I am taking part in a startup revival in my area. I was quoted in the article below about entrepreneurship and building the area up.

Check it out!!!

By Andrew M. Seder aseder@timesleader.com
Times Leader Staff Writer

Hoping to give local entrepreneurs and college students a chance to learn from those who have successfully launched their own ventures, Clarks Summit native Stephen Douglass is bringing a StartUp Scramble to the area next week.

“I think it’s a great tool for entrepreneurs,” Carey said. “Not just those who want to start up a business, but for those who are in the first year too.”

Carey said he couldn’t pass up a program like this being offered so close to home.

“I was born and raised in this area. I’ve seen it go through various things, but as a citizen of this area it would be great to build this area up instead of moving away,” said Carey, a 2005 graduate of Meyers High School and a Wilkes-Barre resident.

Douglass, 27, founder of Young Impact, a company he describes as “an interactive edutainment company,” said the program has been held elsewhere, most recently in Washington, D.C.

“This is a community building event,” Douglass said. He said the aim is to take concepts and ideas and “create ventures from scratch in 54 hours.”

Jarod Grossman, who attends Drew University in Madison, N.J. and lives in Shavertown, will be at the program looking for ideas on starting a business. The 20-year-old Wyoming Seminary graduate has a dual major in chemistry and environmental science. He said he has some ideas for businesses involving his areas of study.

“I think stuff involving the environment is really big right now,” Grossman said. “I just think I’m going to learn a lot and meet some people to help get me started in my career.” He sees the July 30 through Aug. 1 program as a way to not only learn tricks of the trade but also to network and make connections he may be able to call on in the future.

Participants also will be able to get advice from local specialists, including Brian Petula, an attorney who specializes in business startups and also teaches at Marywood University, and Karla Porter, director of Workforce Development and Human Resources for the Greater Wilkes-Barre Chamber.

Porter said this kind of an event could lead to great things for the area.

WHO WANTS TO GO?

Featuring presentations from startup owners who have been on the ground floor, such as Kris Jones, founder of Pepperjam, and Peter Kamali of meetup.com, the three-day retreat gives those who want to start a business or who are in the early stages a chance to hear voices of experience.

Scott Carey sits with some of the drums he’s reconditioned at his Breaker Boy Drums and Percussion workshop in Wilkes-Barre. Carey will be participating in a StartUp Scramble at the University of Scranton, which is geared to allow entrepreneurs to share ideas and success stories.

http://www.timesleader.com/business/Starting_it_up_07-21-2010.html

Bang on this drum …
Up Close & Personal
By Eric Scicchitano – Diamond City Weekly

Having a fouled-up instrument in marching band is certainly not novel, but fixing it up and eventually translating that into a business is. That’s the path Scott Carey, 23, has traveled. The Elmer L. Meyers alum turned his tinkering into an enterprise during his senior year at King’s College. Now with partner Gerald Lamark, he’s heading up Breaker Boy Drums and Percussion, which will open its first storefront on Casey Avenue in the coming months. He uses shells from Keller, as well as RCI acrylic shells, for now, but is focused on product development and designing his own shells and hardware. Have a look at his products at Breakerboydrums.com, but first, meet Scott Carey …

Tell us how you got into fabricating drums.

Well, I was in high school playing in the marching band and my first drum was held together with duct tape; absolutely horrible.

So you had the worst drum in band?

Basically! And I spent six years in school learning how a drum works, the different parts of it, and I repaired a bunch of drums. When I went on to college, I was like, “I’m bored,” so I started ordering some shells, tested it out to see what I could do and I turned it into a business my senior year.

And you were making them for yourself at first.

Yeah. One of my best friends gave me a shell that was laying around in his basement, and I said, “You know, I can refinish that. Let’s see what I can do with it.” So I just took it, cleaned all the hardware up and made it look real nice and just went from there. After I finished that shell, I bought another shell and did something basic to it — I did all the veneer work, painting it, spraying it, you name it.

Are you handy in other trades?

This is all I’ve ever done. I never really got into any other type of woodwork. Everything I’ve learned with woodwork, like with routers and drillpresses, I’ve learned through doing the drums. … It was all do it yourself. I went online and researched it.

You got better with trial and error.

Yeah. The drum I repaired in high school, I probably made it worse. From there I just learned and learned and learned. When I first started doing veneers it was really tough because you had to get the veneers to totally fit onto the wood, and there were times when it would bubble up on us. After awhile we got it down right.

At what point did you realize you could make a dollar off this?

When I started to compare my work to other companies. At first when I was building stuff I was looking at other drum companies, trying to compare my drums to theirs and make something just as good. Eventually I started to build stuff that was better. It sounded a lot better, it was well put together. Everything from the hardware to the finish, I just liked it and thought it was a lot better. (Holds up a drum shell.) When do you ever see a drum with a finish like that; like a really hand-rubbed, high-glossed ebony finish?

And if you don’t want to use this for a drum you can make a really cool looking vintage lampshade.

Basically. We screwed up a drum and we were like, “Yeah, let’s make a table out of it.” It’s a very costly business. If you build a Web site and you screw up all you have to do is replace the design or the code. If you screw up the wood, yeah you could fill it and make it look like it’s fixed but it’s not going to sound as good. We’re always very detailed to our work and very patient.

Who is your partner?

