Chad Shellabarger: Now’s The Time

Disclaimer: Transcripts were generated automatically and may contain inaccuracies and errors.

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Hey listeners. Thanks for joining us for another session and learning from others today. We got Chad Shellabarger on the show and we’ve actually worked with Chad. Uh, I’m excited to talk about, uh, I’m sure we’ll laugh about some of our, our jobs we’ve done in the past together, but I’m going to talk about, uh, balancing multiple businesses and I’m interested to talk to chat about how he scored a lucrative longterm government contract and then the usual family and entrepreneurship and all that.

So Chad, welcome. And thanks for joining us. Yeah, man. Thanks for having me. I’m excited to be here. Well, let’s talk, uh, let’s let’s get the basics out of the way. So you are in our neck of the woods, Utah as well, right? Yes, sir. Are you, are you obviously, are you born and raised in Utah? Yeah, I was actually, uh, born and raised in like Roy, which is kind of Detroit’s out of Ogden.

So I’m, I’ve moved like five miles my entire life.

Okay. So, um, why don’t we give everybody the crash course on what you do? Um, what’s your, the name of your business and what you focused on. And then as we talk, we’ll kinda go into the specifics of what you offer. Yeah, sure. Uh, so my primary business is called dojo built. It is a video production company.

We kind of, sort of specialized on a little bit higher end video than normal. A lot of times you’ll see online video work is just, you know, one guy in a camera. So we’ve really tried to build a business around creating somewhat of a cinematic brand, uh, commercials that you might. See in a big theater, but just rolling on your Facebook feed or something like that.

So that’s kind of something that’s set up. Uh, in addition to that, I have a YouTube channel Greenlight shooting, smaller one called Greenlight life. Both of which are sort of review based. The shooting. One is sort of more in the tactical industry, firearms, knives, flashlights, that kind of thing. Uh, and the Greenlight life is more about, uh, like video and kind of behind the scenes into what I do.

Uh, on top of those, we sort of branched out again, uh, with an apparel brand, a tactical apparel brand for Greenlight shooting. And then, uh, below dojo built is another company called Utah property videos where I sort of specialize in like real estate, walkthroughs photos, stuff like that. And we can get into kind of what sets that apart from the industry.

But, uh, that’s been really lucrative and it’s something I’m excited about. Yeah, that sounds cool. Um, I know I’ve seen some of your property videos and what can I talk about with some of your, um, Greenlight shooting clients too, but I think that’s a good segue into, um, you know, taking a lot of deviates and doing a lot of different projects.

Uh, ha ha are you, to the point, are you fresh into these projects where you don’t feel burned out? Um, or how do you take on juggling? So many of these projects, uh, Well, without diluting the quality on one or the others, or is it just an ongoing thing? Do you have any insights into that? Uh, yeah, I think they all sort of fall into the same category of video production.

So it kind of doesn’t feel to me like I’m doing five different businesses. Uh, it just, it’s sort of five different segues within video production. Uh, my main one that dojo built is really focused on, like I said, higher end stuff. So sometimes it’s nice to take a step. Back from those and be able to do YouTube videos were not as much production and time goes into it.

So, and the same thing with the, with the real estate videos, you know, there’s sort of a formula built into these smaller ones, which for me is it’s almost a little bit refreshing because it lets you sort of clear your palette. And then once you go into another big project, you don’t feel overwhelmed, uh, because everything you’re doing, isn’t so big.

That makes sense. Yeah. A little work, a little work vacation, I guess that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, with, with Greenlight shooting, um, kind of be in a, you know, I’m familiar with Greenlight shooting, uh, tell us kind of tell the listeners about it. What’d you say at Greenlight shooting kind of more of your hobby.

Project your hobby DVA. Yeah, it does really started that way. Um, and I think that’s important, uh, to go back to all these businesses. These are pretty much every single one of these businesses sort of rooted from something I was passionate about. And then I was able to tie video into it and turn it someone into a business.

But, uh, to answer your question with Greenlight, it started out with, uh, I was really into top shot the TV show. I don’t know if you’re familiar with it or not, but yeah. Um, I really wanted to get into that kind of stuff and I knew nothing about it firearms. So I ended up working at a local gun shop, uh, kind of working my way up and learning what I could.

And then I started making videos for the new customers because when I was sort of getting into firearms, I didn’t want to. You know, walk into a gun store. I didn’t want to be that guy that the Asteron questions. I don’t know. So I started making videos for the complete beginner that didn’t want to go into gun stores and, uh, I sort of left it alone.

