We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Heissam “I’m in” Jebailey. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Heissam “I’m in” below.

Heissam “I’m in”, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Coming up with the idea is so exciting, but then comes the hard part – executing. Too often the media ignores the execution part and goes from idea to success, skipping over the nitty, gritty details of executing in the early days. We think that’s a disservice both to the entrepreneurs who built something amazing as well as the public who isn’t getting a realistic picture of what it takes to succeed. So, we’d really appreciate if you could open up about your execution story – how did you go from idea to execution?

Upon graduating from the University of Central Florida I started working for the independent school newspaper called The Central Florida Future. However, a few months after graduated I fell near fatally ill with Full Blown Pneumonia on an ICU bed for two months. Eventually one miracle lung surgery in the end saved my life. During that time I envisioned Black and White Colors and knew I would do something with it but wasn’t sure then just what it would be or become. Over the next decade I helped turn the newspaper into the number one publication in the Nation and owned a franchise, did public speaking and got my real estate license as well for investments and property management. In 2010 though, when I felt like I fully recovered mentally and physically from surgery 10 years prior, the vision of Black and White colors resurfaced. And that’s when I got into the event business by starting a Black and White Party every May. An event bringing together anyone and everyone that supported me before, during and after my hospital incident. The first one went so well with 100 people coming dressed in Black and White that in year 3 I wanted to give back to the community and added the charity known as BASE Camp Children’s Cancer Foundation. Since then we made it to the 10 year anniversary mark in 2019. In 2021 we became the first major charity event in the nation to launch safely and successfully post pandemic allowing every other event company to follow after us. And now we are working our way past year 13 as The World’s Largest Black and White Weekend for Charity and Wellness still in existence today with nearly 1,000 people dressed in Black and White across 3 days and 2 nights and nearing $200,000.00 raised in programming for kids battling cancer. We will return to the Rosen Plaza on Saturday, May 18, 2024 for an unprecedented 14th time at http://blackandwhiteweekend.com

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I’m in. My parents are Lebanese, I was born in Canada and moved to Orlando, Fl when I was 5 and have been there ever since. I went to Bishop Moore High School and graduated from UCF with an Advertising/PR degree. My parents were very hard workers and instill the same work ethic in all their kids who are all Entrepreneurs. I put together and host large networking and charity events throughout the year with a #committeefam of 20 amazing people from the community. We give countless others an outlet to have fun and enjoy themselves stress free and allow companies to promote themselves extremely affordably. What sets us apart from others is our consistency to provide events long term while overdelivering our promise to provide everything we say we will. We just love the support of our family and friends and want anyone and everyone that’s good to experience what we put together for them throughout the year.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

During the pandemic it was everyone’s first experience of it. Many event companies had no choice but to cancel their events and never came back or were never the same again. Luckily, the #committeefam never gave up. We kept in touch with each other and everyone we could in the hopes that the event industry would return in full swing. We never quit our events, we turned them virtual temporarily, still managed to raise money for kids battling cancer and pushed back our main event (Black and White Weekend) twice until we were the very first major live event in the U.S. to return thanks to the unwavering support of Central Florida supporting us and never giving up either.

Can you talk to us about your experience with selling businesses?

I’ve sold a newspaper, a franchise and an office building. Here are the lessons. If you’re offered a good and fair price, take it. You can never time the market, receive the same deal again or predict what will happen in the future. Also, I believe the difference between a smart business person and the exact opposite is the ability to separate emotion from the decision making process and not how you feel or If it’s going to turn around. And lastly when dealing with a lot of money, of course have everything on paper to refer back to in case you ever need to.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://Iminevents.com
• Instagram: heissamimin
• Facebook: heissamimin
• Linkedin: heissamiminjebailey
• Twitter: imintoevents
• Youtube: IminEvents