He Ditched the 9–5, Hit the Road, and Built a 6-Figure Video Business

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Vipul Bindra (00:04):
hey, josh, thanks for coming, uh, taking the time
off your busy schedule, comingand having this talk with me.
Funny enough, we had a prettymuch a podcast a couple of weeks
ago because we were we werechatting at the meetup for a
while and that's what ends uphappening and, like we were
talking, that was just mypurpose.
We had so much, uh, informationthat we shared between each

(00:24):
other and I was like it'd begreat if people would just
listen to the information beingshared.
You know, I don't promise thatwe have to share valuable
information, but hopefullysomebody in the similar field
could learn something out of it,so anyway.
So thanks for coming and cominghere to talk to me.
How was your drive?
You're a little further from me, right?

Josh LeClair (00:43):
oh man, I'm so thankful that I have my own
business and I don't have toleave my house if I don't want
to uh yeah, traffic is kind ofridiculous yeah, orlando it
makes me very thankful.
Just you know, walk from mybedroom to eat some food and
then out to the garage where Ihave my little office set up,

(01:04):
and yeah, yeah, isn't that thelife?
Right.

You have to be self-disciplined.
Though it's not for everyone,yes, cause for some people they
do need that nine to five, but,yeah, not for me.
I'm like no, no, I'd rathermake my own schedule but then
gives you the freedom you know.
Earlier this Last year my familywas like, oh, we haven't been
on an international vacation ina while.
I was like, all right, let's goon a cruise.

(01:27):
And we were able to do thatBecause, funny enough, most of
what we do is on a computer andI was able to still continue my
business.
I know I shouldn't on vacation.
But, I was responding to emailsand texts and stuff Because you
can buy, thanks to Starlink,internet on these cruise ships
now and it was like neverleaving work you know, so it was
incredible except for you canshow your clients and your

(01:49):
friends like hey, by the way,yeah, here's what I'm doing when
I'm not answering emails?
Yeah, exactly right so that'sthe life, so I'm so glad
obviously I do this.
Uh, tell me more about, like,how you started into this yeah,
um.

So I picked up a camera a long long time ago, uh,
my nota dimage z1, I think, 3.2megapixels, and just played
around with it and uh, then Iwent into high school and I
started getting into filmphotography and, uh, dabbled in
some large format stuff and youknow, it was just kind of fun.
I was just playing around, Iwasn't even doing like senior

(02:24):
portraits or anything like that.
Um, back then you didn't haveYouTube universities, so you
couldn't really go online.
And you know, learn as much asyou possibly can right now.
Uh, anyways, fast forward.
I went to Northern Michiganuniversity and I went for a
different degree originally andthen ended up switching it over
to photography, and then therest is history.

(02:46):
Like, I've been doing photo orvideo in some shape or fashion
ever since then, so well, whichuniversity you?
Said northern michiganuniversity go wildcats, look at
that.
I went for a semester.

So how I ended up in us was to an exchange program
with disney and centralMichigan University.

Look at that.

So funny enough.
So what brought you down toFlorida?
So?

well, this is a bit of a story.
So Michigan shut down reallyhard with COVID and so my
business.
What had happened is I hadhired my first employee February
of 2020.
We had a baby February 2024, mywife and I, not my employee.
Uh and then, um, I think it waslike early March, everything

(03:33):
just shut down so couldn't go tothe office.
I had a office downtownMarquette, michigan, um,
basically couldn't leave thehouse, and so for like four
months we just sat in the house,not sure what to do.
The only cool thing is is, uhis our third kid and we got to
spend a ton of time just hangingout as a family, right?
So we definitely don't takethat for granted.

Um, but what did you do with the employee?
Where they actually coming towork and just hanging out with
the family, or they were just athome, they were just at home?

Yeah, because we weren't allowed, like they were
really hardcore about it, um,and so thankfully we had the PPP
loans, so that kept, uh, atleast a little bit of money
rolling in, but basically Iwasn't making anything, Um, so
it was enough to cover bills forme and the employee and
actually worked out better thatI had the employee because we
got a little bit more money.
And then I had a buddy who hada production agency in alabama

(04:29):
and out of the blue he's likecalled me up.
Who do I know anyone?

uh, west wages oh, I know that guy do you not
personally, but you know I haveuh, you know through common
people.

Yes, yeah, so our most studios.
Yes, he's amazing.

I love that guy look at that I didn't even know
that common thread.

But go ahead yeah so he called me up out of the
blue and he's like would youlike to come do a shoot for
winnebago, like the rv?
Company and I was like yeah,absolutely, and it had turned
out him again.
So through studio sherpas ryancoral um, we had gone to a
meetup in michigan and we metthere and just kept in contact
okay and so um, we got ourstimulus check that summer.

You know six grand right, wow, not a lot not too
bad, yep.

And so, uh, to dive back a little bit further,
I'd always wanted to buy an rv,travel, you know, do that sort
of thing.
My wife was not super on boardand then all of a sudden, out of
the blue, we got this stimuluscheck and we were just staying
at home.
It turned out that I needed todo a little bit of traveling for
my work and she's like I'm notstaying at home with three kids,

(05:37):
like I'm going to come with you, let's, you know, find an RV.
And I laughed it off.
I was like there's no way, likeI can't buy an RV for six grand
.
She's like just look.
So I went on a bunch ofdifferent places and, you know,
found a bunch of rolling methlabs essentially yeah, but I
went on to eBay type of thing,yeah exactly Walter White could
shave my head, grow a mustache,uh.

(05:59):
But I went on to eBay andthere's this one that was buy it
now and it looked terrible onthe outside but it had low
mileage and I called the guy andI'm like does everything work?
He's like, yep, everythingworks.
So we bought it like that.
Probably a terrible idea, but itended up working out great, and
so we ended up travelingthrough 39 different States,

(06:22):
working in a bunch of differentplaces, doing a ton of work with
my buddy Wes for Winnebago,tiffin a couple other things.
Um, I got a client that hascampgrounds around the U?

S, so I was doing that and we were just traveling
for about a year and a halfTraveling and making videos for
the people while you'retraveling, so that's pretty neat
.

Yep.

Um, and then what landed you in Florida?

So one of the last jobs that I did with Wes was
for Tiffin Motorhomes and thatwas in Ocala, and we had been
coming down to Florida everysingle year anyways.
We really liked Florida,especially during the wintertime
.
I'm Midwest born and raised.
I've lived in Wisconsin,minnesota, michigan, north

(07:05):
Dakota, all very cold places andso it was time for a change.
So we had this job in Ocala,got done with that, and then we
decided, you know, maybe we'redone with the RV lifestyle for a
little bit, and we made themistake of renting an Airbnb
that had multiple bedrooms, bigTV, big pool, and we were like,
yeah, I think it time to to finda place and settle down.

(07:27):
So then we started searchingfor homes in florida, and here
we are three years later look atthat.

Did you sell the rv?
So it's gone?

we did, yeah, so rv life is in the past now well,
we have a travel trailer now,um, and I think we'll do it
again with the kids, uh, whenthey get a little bit older,
because our youngest was mean,he was a baby.
He doesn't really rememberanything, so I'd love to do it
again with the kids.

That's awesome to meet someone Because you know
funny enough.
Like all people before COVID,before pandemic, a lot of times
I have done that or had the ideaof it would be so cool to
travel and it was so funny.
My mom you know uh, and it wasso funny, um, my mom you know
indian, so I took her to one ofthose rv dealerships and she's
like what are you doing?

(08:09):
And this is not you know anyway, because you know the indian
parents.
They're like doctor, engineersatellite.
This is completely not around inan rv no, yeah, and that's not
even like a concept for forindian parents at least, anyway.
So so I did do that.
You know, that was a long timeago 2016 or whatever, whenever
but there was been times when Iconsidered that and, uh,
obviously, for me at least,looking back, I'm so glad I

(08:32):
didn't uh take the plungebecause, uh, what I initially
started, you know, was class A'sbig ones, and then, finally,
the last time I considered them,I wanted to do the before this
is before it was trending onYouTube I, I wanted to do the
van life but now I'm like, howwould I run this video business?
I have more gear, that could youknow.
As you saw my van earlier,there would be no room for me

(08:53):
and the wife of the kids.
And anyway so I'm glad I didn'tdo it.
For me it wouldn't have beenthe right thing.
I'd rather be, you know, one ofthose where we rent it for a
week or whatever, thenpermanently move into one.
But I did consider it manytimes.
So it's good to meet somebodywho actually ended up taking the
dive and actually doing it andseems like had a great time,

(09:14):
because you're doing shoots too.
So which is the you know, theultimate thing?
What happened to the employee?
Did you have to lay them off?
I'm guessing.

We did.
Yeah, I kept her on for as longas possible and tried to send
her like editing work and stuff,and then her and her husband
actually moved downstatemichigan so it was just too far,
like I was living a differentlifestyle, um, where originally
you know we were in the sametown, went to the same office,
so it made sense, and then afterthat it just didn't so uh, was

(09:41):
it like a one of those employeeswhere you have to shoot, edit
everything?

you know pretty much yeah, so how did that
conversation go for people?
You know, because that is partof it, as somebody who's had to
do that and, to be real, I liketo delegate that task.
Um, it's been so fun for me.
I've had to fire people,sometimes on set, uh, and I as a
director, you know, I call myproducer, you know, which is
julie.
Uh, she's more, uh, lead editornow, but at that time she's

(10:05):
doing both roles anyway.
I'll be like all right, julie,uh.
And then, you know, I put allher side.
I was like okay, we need to letthat person go and let you know
, all right.
And then she's like all right,buddy, come here.
Oh no, but you know, sometimesyou have to.
I mean, that's just,unfortunately, when you're the,
the leader, uh, that is what youhave to do because you know, at
the end day, the client is theboss and that is what's most

(10:27):
important.
But coming back to it, how wasthat conversation?
How?
Because I know it's a difficultconversation.
Regardless whether whether it'smutual, it's still a difficult
conversation.
So how did you manage that?
How did you handle that?
especially seems like you hadn'tdone that before no, this is
your one and only time so pleasewalk us through so people can
know what it's like or how to doit.

Man, I don't like conflict so I definitely am not
the person to be like here's howto fire somebody or let
somebody go.
She kind of saw the writing onthe wall.
I mean, you know, my businesswas going in a different
direction.
Her and her husband moved, theyhad a kid.
She lived out kind of in theboonies so internet was not
great so even sending herediting work was difficult.

(11:09):
So I just called her one dayand I'm like hey, I'm really
sorry, but this is not working.
And she, she knew it was comingright so she took it.
Well, there was no animosity oranything no, we're still good
friends to this day so perfect,so that's great, and that's what
I'm saying.

People like um and I'm not, uh, it's not an easy
conversation.
Like I said, a lot of timesI've had to delegate it, but I,
having done that myself too,where I have had to have that
conversation, it is verydifficult, right?
Oh, yeah, uh, because, um, youknow, regardless, like I said,
even if it's mutual, there is alittle bit of like what you feel
like rejected.
I guess it's like, uh, you know, tinder or whatever, right,

(11:43):
when people are like saying noto you, even though it's virtual
, you still feel a little badanyway.

So, um, but I think it also depends on what
the circumstance is right likeif they know that it's coming
and you know it's not that bigof a deal versus you know if
they did something that theyknew they really screwed up, or
you know, you just don't likethem, or something.
Yeah, then it's more awkward,more difficult to do, I think,
for me.

The difficult one is the other.
I've had a few times where thethe client wants them gone from
the set.

That is the most rough one but and but.

I saw the valid writing.
Why yep?
And at the end day, uh, I'mlike, look, but here's my
strategy.
I'm like, look'm going to stillpay you for the day.

Yeah.

Right, you're not getting.
It's not like, oh, you came forfun hours, I'm going to now
give you one tenth of your payor whatever.
Yeah, personally for me it'slike look, you shouldn't have
done what you did.
But at the end of the day,there's no blame game here.
Right, so I, you get toactually not work and get paid.

(12:47):
But obviously that does not.
But the the awkward part herefor me has at least been the
people will usually text me likehey, I hope this doesn't affect
our working relationship andI'm not a liar, I don't want to
lie.
So it's like, yes, they will.
Unfortunately though, so I'mlike I'm not gonna lie to them,
like no, no, you're good, youknow, because at the end they
you know, uh, it's hard to bringsomebody on, that you know.
But they may still fit.

(13:07):
I'm not saying I've had peoplewhere I've like considered like
never hiring them again, andthen I have many, many times.
So there's both sides to it.
But yeah, it is one of the moredifficult things that we have
to do, especially if you'retrying to be a producer,
director or owner of a company.

Right, yeah, and it's good to have that
transparency, bp, because,honestly, you want to help
people grow right.
So if they did something wrongand they truly want to grow,
they're going to own up towhatever you know happened.
So yeah, that's good for youfor doing that exactly.
I've only been on set uh once II don't work a lot of larger
productions, but I've only beenon set once where somebody was

(13:43):
asked to uh like not come backfor the rest of the production.
Yeah, yeah, it was super weirdbecause nobody else was told and
then all of a sudden thatperson wasn't there and we're
all like, oh, where's so and soand uh, it was just kind of an
awkward unknown, yeah and andusually I'm not like to be real
on my side, at least as aproducer or director.

either way, whether I did it directly or had
somebody else like who wasunder me go do it, we're not
going to start now going to therest of the crew.
That person's not coming back,I'm generally like, yeah,
they're not going to be back,and that's it, and you move on.
You're not going to stand there, give reasoning or whatever,
because, a, we don't have timefor that, we don't want to, but

(14:24):
yes, then then it does become anawkward unknown, because it's
like, hey, walk with me, andthen they don't come back.
But you come back and wecontinue with the shoot.
Uh, but hey, I'm, I, I'm soglad we're having this
conversation.
Uh, you know, it wasn'tobviously planned, but yeah, it
is an important conversation andit's an important skill, um, to
learn, because I'm not forpolitical talk, but you have to
handle this carefully because,at the end of the day, there's a

(14:46):
human being on the other sideof it who is also being affected
and I don't know.
But I'm all for, on the otherside at least.
Personally.
I'm all for if somebody reachesout like, hey, what happened?
Blah, blah, blah, I'm happy tohave that conversation If any
way I can help them.
You know, not have thatsituation in the future.
You know why not Like again.

(15:08):
You know we're all human beings, we all make mistakes.
It is one world I'm not like,but I would never do that.
I've also heard stories frombuddies where it's like they go
to a production meeting and thensomebody doesn't like them.
Who goes?
I'm the DP.
If you bring this gaffer again,I am quitting.
And then they the productiongenerally has picked the dp.

(15:28):
So they have to fire these otherpeople just because this guy
had an attitude trip, you know.
But they can't ruin theirproduction because they've built
the look and everything right.
So, yeah, it's hard to workwith people like that too.
I wouldn't obviously bring themon my set.
But then when I hear thesestories I'm like, oh my goodness
, that sounds like a nightmare Idon't understand that.

