The Small Business Owner

To Whitt, a payroll is real money, not a number on a spreadsheet.

What started as a cooler in the barn (that story is in The Farmer) is now a working payroll. Whitt's Place employs people behind the counter and on the farm, and every week Whitt signs their checks himself. That's a different kind of arithmetic than a government budget, but it runs on the same principle: the money has to be there before you spend it, and it came from somewhere real.

More Claiborne County collaboration: Whitt raises a lot of the cattle himself, and partners with five local sister farms for the rest. Every bit of it is finished right here on the farm he's worked since 2009. The beef never leaves Claiborne County, about as close to farm to table as it gets. Pork, chicken, lamb, bison, and a whole lineup of other local products come the same way, raised and made by other local producers Whitt has sought out and stands behind.

That's on purpose. Whitt didn't have to make room on his shelves for anybody else's name, and he does it anyway, because Claiborne County's small business scene works the same way his shop does: neighbors building something together instead of competing for the same dollar. Whitt's Place has grown into something closer to a marketplace than a single shop, curated so other local producers get a shelf and a customer they might not otherwise reach. Every product he carries that isn't his own is a vote for somebody else's small business too.

He's said the same thing about the county that he practices at the shop: he'd rather see ten small businesses grow roots here than land one big one that leaves in five years. Most of the jobs in Claiborne County come from neighbors who already live here deciding to take a risk on something of their own, and Whitt thinks the county's job is to make that easier, not harder.

Meeting payroll, watching costs, answering to the people who walk through the door: that's how Whitt has run Whitt's Place, and it's exactly the kind of county government he wants to run as mayor.

More of Whitt's story in the weeks ahead.