The 85 South Show with Karlous Miller, DC Young Fly and Chico Bean - #BlackMarket- AJ Dewberry w/ Karlous Miller

Episode Date: November 21, 2022

AJ Dewberry pulls up up to Black Market and shares his Journey on how he started his phone repair and phone accessories business 'Level 10 Repairs'. Dewberry tells us stories he had while working at UPS as truck loader, then moving up to become supervisor.  || Subscribe to 85 SOUTH on YouTube: www.youtube.com/c/The85SouthShow || Twitter/IG: @85SouthShow || Our Website: www.85southshow.com || Custom Merch: www.85apparelco.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. I knew I wanted to obey and submit, but I didn't fully grasp for the rest of my life what that meant. For My Heart Podcasts and Rococo Punch, this is The Turning, River Road. In the woods of Minnesota, a cult leader married himself to 10 girls and forced them into a secret life of abuse. But in 2014, the youngest escaped. Listen to the Turning River Road. road on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Join IHeart Radio and Sarah Spain in celebrating the one-year anniversary of IHart

Women's Sports. With powerful interviews and insider analysis, our shows have connected fans with the heart of women's sports. In just one year, the network has launched 15 shows and built a community united by passion. Podcasts that amplify the voices of women in sports. Thank you for supporting IHeart Women's Sports and our founding sponsors, Elf Beauty, Capital and Novartis. Just open the free IHeart app

and search IHeard Women's Sports to listen now. Welcome to Pretty Private with Ebeney, the podcast where silence is broken and stories are set free. I'm Ebeney, and every Tuesday I'll be sharing all new anonymous stories that would challenge your perceptions and give you new insight on the people around you.

Every Tuesday, make sure you listen to Pretty Private from the Black Effect podcast network. Tune in on the IHeart Radio app Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Your entire identity has been fabricated. Your beloved brother goes missing without a trace. You discover the depths of your mother's illness. I'm Danny Shapiro.

And these are just a few of the powerful stories I'll be mining on our upcoming 12th season of Family Secrets. We continue to be moved and inspired by our guests and their courageously told stories. Listen to Family Secrets Season 12 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Summer's here, and with the kids home and off to camp, it's easy for moms to get lost in the shuffle. On Good Mom's Bad Choices, we're making space to center ourselves with joy, rest, and pleasure. Take the kids to camp.

You know what? It was expensive. But I was also thinking, if you have my kid, this is kind of priceless. Take her, feed her, make core memories. I don't have to do anything. Main thing, I don't have to do anything. To hear this and more, listen to Good Mom's Bad Choices from Black Effect Podcast Network on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Time to get to work.

You don't know what that sound mean? That means that the black market is open, man. This bill attracts money to the business. Okay, they all wore green. Yeah, I see. Man, look at this. What did this suit you got on? Man, I got this from ASOS, actually.

Man, stand up. This suit looked real fucking untrustworthy. I just want them to see it. Because my audience like to laugh at shit like that, bro. You spend a lot of money on this shit, too, then. Nah, no, no. I'm a smart shopper. I know, can you buy this shit of stuff?

This is too small. This little call on more than back. A little bit ass soup. Hey, not where'd you day? Your shoes bigger than your suit, me. Y'all got shoes too. Somebody pick the camera up and get this suit. This shit ridiculous, man.

I wouldn't have you on it like that. The fuck did you come out of a tube, my name? They squeeze this thing out of a toothpaste tube. Sit your ass down, man. Where the hell you're just wearing little suits? Badges? You got a little tie to go with it. Yep, skin and tie.

That's how I know you got to get money, bro. When you wear a suit like that, you don't get a fuck by no job no more. You're crazy, man. You're not going to be on American Horror Story or something. Nah. What happened? Something in a little green suit got me. I don't know what happened after that.

No, man. I'm just messing with me. You know, it's all in good fun. I'm a comedian, darling. But welcome to the black market slash trap. It's the black market in the day time. Then it's a trap at night, man. I heard you've been very successful over there.

I got one of the number one electronics repair stores in Atlanta, founder, CEO, level 10, repairs. My man, A.J. Dewberry. Welcome, welcome. How you been? Been good, man, been good. Just been grinding and been just continuously mentoring and trying to inspire all to do the same thing. Man, give them a brief rundown on how you got it to this point. It's crazy how it started. So at first, I was a supervisor at UPS. I was a senior college.