So I'm midwest born and raised and, like I,
also work on smaller productions, right so even the ones that
you know, they have a specificrole and they do not do anything
outside of that.
I don't understand that.
If it works for thoseproductions, that's great, but
I've always worked on theproduction that, like, at the
end of the day, everybody rapsand we all do it fast, so we can

(16:08):
get to dinner faster or we canget to bed faster, or whatever
right but it's like how can wehelp one another work together?

exactly same thing .
I think we're in similar spacecorporate and commercial work.
Now, uh, I would say some of myshoots that do end up being
really, really large I'm talkingthree, four hundred thousand
dollars.
There is a hierarchy and it'smore for efficiency sake,
because when you have 50, 60people on set, uh, you don't
want anyone, uh, you know doingsomething and causing other

(16:35):
persons work to slow down, eventhough you think you're helping.
But to be real, 95 of my setsare 10 or less people and that's
where it's all hands on deck.
It's like it doesn't matteryou're a pa or you're a director
.
Everyone's picking up bags,everyone's helping load in, load
out or whatever whatever thetask is, because at the end
everyone's working together tobuild an image.
We're not working for credits,right?

(16:56):
It's not like it's my image,it's your image, everyone's
image.
Everyone at the end helpedclient get whatever they wanted
at the end there, right, yeah,um, so talk about, uh, I want to
talk to story how we met.
It's so funny because we didn'tmeet.
It's so weird so.
So it doesn't happen often withme.
Obviously I will hire owneroperators in other states,
sometimes when there's notbudget for me to go or I'm busy

(17:17):
or whatever.
So I have hired, hired people,but typically I will have like a
video call or something likehey, let's, let's, let, let's,
let's hop on a call or whatever.
Uh, but yours is one of therare ones.
So here's what happened, myside and then I want to know
your side of it.
So, so a very good, um, I wouldsay.
People I've known for a fewyears an agency, a part of my
chamber or whatever they needed,um, some content for a big, I

(17:39):
would say, theme park orwhatever you want to describe it
here locally, and then theywanted some content for that.
And I'm excited, I'm like,absolutely, let's go.
And then they're like we justwant photos, and obviously I'm a
video agency.
But guess what?
We have to provide photos.
But I'm also about doing itright.
So I don't say, oh, let me godo it.

(18:00):
Headshots is fine, it's easy,but what I'm saying is, we don't
go, we'll also do photos.
Like, I'll go do photos, then Ican't give them the best.
So what I do is I hirephotographers all the time to
provide that service Anyways,because again, at the end of the
day, if I say no, then I'mlosing the client.
Regardless, this one was alsomore helping out.

(18:21):
Their budget was on the lowerside, uh, than I would like, but
it was more like hey, we havean existing relationship.
I really like the employee thatworks there.
I've worked with him on otherprojects anyway.
Point is it was like oh yeah, Iwant to definitely help you, uh
, but the on the other side it'slike it's only photos and I'm
uh, you know I'm not gonna.
It was drone photos too it isand I'm like I, if it's drone

(18:41):
video I'd be all over.
Then I was like, okay, so Iwant to provide them good
quality content from BinderProductions.
So I went on our group thingand I was like, hey, who does
drone photos or whatever?
And then you came up and thenit was so last minute that you
know I was like, look, I've notmet you, Just don't ruin this
relationship for me, becausethat's for me far more key.

(19:01):
And obviously you know we didhop on the phone.
At least we did talk.
And obviously you didincredible work.
They loved it, because thefirst thing I did was after you
sent me the photos.
I sent the guy over therephotos, my contact over there
and then a day or two later Iemailed him.
I was like, hey, how did it go?
How was everything?
And he's like, no, no, it wasgreat, your photographer was

(19:22):
great.
So I was like, okay, awesome.
So, everything's maintained.
They got the content of thebudget that they had and
hopefully you had a great time.
So that was at least myexperience.
And then, funny enough, when wefinally met, I didn't recognize
your face.
They're like you've hired mebefore and I was like what.
How do I not recognize?
Then you know, obviously, whenwe knew I was like oh, josh,
okay.

(19:42):
And then you know obviously,here we are, yeah.
So now take me from yourperspective of this experience
At least that's mine.

Yeah, absolutely so.
Yeah, the group that we're inawesome group of folks here in
the production realm in theOrlando area and surrounding
area.
And, yeah, I had just gotten mydrone license.
I've been flying drone for along time.
Maybe I'm not supposed to tellthis, but I I've never gotten my
license, cause most of thestuff I do is like out in the

(20:09):
woods, it's architectural stuff,um, it's not you know, metro
area like the one that we talkedabout, where they're saying
specifically like you tell uswhat your flight plan is.
Uh, how long are you going to bein the air?
Where are you going to be inthere?
You know very specific things.
Uh, you got to have droneinsurance.
The whole works, uh.
So we had a number ofconversations to make sure that

(20:29):
that went, but for me, it's justawesome to be able to have new
connections and that's part of,you know, getting yourself out
there.
I'm fairly new to the areawithin the past three years, and
so it's just me meeting people,and so you know, having an
opportunity like that, you tooka chance on me.
Thanks for doing that.

(20:50):
Now we have a relationship.

And now you don't have to think about hiring you
Exactly.
Yeah, and so that's yeah, itwent great.
Yeah, no, and that's the otherside of shoots like that.
So that was obviously at atheme park with actual guests,
travelers, so they can't takeany risks.
So we had to like provide themactual flight plans, insurance,
like you said they have.
You have to have a license.
It's one thing you know.
Like you said, when you're um,for us, like for corporate video

(21:15):
at least, what I am most timeusing drones for, is push and
push outs at like the beginningand then the videos, you know,
establishing shots or whateverin a business, but that's the
extent of typically it is uhanyway, so um, but this one, you
know it's like you're flyingover.
Well, you say you're not gonnafly over people and you're

(21:35):
providing insurance and all thiswritten thing.
So paperwork was most the part.
And then, funny enough, whenyou show up, all that is the
legalese.
Now they're like oh go, oh, goover there, go to this person,
go on top, and you're like noneof this is you know.
But that's just how it is,because, at the end of the day,
these companies don't wantliability right the theme park
is going to push the liability,or the resort I don't know the

(21:58):
right way to describe them butthey're going to pass the
liability to the marketingagency.
Then the marketing agency isgoing to pass the liability to
me, and then I'm going to passthe liability to you.

This is how it works.
That's right, exactly.

At the end of the day, everyone just wants to be
able to go.
Something goes wrong you know?

hey, it's on you, Right.

And that's just how it is.
Yeah, when you get specially tothese higher end jobs, like,
even though, like I said, theirbudget was lower, uh, at the end
the client was very high end,so that's just what it is right.
But, but I'm glad, like I said,it all worked out.
They loved the content.
Uh, you know, uh, like I said,they were happy.
I'm happy.
Uh, at the end, we met and youknow directly, like I said,

(22:37):
because of that and built thisworking relationship and, uh, in
the future, hopefully, we canobviously collaborate a lot more
.
But anyway, that was veryinteresting to me that I've had
that never happen, I think,where somebody's been like I
worked for you and I'm like, whoare you?
And then it took me a second.
As soon as you were like thatlocation, I was like, oh, I know
you.
Of course, now it's like weknow each other, and then we had

(22:59):
such an incredible conversationafter that about you know
business and strategies andeverything, so, anyway, that was
that was incredible.
So let's talk about that.
So, what type of videos are youmaking?
Obviously, I know you do dronephotography, but what else are
you dabbling in and what else doyou do?

I've never really niched down too much.
I do photo and video production.
I started off with photographyand then video just became a
part of the business and Ireally enjoyed it.
So, um, I do a lot of corporatestuff, uh, you know, interviews
, uh, brand stories.
Um, if you're going to diveinto what things I like to shoot

(23:36):
, lifestyle would be my numberone, and then architectural, and
then, if I can do it,automotive, and that's mostly
because of the RV work that I'vedone and I just like cars so
yeah, so what price range areyou trying to shoot into?

And then I would love to know your sales strategy
.
So what?
What price range?
Let's talk about project Causesometimes you know it's not per
video.
Sometimes a project is onevideo right.
Sometimes, it could be threevideos.
Sometimes it could be photo andvideo.
So, but what price range of aproject are you aiming for
typically when you're lookingfor clients?

For 2025, I'm definitely upping it, but at
bare minimum.
I want to stay in the $5,000range and then go up from there.

And is that where you were in 2024?

Where were you in?

2024?
A realistic number.
Where you were, what would you?

say it depends on the project.
I definitely had lower ones,but I would say an average is
between five and 10.

Five and 10, but just pretty good for corporate
and commercial work.

Yeah.

And how are you finding these clients?
What's your strategy?

I don't have a strategy, cause you know you're
new to the area.

but yeah, but let's, let's be real.
You're, you've been in,obviously finding clients,
you're doing pretty good.
So how, how are you?
How are you navigating themarket?
Let's uh, let's get into thatfor somebody you know who's in
this area, or maybe any city howdo they navigate the market
when they're new?

but within a couple of years of uh moving
there for me it's a lot ofrepeat business, so I'm going
back up North and then, uh, it'sjust connections that I've made
over the years and then reallymy sales strategy for the time
being is just meet up withgroups like the one that we're
in and just make connections andtell people the type of work
that I do.
My goal for 2025 is to actuallystart reaching out to companies

(25:16):
.
I just haven't had the time andwherewithal to do that.
We're a family of five so we'resuper busy with that.
We moved to a new city thisyear so that was super busy.
And then this summer, just fromrepeat clients like Q1 was super
slow, and then Q2 and three wasjust pedal to the metal

(25:37):
traveling all over the place,and then now it's kind of
quieted down and I'm catching upand now it's like all right,
how do I make a sales strategy?
And you know messaging youtalking about okay, yeah, I
should join the chamber and Ishould make some new connections
and really that's all it is.
It's just making as manyconnections as possible.

Yeah, just putting yourself out there and don't be
afraid, because a lot of peoplewill go at least.
Oh, they already have fivevideo people, or they already
have I don't know whatever, orthe thing is, uh, you know, stop
treating your fellow videopeople as competition yeah we
all grow together and there'senough work for everyone and
funny enough.
If they're better than you,then they can hire you exactly,

(26:15):
and if you're better than them,you can hire them.
There's no competition.
Yeah, I find that very strangefeeling and at the end they just
go there, meet people, shakehands and you know, and, and me
and adam had such a great talkabout that, so I would recommend
everyone go listen to that one.
Uh, but, like it's, it's allabout putting, you know, those
boots in the ground.
Now, that's not all thestrategies.
This is one other way to do it.

(26:36):
There's other ways that we havepeople in our group doing it
and finding huge success withads and and social media and
marketing and whatever, but tome, that's what's worked you
know, just going to a chamber,meeting people shaking hands,
telling them what you do, andalso my strategy is to let the
work do the talking it's likehey, and then it's full funny.

(26:57):
I go to some events and someclient will get up and they're
like he's great, and I didn'ttell them, I didn't put plant
them there, because you knowthey're there to promote their
business.
But yeah, he made a video formy business, you know, and that
the other video guy can't do,because absolutely you know what
I mean.
And then it's so funny even,and then I also say partner with
your chamber, because it's uh,it's so great, because I'm like
that we'll make a video and thensomebody else will make a video

(27:18):
and our video is all aboutstorytelling, and then the other
video is just a montage, andnot saying a montage is bad, but
it's not the same impact, right?
So even the chamber goes whensomebody calls them, even though
they're supposed to benon-biased right.
They'll go oh, call Bindra,Because you know people do call
chamber.
I know I have where.
I'm like hey, I'm looking forthis, right, I'm looking for a
real estate agent, whatever.

(27:38):
Recommend it when you, Because,again, the trust factor with
the chamber.
They're not going to recommendme somebody who's not good.
You want to be the guy thatthey tell, hey, and I've closed
big deals.
Now, long-term strategy thisdoesn't work.
Tomorrow, like, you show up ata chamber the second day, you're
like, oh, where's my clients?
But long-term, if we've beenactive for years, you know

(28:01):
there's a higher chance you'regoing to be able to close these
high-end deals.
Now here's the catch-22.
I do want to say that, like,there's one chamber that's quite
far from me now because I movedand I've not been able to be
active at all.
So now.
I'm debating is it worth, youknow, even being a member or
what?
Because at the end of the day,I'm like I can't.
You know it's me and like you,I'm traveling.

(28:23):
I'm literally flying tomorrowmorning out.
I'm like I can't.
I can't just do this right, Ican't just be everywhere and I'm
not going to hire somebody justto go to these events for me.
So so there's.
So you know there's there'ssides to it, but no, I highly
recommend somebody, especiallyif you're new to the area's the

(28:46):
best place to meet uh yourclients, which are businesses so
that's incredible.

Yeah, well, and depending on what you want to do
with your production company,like for me, I actually want to
go and find my own clients aswell as doing, you know, the
shooting.
I'm trying to pass off all ofthe editing to my editor now.
Um, but I realized I had a chatwith my wife not long ago and I
need to set a specific dayevery week to go and just talk

(29:09):
with people you know.
Make those connections andthose conversations, because
even if you just meet somebodyonce, you're more likely to work
with them than you are to havenever have met them, right?
So when you hired me, you hadno idea who I was, but because I
was in that group, you at leastfelt a little bit more
comfortable rather than likejust some random person, right?

exactly.
And then what's crazy is whenyou you responded to it, other
people are like josh is great,josh is good.
That's that also builds trust.
Right again, people buy frompeople they like, know and trust
, and the best way to build thatto me is obviously video,
obviously in person, and thenvideo, and then video can
replace in person you're notbiased?
Yeah, well, I'm very biased butI also believe in the product

(29:54):
that I'm selling and it works.
You know right.
But at the end of the day I'msaying that's what it's about.
Everyone has other video peoplein their town and go meet them.
Now some people are not goingto meet them because when I
started.
I reached out a bunch of peopleand not everyone responded.
And that's okay.
Yeah, you know, go meet otherpeople and, and again, don't
wait for instant reaction yeahbecause it's not like you

(30:15):
immediately meet someone, like Iwent to the meetup, right, I
met a bunch of people.
Doesn't mean to the next dayI'm calling everyone come,
there's this project.
But when a project comes, youknow, I genuinely at least try
to keep the people in mind.
I'm like, oh, this, this personmay fit well or whatever, right
and.
And so you never know, right,and it may not happen tomorrow,
it may happen in six months,right and uh.

(30:37):
So so you know, just don't uh,like I said, don't go with evil
intentions.
I guess that's my only thing.
Just be nice, right absolutely.

It's not that hard right, it's karma right.
It comes back to you.
If you put it out there and yoube nice to people, it will come
back to you yeah, exactly.