Gerald Lamark. He came to me as a customer. I was working in my basement by myself, me and my dad, and Gerald had some cool ideas. I said, “Why don’t you come down and watch us build drums and hang out?” I wanted to expand my business and see what kind of talent I could draw from the area. He was all about it.

Was he like an apprentice?

Kind of, but he knew a decent amount about drums too, so I learned from him and he learned from me. Right now Gerry does stuff that he’s good at and I do stuff that I’m good at. When something comes in like a high-gloss finish he’ll do that because he’s more comfortable with a spray gun. If someone needs something drilled like an off-set drill pattern, I’ll do it because I like to lay out the drum.

It’s a tough go right now for small business. What gives you the confidence that a niche business like this will fly?

It is tough. We’ve actually run into issues where one month we didn’t make any money, and it’s like, “Can we do this?” But we keep putting our name out there. We’re grassroots, always talking to people. I was real down one night, although I knew I had a great product, and I ended up going to a bar one night and started talking to a drummer and I made a sale in like 20 minutes. So that stuff kind of keeps me going. I’ll lend out drums to drummers who want to play them, promote my name and kind of build partnerships like that. Right now it’s a tough economy, but I believe in our product and I believe we’re one of the best custom builders out there.

Who are some of the area drummers who are playing a Breaker Boy drum right now?

Ben Russin from Title Fight, AJ Jump of Underground Saints, Zack Baldassari of Kartune. I ave a few kids playing snares, they’re not really in bands that are known. I actually shipped a drum kit last week out to Arizona to Esteban’s drummer. Our drums are getting out there. It’s a tough economy but people are seeing our product, hearing our product and they’re liking it and buying it.

source: http://www.diamondcityweekly.com/features/story.asp?id=50343
-escicchitano@timesshamrock.com

Last week Scott Carey, owner/president, was interviewed by Kenny Luck for The Weekender, NEPA’s #1 local arts and entertainment paper, about Breaker Boy. This is the article:

Scott and Gerald

Drum maker marches to own beat

by Kenny Luck
Weekender Intern

When Scott Carey told some of his friends that he was going to start a business in the middle of an economic recession, many of them were skeptical.

“A lot of people didn’t think it was a good idea, but I don’t let that get me down. I still believe in my product, I still believe in myself, and I still believe that when a person wants a really high-end custom drum kit that we could build it for them.”

Carey, 23, a King’s College graduate, is the owner of Breaker Boy Drums, a Wilkes-Barre-based business that he started in early 2009. Starting a business was, according to Carey, an idea he had been considering for a long time.

“When I was in high school I always played on really bad drums in the marching band,” he explains. “My first drum was practically duct taped together.”

But it was not until his senior year at King’s when Carey decided to put together a business plan to make his dream turn into a reality. His efforts immediately paid off. He won the King’s College Entrepreneurship Business Plan Competition and a year later won a business grant of $20,000 and $30,000 in donated services at the 7th Annual Greater Valley Technology Alliance Business Plan Competition held at Mohegan Sun at Pocono Downs last April.

What is unique about Breaker Boy is that the company treats drum construction like an art form. Carey, along with business associate Gerald LaMark, works closely with its clients, consulting them on every aspect of the process. Whether choosing between wood-types such as maple, mahogany, or acrylic to selecting what type of finish to apply to the drum shells, Carey makes sure that each drum kit is custom built for each drummer’s needs. Not surprisingly, there is a lot to consider. From planning to product the process takes about a month.

“There are a lot of factors,” Carey observes. “First we have to figure out what [the drums] are going to be used for, the playing style, whether or not they are going to be used live or in the studio. The final step is I recommend a finish. Our specialty, what we really love to do, is we take really exotic veneers and apply it to the outer drum shell. You get a really nice look and finish.”

Others agree. Ben Russin, the drummer for the pop-punk band Title Fight, which toured with New Found Glory this fall, has been playing a Breaker Boy drum kit all across America. From an Orlando, Fla., tour stop, Russin took a minute to praise Carey’s work.

“The drum set is working great,” he says with confidence. “This is the first tour that I’ve taken it out and, honestly, it’s probably better than any other set I’ve ever played on. It sounds great and the sound guy has been complimenting me. I’ve got tons of compliments on the look and sound.”

Russin and the other members of Title Fight are originally from Kingston, and it was Breaker Boy’s unique approach which initially gained the bands attention. Other Breaker Boy endorsers include A.J. Jump of Underground Saints and Miz; LaMark, a member of Goodbye Soundscape; and Zach Baldassari of Kartune.

No other local music business offers custom drum kits, Carey said.

“You go to a music store around here and you are going to just get something manufactured off the shelf,” Carey pointed out. “But if you come to us you are going to get something totally custom made for you.”

“I noticed that I have a lot of people coming to me for parts like drum heads, lugs, and hoops. Basically what I want to do is launch an e-commerce store for drum parts. People can go on the site and if they need to replace something, or if they want to build their own kit, we will supply the parts to them.”

Despite the skepticism of naysayers, what began as a vague idea for one area King’s College student has now grown into a successful small business.

“In a few years,” Carey says, “my ultimate goal is to be the leading custom drum suppler and manufacturer.”

source: http://www.theweekender.com/music/Drum_maker_marches_to_own_beat_01-26-2010.html