What does the supervisor at EPS even do? UPS, we, I was just watching other people telling them what to do, because we, I used to load trucks. Oh, where? So that way I started out doing, I was loading trucks, and then I got promoted from there to be a supervisor. How they proposed? Like, damn AJ, you's a truck loading, my boy. Hey, we got something else for you. You're too good at this truckload.

Hey, but yeah, I don't get employed a month, like my third month down. Hell no. Yeah, and then like two months after that. On the wall and everything. On the wall, I have my certificate, nah. What they give you for that? Just a certificate? I had like a $20 a sub way you can give for us.

You make your ass off for a month for two subs. Yeah. You know, they probably got a lot though. Right. Yeah, I only got two subs. But now, let me ask you this, though, as a business owner, do you see, like, how incentives like that can motivate the people that work for you? It's a long way.

Don't give them $20 shit, but I'm saying, like, people like to be rewarded. Yeah. For they hard work. Yeah. and then, you know, it just... Make it feel like they're a part of something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, they're like, well, I know you're going to look out for me,

so, you know, I don't got no reason to even think about going to get you. Yeah, it brings the best out of people. Yeah. Okay, so you do that, and then what? What happens after you decide? I ain't employer of the month, especially for no $20. After that, I was just talking to them because I had wanted to go corporate when I graduated. Because at that time, by employer the month, it was like the beginning of my senior year.

Of high school? No, college. Oh, okay. I was about to say, ain't no way in the hell I'm about to let my supervisor be in the 12th grade. Hey, I wish, though. By the way, I was the youngest supervisor at the Forest Park Hub. Okay, bad. I can use your project, yeah.

They'll do that. So I'll say about, you know, two months after the employer the month, you know, he would just talk to me about being supervisor. I'm like, yeah, I'll take tests or whatever. That way I can move on up because you've got to be a supervisor so he can get in the hub to go corporate. Okay. So I took all the tests and everything and came out. pretty good so a month later that's when it started but i'm thinking i'm gonna have less stuff to do but that would really give me more stuff to do like yeah i was watching everybody else

being sure they did what they had to do too but then i have to go inside and i got to do computer work i'm like i got to do computer right now so i got to you know out of pick up my people's slack and stuff like that but it really was a learning lesson for me right because it taught me everything that i used in my business now as far as my employees and how i moved to do things for my staff. Right. When did you establish your business? And what was the driving force behind us?

Um, so three months after I was a supervisor came spring break. So it was like March of my senior year. Me and my cousin, we had went to LA, been out there, made me dream. I'm like, I want to live like these people. I said, I want to just ride in my car and not, you know, care or have to clock in nobody. I just want to build my own terms. I literally came back. And I just said, I got my refund check, too.

That's how I was able to go. Exactly. and all that exactly so that was my lair refund check so I'm like I need to some with this money so I just this short work they were calling me blowing me up no call no you know UPS they got like counseling they got like a whole bunch of different stuff for you they like do you need to see one of our counselors and all that I'm like nah I'm all right I'm all good so they like I don't know wrong with him man he's the young supervisor he's about go corporate he just quit I

what's wrong with him so they really thought something wrong but I just had a vision that only I had at that time. When I heard to my parents, I quit. My dad told me I was stupid. He was like, you got a good job, you know, stuff like that. I should have stayed with it. My mom, she always trusted me. She was like, I know you're going to do what you got to do.

Because I never been in type to call home and need something. So that's why she felt that she was like, well, she know how am I been. So that's when I just went home and I struggled on Instagram. And I'm like, hmm, I want to do something innovative. And I say I can either do a shirt print business, a photography business, or I can do cell phone repair. I had some way to experience in all those things. So I'm like, I know if I, you know,

put my all in one of those, I can get to work. Yeah. When did you get your experience in repairing phone? I had tried to fix my all. My first phone was iPhone 4. This was my freshman year of college. I had worked screened off Amazon and I tried to fix it and it didn't work.

Yeah, it just started smoking. Yeah, it started smoking. And then from there, I just had ordered another scrim. I was like, I got to get their phone to work. So then it worked. So from there, that was like my, you know, it was a little experience that I had, but I was like, I knew if I can get that way.

