An entrepreneur finds a booming business: A/C security

Chuck Barlow EVAN WILLIAMS / FLORIDA WEEKLY Lehigh Acres is what some Lee County residents think of as “out there.” There is a hospital, and along Homestead Road a small collection of businesses, a grocery store, some banks, and a few restaurants. And that, more or less, is all.

Unless you include, as one must, the miles and miles of centerless residential sprawl. Traveling further into the outskirts, roads were cut into the flat landscape seemingly at random, dead ending in the middle of nowhere. Houses clustered along the roads look like where families might call home: a place with a few bedrooms, a garage and a nice yard. But most were abandoned by people who were foreclosed upon, or never sold. Many more are unfinished cement structures, some inexplicably sitting alone in a field of saw palmettos, as beautiful and useless as modern art or Stonehenge.

Chuck Barlow, 46, was adventurous enough to run a landscaping business in this community, even as it disintegrated during the housing bust and the long, deep recession that followed. The son of Michigan dairy farmers, Mr. Barlow has the confident, weathered features of a handsome everyman. He also has a natural industrious streak, which has led him to try his hand at a broad spectrum of endeavors: farming corn, running a nightclub, repossessing cars, scuba diving for a sheriff’s department, and leading big-game hunting trips out West.

While running his landscaping business in Lehigh, Mr. Barlow noticed that thieves were stealing parts of people’s air conditioners so they could sell the parts, including metal pieces, to junkyards. Out of 100 houses, Mr. Barlow estimated, 30 had their air-conditioning unit stolen or destroyed. As it turned out, it wasn’t just a problem in Lehigh, even though it’s easier to steal from a house where no one’s home. News reports from all over the region, and in other parts of the United States, indicate that many homeowners and businesses have paid thousands to replace their A/C units.

“You wouldn’t believe how bad this is,” Mr. Barlow said

With his eye for business and enterprising spirit, he created a steel cage to protect air-conditioner units and other items thieves target, including pool pumps, electric meters and well equipment. That was in late 2008. And his business, AC Stolen Inc. (www.acstolen.com), is booming. Mr. Barlow points out that he’s licensed and insured to do the work. He keeps 30 or 40 cages in stock and builds 12 of the cages on a busy day, cutting the steel parts and welding them together at his home in Lee County. He can paint them whatever color you prefer.

“I have steel saws I bought,” he said. “They were high-dollar saws, but they cut through the steel like it’s butter.

His girlfriend, Merrie Schaar, 43, is his lead salesperson. He met Ms. Schaar briefly, 18 years ago in Michigan, but they fell out of touch. Mr. Barlow moved to Lee County about eight years ago, and only recently ran into Ms. Schaar on Facebook. She says Mr. Barlow hasn’t changed much in all these years. He still works hard, and is often up at 4 a.m., making the cages in the garage.

“I would say he’s the same,” she said. “Worked hard, played hard, goofed off.

Mr. Barlow grew up in Flint, Mich. His family still lives there, including three sisters and his parents. For more than a century, the family has owned a diary farm near Flint. But it’s currently in bankruptcy because of high taxes on the land. Mr. Barlow thinks they will get it back, but isn’t interested in running the business, in part because he doesn’t feel there’s much money in it. One of his first enterprises was to buy some land in Michigan and farm corn.

“I went and bought all the old John Deere equipment from the 1940s,” he said. “I did that for a while.”

The air-conditioning cage business won’t be his last enterprise, even if it’s now a full-time job. He plans to work for the Lee County Sheriff’s Office someday. He likes to ride his Harley Davidson motorcycle, attend Bike Night in downtown Fort Myers, and has a standing reservation at The Edison Restaurant on Wednesday nights. One of Mr. Barlow’s most immediate plans last week was to order more steel to make his cages

“I waste no time,” he said. “I’m on the go all the time.” 