AVL Biz Weekly — July 22–28: NCDOR Declassified, Big Wiener Weekend & Sleepytime Gorilla Museum

Welcome to AVL BIZ Weekly—your local cheat sheet for what’s happening in Asheville’s small business + creative scenes.

Each week: hand-picked events, marketing ideas that actually work, and a little local flavor to keep things fun.

My name's Jason and I'm writing this (connect with me here).

Hey friends,

This week: AYPROS gets the North Carolina Department of Revenue in the room, avl.js is back for the JavaScript crowd, B.B. Barns hosts Business After Hours, and the city holds a Biltmore Village infrastructure recovery meeting.

Outside the business lane, downtown fills up with yoga and movement classes for Love Shine Play, Bear’s spends the whole weekend on hot dogs, the City hosts a teen pool party, and the Asheville Art Museum gives you two Sunday options that are significantly calmer than hot dog pageantry.

The Grey Eagle has five shows this week: Summer RADiance, Kaleta and Super Yamba Band, Chris Acker, Woody Wood & Abe Reid, and Sleepytime Gorilla Museum. The Orange Peel has School of Rock, Off Campus Night, and Bop To The Top.

The Marketing Quickies this week: how to make your website stop acting like a brochure and start acting like a follow-up machine.

Let’s get into it.

📋 On Deck

• Business Events: NCDOR tax basics with AYPROS, avl.js, and Business After Hours at B.B. Barns.

• Marketing Quickies: Website forms, missed-call text-back, and the first message after someone raises their hand.

• Fun Stuff: Love Shine Play, Queenies & Weenies, Big Wiener Party, Teen Takeover Pool Party, and two Sunday picks at the Asheville Art Museum.

• Bands & Shows: Summer RADiance, Kaleta and Super Yamba Band, Chris Acker, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, and more across the week.

🙋 Want your biz featured in front of a few really smart AVL business owners? Email me for details

🗓️ Business Events

• 🗓️ AYPROS Lunch & Learn: Straight From the Source — NCDOR Declassified — Wednesday, July 22 · 11:30 AM–1:00 PM (Hatchworks Coworking, 45 S French Broad Ave, Asheville)

  A free lunch-and-learn with the North Carolina Department of Revenue covering business income, sales tax, withholding, registration, recordkeeping, penalties, and the rules small business owners usually learn five minutes too late.

• 🗓️ Drop-In Community Meeting: Biltmore Village Infrastructure Recovery — Wednesday, July 22 · 11:00 AM–1:00 PM (Standard Pizza Co., 631 Haywood Rd)

  A city meeting on Biltmore Village infrastructure recovery, worth a look if you do business anywhere near that part of town.

• 🗓️ Ride the Lightning ⚡ — avl.js — Thursday, July 23 · 6:00 PM (Mojo Coworking, 81 Broadway St Suite 201)

  The Asheville JavaScript crew is gathering for a developer-focused meetup, which means code, people who understand your framework opinions, and probably at least one conversation that starts with “I have a weird bug.”

• 🗓️ Business After Hours with B.B. Barns — Thursday, July 23 (B.B. Barns, Inc., 3377 Sweeten Creek Rd.)

  A Chamber after-hours event at B.B. Barns for local business people who want the networking without making it the entire personality of the evening.🗓️

• Elevate and Align — Thursday, July 16 · 9:00 AM (216 Asheland Ave, Asheville, NC) 

  A morning workshop for professionals checking whether their goals and their daily grind still match.

Hosting something cool?

📬 Hit reply and tell me what you think. Or share an event!

💡 Marketing Quickies

Sending the estimate feels like the finish line. It isn't. Most contractors and professional service businesses send the quote, then wait for a call that never comes, when the real problem is the estimate got buried under 159 other emails and nobody came back for it.

Here's what actually gets a reply, no awkward "just checking in" texts required.

Confirm it landed. The second the estimate goes out, send a one-line text: "Hey [Name], your estimate from [Business] just hit your inbox, let me know if anything's unclear." Now they know where to look, and the door stays open.

Follow up on a schedule. Day 2, ask if they saw it. Day 5, answer a question they probably have about price or timeline. Day 10, ask straight up: moving forward, or should I check back later? Once they reply, the sequence stops on its own.

Let "not right now" mean later, not never. Tag anyone who stalls and check back in 30 days with something short: "Hey [Name], still thinking about [project]? Wanted to check in before your schedule fills up." That one text has closed jobs everybody assumed were dead.

This is the kind of thing the Show Up and Follow Up System runs in the background, so the follow-up happens whether you remember to do it or not.

A lot of contractor and professional service websites are still acting like online brochures. They look fine, they explain the services, and then they leave the actual follow-up to memory, inbox chaos, or whoever happens to notice the form submission first.

