piece can fetch up to $1,500. An authentic “spider skillet” originally designed by Paul Revere and made up until the 1890s can be worth up to $8,000.

There are, of course, varying tiers of cast iron skillets, depending on the level of hands-on craftsmanship. Borough Furnace is probably one of the most handcrafted foundries in the country: they do only about 15 iron pours per day.

The Finger Lakes-based company is working to catch up on orders for its 10.5-inch frying skillet, which sells for $300. The company also custom-forges porcelain-enameled dutch ovens and something called cazuelas, ramekin-like cookware made out of recycled cast iron—part of Seru and Truex’s ironclad commitment to keeping their foundry as environmentally friendly as possible. They are even voluntarily carbon emissions-certified.

“We do our best to reduce our footprint,” said Seru. “We want to preserve American tradition as much as America itself.”

Alice Giordano is a former news correspondent for The Boston Globe, Associated Press, and New England bureau of The New York Times. Alice loves to cook her vegetarian cuisine on the vintage cast iron skillet she inherited from her mom.

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Entrepreneurs Features

Bridging the Divide With BBQ

(Courtesy of Ben Ferguson)

At 31, Ben Ferguson took the perfect job for anyone seeking national influence. A conservative radio host, Ferguson joined CNN’s stable of political contributors in 2013. But seven years of expressing conservative views to a hostile audience, and even to hostile colleagues, became debilitating. “I got exhausted,” Ferguson said. “I just saw the hate and anger every time I’d go on TV that would come from people hoping that you die, and from liberal groups trying to attack you and silence you forever. They really try to ruin your life.”

So Ferguson chose to defuse the anger by building community. He left CNN last year and started a barbecue restaurant in his hometown, Memphis, Tennessee, while continuing his nationally syndicated radio show from Dallas. “I wanted an outlet that was just totally non-confrontational or controversial,” he said. “Food was my outlet to bring people to the table and bring them together.”

But Ferguson’s BBQ has a unique feature. It shares the building with a gun range the host also owns.  “People love it,” he said. “It’s not what you expect when you’re walking into a gun range to have a world-class barbecue restaurant. People are going, ‘Are you kidding me? This is here?’ They keep coming back.”

(Courtesy of Ben Ferguson)

Savory Memories

Ferguson’s desire to open the restaurant reflects the memories of his younger days. “You know, when I lived there, I’ve never once cooked barbecue,” Ferguson said about Memphis. “The best barbecue places in the world are in Memphis, right? Why would you want to barbecue when you can literally just go down the street and eat some of the best barbecue in the world?

“But I missed the traditional Southern pork barbecue: pulled pork, shoulders, ribs and sausage. I got into barbecue because I missed it. I wanted that quality that I got in Memphis, when I could drive to an amazing restaurant and just get it.” His customers seem to agree. “Father’s Day was jam packed,” Ferguson said. “There was a wait list to get into the restaurant. We had our biggest Sunday ever on Father’s Day, which was exactly my goal: to bring families together.”

(Courtesy of Ben Ferguson)

Serving Safety

The gun range, meanwhile, allows residents to receive defensive firearms training in one of the nation’s most dangerous cities. “I wanted to teach as many people as possible how to protect themselves,” Ferguson said. “There are a lot of single mothers in Memphis, and we’ve done a lot of outreach in trying to bring in single mothers so they can protect and defend themselves and their kids in their home. That’s part of our mission statement, our purpose, and it’s worked.”

(Courtesy of Ben Ferguson)

The unique pairing attracts a wide variety of customers. Some conduct Bible studies. Others hold weddings, wedding rehearsals, or funerals. “Every Friday morning, we have a group of men that just hang out with one another, and they have a great time,” Ferguson said “It’s pretty amazing.”

Backseat Beginnings

Ferguson’s journey to radio host and barbeque entrepreneur began “in the backseat of my mom’s car, listening to this new guy on the radio by the name of Rush Limbaugh,” he said. “That was in 1993.” At the time, Ferguson was 11 years old. Later, he heard another host, a liberal member of Memphis’s City Council, talk about a bill being debated in Congress. “I asked my mom if I could call in because I thought what she [the female host] said was wrong and inaccurate,” Ferguson said. “I called and challenged her on it after I got the bill from Congress. She started yelling at me but I was able to beat her with facts. I fell in love with talk radio right then and there.”

Two years later, at 13, Ferguson became the nation’s youngest talk-show host. At 20, he became the youngest to sign a syndication contract. At 23, he wrote his first book, “It’s My America, Too,” and spoke at the 2004 Republican National Convention. In 2012, Ferguson moved to Dallas, where he conducts his local and national shows.