It just went out, like, I had fixing myself. Yeah. Yeah, I quit my job before I knew what I was going to do. Like, it really was like, it's a blessing for real. Yeah. So, yeah, so once I actually figured out what I was going to do. I just started doing a lot of research on Instagram, on YouTube and stuff. YouTube University taught me everything. Shout out YouTube University.

No excuses. No excuses. No excuses. And it crazy because I graduated that same semester, but YouTube taught me everything. So yeah, I literally was on YouTube for about 45 hours a day, and I'll get like everybody old cell phones, all my friends old phones, I phone 5, 6, 6. and now I'll just be tacking them apart and putting them back together. I didn't have my screens yet. I had ordered screens off eBay. I went on doing to come in,

but in the meantime, you know, I found like some glasses toolkit, so I was just using that to open and just builds my own experience until everything came I needed. With me doing everything by myself without a mentor, I ended up spending too much money on stuff I didn't need. So I ain't spend about $5,500 for everything,

but I only need just. It's been like 2000. Damn. Yeah. But, you know, I still had everything I needed anyway. So I just kept perfecting my craft, kept working, kept building. So I would spend, like I said, 45 hours a day on YouTube and just hands on learning. After that, I would get on Craigslist and Instagram post ads for like an hour, consistently.

On Instagram, I was running up my followers. I had got up to 7500 because they wouldn't let me follow more to 7500 people at the time. And I just had a picture that I stole off Google or it's a whole bunch of crack screens on the floor. So I posted that picture and I was just following people. So they get saw a screen, well, crack screens and they said, come soon from my couch. So, you know, they saw some stuff by my bio,

but I didn't say it was me. I didn't pick my name and then and then I just had them thinking it was a random person. Because at first I was thinking like I just wanna, you know, build my brand, because that was not mainly focus on. So I ended up coming up with a brand called Level 10. And today, level 10 consists of, you know, repairs,

level 10 in France which is my non-profit Level 10 music which is a music group that I have okay so at that time like I wanted to get started something because I was engineering at that time too I had artists I was engineering for so at that time

I'm thinking somewhat so at that time I'm thinking like I'm going to have a phone shop and I don't have a studio in the back I don't draw it on sheet paper I'm in my apartment still this before I even went out of my first phone I'm already just just drawing everything got just really envisioning why I want to be and I'm setting deadlines to get stuff done so I can get that too because you got to say going it like you already got it

even in the building oh I had watched Wolf's Wall Street too I saw that movie literally like two weeks before I quit my job and they help inspired it too yeah so yeah I'm just like I said it's really with a time management for me because I had to adapt to being in my own time too you know it's not like I can just go in the building and I got to be here at this time here at this time here at this time I really had to sit down and set my own schedule right like be like well I'm making up at nine like I would go and work my job and I need to do this and this time this and that time and the whole time I start my business I'm still in college I'm still in school

trying to do homework riding the campus knocking out classes all that and then so summer that's when I finished school I ended up grinding up enough to from my business to pay my own tuition so it was just me like really just trying to just complete everything I was started honestly so that's the inception the beginning like yeah what major what was the next step taking it to the next level so at three weeks after I quit my job I'm just training training training that's when I first launched the business so April 22nd 2015 that were the very first day I was mobile and I made mistake and it was a blessing at the same time because of learning

experience so I did 50% off everything my first two days in business but I was booked open and closed but that's why I was doing 50% off I ain't made no money but I built word of mouth and because I was young and I was trying to do something with myself people they love to see it so they just start spreading word to other people and really word of mouth help me more than anything yeah what's your IG and all that now like How can they get in touch with you? You can follow the business page at level 10 repairs.

That's number 10, L-E-E-L-0-E-P-A-I-R-S. Or me at AJ underscore Dewberry. Okay, you have to tell me some more about your other businesses that you got also. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So you got music group. What else? Cereal Investor?

Basically, yeah. Yeah, I do a little real estate. Nah, right, like, what's your educational background? He's a well-spoken man, you're smart, apparently, you know what I mean? Not apparently, shit, we're seeing it in motion, so it's like... Well, it's crazy is, like, I come from a family where my father didn't graduate high school. My mom, all she did was graduate. So I don't really comfort, you know what I'm saying, too much education.

Like, when I was in high school, getting ready to go to college, it would just me and my counselors. I didn't have no help. You know what I'm saying? You know what I really, I just tried to really change where I was at. I went to all being state. At first. At first? Yeah.

