This week Kayleigh sits down inside the beautifully designed walls of Raleigh WorkUp, a niche co-working space built exclusively for interior designers, builders, architects, and contractors in the Triangle. Host Hilaire Martin, founder and creative visionary behind the space, shares how growing up in the interior design world (her mom's been designing in Raleigh for 45+ years) led her to build a co-working concept unlike anything else in the city, one with CR90 color-accurate lighting, a full resource library of fabric and wallpaper samples, private offices, and even an espresso bar.

Hilaire and Kayleigh get into the meaning behind the name, the "community over competition" mindset that drives the space, and the piece of advice from a close friend that's stuck with Hilaire ever since she started her business. Plus, a solid debate about the best burger in the Triangle.

Resources:

Website: raleighworkup.com

Instagram/LinkedIn: @raleighworkup

Location: Hutton Street, Raleigh (between Hillsborough St and Western Blvd)

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🔗 My Links:

• Email story ideas to AllUpInYourBusinessPod@gmail.com
• Follow / DM on Instagram: www.instagram.com/allupinyourbusinesspod
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/@AllUpInYourBusinessPod

Become a Supporter of the show for as little as $3 and get exclusive access to shows early, special interviews, and updates from guests! Support the show here

Jalen isn’t just a business owner, she’s basically a one-woman wellness empire. Between Raleigh Waxologist, Holistic Harmony (facials, spray tans, holistic skincare), her podcast She Thrives 101, and her women’s health workout + guided journaling events, she’s built a whole ecosystem around helping women feel good in their bodies.

In this episode, Kayleigh and Jalen get real about cycle syncing, hormone health nobody teaches you, the hard lesson Jalen learned about trusting employees, and why grassroots marketing beats social media every time.

Resources:

Raleigh Waxologist (downtown Raleigh)

Holistic Harmony Raleigh

She Thrives 101 podcast

Support the show

🔗 My Links:

• Email story ideas to AllUpInYourBusinessPod@gmail.com
• Follow / DM on Instagram: www.instagram.com/allupinyourbusinesspod
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/@AllUpInYourBusinessPod

Become a Supporter of the show for as little as $3 and get exclusive access to shows early, special interviews, and updates from guests! Support the show here

Kamar Perkins spent 13 years in the Army before building not one, but two businesses that are quietly changing lives across North Carolina. ProTech Consulting Group builds AI and machine learning solutions for federal, state, and local government (and yes, he'll explain what SAM.gov actually means). Priority Health, his medical clinics, provide addiction treatment and in-home elder care in Lumberton and Laurinburg, two areas close to his heart for reasons that get real personal, real fast.

Kayleigh and Kamar cover everything from cut sling loads (an Army phrase that applies way beyond the military) to why "find a problem, be the solution" might be the only business advice you actually need. There's also a stolen Mustang, a Moana quote that hits harder than expected, and a scholarship program giving real money to underfunded teachers.

Find Kamar:

LinkedIn (Kamar Perkins) | ProTech Consulting Group

Support the show

🔗 My Links:

• Email story ideas to AllUpInYourBusinessPod@gmail.com
• Follow / DM on Instagram: www.instagram.com/allupinyourbusinesspod
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/@AllUpInYourBusinessPod

Become a Supporter of the show for as little as $3 and get exclusive access to shows early, special interviews, and updates from guests! Support the show here

This week Kayleigh heads to downtown Cary to sit down with Paul Wasman and Sean Ryan, co-owners of The Albatross, a golf simulator bar born out of a $1.50 margarita and a whim trip to London. Paul and Sean walk through how their friendship (and a shared love of golf, beer, and beer league hockey) turned into one of downtown Cary's most in-demand spots, complete with a golf league so popular it's had a waitlist fill up in six minutes flat.

They dig into why they turned down franchising, how they built their food and drink program from scratch (including a smash burger that took six months to perfect), and the hard lessons they've each learned running a business together. Plus, the real meaning behind the name Albatross, and why it's rarer than you'd think.

Find them:

Website: thealbatrossnc.com

Instagram: @thealbatrossnc

Location: Downtown Cary, NC

Support the show

🔗 My Links:

• Email story ideas to AllUpInYourBusinessPod@gmail.com
• Follow / DM on Instagram: www.instagram.com/allupinyourbusinesspod
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/@AllUpInYourBusinessPod

Become a Supporter of the show for as little as $3 and get exclusive access to shows early, special interviews, and updates from guests! Support the show here

Kayleigh sits down with Teresa, the portrait photographer (and rising comedian) behind My Friend Teresa Studios in downtown Cary, for a conversation that goes from bank tellers questioning her business name to what a LinkedIn recruiter survey reveals about AI headshots.

