Shyon
Keoppel—a man with a Midwest heart and West-coast flare—is a self-made entrepreneur and developer with a portfolio as expansive as the American terrain he grew up near.
AHEAD OF THE GAME
TOP ENTREPRENEURS
As a young boy in Oklahoma City, Keoppel had big dreams. “I always wanted to be an entrepreneur, own my own business and give back to the community I lived in,” he says. As a teen, he mowed lawns and had a few odds-and-ends jobs; but soon, hanging out with the wrong crowd got him into enough trouble to prompt him to turn some bad mistakes into good decisions. With determination and hands-on lawn experience, he started his first business at 19—a lawn sprinkler company—and later moved into real estate and development. “My dream, as a child ,was happening; but then as my career developed, I started wanting to get more into hospitality,” he says. From that idea came SK Ventures—“Where real estate meets hospitality.” Keoppel recently formed the company and currently has several restaurants and real estate ventures in California, Oklahoma and Ohio. Most pertinent to this story, however, is that Keoppel is also lifestyle purveyor, and his latest partnership is with Deluxe Version Magazine as founder Timothy Hancock’s co-publisher in Los Angeles. “The magazine has a shine to it that I feel makes it stand out from others,” says Keoppel. “There are networking opportunities for pushing the brand—that brand of ‘luxury’—with some of the people and partners I have here in L.A. I feel we can develop the magazine further and market it into other major metropolitan cities.” When Keoppel is not working, he travels the world—Italy, Greece and Dubai are up next on his list—and, he hits up the food scene in L.A. “I love going to new restaurants and trying new things, and in L.A. ,there are so many places to go,” says Keoppel. In fact, L.A.’s fast pace is why he decided to make the permanent move there last year. As someone who prides himself on maintaining a hands-on strategy with each of his projects and who lends a wealth of versatility and knowledge to everything he does, his bridge-building, people-over-profit attitude makes him an entrepreneur with both heart, and vision. Says Keoppel, “Everyone [in L.A.] has something they are working on. There are a lot of movers and shakers, and that keeps me motivated.”
SHYON KEOPPEL’S Westward Conquest – By Ashlee Demartino
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