Meet Nick Baker | Professor, Beekeeper & Real Estate Agent

We had the good fortune of connecting with Nick Baker and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Nick, what role has risk played in your life or career?
Risk plays an integral role in career moves and life. I think about risk in several terms. There is ordinary risk where you know nothing of the outcome. This is what I consider high risk and could potentially be the most rewarding. However, it is also the type that can bring everything around you crashing down. High risk, high reward. The other type I consider is calculated risk. Calculated risk is more certain of what the outcome will be because you can weigh the pros and cons a bit more. This gives one leverage on the direction you can take and where you could possibly land. The outcome can still be very high in terms of success, with less loss versus high risk. I like to mix the two, but lean more on calculated risk.

Risk has played a major role in my life and career choices. I took a risk to start a commercial beekeeping company out of nothing. I originally thought this was calculated risk, but very quickly learned it was just high risk. I thought, because I had been a beekeeper for ten years at the university that I knew everything I needed to be successful on my own. I was wrong! The way I learned beekeeping was for research. We went through every comb of every hive several times a month to evaluate the bees. This is very opposite of how commercial beekeepers operate. Which makes sense now as they need to work hundreds if not thousands of hives in a short amount of time. Whereas, at ASU I only had to manage a couple hundred hives and I had almost all the time in the world to do it. This failed me on my first venture out.

From there, I started fresh and used more calculated risk. I rebuilt my business using the contacts gained and became more successful the second time around. I leveraged that business and my love for teaching to work my way into becoming a residential faculty member for Glendale Community College after first becoming an adjunct for several other colleges while continuing my beekeeping business. When tragedy fell upon me and I severed my Achilles tendon I had to walk away from the bee business. Mostly it was family who urged me to give it up. It was easier knowing that I had used my skills to land a new role teaching.

Finally, the next move was gaining my professional real estate license. I know teach and sell real estate. I enjoy being an entrepreneur and testing new boundaries. Risk is something I weigh with all decisions, but sometimes you just got to do it!

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?

My career started out in the science world and still revolves around it. I earned my Masters degree at Arizona State University in biology while working with honey bees. This is where it all started! Had I not ran into my mentor Dr. Gro Amdam by taking one of her courses I would have never become a beekeeper or possibly and entrepreneur. After the first day in her class she informed us that she had research opportunities if anyone was available and to talk to her after the class concluded that day. I ran up there and for some reason was the only one. She informed me her lab group worked with honey bees and had I ever been around them. The last time I had an interaction with a honey bee leading up to that day was when I was ten and stepped on one where it lodged its stinger into my foot, ouch! The following week I began my journey of learning to become a beekeeper. Once I learned the beekeeping I began learning the research. This lead me to living and working in Norway for a couple of summers. My PI, Gro is from Norway and had a lab at the Norwegian Biological Institute just outside of Oslo. What an amazing experience! From there I worked with biologists all over the world on honey bee driven projects, many of which revolved around genetics. I completed my thesis ‘Reverse Aging in the Honey Bee’ in 2010. My research was featured in multiple news outlets both locally and internationally. My two favorite were National Geographic online and Rotating Planet. Rotating Planet is a Canadian based documentary production company that filmed a part of their series around my research. That was a very cool time!

I took a break from research after nearly a decade at ASU’s honey bee research facility and moved to Japan to teach English for a year. When I came back I began working with another beekeeper who I was helping mentor before leaving for Japan as he took over a small portion of my old job at ASU. When I returned he was conducting bee removals, which I joined in on. Over time we grew apart as I wanted to focus on beekeeping by being paid for pollination and honey production. I was not much into the removals. This is where the hard work began. I bought 250 hives with no idea where I would place them or how to set-up shop. I learned as I went. I found land by spending lots of time driving and meeting farmers or ranchers. I even had one hundred hives placed behind Best Buy and Target! Don’t tell anyone *wink*. I lost bees year after year and eventually lost it all. That was the most challenging time of my life. Everything felt like it was falling apart. At some point, I realized I needed to dust my self off and take one more step forward. This is where my community came in and other beekeepers stepped up to help me back out. I still had my customers and contacts that bought my products so I started over working with another beekeeper. Success was immanent the second time around as I had learned from my failures. However, tragedy struck and I severely injured myself and lost the last two honey crops that year. I did manage to work those bees, even after losing my crops, to get them ready for pollination. Almond pollination is a huge payday for commercial beekeepers. I worked in crutches and a boot in the middle of the summer and fall to get those girls ready. That was my most successful winter where I had a 97% survival rate of my bees over winter. That’s very rare these days! I learned having a mindset of coming from behind and wanting to prove to myself that I can do it was the best mentality to have. People told me to give up before than because my injury would limit me. I took that as a challenge where I felt I needed to prove to myself that I can do anything even while coming back from behind.