Teresa built a 16-year photography career photographing everything except weddings, babies, and pets, and now she's starting over as a beginner again in stand-up comedy. They get into imposter syndrome, being taken seriously as a woman in male-dominated industries, why she meets every client in person before ever picking up her camera, and the moment her comedy coach told her the only way to fail is to stop having fun.

In this episode:

• How "My Friend Teresa Studios" got its name
• Fighting for credibility as a woman in photography and comedy
• Why real photos build more trust than AI-generated ones - the data behind it
• Detaching from outcomes and just having fun with something new

Find Teresa:

• Photography: My Friend Teresa Studios — downtown Cary studio
• Comedy: @laughwithteresa on Instagram

Support the show

🔗 My Links:

• Email story ideas to AllUpInYourBusinessPod@gmail.com
• Follow / DM on Instagram: www.instagram.com/allupinyourbusinesspod
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/@AllUpInYourBusinessPod

Become a Supporter of the show for as little as $3 and get exclusive access to shows early, special interviews, and updates from guests! Support the show here

Craig and Caz Makepeace didn't just fall in love with Raleigh, they fought a decade-long, White-House-visiting, tent-living, paperwork-hauling battle to be able to live here for good. The husband-and-wife team behind This Is Raleigh (and the globally recognized Y Travel Blog) sit down with Kayleigh to talk about how a teacher-exchange program in 2004 turned into an accidental green card journey, complete with a nearly-blown White House invite and eighteen months living out of a tent with two little kids.

Along the way they get into what it actually takes to build a brand people trust in a world of shifting algorithms and AI, why "growth is not linear," and their honest answer for what to do on the weeks you want to quit (because it happens more than people admit). Grab a coffee, this one's a journey.

Resources:

Website: thisisraleigh.com

Global travel site: ytravelblog.com

Instagram/Facebook: @thisisraleighnc | @ytravelblog

Support the show

🔗 My Links:

• Email story ideas to AllUpInYourBusinessPod@gmail.com
• Follow / DM on Instagram: www.instagram.com/allupinyourbusinesspod
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/@AllUpInYourBusinessPod

Become a Supporter of the show for as little as $3 and get exclusive access to shows early, special interviews, and updates from guests! Support the show here

Birthday Episode!! In this three parter, you will hear from my nephew and what he loves (and we share a birthday, so obviously he loves me enough to join me), my business teach from senior year of high school, and then the tables turn and she asks me advice I would give for students in high school.

Brenda Saunders has been teaching business and law at Greenwich High School in upstate New York for 24 years. She's also run the school's internship program, taught family consumer sciences, and somehow managed to be the safe space for countless students who needed a mentor.

This is Kayleigh's birthday episode - a conversation with the teacher who changed her mind about business when she was absolutely convinced she'd never go into it. Learn how Brenda went from being a college dropout working in insurance to becoming one of the most influential teachers in a small upstate New York town. Plus: why saying no is harder than it looks, how one name in a hat led to a 24-year career, and what it really takes to build a safe space for teenagers.

Resources:

• Greenwich High School, upstate New York
• Business, Law, Family Consumer Sciences (FACS), Internship Program
• Retiring in one year

Support the show

🔗 My Links:

• Email story ideas to AllUpInYourBusinessPod@gmail.com
• Follow / DM on Instagram: www.instagram.com/allupinyourbusinesspod
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/@AllUpInYourBusinessPod

Become a Supporter of the show for as little as $3 and get exclusive access to shows early, special interviews, and updates from guests! Support the show here

Scott is the co-founder of Sodabox, a dirty soda shop with six locations across the Triangle. He started the business in a shipping container in Apex with his brother Brent after moving to Raleigh from Utah in 2017.

Learn how Scott went from mixing sugar-free Red Bulls at a call center job to building a dirty soda empire across Raleigh. In this episode, Scott talks about why entrepreneurs are born (not made), the importance of speed over size, and why you should share your business idea with everyone instead of keeping it secret.

Plus: getting fired twice from the same pizza job, convincing a stranger to take a helicopter ride in Myrtle Beach, and why the "Sea Town Pops" drink honors his dad.

Resources:

• Sodabox: sodabox.love | @sodabox.love
• Scott's handle: @sodaboxscott
• Locations: Apex, Rolesville, Garner, North Hills Raleigh, Raleigh Boulevard, Cary/Morrisville

Support the show

🔗 My Links:

• Email story ideas to AllUpInYourBusinessPod@gmail.com
• Follow / DM on Instagram: www.instagram.com/allupinyourbusinesspod
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/@AllUpInYourBusinessPod

Become a Supporter of the show for as little as $3 and get exclusive access to shows early, special interviews, and updates from guests! Support the show here