The layoff is what started it. Joseph Schlottenmier had done everything right — graduated Upper Cape Cod Regional Technical School in 2024, banked thousands of apprenticeship hours toward his electrician's license,(5500,) showed up and worked hard. Then the call came that the work was done, and just like that, the future he'd been building toward had fallen through. He could've waited for someone else to give him a shot. Instead, he decided to bet on himself. He bought a pressure washer, went into debt to do it, and started knocking on doors across the Cape — alone. Most of those doors closed. Some opened. The few that said yes turned into clean driveways, before-and-after photos, and one neighbor telling another. That's how JPW Cape Cod got built: one "no" at a time, until the "yeses" shined.