And then when they do hire you just do a good job.
You know, don't say yes ifyou're not gonna put your
hundred percent, because I thathas happened generally when I
bring on sometimes people whenI'm like they're green, they
don't realize they're green andthat's okay because you know
you're so self-confident, whichis what it takes to go, take
this leap of faith to gofull-time and, uh, and it's okay

(31:12):
.
I mean, uh, I don't mind thatbecause you, you know, I like
confident people, obviously, butat the same time, it's okay to
uh to follow directions, assomeone says hey, can you set
the light here, put it there,blah, blah, blah.
And you know you do it.
Um, you may not know right nowwhy you're like uh, why am I
putting the light there or there?
You know, you just have tofollow the process and I feel
like, as long as you're open,but it doesn't stop you from

(31:34):
giving an opinion and I don'tcare who that person is, if I've
never even worked for them ifthey see something, please,
because you know I'm thinkingabout a thousand things and, and
you know, there's memories thatwe're literally talking with
clients thinking about lighting,camera, sound, whatever we may
miss something, and it's okayand I love it when somebody goes
hey, could we move that there?
it may look better and I'm like,let's take for a second.

(31:56):
I'm like absolutely let's do itright, or sometimes I've had
that happen where I go.
No, no, I want to film on theshadow.
No, I'm not going to changethat or whatever.
So that's okay, and you knowit's not being mean.
It's like genuinely giving yourthought.
You know what do you call it.
I'm actually giving it a shot,you know, and I'm like going
yeah, absolutely, and why not?
So what I'm saying is just beon set, be nice, be

(32:18):
collaborative, and you'llimprove, improve, they'll
improve their craft.
It doesn't matter who they areor how experienced they are.
You make the production betteras long as you give it your 100.
And so only go if you, if youknow you genuinely want to go
there.
It's my point, becausesometimes you don't, are not
getting paid.
What you think you're worth,sure, uh, but but then don't say
yes, is my opinion yeah onlysay yes if you genuinely want to

(32:41):
either learn or whatever,because you never know what
you're going to come back with.
And I do that even now you knowI've said this before like for
me, I had closed myself off,like I started this production
company and you know I wentaround, funny enough uh, I was.
So I was in florida, I was inorlando, and then I was
freelancing and I had a job orwhatever, and then I moved away

(33:02):
to alabama, for Biggest mistake.
But let's not go there.

We're in Alabama.

Exactly where your friend was.
Not Florence For real, yeah,and I started my company there.
I'm in the middle of nowhere.

You know where Florence is.

So I genuinely yeah, this company was started
in Florence, so everyone goesaround me.
Funny enough.
Actually, most people don'thave this reference.
Let me tell you enough.

let's actually most people don't have this
reference, so let me tell you.

Yeah, you know where, florence, yes, so you
know how small that is.
Yes, so I'm in florence andthey're like there's already an
established company here,hermosa yeah, forever and I
don't know them personally.
I don't want to go there, yeah.
But point is they were likethey're already here, they're
already really good, they do alot of business.
So you know you're not gonnamake it, blah, blah, blah.
And at that point, you know, Isaid there's two parts of it
there's business and thenthere's craft.
I was 100% confident in mycraft.

(33:46):
I was like I've made thousandsof videos.
I'm not worried about thequality of the videos, right,
I'm worried about the businessstrategy.
They've figured it out.
They have existing clients andstuff like that, and I don't
right.
So I'm like I could have this.
Is it 100?
In the middle of this, one ofthe smallest towns, I could say

(34:09):
anyway, and if I succeeded,guess what?
By the way, I started thecompany on the 10th of september
, something like that.
Uh, 17 september we had alreadymade 30, 40 grand.
This is in a town withestablished partnership, with
established, you know, qualitylevel and whatever.
They were good, obviously,that's why they were doing a lot
of good work.
And uh, without any guidance,without any business strategies,

(34:30):
uh, you know.
So I'm saying, if I can do it,anyone can do it.
So it's all possible, you justhave to give it, your all in you
.
But.
But I didn't go in and say letme come make a video.
My whole strategy was let myyou know, I recruited everyone I
could that I knew had talentaround me in a small town, you
know, which is also very hard.
And I was just like, let's go,like, hey, look, I'm going to

(34:50):
bring you a Grammy award winningaudio engineer, I'm going to
bring you a team of three, we'regoing to have a BTS photo, bts
video.
You know what I mean?
The whole shebang.
And then obviously, gettingyour first client is the hardest
.
So first client is the hardest.
So I did have help, like I hadpeople you know giving me leads.
Uh, like, hey, you could gotalk to this person, go talk to
this person or whatever, butthen you have to go close those

(35:10):
leads, right?
yeah, and and it was soincredible, walking away with
you know tens of thousands ofdollars, uh, at the end day and
you go oh, people thought Iwouldn't make this in a year.
I made this in three days.
Now what?
yeah now you know what I mean.
Obviously that doesn't mean allmy strategies were great.
I had to refine my businessstrategies because I had to
learn myself.
I didn't have anyone else, youknow, around me teaching me

(35:31):
because there wasn't that manyoptions there to go reach out to
.
But anyway, the point is uh, soit doesn't matter who's there,
who's established, what wellthey're doing, and it doesn't
mean I went out for winnebago orwhatever their clients were I
found my own clients, right?
yeah, so I think it's just allabout a giving it a shot and and
just taking that leap of faithand, uh, giving it full effect.

(35:52):
You never know, and don'tlisten to the noise around you
at least that's what I did yeahbecause, to be honest, you know,
part of me obviously wanted tolisten.

Right, you're scared you're worried, you have
a kid at home.

You know you've got you.
You got people to feed you.
You go.
Should I, should I do this orshould I go for something more
established?
You know, maybe I could get ajob in this field, or whatever
right point is, don't listen tothat just just go give it 100.
You are an example of that.
I'm an example of that it's alldoable.
Plus, you know, I did it likestanding in a very, very small
town.
Please tell people how smallthat town dude like why florence

(36:23):
?

I don't want to dive too deep on this.

Well, somebody took me there.
The really, yeah, my wife she'sfrom there, so she was like
it's gonna be great, you know,and then you know, and and I'm
obviously 100 at that time, tobe real, I I'm glad I went.
Okay, let me backtrack.
Uh, at that point you know I'dbeen in orlando and obviously I
loved it.
I love we can do so much here,oh yeah, but I also go florida.

Traffic sucks you know this is the what is there.

I can always come back for a vacation, you know
like the thought process um andthen, uh, you know, I'm like
whatever, and the home priceswere absurd, and I'm like oh, I
can buy a brand new really nicehome there, blah, blah blah.
So you know, obviously there wasother factors.
I don't want to just say it wasjust that.
And then, as soon as I showedup, I was like what do we do?
Oh, it's just the threerestaurants.
You can only go eat the downthe road.

(37:08):
And again, I love southern food, but you know it's unhealthy.
You can only eat it so manytimes the same thing, um, you
know anyway.
So so, like I said, it was fun,it was nice, but then you go.
What do I do?
yeah where do we go?
And then I instantly was likeuh.
And then I thought, oh, I'm inthe country, I'll do a lot of
country things, and then weweren't doing that much country
things, so I'm like so it's notlike uh, you know, I'm enjoying

(37:31):
the other side of the worldanyway.
Yeah, so instantly.
And then I, like you, I tookadvantage of the covid.
As soon as covid hit I was likelet's get out of here.

This is it.

This is the time to to leave, uh, because you
know everyone's making a moveand I'm like this is perfect
timing and then took it.
Obviously can't have no regrets, never going back.
But funny enough, I've goneback.
I still have clients there, soI've gone back and shot.

But that's it.

That's the limit of what I'm going to do.
I'll happily go back thereshoot for a few people.
I don't think I'm moving back,and it made my love for Orlando
grow bigger.
Sure Cause I'm the type of guyI'm like, you know.
I have free time, let's go toDisney and let's go to
university or wherever there'sso much to do here, and now I
respect that more.
before I did it and I was likenow I'm like, oh, being able to

(38:17):
just go to these places and thennot spend weeks, you know,
planning or whatever isincredible.

Or you can go in the off season.
There you go Right, and thenyou don't have the massive
crowds to wade through.

Yeah, exactly, and you don't have to.
What I like is at least nothave to.
You know, plan out, takevacation days, whatever, like
the whole thing.
This is every day for us, likefor other people's vacation.
So now our vacations can bedifferent, like we could go on a

(38:51):
cruise, we could do otherthings and um.
I don't know, like I said, I Irespect it more, I get it.
It's not for everyone.
You know it is hot and hot andhot and hot.
Not everyone likes that.
It was so great.
Last year I had a manual, thepodcast, and we were talking
about how we were in dc for aproject.
Uh, late last year and it wasfall weather like real fall
weather.
And it's like we don't get thatdown here.

So there's pros and cons, except for now, like
right now.
All of a sudden it's like afreak.
Yeah, it's random but it's not.

Also, you know, we don't have like leaves on the
ground.
Sure, you know what I mean.
You don't get that feel.
I'm sure you know that fromMichigan.
Obviously you get it.

Oh yeah, you get way too much snow?
Obviously yeah, but you knowwhat I mean.
Like right, do you miss thesnow?
Um, like the romantic side ofit, yeah, absolutely.
You know I'd go up there for,you know, maybe a week or
something like that but youdon't miss shoveling, no like
the.
You know all the stuff that youwould spend hours and hours,
whether it's warming the car,shoveling, scraping the windows
just being bitter cold.

Yeah, no, I don't miss that at all.
Yeah, um.
So, like I said, if I um, youknow, anyway, yeah, same thing.
Uh, my kids go, my, my daughtergoes.
Uh, you know, she was like it'ssnowing, like we want to go to
alabama.
It snows and I'm like girl, itsnows like one day a year maybe
at most there.
If you really want to snow, wecan.
We can go up north.
I don't I don't have thatromantic side of it like
obviously it was.
It's cool, yeah, again stayingin alabama for a few years, it

(40:09):
was awesome that one day when itsnowed, yeah.
But but it was awesome becausethe whole town basically shut
down right, so you could justhave three off, extra off days,
paid from work, because I had ajob at the time too, but now I'm
like it wouldn't be fun if Iwas in michigan, and because the
world is used to it, I'm sureyou guys don't shut down for
three days for tiny snow.

(40:30):
So you're, you're, you have tolike shovel and whatever right,
and I'm like that doesn't soundfun at all you know so.
So yeah, I'm, I'm happy where Iam.
Obviously they want to see snow.
I'm like we have here inorlando.
There's enough locations, youknow where they do the fake snow
park and whatever I'm like Ican show you snow.

If that's what you want to see, we go to sea world
where they do the bubbles inthe air.
You know it's 50 degrees here,like this is close.
They're doing ice skating.

I'm like look there you go, which is funny.
My daughter, uh, oh, my godattention.
But my daughter was like I wantto go high skating.
I took her and then for 40minutes all she did was hold the
handrail to just walk and I waslike there you go, there's your
ice skate it's different.
You know when you look at it itlooks beautiful, um, but you
know, when you do it I'm likeyeah it's all right, I mean

(41:14):
obviously I'm sure there'speople listening who love that
and that's great I have buddieswho go every year to you know,
go snowboarding or whatever, andthat's great for them.
I'm just like I'm happy in mylittle bubble and I'll
definitely go for vacation ohyeah that's my limit, you know
yeah, I think I'm happy and and,like I said, it took a while,
it took me that change toflorence and back to just go.

(41:36):
Okay, I'm happy, this is, thisis it which is why you know
about the home now settled andmade roots down here, because
I'm like this is it, we'lltravel, but I'm just happy down
here, you know, because I thinkthis is a good, um, permanent
spot, and then, um, yeah, butanyway so I'm super interested
in your story.

Uh, so, first of all, you had a milestone this
past year.
What was your revenue or whatdid you make this past year?

so we finally crossed two mil.
Hey, let's take a moment forthat.

Congratulations, thank you, thank you so I I want
to know how do you go from, youknow, being in orlando, going
to florence, alabama no hate onflorence or muscle shoals I just
like saying that name uh, andthen I want a sweatshirt that
says Muscle Shoes.
I still haven't gotten it, buthow do you get from that?
Coming back to Orlando, wherewere you financially as far as

(42:31):
your production company then?
To how do you get to where youwere this past year?

So funny enough.
Like I said, I started in 2010here through Central Michigan
and Disney exchange programthing.
Blah blah blah started in 2010here through central michigan
and disney exchange programthing blah blah blah.
Uh went back to india for alittle bit to finish my degree
and uh did the internship at mydream job per se in india.
Whatever didn't like it.
I've talked about it, so I don'twant to go into that the point
is now I'm back in us, right,I'm working for disney full-time

(42:57):
, and then I started freelancingvideo on the side, bought my
t4i and all that right anyway,and then you know, obviously you
went through the freelancejourney, but it was a side job
so I was like.
You know, I'm passionate aboutmaking videos, so for years I
just did it to do it you know itwas like you know, what happens
is when it's not your primarysource of income.
And I finally had a decent,finally I mean these, those

(43:18):
exist had a decent job at disneythat paid well.
You don't you stop thinkingabout you know, like I have to
make money yeah uh.
But there's always been thisentrepreneur my family's
multi-generational from business.
So I had this entrepreneurialside in me, like I was still
making people sign contracts and, you know, making a legit, even
for a free job.
I'm like, no, no, I don't work,come out for that.
So there was some side of theentrepreneurial side to it, but

(43:40):
it wasn't deep.
And then obviously startedother companies did tons of
things, things.
Point is it was never a primarysource of revenue, but I was
doing enough that I was makingdecent money out of it and it
was a buddy of mine.
Funny enough, we still talk inFlorence in Muscle Shoals,
whatever he goes like dude, likehe got me inspired and at that
time you know you do everything.

(44:00):
He's like make me a logo.
He's starting some company.
He's like make me a logo.
And so he's like encouraging me.
I was like sure, I'll make itfor 500 bucks, right, that's how
your brain goes.
And he's like sure, I don'tremember the exact amount, but
I'm just saying let's, let's saythat and then and then, uh,
then he makes it like, he's likeso great, now make me this.
Or or have a buddy who wants tomake a video, so you know, and,
and it always takes peoplearound you, the the point is

(44:22):
somebody was encouraging me andthen I'm also miserable at my
job because I'm like what am Idoing?
You know, this isn't fun.
Point is, it was in that leapof faith and I was like debating
it.
I was like I want to do thisfull time, right, I want to go
deep dive in it.
I knew, and, by the way, in midjourney, mid of that, I bought

(44:47):
like GH5s and gh4s and blah,blah, blah, move through the
journey, yeah, five, yeah, Imean.
And gh5s, uh, primarily at thattime was my main a camera when
I started this company and Istill had my gh4s, uh, so I was
always on top of you know, uh,everything, uh, which is like
passion, I'm doing it anyway.
So, long, short, short.
It was.
Here's what's my thing, what Inoticed in my freelance journey.
I was like everyone's justmaking and we didn't.
Equipment wasn't thisaccessible back then.
Right, we didn't have reallygood cheap lights and cheap

(45:09):
cameras I was like everyone'sjust making trashy videos at the
low level.
They'll charge clients 500bucks and then it's just.
It was really bad.
I'm talking you can make bettervideos, cell phone now, right,
and then, um, the videos don'tdo anything.
They're just a montage.
There's no purpose to them.
And I know, obviously, power ofvideo.
I know how effective videomarketing can be.

