Honoring the Legacy of Ky Ekinci

Some people are lucky enough to find their soulmate. One of those people was Lisa Ekinci.

Surrounded by family, friends and colleagues who described their memories with her beloved Kayhan Ekinci in touching tributes, Lisa was bathed in love and support.

Dearly Departed

It was a first date that almost didn’t happen. Lisa was sidelined by an appendicitis for their first date and asked her sister to call Ky for a rain check, which he willingly agreed to after expressing his hope for Lisa to get better.

A 20-year-plus relationship built on love, admiration, and respect, Ky and Lisa were kindred spirits, who truly enjoyed being together, and it was obvious. Their energy and enthusiasm for life was as contagious as their wit.

After two decades of building their lives together, his sudden passing in March 2023 has left those closest to him shellshocked.

His family in Turkey and others across the world joined Saturday’s celebration of life gathering at Channel Side via Zoom, sharing poems and thoughts nearly too painful to be expressed.

“It’s very hard not to have my words to tell our family about Ky. I can’t do that yet, but I will,” said Lisa, as she read the message sent by Ky’s college friend, Birol Balci, to those assembled as they remembered the trailblazer.

His family members haven’t been the only ones impacted.

Saving A Community, One Business at a Time

Ky and Lisa were a beacon of hope in a community decimated after The Great Recession. According to Ky’s cousin who spoke via Zoom, Ky had always been a thinker, a doer, ahead of the trends.

Partnering with Sim Taing, the trio launched the region’s first co-working space, Office Divvy in Palm Coast.

But it wasn’t just any multi-use office. It became an incubator for the countless small businesses launching as a result of the economic impact on the community during the recession, especially those who couldn’t afford a full-time brick and mortar location. It offered the services of an administrative team at a fraction of the cost.

Ahead of their time, Office Divvy also helped ignite the social media marketing craze locally, offering workshops on ‘new media’ social media platforms. Riding the wave of excitement for Facebook and Twitter, Office Divvy held the first World Social Media Day event in Palm Coast at The Hammock Beach Resort & Spa’s Conservatory in 2012, packing the venue and showcasing the property.

Intuitive, Ky and his team supported the area’s businesses by bringing the people to them, a model mimicked today by a number of successful networking groups. Connecting with other small business resources in the community such as SCORE and the Palm Coast Business Assistance Center, Office Divvy took networking to the next level with the monthly Entrepreneur Nights, which became so popular they expanded regionally.

Working with Ky from a business perspective via SCORE and as a personal friend, Tom and Linda Hellman were saddened by his loss.

“He actually had what people call a true north. And that is values and things that he kept true to in both his personal and his professional life,” said retired executive and former SCORE mentor Tom Hellman.

As a small business owner, Linda Hellman attended the Entrepreneur Nights, seeing first hand Ky’s genuine desire to help support Flagler’s small business community.

“By determination. He had a vision,” she said. “He will not be forgotten, ever.”

“He had not only a vision but a personality to make it work with people,” added Tom Hellman. “He had a way, it was very interesting to me at least. Many people have visions but he had the ability to explain it in a way that people could understand and was always empathetic to those folks, on both a professional and personal level.”

“I believe his legacy will be as one of the first and most important leaders of the entrepreneurial ecosystem both in Flagler and Volusia counties,” he said.

Training interns in a fun and hip environment, Office Divvy thrived and grew while helping revitalize Flagler’s business community by helping brand Palm Coast as ‘small business friendly’ to the world.

Among the business owners working with Office Divvy in the earliest days, Cindy Dalecki and Jason Johnson shared fond memories of Ky.

“To frame what Ky brought to the community, I’d have to go back to when I first moved to Palm Coast. Ky was one of the first people I met in a business environment and somebody who was very optimistic, very creative in terms of his outlook,” said Johnson.

“We partnered together actually on one business at one point over the years so I think one of the things he brought to the business community, specifically here in Flagler County, was his sense of optimism and his creativity to help businesses do more business.”

“To me personally, it’s the loss of a friend. Somebody I knew for years and years. To the larger community and the world, I’m a huge fan of small businesses and every small business champion is needed right. We’re in an environment where bigger businesses tend to get bigger but that doesn’t take away from the impact that small businesses have in communities. Where the money in communities is typically generated is in small businesses, so the loss of a small business advocate and champion is just something that can’t really be measured.”

“I’ve known Ky and Lisa for a long time and they’re just both lovely people. Ky was a true visionary, always consuming the latest technology, how to do things better, faster, stronger, and truly caring about the not just young people coming up in the business world or tech world, but people around him,” said Dalecki, a friend since 2010.

“He never thought of marketing firms or office sharing companies as competition, he was welcoming to all, and that’s what I loved about him. You could run ideas past him, get his professional opinion, and just an incredible human. It’s a great loss for all of his friends and family, and of course the community as well.”

A dozen current and former interns shared what most inspired them about Ky’s leadership and as a person during a video shared at the celebration. Words most used to describe him included pioneer, nurturing, inspirational, brave, innovative, brilliant, believer, empathetic, and connector.

PALS.

A man can have plenty of friends, plenty of associates, but truly only a few PALS. If you’ve ever seen Young Guns, you know what that means.

Ky’s professional impact on Flagler County is undeniable. He really did help save the community when it went from number one in growth nationally to number one in unemployment statewide.

But he also helped those who became the closest to him. Acknowledging the leap from business colleague to PAL, Ray Peter’s heartbreaking admission of Ky being the first to console his family on the passing of his 35-year-old daughter, only to pass away himself just a few short days later, was just one of many moments the two families shared.

For Mark Woods, Ky’s passing has been as unreal to him as it has to Lisa. The depth of sorrow was palpable in his prerecorded video, and his remarks at the podium, short. Smiles were seen all around as he described the clever marketing campaign the duo created with their handlebar moustaches after going in as business partners on The Humidor cigar lounge in 2013, with priceless coffee mugs.

The Legacy of Ky Ekinci

It’s hard to imagine Office Divvy without Ky, and the remarks from friend and business partner Sim Taing as he read a poem, a line describing what many may feel – he’ll be just around the corner, seems appropriate.

“This poem gives me comfort that we have multiple people that we cherish but we believe that someday we will see them again. So, I hope that these words remind us that Ky’s essence, his spirit continues to live on in all of us. We honor his memories by embracing life, by enjoying each passing day, and treasuring the precious moments we have with one another,” he said.

Building her life here in Palm Coast, Lisa will continue her husband’s life’s work at Office Divvy, helping to elevate the conversation and supporting small business owners. Surrounded by not only family but friends who love her, her grief is our grief, and we support her in her continued success, as well.

In his honor, the Kayhan Ekinci Rising Entrepreneur Award is being created. This award ‘will recognize a young innovator or emerging start-up that is working on a social entrepreneurship project to meet human needs.’

If you would like to contribute, please visit gofundme.com/The-Kayhan-Ekinci-Rising-Entrepreneur-Award.