And then to be honest, probably about a year later, I looked at it and I have like a million views. And I was like, Whoa, this could be something people are actually responding to this. Uh, and so over the, I’d say. I don’t know, two years after that, it was sort of a hobby. It was something that I was like, man, I, I really liked guns.

I’m just going to share this info with you. And it wasn’t intended. We’ll be a business until probably last year. I started taking it. Yeah. Serious as a business. When we started getting some sponsors on board, getting some actual ad revenue out of it and it started to become a real source of income. Do you have any advice that you can offer?

No, it’s funny. So my oldest boy, he’s seven and he, you know, kids are always into YouTube and Kyle’s kids into YouTube. And that’s the funny thing. It’s about the little circles that kids run in is they want to be YouTube. Yeah. So, um, you know, and nowadays it’s a, it’s a legit career to pursue. Um, do you have any.

Advice for people that want to take YouTube seriously. Yeah, for sure. Um, and to actually back up for a second, you mentioned that, uh, you know, YouTube is actually becoming somewhat of a serious career, uh, to consider, and I’ll listen to another podcast recently with Ninja, who is a, I mean, a big time, Fortnite video gamer making you guys on Twitch.

Yeah. He’s on Twitch. He’s making like half a million dollars a month. I mean, it’s insane. Um, but he’s talking about in the future, imagine a point where, you know, you’re a parent and you’re talking to your kid and your kid’s like, can I go out and play? And instead of saying, you know, have you done your homework yet?

You’re saying, have you prac, have you streamed you’re two hours a fortnight yet? Like, like you’re, you’re practicing to become, to make this your career. And I was like, wow, that’s, that’s an insane thought to think about, but you know, something like that’s coming, um, But anyways. Yeah. So to answer your question about, uh, you know, advice with, with YouTube, I think that there’s, there’s a lot that goes into it.

Um, if I’m. I guess the, the biggest thing I would say is that number one, start with something that you’re passionate about. That’s the whole idea behind YouTube. I mean, people can see right through what you’re thinking. So make sure what it is you’re doing. You’re not setting out with a goal of making money.

There’s just, there’s YouTube is too saturated with people like that. Like you have to be. Yourself and you have to be authentic and true and, and whatever you’re doing has to come through. Um, beyond that, I would say, uh, consistency is obviously huge. I mean, big things on social media, uh, consistency, if you can hit daily videos, I mean, it’s going to be huge.

And then just keep pushing like a lot of times, you know, new social media people will come on and they’ll get 36 views on their YouTube and they’ll give up after three or four videos of getting 36 views because it’s disheartening. Uh, but I’d say just keep pushing and. Kind of, if you can change your perspective on that a little bit.

Uh, you know, when I first started getting 36 years, especially now on my secondary channel where I’ll get a couple hundred views, as opposed to tens of thousands. If I change my perspective to think that 36 people actual people took six minutes out of their day to care about what I said, it means a lot more to me.

Because I think numbers have become sort of disconnected from the actual people on social media. If that makes sense. Yeah. It’s funny you say that because there’s a gentleman, I’ll try and find his name while we’re talking. But, um, so I would correlate exactly everything you said over there, LinkedIn. So I’ve been really working on doing LinkedIn influencing the lately.

And there was a video I watched just yesterday. I’m going to try and find the guy. And it was from this big influencer guy, uh, right here, uh, Ronald Richards. Um, so this guy came out with a video yesterday and he called it a hashtag hashtag one view, but he is video is about. You know, um, all this YouTube generation where everybody looks at view quantities, do you know what?

I don’t care? You know, he, he was very appreciative. He says, I gave lots of you and I’m grateful for that, but you know, what it boils down to is furthering my business and I don’t care how many views I get. I care. I care about that one view where somebody said that guy speaking to me, and then they called me.

Are they here in the message and it’s totally true. As I’ve been playing the LinkedIn influencing role. Um, some, some posts will get, you know, 20 likes and others will get 200 and some videos will get 20 views and others will get 2000 and it’s, it just takes that one person. And honestly, out of these ones that.

Gain traction. That’s about what you get is you get one person that hits you up and they couldn’t. I went to lunch with a guy, um, just last week. And you don’t know what people are working at that, those, those 36 views. One of those 30, 60 years could be the same person that’s looking at that video. And the video before the video, before, and this guy went to lunch with, he just reached out and he finally said, Hey, I’ve been checking you out on LinkedIn.