(45:30):
I've been bullish on youtubesince the beginning and uh, so I
was like you know what?
And plus my desire to be on bigsets, right, I was like I don't
want to deal with the bs thatcomes with music videos and
movies uh, indie movies and thenbut I still want to make those
type of content.
How, how can I bring thesesmall businesses that level of
content that I've seen on setsthat are bigger?

(45:51):
Yeah, and uh.
So it took a lot of thoughtprocess, like I said, of going
through this wild job.
So the process was very simple.
I'm like, okay, so I know thisguy who's really good at audio
processing, I have these buddies, I have me who's good at
strategy, uh, and then point is,and I have julie at home was
good at organization, so Ibrought all the people together.
I was like, okay, so here'swhat I'm gonna do I'm gonna

(46:11):
start a production company andI'm gonna again arbitrarily.
That time I was like I'm justgonna charge people thousand
bucks per minute or whatever.
I thought stupid.
But at that point mycalculation was if I make this
much minutes of video, producevideo.
But from day one thefundamentals, I think, were very
good.
We were like we'll never shareraw video.
We'll repatch the content tomake more money in the future.

(46:34):
So you know I had given enoughthought what I'm saying before I
paid any pen to paper Plus.
Having started enough companies, I was like I'm not spending
all this time doing LLC.
It's going to be soleproprietorship.
You know what I?
Mean I had enough businessfundamentals.
I would say, um that there wasless risk but there was still
huge risk because I put all my401k, everything into it and I

(46:57):
went um.
So all in uh to be real.
One week after so the firstweek same thing, so everyone
around me goes.
You can't charge people athousand bucks per minute or
produce.
They'll never pay that.

That's too much I was here in, or no?
No, no, that's in florence.
Okay, yeah, they're in florencenow.

So that's my journey anyway, so I go oh
really, oh really.
And then you know, I show up.
And then I showed up, uh, at alocal university, um, and they
were like we already have a youknow a company that we work with
and stuff like that.
And I was like, look, here'swhat I'm going to make for you,
I'm going to make a testimonial.
And it was like four or fivegrand, whatever the price was.
Remember, this is my first everthing and I'm like official

(47:34):
thing and I'm like, but this isgoing to be like nothing, like
you know, you guys haveexperienced before, because I
knew even this other company wasdoing great, but they weren't
bringing BTS photo video,everything for the university
whatever.
I'm saying anyway.
And then same thing with thelocal businesses.
I was, like, you know, havingmeetings, but it was just that
it was like genuinely goingthere, genuinely paying

(47:54):
attention.
So instead of this was mystrategy from day one.
I was like I'll make you apretty video, it'll have all the
right equipment.
Blah, blah, blah, right, letright equipment.
Blah, blah, blah, right, let'stalk about why you want this
testimony, why do you want thisbrand video?
And uh, obviously, immediately,like with the university, uh,
it was like okay, let us thinkabout it.
And then, uh, not even fiveminutes, I was like absolutely,
you know, nonchalant, absolutely, because the good thing is, I

(48:16):
had some leeway.
Obviously I didn't.
Just, you know, I wasn't goingto go bankrupt if they didn't
take it anyway, I walked out,you won't believe.
One minute later they're likelet's do it.
And then same thing with the uh, the next uh, when I was like,
okay, it's gonna be 10 grand, uh, I'd like, uh, you know, 50
down now, how would you like topay it, you know?
And then they go uh, oh, maybewe could see.
I was like well, and then theyou know what's there to think

(48:38):
about whatever right?
And then they go you know what.
Yes, here's the check.
You know what I mean.
Like it was like that.
And then now you're with the,you know 30 grand or whatever,
and you're though, holy crap,this is it far exceeded what I
want to do.
And then I had to.
I immediately bought.
Uh, you know, I was like, okay,now these clients deserve the
best.
So I did that one testimonialwith the gh5s, that was it.

(48:59):
Like we moved very quickly.
I was like, okay, I invested infour Big big.
I made so much money from them.
And then you know all the app,the best lights.
They were like I think it was120D Mark IIs or whatever I
bought a three light Point is.
From day one we were like, orsay, second video technically,
because we did use the originalcontent for that one video.
But outside that we were likeall in.

(49:21):
And then I partner with localschool organizations, and this
thing, you know, because it'slimited, You're very little
option in Florence.
And then I was reaching out toall my contacts outside.
This is how I was flying in orflying out.
I was like, hey, now I'm aproduction company, we have
really good audio, Another thingI was focusing on which other
people didn't at the time.
I was like, no, we're going tohave high quality audio, high

(49:41):
quality camera, high qualityeverything.
Anyway, it was just that.
It was like just being able totap into other people and it was
just that.
It was not even something crazylike hire me.
And.
But from day one we were likethat.
I was like, look, this is whatI'm going to make you, and if
I'm not the right fit, I'm notthe right fit, and you would be
amazed how many people saw that.

Yeah.

And it was very quick to find people who were
fitting.
And then I was noticing all thepeople who'd say no and would
go to somebody outside of me andthe other company, cause you
know that was their only choiceand I know what they were
charging.
So I was like I know we'repricing, so if you're going to

(50:22):
third, I know there's no oneelse that good out here, so it
was always terrible.
It was like so your option waseither at least locally I'm
saying it was me or or armosa orno one, so so it was kind of
pretty much like that, becausethere was a few other companies.
But, like I said, it wasn't, itwasn't what we were trying to
do there, and that was prettygood.
And then what I liked was I wasable to coexist in that small
little market.
And again, I wasn't there.
I was there very limited time.
I don't want to uh take toomuch of it and then I was able

(50:43):
to fly out and travel out andget big gigs.
Uh, obviously there were somemistakes made, as in like I was
so like gung-ho on it being aproduction company that so many
people just came in.
They were like we just want theraw files like I want it for me
.

I was like nope, not me.
Yeah, unless me.

Unless I own the footage.
You know, if you want, editedsure, which I've changed now,
which is fine.
Like I said, I'm never hurtingfor revenue, but at that time I
was so like no, we're going tobe a production company.
I don't show up unless there'sfour people.
Blah, blah, blah, right.
And it worked no-transcript,and they were always impressed

(51:27):
and we were always, from day one, trying to tell better stories.
It doesn't matter the visual,obviously they'll be somewhat
good, but it was like thestories is what they cared about
.
And then talk about theuniversity.
As soon as I got that firsttestimony, I sent it to every
department.
I was like look, we're aregistered vendor, we have, this
is the video, and I was happyto share.

(51:47):
I was like this is the video wemade.
Do you want one?
And now it's seven grand, right.
So we made tons of money.
I'm saying that year, I think Idon't want to quote exact
number 70, 80 grand, just fromthat one university client,
without even putting in effort,because all we did was send an
email.

That was it.
Yeah, that was it.

The work's already done, yeah exactly Because now
we have a registered vendor, wehave this client, we have a
proven thing, our contract'sproven because it's a
state-owned university.
So, anyway, I think it's allabout just coming.
I hope that answered yourquestion.
It's just about a obviouslyperfecting your business skills
and then perfecting your craft,and if you are not good at craft

(52:28):
, you can always bring people,and I was, from day one,
bringing people with me, andit's not about that.
I couldn't do it.
It's because I wanted to focuson the client and the client
experience and I was focused ondirecting.
If I had picked up cameras oror lighting or whatever and not
that doesn't mean I wasn'thelping set up, but my focus was
the client experience and thestory experience.
I think that separated me from,uh, their experience in the

(52:51):
past and I was able to, uh, kindof you know, uh, I guess
establish myself and as soon asyou know you do good work,
they're happy to bring you backabsolutely and once.
I was able to do that for enoughpeople.
I at least found that, oh, I nolonger have to worry about
revenue.
I was focused on followingsolutions.
I've talked about that again.
First time I had issue wherethe cameras wouldn't sync.

(53:13):
I'm like, okay, we're time code.
Only now going forward.
First time had issue of a cardnot working time code.
Only for a first time had issuewith air B cam not matching.
You know, we had I think it wasC 200.
And then another I think somesome Canon camera is what I was
shooting on and it didn't match.
I didn't like in post that thetight didn't match the thing.

(53:34):
Nothing wrong, people do thatall the time.
But I was like never again Formy shoot A and B camera have to
match.
Our B-roll camera has ever beenextra cameras, which is very
rare.
You know again corporate videoand the advantage of that was
once I solved a problem, it'snever been a problem.
So, now I've realized, when Iask my clients why you hired me,
they hire me for reliability.

(53:54):
I show up, we're going to showup what we're going to bring,
what we're going to show up whatwe're going to bring, what
we're going to do and the resultthat we're going to give them.
They get it.
And then and I find that it's alot easier because now I don't
have to sell or do anything it'slike genuinely just trying to
help people and it just kind ofskyballs from there and then, uh
, like I said a year or two ago,finally opened where it's like

(54:15):
I don't care, now I can have ashow up and be your dp I don't
know why I had that stupidrestriction in there and happy
to give people raw files,obviously for a price, right,
unless they're hiring me a dp,then that's different than they
just get the files.
Point is, and that made it, Ithink, finally brought
everything to where it is nowand I think I'm very happy.
Talk about 2024.
I think it was such anincredible year where I

(54:36):
personally felt creatively happy.
I felt as a business.
We were happy, finally was ableto build that man that I wanted
to oh, by the way, I had atrailer in alabama too.
Nobody had it.
We were building a fullproduction trailer and nobody
had that, so that was also aseparation point.
When they saw like a legitproduction trailer, they were
like whoa, what is this you?
know, again and the advantageisn't just to go whoa, it was

(54:58):
also useful.
We had it loaded with stuff wewere using all the time I'm
setting a four by fours andstuff, and who's used to that in
florence, alabama right andhuntsville obviously the other
markets we were shooting inright in and around of that.
So people were like impressed.
And then they, and then whenthey saw the quality, they were
like, oh, this is really goodyeah and so, and that's what it,

(55:18):
and then you don't have to goask for a repeat client.
They automatically call hey, wehave another video, or we have a
buddy here down the street whocan use you, or whatever.

What were your sales strategies when you were
in that area?
You said at some point youstarted flying out doing jobs
for other people.
How are you getting that typeof work?

So same thing.
So I went in my freelance thing.
I pulled up everyone.
You know that I knew, and Ibasically sent them an email out
.
I was like, hey look, so we'redoing this production work, now
we have the production trailer,we have all this equipment, plus
I fly packs, uh, and that wasit.
To be honest, I didn't reallydo much.
I did join the chamberimmediately.
The local chamber was veryactive doing events.

(55:57):
They're giving speeches toother, uh business owners and uh
, again, see things I say now Iwas like immediately, like I
have to join a businessorganization.
I was even joined huntsvillechamber, you know.
So I was very active from dayone from there, um, but to be
honest, like I said, those arelong-term strategies.
So, again, I didn't immediatelystart to get business from there
, but I think it was just thatit was reaching out to every

(56:19):
network and I have everyone thatI met with knew what I was
doing right and then I think itwas telling them hey, this, this
is what I'm up to, and thengoing to these jobs and just
doing a great job and tappinginto whatever network I had and
just waiting for things to comethrough, and I think, just being
uh, I think, at least for thearea I don't want to take,

(56:41):
because, like I said, most ofthe work wasn't in florence but
also there wasn't that manyoptions.
It was that company or me so itwas like you know, I'm sure that
whoever worked with me wasreaching out to our mosa too,
and they were obviously on adifferent level at that point.
But again, I I don't know theircurrent revenue or whatever,
but I'm pretty sure I was, I was, I went up very, very high.

(57:03):
I may have been at by the timeI left there, even same or
higher revenue, sure, but that'swhat I did.
I didn't want to take away, andthat's why I say it wasn't
competition, it was just likeknowing what other people were
doing, and I was like thesepeople are doing this level of
great work, right yeah I have todo same level of work, or at
least close to it, in thebeginning and then, once I was
good, I was like now I have totry and do better work.

(57:24):
Not saying my work was anybetter but that was at least the
aim right from my end.
And then, and at the end of theday, I was like I know
everyone's not my client, right,that's just the truth.
There's so much work, even thatlittle town, that we're fine.
Uh, as in, like you know if,and that's why I was like some
company, I do want to know theother side of it.
Not all transactions went great.
We went to meetings.

(57:45):
They were like oh well, I canhire this guy down the street
for 500 bucks, absolutely youcan you know I mean we're not a
good fit, yeah, we're not gonnado what they're gonna do.
And it's funny and sometimes,like I said I would, at that
time I was small enough that Iwould follow up and see and I
was like, yep, that's what theywanted.
And then they weren't happy andsome would come back, some be
like, hey, we weren't happy yeahare you gonna work with you, or

(58:05):
some would just be like youknow, and then they didn't last.
It's so funny.
A lot of those businesses closeddown too right so I wonder what
the fate could have been theother way.
That's why I'm so bullish invideo you don't have to get it
from me.
I don't care where you get it,get video and do it right.
But, like I said, again, thatsounds crazy, but that's all I
did.
I didn't do that much, but Idid join the chamber and that

(58:27):
did bring money, by the way,even in shows.
But it wasn't, like I said, dayone, but it was like maybe
three months, four months downthe road, but I was very where
you like.
uh, plus, I also liked here'sanother thing.
So in the beginning I didn'thave an office right, so people
wanted to meet.
Where do you meet the chamber?
Most chambers will have like aconference room that you can use

(58:47):
.
So what I was leveraging was,uh, at that chamber, the
shoulder, shout out to themreally good team, great, really
great people.
Shoulder chamber of commerce.
So they had like a conferenceroom or whatever that you can,
you know, borrow as long asavailable as a chamber member.
So I would just, anytime at ameeting I'd be like we're gonna
meet at the chamber of commerce.
Gives you credibility, plus,gives me an office to meet.
I didn't have an office to me.

(59:08):
There you go.
So that was the perfect placeto meet people and have meetings
or whatever, or even hiringpeople.
I hired so many people locallyI ran out of people to hire, by
the way the issue.
I had the opposite and and great, I met great friends.
I have so many great friendsnow still because of that,
because you know, you start ashiring someone and then you
become friends and you stillkeep up.
Funny enough, I was literallytexting last night with one of

(59:30):
the buddies from there, uh.
But point is, yes, I, Igenuinely ran out.
So then I was had the otherissue where I was calling
literally every other person.
I'm like you're availableavailable you available and a
lot of time.
You know they were not full-time, so they had jobs or whatever.
So I was actually struggling tofill in roles because there was
not that many people there,yeah.
So either they were, like Isaid, full, not full-time, or

(59:52):
they had jobs or whatever like,and and then the people that
were good were working foralmost already anyway, because
like in this so small town.
So yeah, that was the other sideof the issue where I was like I
was having issues scalingbecause I could only have so
many people on staff.
But no, we did great.
We even tapped into the tourismdepartment.