Another lesson learned was positioning myself for future success. I had a backup incase my second time around with the bees did not work. I began teaching anatomy and physiology at the community college along with cellular biology courses. Somehow, I managed to gain a full time position at Glendale after two years of being an adjunct. This is an oddity as I was told to expect it to take 6-8 years to earn a full time position. It was my professional background from beekeeping and research that earned me that position with the college. I learned that every step I had taken previously brought me here. Sacrifice is a necessity sometimes. Sacrifice early to create a giant wave of success, then ride that wave!

Now, I’m the Beeman and I use this as my branding for my new venture in real estate. People who know me, know my work ethic and my moral standings. I’m honest, I work hard for my clients and I love to win! My story has been writing itself since I met my mentor Dr. Amdam. I didn’t know it at the time, but I have always had a vision of where I want to be in life. I continue to take small steps daily to achieve that vision. The Beeman was born in 2006 and he’s gone from scientist, to farmer to teacher and now real estate agent. I bring a strong work ethic and a never give up attitude into everything I do. I want my clients to be happy at the end of the day. From hives to homes; I’m here to help everyone find their dream!

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.

Being an Arizona native there are so many cool places to visit. We could start the trip out down south in Casa Grande at my friend’s farm where we can feed some cows and visit the other little critters they keep from chickens to sheep. Maybe jump on horseback to tour the farmland. The following day to cool off, we’d hit Golfland/Sunsplash where I was a lifeguard during the summers while in high school. I wouldn’t recommend eating there, so for lunch we could hit the Arrogant Butcher. Next up we could head north to Sedona for any one of the many trails I hiked as a college student while studying at Norther Arizona University. Even further north I would take us to the lava tubes to explore underground lava caves that had frozen over. The same as when I was a boy scout long ago. In Flagstaff we would dine at my old restaurant Salsa Brava ordering dishes that are no longer on the menu. It’s good to know the secrets!

Heading back down to the valley I would head over to one of my friend’s apiaries where we could open up some bee hives and take a look inside. Then head back to his honey house to extract some honey on their amazing set-up. If we were lucky enough my friend the beekeeper would allow us into his parent’s home where his mother makes the most amazing meals for the workers. Like back in the day when my Grandmother’s father was a farmer and fed the help. The best conversations happen around these tables.

Finally, I would top it off by promoting my wife’s amazing work. She redesigned the Peace Officer memorial in Phoenix. I am so very proud of my wife and the great architect that she is. We’d hit up the Barrio Cafe to top it off for the day. Maybe a drink after we would stop by Four Peaks Brewery. I would walk there a couple times a week when I lived behind it near ASU. Support local!

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I am not successful because I did it on my own. I have had much help from many loving people and my community. First, my wife has been my bedrock. She listens to my ideas, gives me honest feedback along with constructive criticism. We are partners like John Adams and Abigail. I skimmed the book Frist Family about John and Abigail Adams letter correspondence they had over their lifetime. It inspired me to find a partner such as Abigail. One I could confide in and take counsel from. Roxana is my Abigail and she has been the biggest part of reason that I listen to. I would not be as successful without her by my side!

My parents are the second biggest influence and help. Although, like many of us, I didn’t much listen to the warnings they had given me when I first started out in the bee business on my own. I quickly learned to push that; ‘I know everything’ aside and take their advice more to heart. Don’t get me wrong, I still take risk that my parents would advise me against. Nevertheless, they see my success and love that I am willing to push the boundaries. Even if I am wrong and fall flat, they have never thrown that back at me. Instead the encourage me to gather my thoughts, learn from what did not work and try again.

I have also had the pleasure of an entire community behind my back helping me from my friends at ASU, MCC and others who were just genuinely interested in learning from me or my customers buying from me. Without the backing of my community I would not have gotten as far as I have!

Finally, let’s talk books. I have already mentioned one, First Family Abigail & John Adams. I fell in love with the partnership they formed over the years. I didn’t want someone who just loved me, I wanted a confidant and adviser who would keep me grounded. I have been lucky in finding that with my wife Roxana. The book that motivated me to take a plunge into becoming an entrepreneur was Richard Branson’s Losing My Virginity. This is where my thoughts on risk were formed and how to try and leverage my knowledge and weigh the risks leading me to start my first business in beekeeping.

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