And I just like to keep my feelers out for people I can do business with. And you struck the card on one of the, and you have no idea. You don’t need a million views for that to happen. So I think it’s a good point. Especially from a business perspective. I mean, like you said, growing up in the YouTube generation, you see huge new tubers, Casey Neistat getting 2 million views on a video of him in the airport.

Right. And you don’t, I don’t think you correlate 2 million, like just like that number that you see on YouTube to people, you know? And so it’s, it’s sort of a perspective change when you started and you have to channel that. I really think helps you, did you do a daily vlog? I never could do a daily blog.

Okay. I’ll tell you that last year I did a 30 day videos in 30 days, kind of a daily blog challenge. And it was super difficult, but I will tell you that the subscriber rate on my YouTube channel increased an insane amount. I mean, at that point, I think I had like 30,000 subscribers over the course of like three years.

And then I did those 30 videos in 30 days and I got almost 10,000 subscribers in those 30 days. Wow. What do you think contributed to that acceleration? Like did people just know you’re cranking out more content? So they come back? Are they telling people or what is actually increasing that number? Uh, yeah, I think there’s, there’s sort of two folds to it.

Number one, the people that are, that are watching already, they, they just know there’s a video tomorrow. So they just tune in and expect the video there. You know, they wake up, I’ve got 30 minutes before I leave for work. They watch your video. Um, and then the other portion is you’re getting more content out there.

And if you’re smart about it and you’re utilizing smart SEO, titles, and keywords and whatever, you have more chances to bring more viewers in. And once they’re in again, they know that there’s a video tomorrow. And so they stay around. I think that is an interesting point because I’m so removed from that world.

I would never get on YouTube daily or set a cycle. Sure. There’s somebody in something for everybody. And so it just really. Yeah, man. I think it’s different because a lot of people, I talk to like me personally, I watch YouTube way more than I watch TV. Like when I sit down with a sandwich, I turn on YouTube.

I don’t turn on the TV. Uh, and I think that a lot of my friends do that as well. But, um, I think, I feel like I’m sort of in the generation, I’m 28 years old. Uh, like half of my friends do that. Half of my friends, you know, watch more TV or whatever. Um, younger friends that I have, younger siblings, whatever, they tend to be YouTube all the way.

And then some of my older friends are a little bit more on the, on the television side. So I think it’s just kind of a generational thing. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so you had kind of, uh, Touched on briefly about starting, um, dojo with the partner. And, um, so this is an interesting topic that you talked about. Um, and so the, for the listeners, um, the, the partnership didn’t work out and.

Chad made a decision, you know, how do I continue succeeding? And where do I take this from here? Um, can you talk as much as you’re comfortable with talking about, about what contributed to, um, rough patches and partnerships and what types of considerations you had to go through to decide on how to move on and any advice you can offer on people that to, to listeners that are considering starting a partnership or fresh into one, and they’re already kind of sensing, you know, maybe this wasn’t the best decision.

Hmm. Yeah, that’s a, I mean, that’s a loaded question. Obviously it’s gonna change for different people. I’ll tell you that. When I started my partnership, uh, was working a nine to five job and I was fresh out of college. I think. I mean, I wasn’t even a year out of college at this point. Uh, and it was a previous employer.

He said, look, I’ll, I’ll throw in some money, let’s start this thing together. I mean, you know, he wanted 50% of the company and at the time, you know, that amount of money to a kid straight out of college was like, It was huge, you know, like someone that was willing to throw money at me to start a business that trusted me.

I was super into that. I mean, now that amount of money is inconsequential. It’s stupid, but, uh, I mean, he literally. I think to this day knew that he was sort of taken advantage of it. But I mean, that is what it is in any case, I was stoked on it. So I quit my nine to five. We went in 56. I quickly realized that not only was I doing all the work, bringing in all the clients, but he wasn’t willing to.

I mean, he wasn’t even willing to like. Pay me as a managing partner and then split like a distribution between shareholders or anything like that. Like, he was very adamant on taking 50% when he certainly wasn’t doing that much work. Uh, he brought in and the client, which I will give him, but he sort of just clung on to that for as long as he could.

Yeah. And when it came time to renew with that client, I mean, I’m the one face time with all the one doing the work. And, uh, I’m the one who renewed the contract. And to this day, he’s saying, you know, whatever, that’s, that’s the thing that he gave to the company. And so he, I guess, validates his partnership that way.