A Way to the Heart

But the 39-year-old radio host might be making his biggest impact outside of the studio. “I’ve had liberals who say, ‘Ben, I don’t believe in what you said on the radio. But let me tell you, I went out to your restaurant,’ ” Ferguson said. ” ‘I couldn’t not try it after you’ve been talking about it for the past year, and I ended up taking a permit class. So I just want to say thank you because now, I can protect my family. I really enjoyed your staff and your facility.’ Bridging that gap has been amazing.”

For Ferguson, the way to a potential antagonist’s heart winds through the aroma of sauce and spices. “Anytime you smell barbecue or cook barbecue, it brings people together from different walks of life,” he said. “It doesn’t matter your politics.”

Joseph D’Hippolito is a freelance writer whose commentaries have appeared in the Jerusalem Post, The Stream, Front Page Magazine, and American Thinker.

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Entrepreneurs Features

The Peach Truck Coming Through

Stephen and Jessica Rose at a peach orchard in Georgia. (Courtesy of The Peach Truck)

A Tennessee couple has their hearts set on giving Americans everywhere access to fresh, ripe Georgia peaches

Growing up in Fort Valley, Georgia—one of the state’s biggest producers of peaches—Stephen Rose was always the kid who could tell when someone at a gathering had made a cobbler with grocery store-bought canned peaches. They simply couldn’t compare to the sweet Georgia peaches he frequently ate, plucked fresh from the tree at his neighborhood farm. Later in life, when he moved to Nashville, Tennessee, he realized that the typical grocery store didn’t sell the kind of peaches he was used to eating—and he missed them terribly.

In 2012, Stephen and his wife, Jessica—a Seattle native who also became enamored with the fruit after visiting Stephen’s hometown—decided to take up the challenge of providing Nashvillians access to delicious, ripe Georgia peaches. They started selling peaches from the Georgia neighborhood farm of Stephen’s youth out of their ‘64 Jeep Gladiator pickup truck.

First, the couple sold peaches at roadside stands and farmers’ markets—the fruit was an immediate hit. Nine years later, they have expanded to a multi-truck team that will tour 33 states this summer, along with a website that offers nationwide shipping directly from Georgia peach farms. “[It’s] in the back of a UPS truck the same day it was picked,” Stephen said during a recent interview in Nashville.

A long line forms for The Peach Truck’s fresh peaches. (Courtesy of The Peach Truck)

Indeed, a peach from The Peach Truck tastes different. Biting into one of the Fiesta Gem peaches—with its flesh showing the colors of a fiery sunset—juices flow forth and a surprising tang comes through. Stephen compares it to a Sweet Tart, the iconic sweet and sour candy.

Georgia on My Mind

Stephen believes that Georgia’s climate and soil make it the perfect place to grow peaches. Georgia red clay has a particularly strong ability to hold nutrients in the topsoil. Winters are chilly and wet, while summers are excruciatingly hot and humid. “We like to say, ‘What’s bad for humans is good for peaches.’ You’re gonna have really sweet peaches as that peach suffers on the tree,” he said.

A peach orchard in Georgia. (Courtesy of The Peach Truck)

Peach varieties are plentiful as well—contrary to what one might expect from glancing at the supermarket offerings—from the Elberta, which shines a bright yellow when ripe and “tastes like candy,” according to Stephen, to the Harvester, which comes right off the pit and is perfect for canning.

Changing the Game

The couple realized that even when a peach is grown and picked at the perfect time of ripeness, if the product doesn’t reach the customer soon, the flavor suffers. So they worked out the logistics of getting fruit to people just days after it’s picked. The process requires managing inventory, so that peaches aren’t sitting in storage for more than three days. This means more trips to the farm, and thus, increased trucking costs—but that’s the cost of ensuring freshness.

“When you think of the traditional grocery-store route, what they want is shelf life. They want a product that can sit on the shelf for a long time. It continues to look good, it’s red,” Stephen said. Peaches are commonly harvested before they’re ripe and refrigerated in storage while traveling from a regional distribution center to a local one before finally arriving at the store—where they could sit on shelves for a week or more.

Biting into a fresh Georgia peach. (Courtesy of The Peach Truck)

When peaches get refrigerated before they ripen, they don’t soften up properly and sometimes take on the flavor of the fridge, leading to a mealy texture and bland taste. When buying peaches from The Peach Truck, the package comes with instructions for proper care: The fruit is to sit on the counter or in a paper bag until it gives a little when squeezed—at that point, it can go in the fridge.

