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What is the most important advice you’ve received since starting your business?

“Always try to be conscious of things going on around you. New technologies, ideas in the news, even the people you surround yourself with can all potentially give you some kind of inspiration or good idea. These things can spontaneously come from anywhere, so you just have to be able to receive them.”

Kyle Bashay has enough on his plate pursuing a degree in construction management and working at a local furniture store to keep him plenty busy. But most of his waking hours these days are spent on the Louisiana-based social-networking Web site he created to help generate enthusiasm among young professionals living and working here.

“I know a lot of people think things look better and exciting somewhere else,” says Bashay, a native of New Iberia and a second-year LSU student. “But I think if we use our talents, we can make what’s ours a lot better.”

Armed with that philosophy, Bashay and partner Jacqua Jackson have created Ireptheboot.com, a social-networking site with links to job opportunities, economic development resources and information on anything and everything that’s going on in all 64 parishes around the state.

But Ireptheboot is also a movement, of sorts. It’s a slogan, with T-shirts that promote its catchy name. It also has a service outreach component that seeks to help at-risk youth throughout the area.

“We do a lot of outreach events in Baton Rouge with the Boys and Girls Club, and with English classes at McKinley High School,” Bashay says. “We’re trying to get a forum set up to get the opinions of young people on things that are going on. A lot of people think young people are apathetic. This is hopefully a way to show that young people really do care.”

Now, if the name—Ireptheboot—doesn’t mean anything to you, you’re probably not the target market Bashay is trying to reach. The boot, he explains, is slang for Louisiana. The “Irep” part is an abbreviation for “I represent.” As in, I’m from Louisiana and proud of it.

“I actually came up with the slogan and the T-shirts first,” says Bashay, who was selling them around the LSU campus. “People liked them so much it got me thinking, and that’s what led to the creation of the Web site.”

In just a couple of months, Ireptheboot has more than 4,000 members who joined through a Facebook link Bashay established. He plans to link those members in to the Ireptheboot.com site once it’s totally completed. That way, members will be able to have live chats about everything from job opportunities and how to start a small business to upcoming music festivals.

“The whole point of this Web site is for people to highlight what they’re trying to do and connect with other people so they can work together to get things accomplished,” he says.

Bashay never set out to be a budding entrepreneur. Even though he’s exploring a lot of new opportunities that have come out of his social-networking site, he’s still committed to a career in construction management. The thing is, he explains with an infectious enthusiasm, he’s good at a lot of different things.

“It’s hard to choose just one,” he says.

For now, Bashay is focused on completing his degree and growing the Ireptheboot movement. So far, the Web site has two advertising sponsors—a music company and the company that’s doing the T-shirts—but most of the limited revenues it has generated have come from T-shirt sales. Bashay would like to make more—not for himself, but so that Ireptheboot can do more community outreach.

“That’s really important to us,” he says. “We want to help young people in this state as much as possible.”

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