But in any case that find it, or even work-wise is not the reason that. I decided to split ways at all. It came down to the fact that, uh, there’s just a personality conflict. It was a, it was a personality that I thought was fairly toxic. I didn’t like the person I was becoming because of it. Um, and, and I think that I, I had to make a very hard decision and that was two.

Uh, take my, like my happiness and my wellbeing above financial security. Um, and so at that point, we, we kind of discussed it and he said that I, you know, I said I wanted to buy him out and he threw out absolutely crazy numbers and we eventually went back and forth until we came to a point where I was like, look, I’ll make it happen.

Um, we, I took out a loan and I was just like, Here’s the money go and I’ll figure it out after that. And, uh, I mean, from that point on the second he was out of the company, you know, I just, I felt like this huge weight was off my shoulders. I felt like I could, I could run the company. Like I knew it should be run.

And that year we doubled revenue and the next year we increased revenue upon that. So I do think that it was, it was a lot of just. Just just stress and sort of just a bad personal connection and yeah. And, uh, like I said, I think now to this day, one of my biggest roles with myself is to never put myself in a situation like with people or with personalities where I’m, I’m, I’m taking money over surrounding myself with good people.

Uh, Now I always prioritize who I’m surrounding myself with over anything that has to do with wealth or with financial Dean or success in the company. Anything like that? Yeah. Yeah. I think it’s smart. Um, it’s one of those things where, uh, we probably all have to go through that as much as we always know that it’s something you actually have to experience to realize.

Yeah, man, I’m sorry not to cut you off. Um, I was just saying that, uh, I think. One of the biggest things with it too, is that I, it was a lot of money for me to buy him out. And, and I think that money was better spent doing that than taking four more years of college. I learned more out of that one buyout than I could have in four years.

Okay, cool. Yeah. Well, that’s funny. Um, I actually wanted to ask you about, so, um, You have, tell us a little about your ed, your education and your college background. And then, um, you say in that I actually wanted to ask you, um, what’s your take on college in general. And do you feel it’s advantageous for people to pursue?

It was like a doctor you have to, but, um, yeah. Uh, what I will say is, so I went to university of Utah. I got my degree in film and media arts. Um, I think that it’s very advantageous in the sense that it puts you in, in that world. I was surrounded by likeminded people. I made good friends. I made good connections without whom I would not be where I am today.

That being said, I learned nothing about film. I learned nothing useful about filmmaking and, and, and I I’ve talked to a lot of other people who went to. To different nearby universities. And that wasn’t the case for them. I think it was just my specific courses and the professors and the way they taught.

Uh, but that being said, I think that it is advantageous in the sense that you’re forced to be surrounded by this world if I went to school for philosophy. Right. But I loved film. I wouldn’t be. Surrounded by filmmakers every day and talking about film and talking about movies. And I think that even though I love film, it would remain a hobby as opposed to an actual career path.

Yeah. Uh, yeah. I mean, I guess, I don’t know if that answered your question, is it advantageous? Would I recommend it? If you’re in an arts world, if you have the self discipline to. Uh, like, like for instance, in the film, if I, if I didn’t go to film school, but instead I went, I wanted to be in the Hollywood world and I went to Hollywood and I, I started at the camera PA and worked my way up.

Um, I think that is far more advantageous unless you’re going to a truly prestigious school. Uh, then I, I, I think that real world experience in a job like that is more valuable than a university. You have some contacts that are in the Hollywood world, um, in filmmaking. Yeah. We have a mutual contact. Yeah.

So, so the listeners that are into, into film, um, what’s your take on that world versus your world? You know, doing the self-employment thing and, and different, different job, different clients versus the perceived glory of Hollywood, you know, is it really worth it? Um, that’s a, it’s a hard question and it varies it’s for everyone and what you want to do.

I think that if you work your way to the top of a certain category in the Hollywood world, uh it’s it seems very glorious, but I’ve never been there. So I can’t talk about it. I’ve been on the bottom of the totem pole in the Hollywood world, and I’ll tell you what it looks like from down there is a lot like a construction set.

You’ve got. 200 people working as hard and as fast as possible time is money. If you mess anything up, you’re costing the production money. And, uh, it becomes a lot less personal at that point. It’s no longer. Okay. An art that you’re, that you’re collectively pursuing. It is a job, a 12 hour, a day job, a hard time labor job at that.