Farm to Consumer

The Roses are proud that they’re able to cut out the middlemen and directly bring the product to consumers. “[It] enables us to reconnect customers to farmers,” Stephen said. Jessica lamented that the American food system has gotten “so complicated.”

“It got so efficiency-based instead of quality-based,” she said. “Everyone wants a perfectly round, red peach.”

The Peach Truck website states that the company only sources from farms that are “GLOBAL GAP (Good Agricultural Practices) or PRIMUS-certified”—voluntary audits verifying that produce is grown according to responsible food-safety and sustainability standards.

The Peach Truck does home deliveries across the country (all except four states). (Courtesy of The Peach Truck)

The couple hopes that their model can be applied to any type of produce. “We feel like the next evolution of this company is really connecting the American farmer to the end consumer—with whatever they’re growing. There’s great produce grown in this country, that never makes it to the end consumer because it might not meet the grocery stores’ demands of the shape and the size—but it tastes amazing,” Stephen said.

Last winter, The Peach Truck experimented with offering satsumas, a sweet mandarin orange variety originally from China and introduced to the West via Japan. Stateside, satsumas are grown in southern Georgia and northern Florida. The response from their peach fans was enthusiastic.

Of course, there are challenges to running a company that relies on the forces of Mother Nature. The Roses recalled that back in 2017, terrible weather ruined large amounts of the crop. Luckily, this year’s harvest is bountiful. They hope the summer will once again bring memorable experiences as people nationwide catch breaks from their perspiration by biting into delicious, ripe peaches, with juice running down their arms and all.

“At the end of the day, what it does is it provides gratitude for any time we have a great [harvest] … because every season is a gift, right?” Stephen said.

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Entrepreneurs Features

Gemstone Dreams

Dorian and Alexandrina Filip, the couple behind DSF Antique Jewelry, at their apartment in New York City. (Sam)

How a Romanian immigrant discovered a new path in America

Dorian Filip was a massage therapist in 2009, working aboard the Seabourn Odyssey on its maiden voyage around the Mediterranean. After some years in the industry, he had developed aches in his neck, shoulder, and hands that were increasingly painful, and thoughts of quitting were on his mind.

“I said, ‘If nothing works, I’ll go to the army—I’ll go spend five years there, and they’ll give me a pension after.’”

One fateful day, Filip was assigned to take care of one of the cruise passengers, Brian Albert, who had booked a spa appointment. The two struck up a conversation about life plans. Albert is a wholesale jewelry dealer, with an eye for spotting beautiful things from a young age; when he was 16, he started buying up trinkets at junk shops and selling them to family and friends.

Albert invited Filip to come to New York and learn the trade. Filip was unsure if this was his path, but Albert encouraged him.

“He asked me, ‘What do you like in life?’ And I said a few things that I liked,” such as cars and watches, Filip said. “He said, ‘If you like and understand those things, you’ll understand jewelry too.’”

American Dream

Filip took a leap of faith; about three months after that cruise, he flew to New York from his home country of Romania.

“In the beginning, I couldn’t really tell what was costume jewelry or what was really fine jewelry,” he said, referring to jewelry made with imitation gems or inexpensive materials, versus pieces crafted with precious metals and gemstones. “It was a little confusing.” Albert brought Filip to trade shows, antique shows, and estate sales, showing him the ropes of how to procure exquisite pieces for a bevy of Madison Avenue fine jewelers.

A Tiffany & Co bracelet with rubies and sapphires. (Sam)
Vintage Chanel earrings. (Sam)

Albert tends to buy from estates and other dealers, so as to procure for his clients one-of-a-kind items they haven’t seen before. He also taught Filip the importance of maintaining long-term relationships with clients—Albert is the kind of person who would throw cocktail parties for cruise staff, or meet a maitre d’, become fast friends, and sometime later end up on a vacation in Hungary together.

“We have been dealing with the same people … for 30, 40 years, and even longer,” Albert said.

There are plenty of fascinating stories from traveling around the world in search of beautiful jewelry. Albert recounted a time when he was visiting Turkey while on a cruise trip. He walked into a local shop and began chatting with the store operator.

“He pulled the box out of the safe and in the safe were some of the prettiest things you ever saw. There was a sautoir necklace with pearl and diamond tassels,” Albert said, getting excited as he recalled spotting the rare find. At the time, Albert didn’t have any money with him and had to return to the cruise ship soon, but the shop operator let Albert take the piece, telling him to send a check to his sister in the United States.

