Days out of prison, Brandon Lowery borrowed a lawn mower, borrowed a weed eater, borrowed a truck and started cutting grass for cash — the first dollars in his ex-offender’s business plan.
He would cut a lawn for free then knock on the neighbor’s door to show off his good work. As customers piled up, he learned to branch out and build patios by watching YouTube videos, one step at a time.
Now after 13 years, Lowery owns a pair of Pittsboro businesses: BLLC Landscaping and Royal Touch Mobile Detailing — a success story so attainable that he shared it Monday in front of a crowd of 50 inmates, all of them nervous about life outside the barbed-wire fence.
“I’m not rich,” he said, “but I’m good. The key is starting. I knew how to cut grass. I knew how to trim hedges. I knew how to weed-eat. I started with the basics. A mower. A blower. A weed eater and a rake. You know where you want to go, but you’ve got to kick it back to today. What can I do today?”
Starting a business with 500 bucks
Lowery spoke Monday at Sanford Correctional Center, a minimum security prison 40 miles southwest of Raleigh, as part of the nonprofit Inmates to Entrepreneurs program. Founded in Holly Springs, the group offers a free eight-week course to ex-offenders looking to start from nothing.
“We’re talking about how you start a business with 500 bucks,” co-founder Brian Hamilton said. “We want to get people making money in a week, not a year.”
As the inmates listened, they explained a pair of familiar facts: roughly two-thirds of the people released from prison get arrested again, and anyone with a felony arrest can expect rejected job applications and unanswered phone calls.
“We try to do anything we can to make sure none of them come back,” said Warden Ramon Gutierrez, who brings in presentations on re-entry once a month. “Something as simple as how to shake someone’s hand and how to make eye contact.”
For Lowery and Hamilton, the message to men leaving prison boiled down to this mantra: Keep it simple. Their tips:
▪ Print up business cards for $20 or $30.
▪ Post them in grocery stores and gas stations. Hand them out at Lowe’s.
▪ Get customers and cash flow before you buy equipment.
▪ Rent what supplies you can. Don’t buy a box truck when you can rent a U-Haul. For special jobs, buy a tool, use it once and take it back.
▪ Don’t worry about an EIN or an LLC at first. Hire an old, grumpy accountant — not a lawyer.
“Baby steps,” said Hamilton. “Get one job. Forget about employer identification numbers. Forget about lawyers. You baby-step it and then you get a little more confident.”
Some inmates overwhelmed with fear of failure
For Dominique Lamberth, that advice is intensely relevant.
He gets out of prison in 20 days after serving 15 months on a breaking-and-entering charge, and his future in Raleigh makes him a touch nervous.
“Just positive vibes only,” he said. “Just got to get it right this time. Just starting low. Don’t get overwhelmed with fear of failure. Can’t be afraid of failure if I’m starting low.”
The pull of a familiar life filled with corrupting people and places complicates any inmate’s return to society, and David Anthony Harris appreciated the speakers’ straight talk.
“They didn’t come to talk about investment capital,” said Harris, serving time until 2027 on drug charges. “They kept it simple. Right down in the dirt. Quick money is an addiction, regardless of how you get it. You sell a brick of cocaine at 19 and get $30,000, that’s an addiction.”
As he concluded, Lowery joked at how his old self would laugh at his new self for being a homebody, a husband and father to four children, never going out late. “I used to call people lames and squares,” he said. “I don’t drink. I don’t smoke. It’s OK to live in a house and live in a regular house. That’s a peaceful life.”
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