And, uh, it’s, it’s just, it’s not something that’s for me, but that being said, I’ve also heard on the other hand, you know, working this entrepreneurial side and trying to gain clients is a lot like mowing lawns. You know what I mean? It’s, it’s one job at a time. You can only handle so many physical jobs, so many physical clients.

And, uh, I think that’s where. Uh, I have succeeded in creating multiple streams of revenue instead of counting on those one lawn mowing jobs. That’s a good analogy. Uh, why don’t you tell us about some of your clients? Uh, yeah, so. Let’s see, one of them, probably my biggest client is the state of Montana. The board of education.

That’s kind of that big contract you were talking about at the beginning of the year. Uh, that’s nice because it’s a government contract, so it’s not really their money it’s grant money that they have to spend. Uh, so that’s, that’s something that’s been ongoing for the last five years. Um, and it’s, uh, it’s been.

A huge blessing because it’s sort of a runway that’s allowed me to get my feet under me. Um, so I, I it’s one of those jobs. I think that also sort of pays the bills. It’s not one that, that Stokes my creativity, but it’s, it is one that lets me breathe and, and sort of figure out that creative side. Um, in addition to that, I do a lot, like with real estate, like I said, uh, around here a really big builder destination homes, we recently, I got a good contract with them.

And so, yeah. All the videos you’re seeing from them, or are things that we’ve been doing. And it’s been a blast working with that team. Uh, I’ve done a lot in sort of the gun industry because a lot of clients will find me through Greenlight shooting. Uh, and then they’ll sign up for, you know, a review or something of one of their products.

And then I’ll be like, Hey, in addition, I also do these commercial style jobs. Um, and we’ll kind of keep in touch and, and so I’ve gained a lot of. Good bigger clients from that as well. Um, and then the smaller clients, like, like the, the Utah property videos talking about those are consistent, you know, like these other, these bigger jobs, like low and low in lawns or whatever, you know, you’re doing once a month, once every couple of weeks.

And then it’s nice to have these, these smaller jobs where I can just go and bang out three houses in a day. And, uh, you know, obviously the pay is less, but it’s consistent and it’s nice to have those different tiers of, of revenue streams. I have a question before we move on real quick. We’ve mentioned Greenlight a couple of times, and I know YouTube has been cracking down recently on demonetization of firearm related channels.

Have you noticed anything? And can you give me any insight and then insight around what you’ve seen? So. Sorry, I’m getting, I’m getting a lot of feedback again. Um, the, the YouTube sort of ban on firearm stuff is not near as I guess, strict or, or evil as the media made it out to be everything I saw in the media sort of said anything to do with guns is gone.

That’s just, yeah, that’s right. Uh, so a lot of people have contacted me and said, is your YouTube channel gone? And I mean, that’s, it hasn’t even affected my YouTube channel. Uh, so my YouTube channel is primarily reviews and tips and tricks and stuff like that. Uh, but really what they ended up banning.

Yeah. The buying and selling a firearm. So I can’t sell you a firearm directly from my YouTube channel, which makes sense. Uh, I can’t show you how to build a suppressor. Which makes sense. I mean, it’s a lot of stuff along those lines that maybe shouldn’t have been on YouTube in the first place. Gotcha. Is, um, so I want to ask you about, um, back to the Montana government contract is, um, kind of explain how you get into those types of contracts, that through a bidding process, how’s that work.

Yeah. So for me it was a, it was through BidSync, I believe was the, was the actual website. Um, it was a huge gigantic contract that we had to fill out and we had to specify everything. Um, and they, they do it kind of based on points. So, you know, if you come in with the lowest price and then yeah. Based on how you approach it, you get points.

And then they award the contract. That way it started out as a one year contract, uh, with the option to renew after that. So after the one year, uh, you know, they liked us. We, we, we worked together well, and at that point they renewed it for four years. Cool. Um, Mitzi, I’m actually familiar with them. They do those.

I think you can use that for just dyssynchrony just about any industries. Yeah. Because we’ve seen it come through for design projects. Uh, So, okay. No questions about your Utah property, the videos, um, in, in all my ignorance of the equipment required to do video production, um, is, it seems like it’d be a cool opportunity for maybe somebody that’s new to get in because they can come in with a camera and come in with a drone and it’s fun.

And it’s speaking a minimal investment. Is that a cool, cool intro kind of. But the doors into the industry kind of angle. Yeah. Uh, yes and no. Um, I think, I guess, depending on sort of the level that you’re trying to enter in, uh, it’s possible, I’d say probably to get into it for an investment of, I mean, certainly under five grand, but that is, you know, that’s still a good, solid investment.