Sometimes “there’s this feeling you get when you do business with people, there’s a certain comfort level,” Albert said. Filip and Albert both deeply believe it was destiny that led to these seemingly happenstance discoveries—and also brought them together.

“When I met Brian the very first time, I had the feeling I knew Brian a long time already. … I guess people connect at the right time,” Filip said.

A New Venture

In 2010, Filip experienced his next life-changing event. While having dinner at a restaurant with Albert, he met the hostess, Alexandrina, who was working part-time there while pursuing a career in fashion. The two immediately connected, having both come from former Soviet countries—Alexandrina is from Moldova. Although they were good friends from the start, it was a business trip to Australia that made Filip realize how much he missed Alexandrina. The couple grew closer, and in 2015, they were married.

Alexandrina Filip wears a pair of David Webb 18K gold and rock crystal earrings. (Sam)

Around 2013, Filip and Albert opened a retail shop for the first time, DSF Antique Jewelry. With Alexandrina on board, the shop expanded its offerings to vintage designer handbags, costume jewelry, and other accessories. Albert does much of the sourcing, while the couple handles day-to-day operations. Amid the pandemic, they had to close the physical store, but have kept their online shop going.

As believers in traditional craftsmanship, they hope that more ordinary consumers will make wise investments and buy old. Antique pieces don’t have the costs of manufacturing or advertising in their price tags, and thus represent greater value for the money. Alexandrina said that among their clients, “the younger generation are more responsive to this … because they want a part of history, they want something that nobody else has. And it’s fashionable.”

Alexandrina Filip wears a pair of vintage tanzanite 18K white gold earrings; a Bulgari Parentesi watch in 18K white gold; a Bulgari Parentesi diamond necklace; and an estate diamond 18K yellow gold bracelet. (Sam)

Albert said that from his experience, antique pieces tend to exhibit finer workmanship: “They’re made by hand, they’re one of a kind.” People also cared for and maintained their valuables back in the day.

“Years ago, people bought things and they took care of them. That’s why so many of the old pieces that we buy, that come from the original families, are so well-preserved and loved—because they appreciated that.”

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Entrepreneurs Features

Turning Shutdowns Into Opportunity

Angela and Moe,longtime friends and co-founders of Sparrow Box.
Angela and Moe,longtime friends and co-founders of Sparrow Box. (Courtesy of Sparrow Box)

From the first hello, you can tell that Angela and Moe are go-getters ready to make things happen. Angela Knight and Maureen (Moe) Stone are both moms from Jupiter, Florida, who share a passion for their work and love for America. The friends have known each other and worked together for 15 years, first as partners in a successful charity, and then in event planning.

In March of 2020, not long after the onset in the states of COVID-19, Angela and Moe stepped out of quarantine, leaving their husbands at home, and drove to Liberty University to pick up Angela’s daughter’s belongings. Her daughter had come home for Spring Break, but was then not allowed to return to school. The ladies thought it would surely be a fun get-away road trip, but on the road they were shocked and devastated by the many, many failed businesses they saw along the way. ““The small southern towns seemed eerie with involuntary abandonment. It felt like a black and white episode of the Twilight Zone. Products were still on display inside the dark shops and upcoming sales and event signs of things that would not happen still littered the window,” said Angela. Moe added, “All these small businesses closed for so long, how will they ever come back from this?” They recognized that these weren’t just closed businesses, this scene was the destruction of the livelihood of hard-working Americans. For the next ten hours, they drove home brainstorming how they could do their small part to help their American community.

“We talked about what we wanted: to help others stay connected, feel loved and appreciated and fight the division that is plaguing our country. We talked about how to help these small businesses get going again once everything opened back up,” Angela said. Inspired by the diligent and joyful little sparrow, Angela and Moe chose Sparrow Box Company as the name of their endeavor to showcase hardworking American artisans and businesses. They’re businesses like Grey Ghost, a charming bakery in Charleston, South Carolina, where the friends had the opportunity to tour the bakery and hear from the founder the story of their journey of growth; and Willa’s Cookies, a mom-and-pop team; and Forest and Hyde, run by an entreprenurial young husband who had just bought a leather company to combine with his own.

Angela and Moe had previously worked at a nonprofit, Pink Purse, whose mission was to connect women with various causes, and in their seven years of work there were able to help 70 charities, organizations, and families. Taking their years of experience in marketing, communications, event planning, and design, the two friends sprinted out of the gate and are taking the gifting world by storm, connecting with a community of American vendors to create gifts that bring joy and beauty. It is important to them that they deal only with American-made products and that they are helping small businesses during these somewhat trying times.