STAR-SPANGLED BARRELS: Awakened from a midnight slumber, one Southern Pines man s dream becomes a booming business.

AuthorWanbaugh, Taylor

It all started with a dream. Heath Trigg, owner and founder of Southern Pines-based The Heritage Flag Co, woke up with a jolt in the middle of the night in 2014. He was dreaming of an American flag.

"No earthly idea why or how that happened. But I got out of bed ... and I painted a picture at 3 in the morning of the world's first whiskey-barrel American flag."

At the time, Trigg's construction and cabinet-building companies were working on a custom brewery bar for three Army veterans in Southern Pines. "They were getting out of the Special Forces to start work," he says. "I looked at a set of plans, and they had a room that intrigued me: a barrel aging room [for beer]. ... We decided to construct the tasting room at the brewery all out of deconstructed whiskey barrels."

A special friendship formed between Trigg and the Southern Pines Brewing Co. owners, Micah Niebauer, Jason Ginos and John Brumer. They were all in their early 30s, and Trigg was impressed with their passion for the business and how they applied lessons learned while serving in the Special Forces. "Such an awesome friendship was formed that when we were nearing the end of the project, [my team] wanted to make something for them that said 'thanks,'" says Trigg, now 35.

So Trigg and his team of eight got to work on his late-night sketch: a 49-by-26-inch American flag made from deconstructed white oak whiskey barrels. They kicked the owners out of the brewery right before the soft opening to put the finishing touches on the tasting room and hang the secret flag. Trigg, a burly 6-foot-5-inch guy, tears up when he recalls the moment the veterans first saw the flag.

"I've told this story many times, and it still means something every time," Trigg says. "When they saw the flag, it was a total surprise. ... That was awesome. Just seeing these Special Forces guys lose it over this flag."

His workers initially swore they wouldn't make another flag because of the intricacy involved and the special meaning the first one had, but they were soon bombarded with requests for the handcrafted designs. Trigg officially launched Heritage Flag at his Southern Pines property and now works at the company full time, putting his cabinetmaking and homebuilding on hold. The business sells flags and other handmade items made from whiskey and wine barrels to customers in every state and more than 38 countries. Although most of its sales are online, Heritage Flag has a retail store in downtown Southern...

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