(01:00:12):
We did video for tourism thereand tons of stuff like that.
But then again same thing.
It was like I loved going to mymeetings.
Uh, within months it was like,okay, we've seen your quality,
so we're not even talking aboutquality, right?
We always was talking aboutbusiness.
Yeah, uh, but now not.
In the first one I had toobviously show them demo reel
and stuff like that to tap thefirst couple of clients.

(01:00:33):
But after, like, you've seen mywork, right?

Josh LeClair (01:00:36):
and if not.

Vipul Bindra (01:00:37):
Let me show you my work first.
We're not even going to talkabout quality, because if we're
there, then we have other thingsto talk about before we talk
about what video, why video andstuff like that yeah I've never.
I've always wanted to delivergood quality, but I've never
wanted to talk about it because,I'm like I'm going to do that
anyway, otherwise I wouldn't.
This wouldn't be fun, right,this would become another job.
Oh, absolutely anyway.

(01:00:57):
So that's my long rant aboutwhat I did in a small time.
But obviously getting out ofthere was the best decision.
Yeah, leaving shoals.
Uh, because you know theairport was in huntsville was
not direct flights, smallflights.
It was a pain to fly out with ohmy goodness and uh yep yeah, so
just having mc over here hasbeen a game changer, and then

(01:01:17):
just direct flights to a lot ofcommon locations that we go to
LA, you know, vegas, new York,whatever um has also been very
helpful.
So, yes, town doesn't matter,but a good airport doesn't
matter.

Yeah, absolutely, and I think you know you and I
have the same thing in common of, you know, trying to run a
production company in a smalltown, and I think there's a lot
of benefit of learning how to dothat.
I used to struggle to try to getpeople to pay me $1,000 to do a
full commercial in a small townand it would take months for

(01:01:52):
them to be convinced and showthem work that I've done and I
was well-known in the town andit was still just like pulling
teeth to get them to payanything, but also my cost of
living was extremely low.

right, like there's benefits, there was
definite advantage that you knowlow cost of living definitely
helps.

But either way, whether you're in a small town
or you're in a big town, it allcomes down to just keep going
out.
Make those connections as muchas possible and the work will
come flowing to you.

And people will pay high budget.
Remember 2018, I didn't chargeless than $3,500.
Every project was more than$3,500.
That was the minimum I setright.
Sure, so I never did a projectless than $3,500.
I'm talking in Shoals, alabama,and you're one of the people
who'll get that, yeah, so itAlabama.
And you're one of you peoplewho get that, yeah, so, so it's

(01:02:42):
possible.
Obviously, it's not easy.
Yeah, the small town,especially 3500 meant a lot six
years ago than it does now and,funny enough, I think, I set my
rates.
So so, so well.
I have not once raised my rates, my rates.
I set my day rate then andagain, I know I could charge a
lot more, but I have not onceupped my rate since I started
the company.
Now it's internal.
I don't really tell to people,obviously, other than you know.

(01:03:04):
Like you hiring me that'sdifferent, but typically clients
hire me not just me but withthe crew.
The point is I have never done avideo for less than $3,500,
unless I was just a DP orwhatever.
Now that I do that.
But the point is it's doable.
It's obviously harder, but thenthe advantage you have in a
small town is there's not thatmany other people doing what

(01:03:25):
you're doing, right yeah and uh,so you can easily, um, you know
, set yourself apart is what I'msaying and, like I said, I it
was so weird for me to find out.
I actually was in a town with ahigh quality company yeah which
is rare for a small town likeyou said their clients are from
Vinnebago and Tiffin, which israre.
Remember, this is a middle well, not middle well, north Alabama

(01:03:46):
, very small town with a videoproduction company whose clients
range from Vinnebago and Tiffin.
And here I am going, I'm goingto start a video production
company.
You know, I'm saying I think Iwas setting myself a little bit
up for failure.
So I'm saying I think I wassetting myself a little bit up
for failure, so I'm just glad itdidn't go south.
But you know what I mean?
It's doable, they were doing it.
First of all.

(01:04:06):
That's an amazing example.
And then for me to come in andbuild my own clients, and you
know, I was able to be on setsof Fortune 50 companies from
that tiny little town.
Funny enough, I don't want togo too many tangents.
Talk about pandemic.

(01:04:26):
January 2020.
This is before the pandemic.
I tell julie, I'm like okay, sowhat's next for bindra?
Right now we've establishedourselves, we're doing great
content.
I'm like we're gonna tap intolive streaming.
And she's what?
Because you know, at that timenobody cared about zoom and live
streaming oh, pre-covid amazingso I made a huge investment can
you tell the future?

is that what you're telling me right now?

maybe I'm telling you I go funny, let's talk about
toilet paper.
We didn't have that issueeither.
Uh, I've always been like let'sbuy things in bulk.
So again, we weren't the panicbuyers, we just bought it.
So it was so crazy, we hadtoilet paper and everyone's,
which a made no sense.
It has no connection to covid,but people are just crazy yeah,
and then.
So we were able to help peopleout with toilet paper, of all

(01:05:02):
things.
It's just, it makes no sense,but anyway.
But that's the thing.
That's just my nature, as youcan tell I start a production
company.
Three days later I buy 4c 200s.
I don't know if you can tellsomething here yeah, you know
yeah, yeah, that's just been mystyle.
Same thing.
I switched over sony a coupleyears ago.
People would go, you know,little by little, I meant okay,
2fx6, 2fx3s, all gm2 lenses,immediate, like you know what I

(01:05:26):
mean.
And then 2fx30s.
So anyway, that's just.
This is the way I do.
It don't do as I do, do as Isay anyway, because gear doesn't
matter.
You can rent it.
It's my opinion.
Don't invest in gear.
I'm just silly.
Plus I'm passionate abouttechnology.
Um, anyway, uh, coming back tothe the point that I was trying
to make, which was what was it?
I lost my train of thought Idon't know.

Anyway, I mean man we're talking uh all over.

We're talking, uh, january, oh, yes, yes, so
pre-covid, so I uh anyway I'mlive streaming, yeah, so I went
all into live streaming and webought all the equipment and
training and everything.
I obviously put myself in aroom and just did it Like
because, again, I didn't haveresources.
So I'm telling people now justreach out to people who know
what they're doing, Makes life alot easier.

(01:06:13):
But even when you don't,nowadays there's YouTube
University.
There's very little of that, atleast that I remember.
But either way, all I did was Ibuilt a stick rack, I put
myself in a room, I practicedevery scenario and again, if I'm
like, if I'm going to be there,nothing should go wrong.
So I practiced and I knew, oh,this could go wrong.
Then I would buy a double ofthat.
The point is, come February Ifelt experts started doing live

(01:06:39):
streaming events and come april,the whole world shuts down.
And I'm like, when everyone isforced inside and I was like, oh
well, we're here, middlealabama, uh, or not, like small
town alabama, we can actuallycome, uh, you know, make you
content, and yeah and that wasreally great.
So and then, funny enough, uh, Ithought a pandemic goes away.
Live streaming would go away,but it hasn't.
We've done tons of eventsflying all over, you know, even

(01:07:02):
in central Florida, just youknow, all sorts of conferences
and ribbon cuttings and thingslike that.
I think live streaming is ahuge market, different but
similar than video production,but more, I would say, difficult
, because if anything goes wrong, it's going on live.
You better be able to fix it,because you'd be amazed how many

(01:07:25):
people going to live.
And then they're like ourinternet connection dropped off
and the client was so angry.
You know it's not your fault,but it's your fault, if that
makes sense absolutely so, yeah,maybe in a way I don't know
what came over me I did predictthe future and I think that is
why I think I was able to growduring the pandemic, when
everyone else, like you said,was sitting at home and I was
able to just plus also keep alot of people around me, you

(01:07:45):
know, with work, yeah, so youknow, at the end of the day,
that's all I think that's about,like, which is what I'm saying.
I've always been grow witheveryone, keep everyone together
, because it's a community, soeveryone together because it's a

(01:08:05):
community, um, so, if you know,some people were able to make
some money, um, I was able togrow my company, obviously for a
limited time.
We became live stream only nowit's a balance I would say, 40
live streaming, most of it isback to 60 regular production,
uh, but anyway, that did keep uslow.
That keep it kept us going andI was one of the few people and
I think what also helped wasevery single person wanted to
buy live streaming equipment.
It went out of stock and hereI'm like, I've got it already,
I've got everything I've gotevery you know type of converter

(01:08:28):
, sdhdm or whatever, uh,decimators and anyway, it was
just incredible, man, like itwas like, uh, surreal time is
all I can say that's wild, wildyeah, so next time I time I'm
like again, I'm joking, I thinkI just got lucky.
I just I'm always forwardthinking.
And then I don't think I wastalking about pandemic, I was

(01:08:48):
just thinking about what's next.
Yeah, it just, pandemic helpeda lot.
I'm sure we would have stilldone a lot of live streaming.
It just wouldn't have grown, itdid you know, uh.
But you know, I'm glad morepeople have accepted live
streaming.
I think it became bigger thanit used to be.

(01:09:08):
And just imag, another thing.
It's not live streaming, butyou can use similar equipment.
I didn't realize an untappedmarket where, when you do
conferences, you can offer imag,which is just putting the image
on the screen, and, uh, it's sosimple to do and it's so much
extra revenue.
You, you can easily chargeclients more money and I've had,
you know, people frombroadcasting and stuff like that
were like, no, you have to usebroadcast cameras and whatever.
But the thing is, theseconferences, they don't want to

(01:09:29):
spend that much money,especially for something as like
iMac, when they're not livestreaming, right and but you can
still offer high quality withthese cinema cameras nowadays,
which is better than what theywould do.
Um so I've been able to get moremoney from that too, so that's
an extra bonus that comes out ofit anyway.

That's always good .
Yeah so so what do youprimarily focus on as far as,
like you know, your bread andbutter?
What's what's the work?

interview and B-roll.
I think I could do that, closemy eyes and do it.
I mean most of again.
What I like to do is corporateand commercial.
Obviously, my favorite isscripted stuff, but most of what
businesses need, though, isunscripted content, like we'll
be telling stories fromunscripted interviews, and

(01:10:19):
having done thousands andthousands, I mean more than
10,000 interviews at this point,because a lot of what I do
here's my expertise, and I wouldrecommend everyone do that.
Figure out how to do highquality interviews, but over and
over again in the same day sowhat I've been?
able to offer is better budgetsto clients where we can go.
Okay, so we want to tell thestory.
We have 18 people, I can dothat in one or two production
days and they go.
What?

What's the most amount of interviews you've done
in like?

a single day 18 to 20?
.
Okay, I would say I'm talkingone day different location?
Yeah, so, and you can.
I've had people who've helpedme with those, but like we've
literally gone, I've soperfected the interview setup
and you were seeing, now I'mtrying to go to the next one,
but literally like pull up up,go to the location.
I'm talking indoor, outdoorsetup interview, pack up out.
Next location, set up interviewpack up out.

(01:11:04):
Set up interview pack like andthese are unscripted interviews,
unscripted not, not locationsyeah, nice yeah so I'm directing
and interviewing.
Then I have a crew with meobviously doing camera sound and
uh, and, and that's been like Isaid, and I'm talking big
locations.
So, for example, to talk aboutour town, I've gone from like
h2o water park to kia center, to, uh, to interview orlando magic

(01:11:28):
I'm talking an hour or two likethat just takes in traffic just
to get there.
Imagine setting up andinterviewing in both location.
One's like a hot sun.
You know a theme park we haveto set up a frame just to even
get anything decent, fight themusic, because you know people
are enjoying the water park.
And then to go to Orlando Magic, such huge location, to light

(01:11:50):
up an interview.
And I'm saying that just was oneof the two.
And then we did that all day.
We were like, I think, atKissimmee Utility Authority and
all these, and the point is,yeah, that's my thing, like you
know, but trying to also do themhigh quality.
So just, oh, set up a camera.
No, we're still going to set upa key light, you know the

(01:12:10):
three-point lighting, abacklight and all that.
And you know again, at the endof the day, I want people to
know that's the production sideof it, but what we're trying to
do is tell a story.

Yeah.

And if these are the people that you need story
to tell for your client, that'swhat you need to do and you have
to figure out.
The money-making part of thisis scheduling, getting your
setup down to the T, getting allyour settings down to the T and
being able to resolve problemsto the T.
And being able to resolveproblems when you show the

(01:12:44):
location, like I said, thatwater park and we can hear music
.
Now you go.
Oh well, we know we can't usethe copyrighted music, so what
can we do Right?
And then being able to work withpartners.
It's like, hey, I know we can'tturn off the music, can we just
turn the specific speaker offRight?
And then using the correct micsand I'm like like, okay, let me
pull out my outdoor mics andbeing able to bring it as close
as possible so you know you canreject the rest of the ambient

(01:13:04):
sound anyway, but you have fiveminutes to do that.
Remember that.
You also think that thetimeline that's going around you
while my and then having goodpeople to help because I'm
telling them to set up the framewhile I am doing this and and
be like, oh, 10 minutes, we'llbe out.
So you're just turning this onespeaker off for 10 minutes,
getting their buy-in, so they'regoing to look great and doing
that over and over again.

(01:13:25):
But the point I'm trying to getto is, at the end now, the
client's budget was lower, right, we only had to do one or two
days of production versus 20days of production, and you were
able to tell a better storybecause those people were
important to tell, whateverstory you were trying to tell.
Now I do want to note there isa contrast to this.
I do interviews all the timewhere we have 10 people all day

(01:13:48):
to just do one talking headAlexa minis, you know cook
lenses or signature prime lenses.
You know the whole shebang, bigsoft, you know big book light.
So production designers, that'sthe contrast.
And now you're spending all day.
So production designers, that'sthe contrast.
And now you're spending all dayjust perfecting that one
interview and that's just, uh,the budget and the timeline,
right?
The client's like we got 40grand to tell this one story

(01:14:10):
with you know, I don't knowthree interviews.
We're gonna take our time,right we're gonna.
We're gonna kill it, we're gonnabring the better equipment,
better time, but if they're likealso, we've got five grand.
This is the story we want totell.
Guess what?
I'm still going to tell theright story.
We just have to change ourtimeline.
Right now.
Is each interview going to lookthe same as the other one?
No, but I bet you it's going tolook better than anyone else

(01:14:30):
who had five grand to do 18interviews.
At least that's my mindset.
So I would tell people getreally good at doing interviews
one, but then get fast at doinggood yeah, and that's where you
can really start to make moneyin corporate, because a lot of
times they shove you in smalloffices.

Oh my goodness, Horrible locations Conference
rooms with a giant table in themiddle.

Brown, red-brown carpets man, it's so ugly.

Throw a plant behind them and make it look
better.

Yeah, but you have to look around you in the five,
ten minutes that you have and,yeah, become the production
designer that we're not.
You know, uh, you know and andstuff like that.
But but that's the talent,that's the corporate world and
that's not for everyone, butthat's how you make money.
You make money, uh, chargingclient five to ten grand for
that expertise yeah right onceyou can do that.

