Sunrise Over Person: Building, Making, and Growing Our Community

Clear vision doesn't exist without at least a little light.

My fiancée is reminded of this every morning between 3–5AM when I wake up for my most productive part of the day: twilight to sunrise. She knows I can't help my restlessness—my dreams are too big to fit in my head, and they're usually scribbled on countless St. Jude notepads scattered throughout the house and shop.

It's that restlessness and ambition for “better” that drives Dirt Farmer Industries more than any substance ever could—and it’s beginning to illuminate a path forward for our business and, possibly, our community. It's a vision I still can't fully articulate on my own, but like my 3AM stumbling in the dark, the further I let my mind wander, the more I see.

When I started DFI, it was just another pandemic-era Etsy side-hustle to provide supplemental income to an already well-compensated but soul-crushing corporate career. I was a proud geek, enamored with 3D printing, fandom, and the community it provided (I still am). Over the years, whether through necessity or survival instinct, I've honed both my craft and my core values as a maker with integrity and an almost-paranoid need to "do things the right way." As time passes, the vision evolves. Emerging from a long hermit phase in a wood shed converted into a 3D-print studio, I’ve found a growing sense of community in our hometown, one rooted in making—whether it’s physical goods or helping make life a little better for those around us. I'm starting to realize that my vision is outgrowing the original purpose of my business, and that's okay. DFI is allowed to exist in a liminal, awkward teenager phase: a little moody, but wholeheartedly grateful for what brought us here while keeping our eyes open to the dawn. As the light grows, I am beginning to see our business less as serving one niche or another, and more as finding ligature.

Right now, Dirt Farmer Industries is mostly just me—call it “one and a half people” at work. My fiancée provides the other half: moral support, occasional eye-rolls, and reminders that I should probably eat something and try to focus my ADHD-riddled mind on one project at a time. But the work continues. I’ve been collaborating with PCC’s Small Business Center, NCVA Media, and the Roxboro Chamber of Commerce to bring my vision into focus. DFI is pursuing grants to expand our capabilities and capacity. In the process, I'm exploring the idea of a network of makers, tradespeople, and students that can keep skills, innovation, and pride rooted here at home.

The more time I spend at PCC—learning in the gunsmithing program, working with students and instructors, and connecting with local businesses—the more the vision comes into focus. Every conversation, every new connection, makes it clear: this isn’t just about a side hustle or a business plan, and it isn’t just about me or even DFI. It’s an emerging blueprint of a Person County that builds, repairs, and creates with integrity. A place where skilled trades, small shops, modern fabrication, and people willing to learn form a network that keeps innovation, pride, and craft rooted at home, benefiting the whole community.

We have the tools.

We have the talent.

What we don't yet seem to have is all the connective tissue—ways to align makers and businesses so that good ideas, and good work, are fostered locally instead of drifting off to the nearest city.

I can’t do this alone. And I don’t want to. I need makers, teachers, tradespeople, and tinkerers who see the opportunity to return craftsmanship, reliability, and ingenuity to Person County. People who understand that work is messy, that solutions come from hands-on problem solving, and that pride comes from work done well.

These ideas are still in their infancy. Every shop, every project, every small fix begins with a sketch and a little stubbornness—the work is slow, often frustrating, and attention is hard-earned. But that’s how real things of value and meaning are built. Making isn’t just about ideas on paper. It’s about parts crafted with intention, projects completed with care, problems solved thoughtfully, and work that serves the people it’s made for. That’s the culture I want to see take root here: one shop, one student, one clever and off-the-wall solution at a time.

The morning light is just beginning to reach over Person County, and it’s time to get to work. Let’s turn that first faint glow into something tangible, something real—together.

If this resonates, hit us up.

-Sepp