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Max Reisinger - YouTuber, Entrepreneur and Optimist
331 Plays4 years ago
In this episode, we catch up with Max Reisinger to learn more about building a community, the importance of learning outside of school and nurturing creativity. We will also discuss the logistics and challenges behind running a successful clothing brand.
Max Reisinger's social media: https://lnkfi.re/max-reisinger
Episode's page: https://podcast.changemakerz.org/max-reisinger
Follow ChangemakerZ: https://go.changemakerz.org/follow
Upcoming episodes: https://podcast.changemakerz.org
Produced by Vasilis Skarleas
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Transcript
Introduction to Changemakers
00:00:01
Speaker
Hello everyone, I'm Saloni. And I'm Vassilis. We run Changemakers, a student room initiative that aims to empower, educate and connect Gen Zers interested in entrepreneurship. We interview teenagers with impactful projects and create resources to help you change the world. If they can't do it, so can you.
00:00:23
Speaker
On this podcast, we discuss logistics of creating different types of projects with Gen Zers who have already done it. We will leave our social media and website information in the description.
Guest Introduction: Max Raisinger
00:00:42
Speaker
Hello everyone and welcome to today's episode. We are so excited to be here today with a guest that we've interviewed in the past on our website, and now we have the honor to host him on our podcast series. He is a YouTuber, entrepreneur and an optimist. He is a great inspiration for us here at TeensmakerZ. So please welcome Max Raisinger.
00:01:05
Speaker
How did you get started on YouTube?
Max's YouTube Journey
00:01:07
Speaker
What intention did you set for your channel back then and how has it changed up until now?
00:01:15
Speaker
Great question. First off, thank you for having me on. I started my YouTube channel two years ago because we were moving to the south of France as a family for seven months. And I thought it was a great opportunity to just start documenting my life and to film my experiences there. I was going to French public school and just maturing and changing as a person. So I thought it'd be a great opportunity to start a YouTube channel. And since then, it's sort of evolved
00:01:42
Speaker
Just documenting how my perspectives have changed when i'm learning about the world i'm thinking about the world just taking people long on my life. Yeah it's amazing we've all kind of seen you grow your channel so how do you see yourself grow throughout this process like on a personal level and how did the quality of your content change.
00:02:04
Speaker
Yeah, I definitely matured and I think I was able to sort of open my worldview and really see different perspectives and I also became a lot more optimistic throughout just my time there in France and that's what we're coincided with maturing through posting videos of myself and putting that out on the internet.
00:02:22
Speaker
The quality definitely improved. I got different camera gear over time and figured out different settings to make my videos better. And I think over time I learned to tell more of a story with my content, I hope. And just through trial and error I was able to improve it over time.
00:02:39
Speaker
Um, to track my growth, I mean, a lot of it's personal. Like in the beginning, I knew my videos weren't great. Um, and sort of, um, I can tell like, if a friend will text me, they'll be like, Oh, I love that last video. And I'll be able to tell through like feedback through my friends and family. And sometimes I just know personally that it makes them also a consumer of YouTube. So I watch videos and I can sort of tell if the video's good, maybe needs some improvement. Um, so a lot of it's just like intuition and then feedback. This is amazing.
00:03:09
Speaker
You have a unique relationship with friends. If I'm not mistaken, your mom is a friend's professor. And that's the reason why you've engaged with this wonderful language in the first place. I speak French too. What was your experience
Multilingual Aspirations
00:03:24
Speaker
like? Do you want to learn any more languages in the future? Yeah, for sure. I definitely want to learn Spanish again. I went to a Spanish-speaking preschool when I was younger.
00:03:36
Speaker
sort of had a bit of an upbringing with that, but then it faded over time because she wasn't really spoken in the school I went to. So I definitely want to like sharpen the skills up again, because it's sort of similar to French and has that romance language root. And I'm also a dual citizen with Austria, so I'd love to learn German and just be able to like speak part of like what my blood is. It's definitely Spanish, French, and German. Definitely my goals.
00:04:05
Speaker
You have an important impact through your videos, your social media posts, and Perpectopia server. What could you say about your appearance on the Campus France livestream? Campus France is an international organization which promotes the French language à le tranzer, which means abroad. How did this opportunity come? Yeah, it was a crazy opportunity, just experienced to be able to work with the French embassy because, I mean, I moved to France and then
00:04:35
Speaker
sort of within the span of a year, the French Embassy contacting me is just like crazy. And yeah, they just send me an email and they're like, we love your videos and we think you represent the country and traveling the country and the French culture and just traveling to France. You represent that for teens.