(01:15:19):
That's why you can charge theclients that, because at the end
they they don't care about theproduction aspect, they care
about the result right, yeahcare about the final video, what
it's going to look like, andyou have to be able to provide a
certain level of quality.
You cannot go to a client and II've never said to a client hey
, the room was brown, uglycarpet, ugly wall can't do it so
.
That's why it looks so uglybecause, can you imagine they

(01:15:40):
were like uh, what like?
Because they're not eventhinking about that right,
that's not their concern,they're they're just concerned
about is roi or whatever thestory that they're trying to
tell yeah result that they'retrying to get um.
You cannot tell them that, andif you do, then you come across
as incompetent, even thoughyou're correct tell, tell me if
I'm wrong.

What's your experience with that?
So let's talk about interviews.
The wildest I've ever had was42 interviews and we'll say it
was two and a half days, but itwasn't actually.
And they were back to back.
Like I pretty much had about 10or 15 minutes in between each
interview.

But were they same location, at least Same
location.

We did move around .
It was the same room, so wewould move around, you know,
periodically just to switch upthe background and whatever.
But the biggest thing is is Ihad never met these people in my
life and in five minutes I haveto sit them down and make a
connection with them, and then Ihad to ask them fairly
difficult questions.
You know, some people gotemotional on camera and to be

(01:16:43):
able to do that make them feelcomfortable and get a good story
out of them at the same timelike that's an art.

I love being able to do that.
Yeah, I think interviewingpeople is definitely incredible
art and also, you never knowwhere it's going to go, because
you could obviously, you have,you have an idea.
Obviously, as a director, uh,you, uh, you have an idea of the
story that you're trying totell, but at the same time, you
never know what you get and whatyou can integrate into that and
tell a better story until youget people to be comfortable,

(01:17:13):
and I think that's the key rightbecause, these people are not
actors.
No, they are not professionalsof being on camera.
Some CEOs are, they're justready to go and they're perfect,
but that's rare right Mostpeople are nervous.

Most people don't want to be on camera.

Exactly they're being forced by someone, or they
know they have to, or somethinglike that, and so you have to A
make them comfortable and, likeyou said, you have to get the
content out, but then you haveto do that in 15 minutes or
whatever, and that's an art,yeah.

So funny story with that.
So the location that we were atwas in downtown Portland and
there was a rail car.

Beautiful Now yeah it got bad for a minute, but
there was a rail car that wouldgo by.

But there was a rail car that would go by.
So I had to tell people beforethe interview like, hey, if that
happens, just stop theinterview, which you don't
really want to do.
But we had to do it, okay.
So we dealt with that.
Then, all of a sudden, on oneof the interviews there was a
guy who set up across the streetplaying saxophone, and I could

(01:18:19):
hear it clearly in my headphones.
So the poor producer had to goout there and he scrounged up as
much cash as he could and waslike hey, I'm really sorry,
you're playing beautifully, butlike, can you go play somewhere
else?
And he was happy Cause he waslike sweet, I just got a good
payday, yeah, and I'm going tohave lunch or whatever.
Right, but yeah.
Also lunch or whatever.

(01:18:41):
Right, but yeah.
Also being able to just adjuston the fly because you never
know what's going to happen, youknow, unless you're in a
controlled environment.

Um, yeah, and that's what people love to ask
me sometimes.
Again, I don't do.
I do want people to not do fewbig commercials a year.
That's about.
It's not a lot.
I'm trying to get to more.
But uh, people ask me.
They're like, why wouldsomebody pay you 400,000 versus,
you know know, 50,000 or versus5,000?
It's like that.
Because on those bigcommercials we're in a
controlled environment, we're atsoundstage, we have built set

(01:19:07):
sources under $100,000 orwhatever.
Right, that's where the money'sgoing.
And because the talent on stagecosts more than the entire
production budget, we cannotscrew around as in like, uh, I
hope people know like again, onone side, we do value our skills
.
I'm like, oh, I can do thisexpensive production.
I am nothing but an ant in thewhat the talent is charging to

(01:19:29):
be there, and so what I'm tryingto get to is that's what
changes?
Your skill set doesn't change,it's the um, the value of things
diminishes as you go up meaningto that level of production.
A camera costs nothing, right?
They just expect to use the bestbecause they're paying so much
for the talent, not because yourAlexa Mini is something extra.

(01:19:50):
Obviously, the skin tones onAlexa's are incredible, but what
I'm trying to say is people go.
Why would I use an Alexa when Ihave an FX3?
No, fx3 is an incredible camera.
I use it all the time.
3 yeah, no, fx3 is anincredible camera.
I use it all the time.
But when you're being paid thatmuch, that's like the rental
fee is not, it's the least ofyour concerns I'm saying yeah,
and they just want you to usethe best because they have plus,
you know they want the talentto look good.

(01:20:11):
Um, sometimes these talents evenhave riders on what filters you
can use but things that yeah itcan get crazy, but the point
I'm trying to get to is that'swhy it's not crazy.
It's just we can control theenvironment, and when you
control the environment, itcosts money.

Yeah, well, it comes full circle.
It doesn't matter what theclient is.
If they have a bad experience,whether you're the producer
director and somebody on yourcrew doesn't do a good job, or
whatever, you're not going towork with them again, right, or
whatever, you're not going towork with them again, right?
so you want to make sure thatyou have every single thing
prepared and everything's goingto go well, and that if

(01:20:45):
something happens that you knowyou have your list of things
that you prepared for and thatone wasn't on the list, you can
still fix it yeah, exactly, andthat's why in smaller things a
lot of people go, um, don't havepad in them.

Or people try to make so much profit like, sure,
you're charging client fivegrand for a half day shoot,
whatever one day shoot, uh.
And then you have to understandand you're like, oh, I can make
, because it's a smaller shoot,I can do me and an assistant or
just me, and then I can make somuch money after I pay the
editor.
But you have to understandyou're charging and you have
that much profit because you areprepared for anything that can

(01:21:19):
go wrong you know will go wrong.
Plus, I don't like to bother myclients.
I've had that happen where, youknow, sometimes clients will
cover the travel themselves, butsometimes it's part of the, the
initial proposal and I'll addpad because you know, we show up
and it's like, oh, uh, we weregoing to be straight at this
hotel.
Now that hotel was booked.
Now we have to, you know, takeubers from the location or we

(01:21:40):
have to get a rental car.
It's a couple hundred bucks now.
Uh, you know, in a 15 grandproject, I'm not gonna bother my
client like, hey, we need to upthe budget by 200 plus gas.
I'm just gonna absorb that cashand you have to be okay with
that.
As a business owner.
Sometimes unexpected costs comeup, unless, obviously yeah, it
was two grand, it was two grandI'm calling the client.

(01:22:00):
I'm like, hey, we need to addthis to the budget because blah,
blah, blah.
And have that conversation, butyou have to be also able to
absorb.
Like you said, if you had topay a little bit to the
saxophone player, how beautifulit may be, we get it done.
And there's two ways to handleit.
You can go back to the clientand be, like I paid him $50 or
$20.
Can I get that back To me?

(01:22:21):
It's unprofessional, justabsorb it.

It's the cost of doing business.

It's the cost of doing business, right?
Yeah, that's incredible.
That's kind of funny too.
They're like, hey, you'replaying great, but can you get
away because we need to film,right a lot of time.
It is not even filmmaking, it'slogistics.
Uh, funny enough, and I'mgetting paid the most.

Uh, I'm just booking flights, yeah making
sure people are aware they arethey know where they can, um,
you know, go bathroom and whatthey can eat.

That's like the half the battle and, uh, that's
what you're getting the bigbucks, and that's crazy, but
that's, this is what it is.
You know, you're, but you makethe the production happen
because if, guess what, peopledon't know why they eat, they
don't have anywhere to gobathroom.
You'll have a riot, you know,oh yeah absolutely, but anyway.
So that's incredible that youhad this.

(01:23:11):
And then it seems like youtravel a lot too for work, right
?
Yeah, how is it?
How do you manage, especiallywith you know so many kids?
How do you manage, especiallywith, uh, you know so many kids?
How do you manage, cause I havetwo and it's hard to manage?
Uh, how do you manage travelingand uh, you know, just in
general, being able to, uh, youknow, maintain a work life
balance.

Yeah, so I spend as much time with my family as
possible.
Uh, probably to a financial orbusiness fault, but for me
that's the most important thing.
Um, this past year was the mostamount of traveling that I've
ever done, uh, and the longestI've ever been away from my
family.
I did almost two weeks straight.
Uh went from Mackinac Island inMichigan all the way to Vegas,

(01:23:53):
uh, for a conference and, um, itwas awesome.
I really enjoyed theproductions.
But at the same time, man, beinggone that long, you feel like
your kids just grow crazy.
So I try to do as much stuff asI can locally and if I'm doing
work outside of that, I try toget back as soon as possible I
can go and do something.
So, like, um, I had a sameclient, had job out in Portland.

(01:24:23):
Again, I took one day, drove tothe coast, got an Airbnb, you
know, just enjoyed myself, sawthe ocean again, which is always
great, right yeah, I feel likethere's a lot of people that
don't know that I just show up,I do the shoot, like I'm telling
you.

I'm going to be three, four days out in
California and my plan is quiteliterally, go to the hotel.
You know, go to the shoot, goto the hotel.

You know what I mean, Like yeah.

And I'm not saying that's the right way.
Your method is a lot betterbecause that at least you're.
You know, financially it'sprobably a smarter thing to do,
right?

But at the same time, you know you only have a
limited amount of time that youcan get to do this stuff and I
feel like it's a privilege to beable to travel.

Especially, it still blows me away that people
will be like oh yeah, for sure,we'll cover, you know, your
travel, your plane your foodwhatever else, and it's like,
wow, let's take advantage ofthat, not in like a bad way, but
enjoy it right, exactly, no,that's, that's really great,
which is what I was checking,talking earlier, when we were up
in dc last year yeah um, wewere able to actually go out and

(01:25:24):
you know, see the monuments andstuff had.
I have seen that already, butyou know what I mean.
It's also important to who youat least for me, and I need to
get a better at doing it bymyself.
But when I'm hanging out withpeople who do want to do that,
like we were in vegas, andeveryone's like, oh, let's go
see hoover dam and then so wejust drove a little bit out and
we watched, so there's anadvantage to that, but when I'm
alone, I don't do that and Ifeel like I need to get better

(01:25:45):
at um just just taking advantageof where we are.
It's so funny.
I've said so many times in la,like one street over from, uh,
you know in hollywood, from likethe chinese state and all that
I've never crossed the streetbecause I'm like you know, I'm
also wary of things in LA,anyway, but what I'm saying.
But then every time I go, Icould have just, you know, taken
five minutes out of my day,walked a block and now I am

(01:26:09):
quite literally the, thetouristy area, and just so I can
see it, see what the you knowall the talk is about, about.
But having haven't never donethat, because I'm just always
like, uh, whatever, let me justgo chill in the hotel or
whatever, um, so that that is anadvantage.
And I would say, yeah, peopledon't do as I, again, do, do as
I say like go take advantage ofit.
But that's pretty neat.

So you're also getting more value out of all
this trip and work andeverything right yeah, and and
that's for me partially, but Ithink the other thing is is when
you show people that you'regoing and doing that stuff.
Number one you know I'm notsaying that you should just go
on the internet and brag aboutyour life, but obviously that
works and like just kind ofshowing people the cool stuff

(01:26:50):
that you get to do.
But then you know, for futureclients, or even your clients,
like they love to hear the factthat I took one day and went and
did something cool.
And then I show up on set andlike, hey, check out what I did,
I took some cool pictures.
And like they're like yeah,that's really cool that you do
that, because, you're right,most people don't do that.
They'll fly all over the us orthe world and they don't get to

(01:27:13):
see the stuff.
Right, yeah, all right so 2025.

Maybe you'll change that I'm gonna try and
change that tomorrow there yougo try and walk around or do
something.

I'm gonna expect some photos.
Yeah, I better send me.
I need to get better postingand social too.

So, um, no, that that's actually uh, very smart
what you say, that, um, I wantto deep dive more into real
stuff that people want toprobably hear about numbers and
stuff.
So how are you, um, and again,you could pick one example
project that you have, sure, andyou can round up numbers if you
don't want to give exactnumbers, sure, but I want to
know, how are you, um, how areyou building proposals, like,

(01:27:49):
how are you coming with aproject amount?
because that's what most peoplestarting out struggle with yeah,
like what to charge so how doyou come up with that number on
what to charge, and obviouslyyou'll have to pick up a project
, whichever one.

Yeah.
So like the larger projectsit's, you're figuring out what
your day rate is, and then youknow what expenses you have, and
then you're just adding paddingon top of that.
Right and it just depends on youknow what you can think you can
get away with with the clientNot being dishonest, but just

(01:28:22):
like trying to figure out what'sthe wiggle room in there.
How much creativity are youbringing, you know?
Is it just showing up and doinga very standard corporate
interview?
You know that's kind of lowerbudget or are you coming in?
You're bringing, you know, abunch of creativity and a bunch
of crew and everything else.
So that's really yeah, so.

So how do you so give us an example?
Do you have any project thatcomes into mind where you can
give people some numbers?

um, I can't think of anything off the top of my
head, uh, other than we justlocked in a contract for about
30 000 look at that, that'spretty good, so what's?

the deliverables on that uh gonna be so.

Technically it's one video which is pretty sweet.
Look at that one video for 30know.

Now we're talking all right, yeah.

So, that being said, people.

I think most people want to be in the
corporate world.
So 30k one video.
Now let's talk about real thinglike cost.
Yeah, and obviously you've beendone it, you just booked it so
what do?
You anticipate your cost being?

so when I split it up I think I'm going to
probably have about 15,000 inexpenses and it could be more.
It's likely it will end up beingmore.
There's a lot of unknownvariables.
I'm working with the clientschedule and I'm trying to be as
flexible as possible, and Iknow there's some people that
would say, hey, it's going to bethis much per day.

(01:29:41):
But I'm just trying to go thereand work with the client
because obviously they'reworking with me.
So then there's specific daysthat I have to have people and
then I can say, all right, thatperson is going to be this much
plus a little bit of padding,and here's what that production
day is going to cost Exactly,and that's a pretty standard 40-
50% profit in a 30 K video.

Now, how many production days is it?
Are you anticipating at least?

So it will probably end up being just over
two weeks.
Two weeks, and that's prettygood.

Now, if you see the other side of it two weeks
of production for 30 K isactually pretty good.
And then are you includingtravel costs.
Are those extra or do you nothave any?
Everything is in one lump sumso yeah, I'm trying to work
things to obviously be asfavorable to me as possible, but
at the same time, can you tellus location where you're going
to be going to do this city?
Uh?

wisconsin and vegas.