Um, I think probably like. The wedding industry as sort of cliche, is that is, uh, is, is a great place to start if you’re interested in photography and videos, because, um, there’s a lot of them, it’s, it’s somewhat easy to, uh, get into because the competition is there’s certainly competition there, but there it’s the wet, there are so many weddings, I guess, and if you’re willing to work at a, at a inexpensive price, I guess you can get a lot of work and you can really sort of hone your skills that way.

Yeah, that makes sense. So what, um, what do you do outside of, uh, 10 of the work world? Can, uh, I don’t know right now, I, like, I was telling you, we just bought a house. So I feel like I’ve been nothing but working in the yard all day everyday. But aside from that, I mean, I’m a big into fitness. I like to, uh, you know, pick the dog out on hikes.

I, the wife and I try to stay as active as possible. I think when you’re sort of in our industry, I mean, just. Behind the computer for most of the day, you have to get out and like, your eyes are just hating you by the end of a 10 hour push editing or whatever coding or whatever. Um, so yeah, I mean, I try to try to balance my, my son vitamin D with, you know, with screen time, look, look what I got here.

Let’s see if I can find it.

No, you’re hacking the system for those that don’t know, they’re listening, it’s on audio. He just showed me a pill bottle of vitamin D and vitamin D supplements. I’m cheating. You know, it’s funny. I wait all year, Kyle and I, we complain about winter, which is laughable, cause we’re in Utah, but not some place.

And then the winter rolls along and I’m just not a big fan of the call. And then we wait all winter for it. And then now it’s here and it’s beautiful. And I don’t know that I’ve spent a legitimate day outside enjoying it. Yeah. I, uh, I’ve been out, but this, this tan isn’t from enjoying the sun. It’s from, like I said, working in the yard.

So, so on the, on the family topic. So, um, Chad has a baby on the way. Congratulations. Thank you so much, October 30th of due date right now. Now, I don’t know if I’m going to be the first to tell you this. I know you’re a Ferdad you are going to hate your job. Oh, why do you say that? It’s because everything that you love about them then becomes annoying because.

When they come in and they’re smothering you or they’re barking and it’s waking up the kid and anything that interrupts the kid now becomes your enemy. And he’s my, my dog is very, very needy, certainly. But then when you see that on the flip side, now my five year old loves the dog. Absolutely loves the dog.

So it’s just the little flip in the beginning. And then. Yeah, I just got to get through that initial period. There’ll be a couple of little hard scratches or links then I’ll like too much, but then it gets better. It gets better. Well, I appreciate the insight. Okay. Uh, how much do you feel like, uh, health and fitness does that contribute?

Do you feel like that contributes directly to your success? Hundred percent. Um, the white, one of the guys I work with on a daily basis, he, I, he’s just kind of getting into fitness with me right now. And he said that his productivity has skyrocketed, even though he’s technically working less hours throughout the day, you know, he’ll take a two hour break to go on a walk and then to go to the gym with me or whatever.

And I mean, when he comes back that. Four hours that he’s working or are just as efficient as the eight hours when you’re not getting out and exercising and stuff, you know? So, uh, I think it’s huge. I think it’s, it clears your mind. I think it gives you something sort of to look forward to in the middle of the day.

Uh, I’m also, I feel really, uh, lucky that. I’m able to work from home and kind of do my own thing so that I can go to the gym in the middle of the day and not have to deal with the meat heads that come at five in the morning and six in the afternoon, you know, because I think that is a big turnoff to the gym.

I certainly don’t like it. Uh, so yeah, but so saying that it’s certainly a refresher for me and that I think it gets me back on track better than if I just try to work a solid day through. Yeah. What kind of, what’s your typical day look like? And what’s your hours that you’re usually working. Uh, it varies a lot, but, um, my wife either works in the morning or the evening, so I try to work a lot whenever she’s at work.

Um, but you know, in the mornings I’ll get up a couple of hours before her, uh, work for a few hours. And then when she wakes up, we’ll take the dog out. We’ll go on a nice, big, long walk with him. I’ll hit the gym, come home in her. We’ll spend a little time together, you know, cooking some lunch or whatever.

She goes to work at four or something if she’s working tonight. Uh, and then probably from about four to. Seven or eight I’ll work again. So I probably hit between six and eight hours a day. I don’t hold myself to eight hours. I mean, if I’m, you know, I’ve got a big project, it might be a 14 hour day. If I, if I don’t, I try to, I try to stay consistent.