Make the form start the conversation. When someone fills out a contact form, the next step should not be silence. Send an immediate message that confirms the request, names the service, and asks for one useful next detail. “Thanks for reaching out to [Business Name]. We got your request for [service]. Reply here with your address, photos, or timing, and we’ll follow up with next steps.”

Add missed-call text-back. Contractors and professional service businesses miss calls for normal reasons: they are with a client, on a job, driving, or doing the work people hired them to do. A missed-call text-back catches the person while they still care. “Sorry we missed your call. What can we help with?” is not fancy, but it keeps the lead from calling the next business on Google.

Send every lead into one inbox. Website forms, phone calls, Google messages, Facebook messages, and website chat should not live in five different places. A Show Up and Follow Up System puts those conversations into one pipeline so you can see what is new, what has been contacted, what needs an estimate, and what needs follow-up. The point is fewer lost opportunities.

Want missed-call text-back, website chat, SMS confirmations, review requests, and one inbox that keeps your leads moving while you do the actual work?

🎉 Fun Stuff Around AVL

• 🗓️ Golden-Hour River Walk on the West Asheville Greenway — Wednesday, July 22 · 6:30–8:30 PM (West Asheville Greenway, Asheville) — Asheville Transplants is doing a golden-hour river walk for people who want a low-pressure social plan outside.

• 🗓️ Love Shine Play Festival 2026 — Thursday–Sunday, July 23–26 · 8:00 AM–4:00 PM (Downtown Asheville / Pack Square Park, 80 Court Plaza, Asheville) — Downtown fills up with yoga, meditation, movement classes, talks, and hikes for four days straight.

• 🗓️ Queenies & Weenies: A Drag Show for Mental Health — Friday, July 24 · 7:00–10:00 PM (Bear’s Smokehouse BBQ, Asheville) — Bear’s kicks off Big Wiener weekend with drag, hot dog chaos, and a benefit for mental health support in Asheville’s food and beverage community.

• 🗓️ Teen Takeover Pool Party — Friday, July 24 · 6:30–8:30 PM (Dr. Wesley Grant Sr. Southside Community Center, 285 Livingston Stg) — A teen-focused pool party from the City of Asheville if you want a family-friendly listing for the week.

• 🗓️ The Big Wiener Party 2026 — Saturday, July 25 · 10:30 AM–7:00 PM (Bear’s Smokehouse BBQ, Asheville) — Ten teams, 3,000 hot dogs, ridiculous games, celebrity chefs, and Asheville taking the hot dog format exactly as seriously as it deserves

• 🗓️ Modern Pop Art Experience with Michael Albert — Sunday, July 26 · 12:00–4:00 PM (Asheville Art Museum) — A hands-on collage workshop using cereal boxes, because apparently your pantry was art supplies this whole time.

• 🗓️ Exhibition on Screen: Mary Cassatt — Painting the Modern Woman — Sunday, July 26 · 2:00–4:00 PM (Asheville Art Museum) — A film screening on Mary Cassatt’s work for anyone who wants a quieter Sunday with actual culture involved.

🎧 Bands on the Horizon

• NOW That's What I Call Music BINGO! — Tue, Jul 21 · 6 PM @ The Grey Eagle

• Summer RADiance — Wed, Jul 22 · 7:30 PM @ The Grey Eagle

• School of Rock New Moon Festival Show — Thu, Jul 23 · 7:30 PM @ The Orange Peel

• PATIO SHOW: TOMBOYY — Thu, Jul 23 · 5:30 PM @ The Grey Eagle Patio Stage

• Off Campus Night — Fri, Jul 24 · 9 PM @ The Orange Peel

• PATIO SHOW: Why, Why? & The Discs — Fri, Jul 24 · 5:30 PM @ The Grey Eagle Patio Stage

• Kaleta and Super Yamba Band — Fri, Jul 24 · 8 PM @ The Grey Eagle

• Bop To The Top — Sat, Jul 25 · 8 PM @ The Orange Peel

• PATIO SHOW: Laurel Canyon East — Sat, Jul 25 · 5:30 PM @ The Grey Eagle Patio Stage

• Leah Rudick — Sat, Jul 25 · 7 PM @ The Grey Eagle

• Asheville Vaudeville Brunch — Sun, Jul 26 · 12 PM @ The Grey Eagle

• Chris Acker and the Growing Boys w/ Creekbed Carter Hogan — Sun, Jul 26 · 8 PM @ The Grey Eagle

• PATIO SHOW: Woody Wood & Abe Reid of The Blue Rags — Mon, Jul 27 · 6 PM @ The Grey Eagle Patio Stage

• Sleepytime Gorilla Museum — Tue, Jul 28 · 8 PM @ The Grey Eagle

Question of the Week

What is one thing your website should do manually that you wish AI could do for you?

That’s the week.

And if you know somebody who should be reading this, forward them the email.

Until next week,

Jason De Los Santos
Pixelated Stories Digital Marketing
(828) 585-4293