There's been a lot of talk in the business world about how one young Atlanta entrepreneur took an out of business fireplace store and resurrected it into a profit-producing success. That entrepreneur's name is Klayton Tapley.

The April 2016 issue of Patio & Hearth Products Report dedicated a two page spread on Tapley's success, and he has been featured in popular news sites such as Inc.com and The Huffington Post.

Tapley leveraged an unexpected opportunity that paid off big time, and here's how:

When Tapley opened up shop in Stockbridge, Georgia, he was in the flooring business. Within months of the grand opening of his store, Carpets Direct, he realized an unfortunate fact that could not have been foreseen: hundreds of walk-in customers thought they were entering a store that sold fireplaces, not flooring.

As it turns out, the business that occupied the space before Carpets Direct was a fireplace showroom, and customers were openly unhappy when they learned that it no longer existed.

Rather than accepting what most would call a minor defeat, Tapley— a fervent entrepreneur — saw an opportunity to start his own fireplace store.

"There was demand literally knocking on the door," said Tapley. "The one thing I wasn't sure of though, was whether or not the previous store went out of business because of a lack of overall demand. I decided it was worth giving it a shot."