It’s at least six hours and you know, don’t hold myself though. I don’t want to feel guilty if I’m not putting in my 40 hours. You know what I mean? Yeah. Do you feel like, um, is there a rule of thumb for every. X amount of hours, your onsite recording equates to X amount of hours and editing. You know, if you, if you’re recording for 10 hours, does that equal 20 hours of editing?

Um, it can, and it depends a lot on, on what you’re filming. So like with that Montana thing, a lot of times I’ll film conferences, which is just the teacher. Upfront with the PowerPoint presentation and I’ll just have to go through and cut out dead time and add in slides and stuff like that. And I mean, for that, I sorta sorta got it down to a formula for the real estate stuff, because it’s, it’s a lot of the same kind of work I can kind of get that down to a formula.

A lot of times, like with conferences, I’ll I’ll bill it like an hour of filming equals an hour and a half of editing. Um, For, for houses and stuff like that. Uh, it’s kind of one to one. And then I’ve noticed certainly with, with the more experience I get and a little bit, I guess the more comfort I get, I can work much faster than I used to be able to work.

You know, when I take on even a big project, uh, I would say, you know, it’s a two week turnaround and now. I can get it done tomorrow if you, if you need it, you know, a lot of times within a week on a big project, but I have no problem banging something out within a day or two if need be. All right. So what would you tell your younger self, um, that you’ve learned throughout your career or something that might help others?

Something that could save some listeners time or help them? Scale faster. We kind of touched on the partner thing had mentioned that was a big part. Um, but, but anything beyond that, that you could offer as advice? Ah, I mean, that’s, it, it’s a hard one, but

beyond the actual, like practical do this, do that, I would say just. Just have faith and stop worrying. You know, I think we worry so much about the little things. And like, if you just, if you worry about, about what everyone is telling you, that all the naysayers, all the negativity about going out on your own or starting a YouTube channel, everyone’s going to hate because, you know, I don’t know if they can’t do it.

They don’t want to do it or whatever. Uh, I think Casey Neistat said this recently in a video and he said, okay, Those that say something can’t be done. Okay. You should get out of the way of the people who are doing it. So with that said, I would say that, uh, I would tell myself just to keep my head down and just keep working, like stop worrying about what people say you had mentioned, um, at one point your, so your wife was a good support system and encourage you to kind of quit your nine to five jobs.

Um, and, and you had said that the discussion you had with her is she said, now’s the time. So what led up to you considering this? It sounds like she was able to say, now is the time that you guys have had. Previous discussions about that. So, um, talk a little bit about how, um, obviously financial is a big part of the decision.

Um, but were there any other things that you had to discuss for listeners that are in relationships and, um, are considering the leap of faith that you and your wife discussed and kind of have to balance. Yeah. Um, there was a couple of things in place. First of all, I had been sort of freelancing outside of my job for a couple of years.

At this point, you know, I had built up somewhat of a client list and I had built up somewhat of some experience in the world of filmmaking and entrepreneurial filmmaking. Uh, so I, I had something to fall back on, but where the term. Now is the time came from for us is, uh, at the time I was 24, I want to say I was 24.

Uh, we had just got married or weren’t even married yet. Uh, we were living in an apartment that was 600 bucks a month. We had no kids. Our only debt was our $5,000 cars. You know, like it, it was, it was. The, when she said now’s the time it was sort of like, look, you don’t have a family to take care of. You don’t have kids.

She’s like, I have a super solid job. I can support us. You know? Uh, I want you to get your feet under you so that I can step down from my job one day. But right now I want to support you so you can get that done. Um, and that was a huge peace of mind to have, have that, Oh, as a backup. And just her sort of believing in me was obviously invaluable.

Yeah, that’s fine. I guess one thing I forgot to mention too, is that she said is like, look, we’re we’re young enough. We, you know, we have a thousand dollars to our name. Like if we lose that thousand dollars, You can make it back, right? Like, regardless of where you’re at at that stage, it was, it was sort of the time, because even if I had 50 K in the bank, if I spent all that 50 K I have enough life ahead of me that, you know, you can, you can earn that back.

We’re not in our seventies spending our retirement on it. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so kind of the last question, um, offline, I had asked you, I said, if given the opportunity, what are some successes that you’d like to humble brag about? And, um, I liked what you had said, you, you had talked about that, you know, you’re basically kind of living the dream and, and then you kind of compared, um, What you consider success versus what society considers success.

