Working his dream
A dirty towel hangs from the lumber rack in Lehtovirta's workshop. The smell of smoke fills the air, the remnant of a long cut with a dulling blade. Sawdust clings to his safety glasses, and he wipes them between folds in the towel.

The shop is cleaner today than it was yesterday. Tools that had been scattered are back in their racks. Planks of cypress are sorted by size on racks and in compartments.

"Once it gets really messy," Lehtovirta says, "you just have to clean up, and start over."

Lehtovirta knew that if he was going to succeed at this, it was going to be hard work. The first year, he made 250 chairs. His goal was to earn $4,000 a month — a little more than half of what he made in the best years of e-commerce.

He named his business Island Time Design. He was the advertising agent, the marketing consultant, the accountant, the financial advisor and the CEO. But most important, he was the artist.

Business trips were replaced with rides down the beach on a red bicycle. Captain's feathers were trimmed so he couldn't fly away, and he rode along, clinging to the handlebars. The pair became a regular sight on the beach.

Back in the workshop, Captain would sit on a perch "squawking along with the power tools." Lehtovirta branded the parrot's likeness into the chairs as a signature.

He expanded his lineup and branched into other designs. One day, the general manager of the Don CeSar Hotel and Spa, a luxury beachfront hotel, flagged down Lehtovirta and ordered 50 cabana chairs. "I thought, 'Boom! There is a God!'" Lehtovirta says.

He now sells his chairs on commission, online and at craft fairs. Prices range from $150 for a basic Adirondack to $850 for a high-backed lifeguard chair.

But still, there was a tradeoff. "When you do this, you're 100 percent on your own," Lehtovirta says. "There's no safety net at all."

In 2007, with a second child on the way, Lehtovirta went back to work for Fintech. But after a month of once again driving 25 miles to sit in a cubicle, he couldn't do it anymore.

"I found out how my parrot felt in his cage," Lehtovirta says. "Once you know your true occupation, you can never go back."

Today, Captain no longer rides along with Lehtovirta on the beach. Shortly after his last day at Fintech, Lehtovirta donated him to an exotic bird sanctuary. The parrot craved more attention than Lehtovirta and Natalia could give him while taking care of two children.

It was a hard decision, but it was the right one, Lehtovirta says.

Captain's wings aren't clipped anymore.

Prev   1   2   3   4   5