041 - Kaye Bentley of Asheville Rooftop Bar Tours on Career Change, Following Through, and Asheville History

A former postal service worker, Kaye Bentley, founded Asheville Rooftop Bar Tours in July of 2018. The idea came to her just a year before she retired from the postal service. “I knew that eventually, I would retire from the postal service, but I just thought I would volunteer for some organizations and possibly travel,” she says.

Of course, as we now know, things didn’t exactly go the way she thought they would.

One day while a work, Kaye asked a colleague if she wanted to go out to some rooftop bars around town. As she was planning the bar route, she thought to herself, “If there was a tour for that, I would totally take it.” But there wasn’t anything like it out there.

On a whim, she called GoDaddy that day and bought the domain for Asheville Rooftop Bar Tours thinking that eventually “somebody will want to use this.”

She didn’t think that that “somebody” would be her. As time went on, Kaye continued thinking about the idea. “I kept taking notes and audio voice memos on my phone saying someone could do it like this and do it like that. And then I realized after about two or three months that that ‘someone’ was me. The idea just wouldn’t leave me alone.”

For the rest of the story, you’ll have to tune in to the podcast!

Here’s What You’ll Learn in this Episode

• How Kaye started and developed Asheville Rooftop Bar Tours
• The steps she took to get her idea off the ground, from developing the branding and website to building relationships with rooftop bars around town and getting her first customers
• Kaye’s marketing strategies
• Challenges of growing the business — especially for Kaye who didn’t come from a business background
• Why moving to a co-working space has changed Kaye’s work-life balance
• A glimpse of Kaye’s postal service career
• What’s coming up for Asheville Rooftop Bar Tours

For complete show notes, including some supplementary information from this episode visit: MakingItInAsheville.com/041

To see our upcoming social events and workshops, visit: MakingItInAsheville.com/events

To recommend an interviewee, visit: MakingItInAsheville.com/podcast

Curious to learn more about what we do? Making It Creative is a boutique marketing agency in Asheville. We are dedicated to working with small business owners that are deeply passionate about what they do by helping them build and improve their sales and communication strategies. Learn more here.

Music by Commonwealth Choir

If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, like, review, and/or share! It helps to spread the word and get more eyes on Asheville's makers.

Check out Making It in Asheville on other platforms!
https://www.instagram.com/makingitinasheville/ https://www.makingitinasheville.com/youtube/ https://makingitinasheville.com/subscribe/