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When Wendell Crow’s wife, Rhonda, told him that she wanted to make goat cheese, his answer was emphatic. “There’s no way I’m making that crap,” Wendell (pictured) recalls saying. “I’ve had goat cheeses, and they were all bad.” Turns out, they were bad because Crow hadn’t tried the good stuff.

Crow’s Dairy has been operating in the Valley of the Sun for more than a hundred years, starting out as a cow dairy in 1919. In the mid-2000s, Wendell and Rhonda decided to sell the cows and went on what they called a two-year “cheese vacation” to figure out what to do next.

It seemed counterintuitive to head east to go west, but with fires and high temperatures near every campsite we’d planned to visit, venturing into New Mexico and Colorado before making our way to the West Coast was going to be the only way to make our annual summer road trip seem like one of our real summer road trips, when sleeping in tents and eating over a campfire supersede hotels and sit-down restaurants. 

Claire Harlin was entering unfamiliar territory when she decided to pursue a career in fashion. It wasn’t part of her master plan, but after losing her job as a newspaper editor in California, she had to make a change. So, she packed up her love of vintage clothing and moved to Arizona to start Classic Rock Couture.

“It started kind of as a hobby,” Harlin (pictured) says. “I was collecting vintage clothes, and out of necessity, I just started selling my clothes.” 

Everett Jesse (pictured) moved to Arizona for the weather. Tired of the cold spells in Carson City, Nevada, he made the decision to give the Valley of the Sun a shot about eight years ago. Turns out, Phoenix proved to be the right place to launch his invention — and Fossil Outdoor, the company he created to sell it.

The invention is the BōnDry (pronounced “bone dry”), a product inserted into the bladder of commonly used hydration packs. It helps dry the bladders and keeps them from getting moldy. The idea came about, as many do, out of necessity and a desire for convenience.

Wood Evolution owner Michal Korer met her business partner, James Drury, four years ago, when he started helping her fix up old furniture for resale. Drury, an Iraq War veteran, had taken up woodworking as a way to handle the symptoms of his post-traumatic stress disorder. “It started out as a hobby to keep me busy and to keep my brain in a safe zone,” he says. “It would put me in a place where I could relax and enjoy myself.”