Look at that, I love vegas, all right, so that's
pretty good, yeah, man, and,and you have to see from the
client's perspective, they canjust give you, they don't have
to worry about variables.
They're like, hey, look, here's30k, you're gonna, you know,
produce this a video and thenit's good for them.
Now they don't have anyvariable.
And some clients like itdifferently, some want the
travel to be separate.
But for this client and mineare, a lot of my clients are

(01:30:57):
like this.
It's like okay, this is it likeyou figure out your expenses
and everything.
So they have that advantagethere's no variables.
But for you, on the other hand,uh, now you can go out and
maybe try and save, shave somecosts or whatever, right, and
build um, build.
And that's why you also havepadding, because sometimes costs
may change.
Hotel prices can vary a lot,like changes alone.

Yeah, you could be spending double what you think
you're going to spend exactlybut one of you.

Freedom, though, right yeah, absolutely.

But one of the things that I did too, and I
think is important, you know, asyou run a production company,
is just think what is the valuethat you can bring right.
So they came to me and theysaid we need a three to four
minute video.
Here are the things that it'sgoing to entail.
We think and I could have justsaid, okay, well, it's going to
cost X amount, but I'm going tothem and I I sat down, had a

(01:31:46):
long conversation with them.
It's actually multiplebusinesses all under the same
owner.
They've acquired new businessright and they're doing
rebranding.
Well, the one video has onespecific purpose, but now when I
talk to them, it turns out thatthey don't have a marketing
person and we can go there andwe can shoot a bunch of other

(01:32:10):
stuff and then we can sell thatto them in the future, right,
yeah, look at that.
Instead of being like well,we're just going to do this one
thing and then we'll come backanother time, now we're building
a relationship just based onone video.
Right, look at that.

And that's what I tell people.
Your data is your biggest asset.
You know.
By data, I mean our footage andaudio and whatever we record,
because you won't believe howmuch extra money we can make
Right Six months down the road.
They're like're like hey, weneed to read, even just with the
same content.
They're like oh, we need tomake this different edit or
social edit or whatever yeah andyou can do that because you own

(01:32:46):
the data.
So that's why I'm like.
You know your data is veryvaluable.
Save it, store it, don't loseit.
Save in three different placesthe three, two, one backup rule.
Please look that up and followthat because, um, you know
that's I as a production company.
At least you can keep makingrevenue from stuff you've
already shot.
And you would be amazed how manytimes I've gone back and been

(01:33:06):
like oh yeah, we have threeyears of content for you.
We can build a journey video orwhatever.
Like look, here's that special,you know annual event.
Like look, let's see where youcame from, right, and all that.
You can't do that if you don'thave that content.
Most clients at most they photoor cell phone videos and that's
not that good, you know.
obviously you can do somethingwith that if that's all they
have yeah but you can do so muchmore and you are an asset that

(01:33:29):
they're not going away becauseyou have that archival data.
So that's really smart thatyou're thinking about it.
Is this an existing client or anew client?
New client.
So so how did they find?

you Friends, oh friends.
You mean people in productionworld or just regular friends.
I've known these people for agood long time.
It's never worked out that Iwould work with them and I've
never pushed it.
That's one thing, you know.
I kind of believe in thingscoming organically right, Don't?

burn bridges, because you never know.

You never know.

It may not be the right time now, but it can come
back yeah so, uh, obviously it'sa new client, but you've known
them so that's pretty good.
Now they came to you youalready explained that you have
this deep dive with them.
Was it remote, I'm guessing, ona on a video call or something,
or how?

actually just a phone call, just phone call,
okay, yeah and, uh, you had thisconversation with them.

Um, uh, what did you pitch to them?
What was your final?
Final?
Like you know, they've told youall these questions.
You asked them questions, right, um, like, um, you know, I
guess, what the video is for,right, any other deep dive
questions that you asked that wedon't?

So they actually gave me very.
I can't talk about it but theygave me very specific like this
is what the video is going to befor.
This is where it's going to beshown, you know and then what
did you ask?

obviously, broader questions.
What did you want to know?
Where you came to thisconclusion that you did?

yeah.
So they sent over a video ofwhat had kind of been done in
the past by a competitor, uh,which was not great, and so they
kind of gave me a little bit offramework of what they were
looking for.
And then it was me just askingmore questions.
Right, whether it's aninterview on the phone or you're
interviewing for an actualvideo, you just want to dive in

(01:35:07):
and know as much as possible,and the more questions you ask,
the more they're just going tokeep feeding you information and
they're actually technicallyselling you to themselves right
Because they came to you.

They're obviously interested already.
They just want to know thatthey'll get the ROI that they
want, right.
And then how do you pitch that?
That's the main thing I want toknow, because I think people
struggle with that.
Now you've come up with anumber.
Obviously, they didn't give youa budget in this one.
You came up with a 30K numberright, okay.

(01:35:40):
So, so.
A lot of people struggle withbeing able to say these big
numbers.
Yeah, absolutely, I want toknow.
You're on the call.
You've built this proposal inyour head or in your paper,
however you do it, but do youpresent it right there and then
on the phone, or do you latersend a proposal?
Yeah, so do you go over withthem?
So now you've created theproposal, did you just send it
over to them or did you hop onthe phone call first and say let
me go over this with you?
How did you approach that?

I've done that in the past, but most of the time I
just send over.
You know what the proposal isgoing to be and say you know if
you'd like to review it or ifyou have any questions or
concerns, I'm happy to chat withyou and you know, see, like
most of the time, it's justimportant to say it's.
This is not a final.
This is kind of get us in theballpark area.
Let's see how you're feeling.

(01:36:22):
Um, I have done it on the phonebefore.
Uh, I'm sure for some people itmight work out well.
Uh, but for me it feels alittle bit pushy yeah uh it.
But it does give you a reallygood reaction, especially if you
can do it over a video call.
Then you can actually watchtheir facial expression and then
you can see like, yeah, okay,how do I react?

(01:36:43):
Like if they go?
Oh, you can be like, well, youknow, there's some things that
we can massage or, you know, wecan take out a couple of things,
depending on what your budgetis um, so did you.

So how was their reaction?
Did it was an immediate yes, ordid they uh, come back and, and
so money I sent the proposal onfriday and then I got a call on
monday.

Part of me wanted to be a little bit pushy and you
know, message them mondaymorning, be like hey, did you
get my thing or no?

yeah, I gotta give them just leave it alone.

And I got a call and they're like yeah, it looks,
sounds good, we're going to bemoving forward.
You got the green light, um,and now it will just be a bunch
of production calls afterperfect, yeah, do you split it
in uh?

do you split it in anywhere or is it all payment
up front?
How do you split your uh?

your project costs yeah, so typically I do 50 up
front, unless it's a larger.
So, like with this one, it's alittle bit of a larger budget.
So I just proposed that we'regoing to split it into three
payments over the course ofthree months.
They seem to be totally finewith that.
I leave it up to people for themost part.

Are you going to deliver deliverables before the
the monies fully come in, or no?
In?

this situation, I will likely be paid before the
deliverables are going to happen.
But this one is a uniquesituation where there is a
deadline to shoot and then thefinal edit is due two days later
okay, oh wow, so you have twodays to to deliver the most of
it will be edited.
There's one production day thatwe need to get specific content

(01:38:13):
, and then that will just beintegrated, so it should be
fully done, except for just thelast part and you would be fully
paid by then.

Yeah, do you care about that, uh, typically or no,
like when you get paid, or no?
What's what's your experienceon that?

not really.
Uh, the only thing that I haveas blanket advice is one client
did this thing where they said,oh, we're not going to pay you
until we get deliverables, whichI was like, for sure, I can do
that, no problem, like I'm goodat hitting deadlines or whatever
.
Well, they kept asking forrevisions and revisions, and

(01:38:47):
revisions, and I was too polite.
Sometimes I'm a little bit toonice, a little too Wisconsin or
Minnesota nice.
And I was like, yep, it'stotally fine.
And they ended up pushing it sothat I didn't get paid for a
month after, and at that pointwe were a little bit tighter.

That was really difficult, but I don't like to
run into that.
So do you do?
You do contracts.
So do you put a to put a cap onthe number of revisions on your
contract or no?
What does that say?

usually I just tell people three revisions, but
I'm pretty flexible unlessthey're asking for something.

That's just, like you know, pushing scope yeah
have you had to put your footdown sometimes have?

you how?

have you handled those conversations where you're
built to be like either withrevisions or something else like
no, this is the scope yeah, ifyou do anything more.
We're changing the scope ofwork.
How have you handled those?

thankfully I've really had awesome, so I haven't
had to do that too much.
But if not, I'm just superstraightforward and like hey,
we've already done this manyrevisions.
If we're going to do anyfurther, then it's going to cost
this much per hour per whatever.

Yeah, Okay, perfect.
And how have the clientshandled it?

For the most part good.
I think people appreciatetransparency and so if you just
do that and you don't try to bestrange about it, like they
understand it's business at theend of the day.

Yeah, absolutely.
At the end of the day, you know, we're just trying to offer,
send them an offer, and which isa solution to a problem that
they have.
Do you use like a proposal?
How do you get them to sign acontract?
Do you have like DocuSign or aproposal software that they sign
?
How are you getting signatureson these contracts?

So I use HoneyBook and if you want that, I can do
a referral, because I end upgetting money.
Look at that.
Hey, we don't peddle anything.

I'm like we don't peddle anything on this, but
sure.
But funny enough here's thecontrast thing I had had a bad
experience with.
I used honey book in thebeginning when I started.
I wasn't a fan of it, but hey,sure it works for you.
Works for you.
What do you like about honeybook?

uh, I've been using it for so long that it'd
be really difficult for me toswitch to anything else.
For me, it's just a really goodway to keep track of my
projects.
Uh, I would say the only thingthat I don't like is I wish I
had an option or maybe there isand I just don know about it but
to kind of separate like warmleads and cold leads cause I'd
like to start reaching out tomore cold leads, but for me it's

(01:40:59):
a really good way to figure out.
You know what projects do Icurrently have going on.
It allows payment through there, whether it's credit card or
ACH, uh, or they can send you acheck, obviously.
Um, so I know my payments.
It connects to QuickBooks, soit goes directly to my
accountant and it's you know.
I can just keep track of myprojects.

Yeah, I like, and things may have changed.
Remember, it's been years sinceI had HoneyBook.
I really liked that.
I liked what they wereinitially offering, which was a
combination of CRM, paymentprocessing, contract signature
proposal all in one.
And that sounded really greatto me in the beginning because I
was like, oh, I can just haveall the projects show up in here
, the timeline, everything, andthen I could create contracts

(01:41:45):
from here, I can get paymentsfrom in here.
But then I realized that theywere, you know, like what I'm
against.
I'm like higher experts.
I was like they're jack of alltrades, master of none.
Like the other crms I foundwere better, sure, right.
So we found a dedicated crm.
Then I was like, oh, all otherproposal software are better.
So I switched to.
And then same thing with payment.
I was like, oh, their paymentplatform is through stripe but

(01:42:06):
you get zero control over it.
Uh, they could revoke itbecause you know you have to go
through honey book directly.
Whatever they're using at theback end doesn't matter.
And so I was like, oh, I'drather just go have my own
payment platform, because now Ican see who's paying me with
what card and all the detail youknow.
Sure, so you know it's a legitpayment point is, and so we
ended up switching to individualsoftwares that still integrate,
like my proposal, softwareautomatically charge clients

(01:42:29):
through stripe or whatever andsend it to my crm of choice,
which is is HubSpot.

You know anyway the point is.

It still works.
But I had to do all thatintegration myself versus being
in one.
But anyway, but it seems likeyour experience has been great.
So there's a contrasting thingDoesn't work for me doesn't mean
it's not a good software, buthere was my biggest issue with
it, and let's see if that'schanged.
What I hated was, uh, thebiggest thing for me was I want
to send them a proposal, uh,that had or the agreement or

(01:42:57):
whatever, and has the agreementthat they agree to, blah, blah,
everything's good.
So they would have to sign, andthen I would have to freaking
countersign.
I'm like, why do I need tocountersign it?
yeah they sign it done.

They agree to the terms, like anyway so the
easiest way to get past that is,you can either send proposals
where you do have to do that, oryou can just send an invoice
and then you don't have to worryabout that.

But they still can sign it, or yeah?
You can put a contract in thereand make them sign okay, and
then you don't have tocountersign it, but they still
do the regular proposal whereyou have, they do yeah, yes they
need to get rid of that I meanmaybe we'll give it another shot
if that happened.
But anyway, that was like mybiggest thing.
I was like I don't need tocountersign it, like they're
agreeing to my terms of serviceexactly like anyway.

(01:43:38):
Anyway, that was, and that wasannoying because that means it
wouldn't initially be executed.
I want them to look at it.
Obviously we can negotiate if,if they want changes.
But ideally, when I'm sendingit, we're ready to just move
forward.
But then I want them to be ableto sign, make a, a payment.
We move forward, don't make itdifficult.

They're busy enough, yeah.

And then we're busy enough, and that would
always kind of throw me off.
I'm like, oh, I got to go backand countersign and forget two
days later, whatever.
Then the client's getting anemail oh look, your contract's
not executed.
They're like what is it?
Anyway, to me it was aconfusing factor, but that's
good to know that there is aworkaround that you found where
you don't have to do thatgenerating invoices.

One other thing that I really appreciate is if I
send any form of an emailthrough the HoneyBook system, I
can see if they've opened it ornot which sounds a little creepy
, but as a business owner,especially for a production
company, it's really good toknow whether somebody's actually
busy enough that they haven'topened the email or they've seen
it and you're like all right,yeah you know a couple days.

(01:44:37):
Let's send them a reminder andjust kind of gauge where they're
at.
Yeah, absolutely, I love thatabout.

So we use better proposals and, uh, what I love
about the same thing it cantrack, uh, so it's good to be
able to know they open the email.
I don't know if honeybook doesthat, but it tells you how long
they opened the email for.
It also tells you on theproposal which page, because
it's a multi-page.
They stayed on the which pagefor how long and then when they
signed, what IP they signed fromeverything.

(01:45:02):
But my favorite part is that,because sometimes clients are
busy, they open the email, theynever open the proposal.
So now you know.

So if they spent 10 seconds.
You're like yeah they didn'tactually read it.

Exactly 10 seconds , you're like, yeah, they didn't
actually read it exactly andthey they never don't even the
price, because you know you wantto know when you call back what
, maybe the factors of the priceor is it, uh, you know the
contract or whatever.
Is it not deliverables?
But when you know they'reyou're like, okay, they spent um
a minute reading the email, or30 seconds reading the email,
but they never even clickbecause with the better proposal
they have to click the wordproposal, right.
And then it shows up.
So, oh, they haven't evenlooked at the proposal.
So it's not the money factor atall, it's just either they were

(01:45:38):
busy or something of thatnature because they were
expecting my proposal.
So they're in click, so it's amuch easier follow-up.
Hey, have you looked at it?
Oh, I forgot about it, right,something like that.
And then, um, the other thingis, when they have opened it, I
can see where they spent thetime.
Oh, they looked at the priceand then didn't pay.
Oh, now I know what the issueis.
Or they looked at thedeliverable same thing.
They didn't go to the next pagewhere the pricing is.