Why don’t you kind of finish my sentence for, for yourself? Yeah, just that comparison about where you’re at in life. Yeah. Um, Oh, well I think I don’t really have like, you know, awards or, or, or wealth or fame or anything humble brag about. And so when you asked that, I kind of thought there’s a lot of people out there, especially who want to go into the social media world or whatever, who.

Want to be the next Gary V the, the Phillip, the Franco Casey Neistat, these huge, huge, uh, personalities and, and making a ton of money and supporting a huge team. And, uh, of course it would be nice to have that fame and wealth, but I think there’s also something to be said about. Being on your own schedule and doing what you want when you want and holding yourself accountable.

Um, and, and being successful in that sense to me is that, you know, I get to live a life that I’m truly excited to wake up to every day. I get to be home with my wife when she’s home and spend time with her and our baby. When our baby comes, not only. Will I be able to financially support this little family, but also I’ll be able to spend time with my daughter, which is huge to me.

Um, I, you know, I’m not on a plane every single day or whatever, uh, you know, having to work from China, you know, whatever. It’s just, it’s nice to, to have a life that I can say that. I put the work in for, um, I think one of the greatest things about being an entrepreneur and especially on like social media and stuff is with YouTube.

Like, look, if you wake up and you make a video and you put in the time and you, you get views and if you don’t, you don’t get views and there’s no one to blame. There’s no client that’s, you have to. Convinced to hire you, right? It’s purely you, it’s you and your audience. If you want to put out content, they’re going to watch it.

If they’re, if you don’t, they’re not going to watch it simple. Um, and I think the fact that I am where I am today is because I woke up up and put in the work and I’m continuing to wake up and put in the work. Um, and I think that that’s, that’s sort of, my American dream is just being able to live on my own terms and, uh, do what it is that I love.

And as long as I’m waking up happy, I get to spend time with my family. Uh, then that’s. That’s sort of my American dream. And I’m excited to say that I’m living that.

Kyle, do you have any, uh, closing questions for Chad? No. I mean, I think the way he ended up with perfect ending right there, that was, that was beautiful. So, so as we, as it close out, go ahead and plug yourself, share your website, your phone number, social media, anything you want to put out there. Sure. Uh, yeah, so I mean, you know, dojo built is sort of that, that primary contact, if for any reason you have any questions on video, or if you are looking to get any videos made or anything like that, hit me up at dot com.

If you’re someone who is looking to get into social media, yourself, who wants to grow your business, who wants to just create somewhat of a brand identity on social media? I’ve actually recently started my very own podcast. A couple of weeks ago, and it’s called fuel the fire it’s available on Apple podcasts, anchor, Google podcasts, overcast, all sort of the main ones.

So it’s cut out. Uh, and in that I give it’s about 20 to 30 minutes. Each episode they’re released once a week, every Monday morning. And hopefully they give you a little bit of motivation and real-world tactics on how to create sort of a social media brand for yourself. There you go. Now, one final thing we started, um, I don’t know if we like it or not yet, but we have the random question generator that we call.

Okay. Uh, alright here. Should, should we let the cost, we let the guests say when to stop or should I just pick one? Just take one breath. Just do it. Alright. Drum roll. Okay. If you could give yourself a new name. What name would you pick? Like a nickname or like a, like a bird’s name? So I’m thinking that sounds like a birth name.

So you are no longer Chad. Okay. Um, I’ll tell you when I met my wife, she, she asked what my name was and, and we kind of had this thing going where we didn’t tell each other’s real first names. I went by Justin and, uh, the re the real reason is because of my, my absolute love for Justin Timberlake. I’m probably going to have to go with Justin on that.

Wait so that we can’t leave her there now. So how did you guys meet without knowing each other’s real first names? Uh, I mean, that’s a very little, a long story, but the, the very short and condensed story is that, uh, we met in Mexico on a cruise. She was on like a rooftop bar. She owl down to me and my buddy went up to her and we started talking.

We found out we were on the same cruise. She was drunk out of her mind. And we, we found out she lived in California. I live in Utah. We did the long distance thing for awhile. She moved out here after a couple years and, uh, yeah. The rest is history history. All right, Chad Shellabarger thank you for joining us.

Yeah, it was a pleasure guys. Thanks for having me on, uh, you guys need to be on the field of fire podcast at some point and by the way. All right, fine. Okay, man. Sounds good. Thank you.