And then when I moved to Atlanta, I had finished at Cling State. Okay. Clayton State. And I moved to Atlanta because I want to start a business. I didn't know what I was going to start. I was thinking I'm probably do some real estate or something like that. But my vision is different. I mean, yeah, I do.

I do here and now. That's what I was about to tell you, though. I was asking about your educational background. It's like, bro, it's something about you. You got a light, man. Like, you're a young man, bro. Try to take over as much of this shit as you can. Like the way that you sell.

self-educated, self-motivated, driven. You got unlimited potential. Yeah. Especially if you keep your same outlook and don't get jaded by the world, bro. You know how hard it is to do anything, especially something by yourself and from the ground up. And you having to know how and, you know, the intuition, to put this with this and to make that happen. Bro, I can't do nothing but salute that. Please, please, please, please.

Yeah, man. So let them know what they can get in touch with you, how they can come. how they can come spend some money with you. Oh, y'all. Signed to the music group or do some investors or whatever it is that you might be doing at the moment. All right. We have three store locations.

We have one downtown Atlanta at 212 Pride Street, right by the courthouse. Everybody know where to jail in Atlanta at. We literally walk a distance right across the street. We have a location in Tire Boulevard in Jonesboro, Georgia, right on the south side, and one down in Griffith, Georgia, my hometown. And we do things like fit cell phones,

fits the backglass sort of phones, cameras, batteries, everything. Your cell phones, buy phones, tablets, computers. So if you got all the old iPads and MacBooks sitting around at the crib, you don't know what to do with them, hollered this young man right here. He can put that back together for you. I'm about to take in my, I got the Apple with the big back.

Uh-oh. The see-through joint now. Yeah. No, man, we're gonna make sure that we, that we blow your business up and we, you know, people know exactly how to get in touch with you. My dog, his phone broke right now. I'm gonna see what you give us an estimate at least.

Gotta come see him, I got you. Nah, I bet, man. I know everybody want to upgrade to the iPhone 14 too, so we're doing a special right now. We're doing $100 to fix the back glass over your current phone if it broke. You got a 13 or 12 that's broke. You want to trade it in?

We're doing a special for $100. My man, A.J. Dewwell, level 10 repairs. The black market is open. Hell, you're talking about it. Get you a suit like A.J. I knew I wanted to obey and submit, but I didn't fully grasp for the rest of my life what that meant. For My Heart Podcasts and Rococo Punch, this is The Turning, River Road. In the woods of Minnesota, a cult leader married himself to 10 girls and forced them into a secret life of abuse.

But in 2014, the youngest escaped. Listen to the Turning River Road on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Join IHeart Radio and Sarah Spain in celebrating the one-year anniversary of IHeart Women's Sports. With powerful interviews and insider analysis,

our shows have connected fans with the heart of women's sports. In just one year, the network has launched 15 shows and built a community united by passion. Podcasts that amplify the voices of Women in Sports. Thank you for supporting IHeart Women's Sports and our founding sponsors,

Elf Beauty, Capital One, and Novartis. Just open the free IHeart app and search IHeard Women's Sports to listen now. Welcome to Pretty Private with Ebeney, the podcast where silence is broken and stories are set free. I'm Ebeney, and every Tuesday I'll be sharing all new anonymous stories that would challenge your perceptions and give you new insight on the people around you. Every Tuesday, make sure you listen to Pretty Private from the Black Effect Podcast Network. Tune in on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Your entire identity has been fabricated.

Your beloved brother goes missing without a trace. You discover the depths of your mother's illness. I'm Danny Shapiro. And these are just a few of the powerful stories I'll be mining on our upcoming 12th season of family secrets. We continue to be moved and inspired by our guests and their courageously told stories. Listen to Family Secrets Season 12 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Summer's here, and with the kids home and off to camp, it's easy for moms to get lost in the shuffle. On Good Mom's Bad Choices, we're making space to center ourselves with joy, rest, and pleasure.

Take the kids to camp. You know what? It was expensive. But I was also thinking, if you have my kid, this is kind of private. It's priceless. Take her, feed her, make core memories. I don't have to do anything. Main thing, I don't have to do anything. To hear this and more, listen to Good Mom's Bad Choices from Black Effect Podcast Network on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. This is an IHeart podcast.