(01:45:59):
So, oh, let me, let me checkwith them.
But now that they've seen prices, my first thing is hey, what do
you think?
Was this within the budget?
Typically, I like to have thebudget talk on the phone before,
but for some reason, let's saywe can go.
Oh, what was it right?
And then, but you're alreadyprepared for, hey, this is the
type of conversation I'm gonnahave.
Uh, it just helps, I think, andit helps you to know which
stage the client is in, wherethey are, where the, the, the if

(01:46:22):
factor may be.
Um, and very rarely I.
What I found the best thing wasthey sign.
Usually it says pay and mostpeople pay.
My, my takeout rate got so high, like you know.
Pay uh, like I would have to.
I stopped having to ask peopleto make a payment uh, and I love
that amazing I'm doing this way, but some people will go to
there they've signed, now theyhaven't made a payment, and

(01:46:44):
that's weird for me.
So now it's like uh and the youknow, until the payment's made
we can't move forward withpre-production calls or whatever
.
Now you, you know.
Oh, so let me call and ask whathappened you know, because you
signed it, you clearly agreedwith the payment terms and
everything.
So why didn't you make apayment?
And it could be like, oh, we'rejust waiting on abc.
Whatever, you know what I mean,I like you.

(01:47:04):
I like that being able to knowwhat stage they're in.

It's a little extra transparency?

yeah, exactly, and it helps us to not figure out,
like I.
I may think it's a whatever theissue is, and that's not at all
the issue.
So avoiding you know, talk thatdoesn't need to be even talked
about, because once they're sold, they're sold.
Right, you don't want to bereselling them on anything, but
if they're not sold, theyhaven't signed it.
Then you can go back anddiscuss hey, was it the money or

(01:47:30):
was it the deliverables, orwhatever the issue was, and,
funny enough, best clients, Ithink, don't even think about it
.
I've had that happen, repeatclients where I'll send them a
proposal.
The email was open.
Week goes by, they haven'tsigned.
And I'll reach out and I'll belike hey, literal text, like hey
, what happened?
You know I need to book flights.
And they'll be like, oh, forgotabout it.
And.
And.
Then, before I can respond noworries, you know, or something

(01:47:52):
they've already paid they sendme a screenshot like, oh, paid,
all right, here's 15 grand inthe account.
And I love that, becausesometimes that's all it is.
It's just they're busy people,they forgot, and a quick
reminder could mean that theycould go in and quickly make a
payment.
But, uh, but do you find that Ifind, the bigger the client,
typically the easier, uh, thepayment comes.

Yeah, let's just go on a quick tangent.
If you have clients and theyare nickel and diming you and
they have all sorts of questionsand they keep asking for
revisions, and generally whenyou think about working with
them you're like man, this iswork.

Yeah.

Then you probably want to get rid of them.
And I've been in the placewhere like, hey, you need some
money.
You're going to work with thoseclients, um, but man, the
satisfaction of being like, hey,this is not working out.
And then and sometimes it'sscary because you're like I
really need that money coming in, but then finding those clients
, just like you talked about,that have no problem.
Like, oh, yeah, you need 10grand for the month so that you

(01:48:52):
can, you know, take care ofexpenses and whatever else.
Absolutely, I'll send it overright away.
Right, because they understandthey're working on a higher
level, they understand howbusiness works and they have no
problem.
This is just a part of doingbusiness and they're happy to
work with you.
And then you feel good about theentire situation and you can do
better work rather than like,oh, my goodnessand-so is calling

(01:49:14):
.

I really don't want to talk with them, for five
hours about yeah, whatever yeah, exactly, and I think um we
need to know is that we aretheir favorite vendor, because
guess what?
Video is the most effectiveform of marketing it?
You generally gives the bestroi, whether it's direct sales
or indirectly, like processes orwhatever we're trying to solve,

(01:49:35):
and we make them, the like youknow, the most amount of money.
So we should be their favoritevendor to pay plus generally I'm
not a tax advisor, follow, aska cp or whatever but generally
on their side, advertising,which is what we are, our
expense is fully writable writeoff so
they love that, they can writeoff the whole thing and they're
making money from us, so weshould be their favorite vendor.

(01:49:56):
And if you're not, that meansyou need to hop in a call or a
meeting and educate your client.
And maybe it's rare, but maybeyou can bring that client from
this level to this level wherethey can understand like, look,
this is the place where you'vegot to be spending your most
marketing money because we canmake the most impact.
And sometimes you can do that,sometimes you can't.

(01:50:17):
I like being able to grow myclients right who are here and
now you're like I've had clientswho are like oh, we're a
franchise, we bought somethingand you start working with them
and next thing you know theybought freaking the whole
state's worth of franchises andthey've grown and we grow with
them right, because now we'remaking 10x the content or

(01:50:37):
whatever for them.
It's good for everyone.
But then there are businessowners who are still you know I
would say green or whatever likethey're not there to go there,
and that's okay too you know.
That's why you find clients whohave the money right, who?
can actually help you, uh, whodon't have to worry about little
money like that.
And then you're not chasingmoney because that's like my
least favorite thing.
I have very few not chasingmoney Cause that's like my least
favorite thing.
I have very few clients who dothat, but that's like you're.

(01:50:58):
You're like after I've spent, Ishould have charged you, like
you know, whatever your hourlyrate is, you're like I should
just times that by the amount ofhours we spent, you know, just
chasing.
Try to avoid those clientsbecause at the end day, we want
to be making content and not bechasing money.
And plus this is again I wantto do the best for them and if

(01:51:20):
it's ours the relationship andI'm not going to be able to give
my hundred percent, I'd justrather not, and you know, have
you dropped a client yet?
Ever, oh yeah absolutely.

How is that experience?

have you sent a direct email or just stopped
working with them?
Have you ever had to where it'dbe like.

Oh, we may not be the right fit type of email I'm
an over communicator and I thinkthat's the way to do things.
I don't ever just like stopcommunications with people.

I can't do that.
Please don't ghost anyone.
Yeah, no no um yeah, so howhave you broken that news?

last year, yeah, there was somebody, uh, I did
editing for and I started off,you know, very reasonable for
them, uh kind of a friend, of afriend situation.
And then I kept upping becauseI was like man, this is taking
so long and I found out that itwas actually cutting into me
being able to get bigger andbetter clients.

Right.

But at the same time, at that point I really
needed money.
So it was super hard.
But I I took a chance, like Iprayed about it, my wife and I
talked about it and we were justlike, yep, it's got to happen.
So I just communicated with him.
I'm like, hey, like if we'regoing to keep working together,
together, I have to go higheryeah and he was like you're
about at our cap, like we can'tgo much higher than this, and

(01:52:29):
I'm like, well then, it might betime to find a different actor
right, yeah, unfortunately, butthat was the right way to say it
.

And like you, said you thought about it, you
didn't just do it on a whim.
Because here's the thingSometimes you have to do that as
you scale up.
A lot of us want to bring ourclients with us and some will,
but a lot of them don't, becauseit's a lot easier to find a 10k
, 20k, 50k client than to bringyour 1k client to 10k or 50k

(01:52:57):
yeah because you know, uh,unless they have a full buy-in
you can do that with video.
But some clients at that leveldon't yet have the buy-in and,
like you said, I found the best.
You do best for them andyourself when you're not
struggling yeah because I foundwhen you're uh, you know, when
you need the money, you you tendto want to take everything, or
at least take the clients younormally wouldn't.

(01:53:18):
And I find you give honestadvice and build a better
relationship when you're notworrying about basic finances,
because then you can be honestabout it.
You're like I want them, but ifI didn't get this job it
wouldn't be the end of the world.
And then I find right, you cango in the sales meeting and you
can be honest about it orwhatever.
Or you can.
You know you try to give them aright solution instead of just

(01:53:38):
do whatever, because clientswill come with silly requests.
You know we want I don't know atestimonial video for you know
X number of dollars or whateverthat needs to be shot in this
city or whatever, and we're notgoing to pay travel budget
whatever.
I mean, they could come up withfantasy, land things in their
brain, but then you can bringthem back to the ground versus
trying to figure out how can Imake this happen.

(01:53:59):
You know what I mean.
Do you feel that way?

Yeah, Anytime you try to make sales happen whether
it's a repeat client or it's abrand new client but you're
doing it out of desperation,specifically for financial stuff
.
Like people can smell it from amile away.
You don't even need to tellthem, but they can feel the
energy coming off of you andthey're like I don't know about
this.
Yeah, exactly.

Uh, do you struggle with that?
because it's production peopleand you know we work at
different price ranges do youstruggle with, um, um, you know,
sometimes narrowing it downlike if it's a new client, like
either the 5k client or the 20kclient or 50k client.
Right, because you don't wantto over or under shock them.
Because if they came in with a5k budget but they weren't
telling you, or whatever, how'syour strategy to approach that?

(01:54:42):
How you, how do you, um, narrowit down?
Basically, what level ofproduction or budget are they in
?
Because you know you don't wantto be making a 50k proposal for
somebody looking for a 5k video.
So how do you kind of qualifythem?
Do you have a process orquestions that you ask, or
whatever?

Basically, just ask as many questions as
possible.
I would say the most importantones are have you ever worked
with you know a video productioncompany before?
What sort of budget did youspend with them?
And then, of course, you canask them what they think their
budget is.
Of course, these days there's alot of people, oh, we don't

(01:55:19):
have a specific budget in mind.
It's like, well, okay, then ifyou're on the phone call or a
video call, I usually like tosay, all right, typically, you
know, projects of this sizemight run between five and 10 or
10 and 20 or something likethat, and then you can gauge
their response right and rightthere.
Even if it's not a specificnumber, you can see what sort of
ballpark you're playing in yeahand then you can build a

(01:55:40):
proposal based off of that rightokay, perfect.

No, that's actually a very good thing.
Sometimes you just have to askand a lot of people won't have
an answer yeah so my firstquestion always is that same
thing.
Do you have a certain budgetthat we need to hit and most
people say no, no, you tell usand then you know.
Okay, you have to ask morequalified questions to get to to
the final because they have anumber.
Yeah, anyone who says nothey're lying.
They're lying.

(01:56:03):
They have a number because youknow, otherwise you could say a
million dollars right away.
You know they'll be like no,you know what I mean.
Like everyone has a number.
Uh, sometimes a they may notsure or B, they just are waiting
for you to throw.
You know, whoever throws thefirst number loses.

This is the truth.

So I genuinely like to gauge.
You know where they are.
Like you said, just ask themqualifying questions and most of
the time they'll give it to youBecause, again, at the end of
the day, you know it's anegotiation, it's a business
transaction.
Give it to you because, again,at the end of the day, you know.
So it's a negotiation, it's abusiness transaction, and the
the main thing for me is andtell me, it's the truth they're
gonna get their money's worth.
like meaning if they give mefive grand, they're not getting

(01:56:42):
the 30 grand video.
And they give me 30 grand,they're not getting the five
grand video, they're getting the30 grand treatment it is and at
the end of the day, we're notlike just arbitrarily making
numbers.
We you know, the production isdifferent at different ranges
and so so it's not like uh, youknow, it's not like uh, an ipad
or whatever, like oh sure, ifyou pay me 30 grand, you're

(01:57:02):
still getting the, the 500 ipad,it's no, it's just rose gold.
Yeah, exactly, yeah, we don't dothat you know, it's genuinely
like the budget changes thelevel of production, you know,
and uh, so we're not just tryingto, uh, you know, just say
numbers just to be well.
I mean at the lower level maybe, because you know, if it's just
you, maybe you're starting?
Yeah, you maybe the two, threehundred two thousand bucks and

(01:57:24):
how much?
Is grocery okay, and then, if Ido, yeah exactly, and that's
okay, and they're, you know,thousand fifteen hundred bucks.
That's what you're doing yeahuh, but that's.
That's a different market.
You know that's not where wewant at least I think the people
listening to it is either theyare at the ranges that we're in
or they're trying to be in yeahand I think that's the way to
approach it.

You can't approach it like arbitrarily making up
numbers, because your clientwill quickly figure it out, but
your business is going to failright, yeah, when you think
about running a business longterm.
you want to think about how canI actually grow this business.
It's not just because you wantto say oh, I'm, you know, doing
a 10,000 or 20,000 or $400,000job, like cool, that's a feather

(01:58:02):
in the cap and you know itsounds cool, especially at
different levels.
But at the end of the day, youwant to provide return on
investment for your client.
You know, blow their mind.
And then you want to build yourbusiness so that you can, you
know, provide for yourself andfor your family and for the
other contractors that you'rehiring and like it's fun yeah

(01:58:22):
you got to do it correct and, uh, it's so crazy.

Taxes, yes, please do that, you know.
Hire professionals for yourselflike you're a professional for
other people.
What's crazy to me is I feellike we just sat down and
started talking and somehow ourtime is almost up before we go
quickly.
And again, I don't thinkequipment matters.
Plus, I think you should berenting it before buying it, for
other people, but peopleprobably want to know what
equipment are you shooting withright now I'm not super exciting

(01:58:48):
.

I have the sony a74 so I I ran the gamut where I
did the gh5, uh, when I workedat northern, and I loved it and
that was my main productioncamera and maybe I'll get some
hate for this, but I I've got abig job and I went out and I
bought the red scarlet w supercool.
I had a red and then I startedshooting interviews with the red

(01:59:08):
and the gh5 next to one anotherand I was like this isn't gonna
work yeah, like I don't know.
I can't really tell too much ofa difference.
I'm sure in some capacities youcan.
Anyways, um, I now live in anarea where I can rent stuff if I
need to, or I can hirecontractors.
So I'm not hoarding gear rightnow.
Um, I kind of have my basic kitthat I need yeah, and so a74.

What drone are you using?
Uh mavic air 3 mavic air 3 andany lights that you have, that
you commonly reach for.

I have well used aperture 300ds.
Look at that.

Look at that people, 30 grand, 30 grand
client with that equipment.
Equipment doesn't matter plus,you said it best if you need
something better, you can alwaysrent it.
It's not necessary to go out.
Uh, you know, just buy.
And, funny enough, we don'thave time.
Otherwise, I would love to gointo my story with the heads and
everything but next time.
Next time, there's always nexttime.

Absolutely.

But especially with you.
I'm like I have not even barelytouched the surface, and two
hours is over, so we definitelyneed to do a part two, maybe
next season.
I would love to yeah, so again,thank you, thank you for coming
.
Thank you sharing your insightswith us.
I hope people learned something, because I learned a lot, I'm
already going to go implement itand you know, I hope the same,
but no, you're welcome to comeback and I think we're going to

(02:00:25):
definitely.
I already know for a fact we'regoing to continue this
conversation in the next season.
So thank you, josh.
Before we go, is there anythingelse you want to share?
Maybe tell people yourinstagram or youtube or wherever
you want people to follow you,sure uh, leclairemedia is my
website and instagram handle too.

You can find me on either one of those perfect,
awesome, thank you, sir,appreciate it, thank you.

Thank you.
You're welcome back anytimeagain.
Awesome, I appreciate it.

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