00:04:52
Speaker
They're like, yeah, we'd love for you to work with our campaign or to be a part of our campaign. And simple as that, all through email. It was an incredible opportunity and just like incredibly humbling to be approached by the embassy. Yeah, that's amazing. So in one of your videos, you mentioned that you were taking like an online course and what is the importance of learning outside of school and what role does school play in your education? Do you think that normal school is more valuable than self-learning?
00:05:23
Speaker
Bunch of great questions there. I think learning outside of the classroom is really important. I think most of what I've learned has just been through experiences in life. Yeah, I mean, I think it's important to have a foundation with what I've learned in school. I wouldn't necessarily say that it's changed my life, but it set me up to have those experiences out of the classroom, be a lot more meaningful, and I've been able to interpret them better.
00:05:49
Speaker
And yeah, I think online learning just allows you to take that one step further. Obviously, the internet just presents so much opportunity. And I think in school, you're sort of forced within a certain curriculum to learn very specific things, which is a great stepping zone to
00:06:05
Speaker
taking the skills that you learned or the study skills that you developed with school and translated something that maybe is not taught in school, but you can honestly learn anything online. And I obviously am sponsored by Skillshare, so I'm a big proponent. I love online learning. I just think there's just so many opportunities and I've learned a lot of my editing and my business, all of that through online learning.
00:06:30
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. So a while back on your Instagram, you mentioned that you go on social media detoxes, like you put your phone in a box and you hit it somewhere. So how do you feel after these detoxes and how do you view social media in general? So after these detoxes, I honestly really dislike my phone. I like
00:06:54
Speaker
find it hard to even read, download Instagram again or whatever social media is on my phone. I'm like, all right, I've lived without it. And I actually realized I don't need it.
00:07:03
Speaker
So I think it just helps me just reset completely, like my whole mental space. And I think it allows me to just check in and create more of a balance with social media. Um, and just gives me more of like a third person perspective on my relationship with it. Um, and yeah, it's just been a great way to, whenever I'm feeling kind of like not creative or in a rut, it's a great way to just reset, fresh my mind. And yeah, I definitely recommend it.
00:07:32
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. I've definitely seen the same thing. So congratulations on hitting 300K subs recently. What do you do to make sure you have an engaged audience? Like we look at your channel and we see so many people commenting. These people are like genuine fans. They're not here just like watching you. They're here to like stay forever. Thank you. To have an engaged audience, I mean,
00:07:57
Speaker
It's not something I necessarily try to focus on. I think it just comes naturally with being authentic. I find that the more I come off as myself, the more people want to engage with me because I come off as hopefully a real person. And I think just taking the time to respond to messages, to respond to DMs, to respond to emails, and just to be a normal person, I think it makes engagement a lot easier.
00:08:23
Speaker
So we're going to have a little break and we will come back to you shortly. It's time to talk about prospectopia. What is the philosophy behind it?
Prospectopia and Community Building
00:08:33
Speaker
What is prospectopia? Yeah, so prospectopia is sort of a philosophy that I created for my own life and for others to live in. It all roots on
00:08:44
Speaker
The fact that no matter where you are, no matter where you live, no matter who you're surrounded by, you can create your own mental space. And prospectopia is sort of a city in our minds that you can escape to and be with everyone else and share an optimistic perspective on whatever's going on in your life, despite what your circumstances are. So it's sort of a place that
00:09:06
Speaker
If you can close your eyes and just imagine that you're there, hopefully that's a helpful space for people. And the Discord is more of like a tangible physical place where people can talk and interact. And then the idea perspective is more of a philosophy. And the Discord is just where we all come together to share those ideas, to talk, to hang out, to have fun, and yeah, just to have a safe space for everyone.
00:09:30
Speaker
This is a great philosophy. So what kinds of events and activities take place on your Discord server? Yeah, so we've tried to expand this as much as possible and we're continuing to come up with new ideas. We've hosted language lessons, movie nights. We recently had sort of like a meet and greet with everyone where we all went and on these calls introduced each other and just sort of just got to know each other.
