Editorial | The Next Great Eastern Kentucky Business Could Start in Your Garage

The latest jobs report wasn't encouraging.

National hiring slowed dramatically. Wage growth continues to trail inflation. Businesses across multiple industries are becoming more cautious about adding employees.

For many people, that report brings uncertainty.

For me, it brings opportunity.

Not because the economy is perfect—it clearly isn't—but because moments like these have often produced some of America's greatest entrepreneurs.

Perhaps we've become too dependent on waiting for someone else to hire us.

Maybe it's time to start hiring ourselves.

When I left Amazon earlier this year, Robin Boraski, my former manager, shared something with me that has stuck in my mind ever since.

She said:

At first, that's a difficult statement to hear.

But the more I thought about it, the more I realized she wasn't predicting the end of work.

She was predicting the evolution of work.

History has seen this before.

The Industrial Revolution changed manufacturing.

The automobile changed transportation.

The internet changed business.

Artificial intelligence is simply the next chapter.

We can fear it.

Or we can learn it.

One of the biggest misconceptions people have is believing they need a huge amount of money to start a business.

That's simply not true.

Look around Eastern Kentucky.

We have people who know how to:

Those aren't just skills.

They're businesses.

Many successful companies begin with nothing more than one person deciding, "I'm going to give this a try."

Some of the easiest businesses to start require surprisingly little investment:

Many of these can begin as weekend jobs while you still have full-time employment.

Eventually...

That side hustle may become your career.

One of my favorite business stories isn't about billion-dollar investments.

It's about two old doors.

When Jeff Bezos started Amazon in 1994, he operated from a rented garage. Instead of purchasing expensive office furniture, he built desks using inexpensive wooden doors laid across supports—a symbol of keeping costs low and focusing on growth rather than appearances. Today, Amazon has grown into one of the world's most valuable companies, worth well over $2 trillion in market value.

Think about that.

The company wasn't born in a skyscraper.

It wasn't started with marble floors.

It didn't begin with hundreds of employees.

It began in a garage.

The point isn't that everyone will build the next Amazon.

The point is that you don't have to start at the top.

You simply have to start.

There's another lesson in all of this.

Artificial intelligence isn't just changing Silicon Valley.

It's changing Morehead.

It's changing Rowan County.

It's changing every profession.

A few weeks ago, I read an article predicting that by around 2040, much of the embalming process could be performed with AI-assisted technology and robotics. As someone who spent twenty years as a licensed embalmer, that's a strange thought.

Last week, I had another conversation that drove the point home even further.

Someone who works at a law firm told me another attorney had remarked that, at least today, the only person in many law offices who cannot truly be replaced by AI is the attorney. Receptionists, paralegals, office managers, scheduling, drafting routine documents, client communications—many of those functions can already be automated or heavily assisted by AI.

Whether every prediction proves true isn't really the issue.

The issue is this:

Technology doesn't ask our permission before it changes the world.

But it does give us a choice.

We can ignore it...

Or we can master it.

Imagine a lawn care company using AI to answer customer messages 24 hours a day.

Imagine a local photographer using AI to create marketing campaigns.

Imagine a carpenter designing projects with AI before ever cutting the first board.

Imagine a local bakery writing advertisements, designing menus, managing inventory, and creating social media posts in minutes instead of hours.

The skill still belongs to the person.

AI simply becomes another tool.

Just like a hammer.

Just like a computer.

Just like the internet did thirty years ago.

The latest jobs report tells us employers are slowing down.

That doesn't mean we have to.

Eastern Kentucky has never lacked hardworking people.

We've simply spent too many years believing success had to come from someone else's payroll.

Maybe the next chapter looks different.

Maybe the next generation won't spend forty years working for one company.

Maybe they'll build companies of their own.

Some will fail.

Some will pivot.

Some will succeed beyond anything they imagined.

But every single successful business starts the same way.

One decision.

One customer.

One job.

One step.

If this economy teaches us anything, it's this:

Don't build your future on the hope that someone else keeps hiring.

Build it on your own skills.

Invest in yourself.

Learn AI.

Adapt.

Keep learning.

Because the future won't belong to those who resist change.

It will belong to those who are willing to grow with it.

And who knows?

The next great American success story may not begin in Silicon Valley.

It may begin in a garage right here in Eastern Kentucky.

— Joe Clark, Publisher
The Morehead Minute