Faced between moving back to Egypt or landing a job in the United States, Muhammad Shehata’s life could have panned out differently if his family hadn’t put its roots down in the Midwest.
Shehata is a serial entrepreneur with businesses in childcare, travel and trucking. Previously, he was an architect, but as COVID rocked job security, he thought it was time to bet on himself. Now Shehata finds himself on In Business Madison’s most recent “40 Under 40″ list for his ventures — but his life could have turned out very different.
Shehata was born in the Waterloo-Cedar Falls area of Iowa as a first-generation Egyptian-American. His journey carried many woes as one of the few Muslims in the area — and one of the only Egyptians with Iowa’s Muslim population largely Bosnian at the time. However, the experience led him to embrace the feeling of being different.
“It’s what allowed me to excel,” Shehata said. “I kind of tried to be better than everybody else because I was representing almost what seemed like an entire religion. Everything Muhammad did, that’s what Muslim people do, right?”
His push to excel from being different from his peers almost came to an end after his father struggled to find work. While still a child, his family had their foot out the door with the intention to return to Egypt when his father received a call from John Deere. The company was interested in interviewing Shehata’s father, but he needed a ‘yes’ that very day. He accepted the job and roots were planted in the area.
In his time growing up in Iowa, Shehata had frequent trips back to Egypt — which would later lay the groundwork for his travel business. But before he started his own business, Shehata was an architect. He studied at Iowa State University and landed a job in Madison post-graduation at Flad Architects.
He remained in the position for a bit under four years until he moved over to JLA Architects. The pandemic ultimately led to him getting laid off from the local architecture firm. The time allowed Shehata to think about what he wanted to do from now on.
“They tell you to go to school so you can get a good job. You can go to a good college so you can get a good job, and then you’ll be stable,” Shehata said. “I found out the hard way that that’s not the case. It’s risky either way.”
He decided it was time to bet on himself. Shehata figured that if jobs were risky, and so was starting his own business, then he would choose the latter. He initially started with some freelance architecture work with the intention of trying out a few different businesses to launch.
He pushed to start 10 different businesses with seven of them failing, Shehada said. Some gained traction so he pushed his efforts down into those ventures.
One of the businesses that gained traction was an Islamic daycare. Little Stars Child Care Center in Waterloo, Iowa, was founded to be an Islamic-centered daycare. The concept didn’t fully follow, so it transitioned into being the area’s first minority-owned daycare business.
“We didn’t get that much traction with the Muslim community,” Shehata said. “We don’t teach religion there, but we just carry ourselves in an Islamic fashion.”
Little Stars has been running for a few years with 10 staff and 35 kids enrolled.
He also got the idea to start a trucking company from a childhood friend. His friend was more business-minded and had experience with trucking. Shehata felt out of his depth in the area — since his trade was as an architect — but found success with the venture.
“As an architect, I knew nothing about trucking… but what I did know is that I was tired of where I was at,” he said. “I wanted something to call my own, something that I could grow and pass on.”
Initially, he sat as mostly the face of the company, Cargo Champion, 2353 S. Park St., but soon laid his major focus on the business. Cargo Champion became his main income source. This past year it hit $850,000 in revenue and over 1,000 loads shipped.
His third business that stuck holds a close place in Shehata’s heart. Travel With Shehata, an Egyptian travel company, brings people interested in touring his home country. The venture started as a more ad-hoc style business. Friends were interested in seeing Egypt due to Shehata’s frequent travels to the country.
“I was pretty good at this. I had an architectural background, and so I knew about the buildings and the ancient stuff that had already been going on,” Shehata said. “The next year I did it and charged a couple of people. A couple of years ago, I was like, ‘You know what? I can actually turn this into a business.’”
Shehata thrives in the venture. He loves Egypt and the chance to share his culture with other people. He takes them to places he visited growing up along with the tourist hotspots to ensure that they get the full taste of Egypt.
He currently tries to schedule two trips a year. So far, he’s taken over 100 people to Egypt but it’s currently on a bit of a hiatus as the region, which borders Gaza, is currently under a great deal of instability.
With his businesses finally down, Shehata looks to the future for what his ventures can give back to people. With Cargo Champion, he is currently offering courses to teach people how to run their own trucking business.
“’Someone that’s been in jail before, or someone would say, is unhireable, we’ve been able to give opportunities to those kinds of people, which is really what I wanted a chance to do growing up,” Shehata said.