00:09:59
Speaker
Movie nights, I think I mentioned, we play games together. People will perform instruments they like to sing. Just anything under the sun that's fun and online we've tried to do. Great. So where do you get your inspiration from for your designs and any other creative projects?
00:10:19
Speaker
Good question. Uh, I mean, my design inspiration comes from a lot of different places. Uh, obviously like my room has a lot of designs and things around me. So I like to surround myself with aesthetics and things that remind me of old memories. And I don't know. I find inspiration in small things like just going on a walk or going on a run. If I see a certain design, um, or just like doing research on certain like aesthetics and yeah, it honestly comes from everywhere.
00:10:47
Speaker
Additionally, I really like that you're sharing some important quotes about you, yourself and your way of thinking and it gives me some time to think about them. So during COVID, do you think that your sales have increased? Has this whole situation affected the delivery of the goods?
00:11:10
Speaker
Yeah, so it's hard to track it perfectly because I sort of started my business right as COVID was happening or right after. I think it definitely
00:11:23
Speaker
It definitely hurt sales because of just the whole shipping thing. Shipping times are all messed up. I've probably lost over $1,000 because of packages getting lost. I think that's just been a whole hassle within itself. Obviously, people don't have the same amount of money they would normally because it's affected jobs and people working.
00:11:44
Speaker
It's hard to say, but I think it sets me up well for the future because I'm probably dealing with the worst of it right now. But yeah, it's hard to say, but I think things will get better. I see. This brings me straight to my next question. So which are some usual problems that you need to solve while you're running your online business?
00:12:07
Speaker
usual problems. A lot of it comes down to shipping. Manufacturing stuff can be a bit of a pain, but I've tried to have a lot of it more be done in house, which gives me more control of that. But yeah, shipping, a lot of items get lost or they just
00:12:24
Speaker
take a lot of time to be shipped. USPS definitely has its own issues, especially more recently. I wish it was easy as you ship a package and it arrives, but some of them get lost, some of them never even come. The thing is that I'm responsible as the business owner for the package to get there, so I sort of take that loss. That's a bit of a pain to work with, but it's all part of it.
00:12:51
Speaker
It seems like you're working a lot on a lot of different things. How do you approach setting goals? Do you have a specific system that you use? I think it just comes naturally. I'm always on to the next thing. Occasionally, I'll come down and write in my journal, maybe weekly or monthly, to just reset and realign my goals.
00:13:10
Speaker
It's just something like every day I have a goal, something to do, something to work on. I try to break it down, make it easy for myself. But yeah, I think everything around me is a goal, everything, something I'm working at. Yeah, same works for me. So are you working on any new projects? I heard something about a media company in one of your videos. Yeah.
00:13:34
Speaker
So a lot of exciting news about that actually. We're really formalizing the logistics of it. It's been really difficult. We have like 48, 50 people right now working on the project to create different videos. And we sort of figured out, or we haven't sort of, we finally figured out the logistics of it. So we had that rolling and we've started to come out with videos, which is really exciting.
00:13:55
Speaker
Other projects, I mean, I'm trying to film a documentary series next and actually another one in the summer, which is really exciting. I'm trying to work on a new collection. A lot of different fun projects happening right now. Might also start a podcast. I just had a call about that earlier today, which we might host on Clubhouse. So a lot of fun things I'm really excited about. Oh, that's amazing. I'm so excited
Staying Optimistic Amidst Uncertainty
00:14:21
Speaker
to see it when it comes out.
00:14:24
Speaker
Last question. All three of us are going to college. We're all on like the brink of adulthood and there is like a lot of uncertainty surrounding this time. How do you feel at this stage in your life and how can we all stay optimistic?
00:14:40
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, a lot of uncertainty for sure with college and just my future and everything. But to be honest, I'm just trying to focus on what I can do today and how that will set me up for the future. I'm really excited for college and all the opportunities. Might even take a gap year. So I honestly don't know what my future holds, but I'm just trying to take it day by day as best as I can. And then we'll see. I'm optimistic.
00:15:08
Speaker
I mean, for me, it's like not an option. Like, you know, there's so many incredible things in life. And it's obviously not easy for the average person. I think I've trained myself to become optimistic over time. And I think the best advice I can give is, or I think the reason why I became more of an optimist in the beginning is because I did small things to step outside of my comfort zone. And I was pleasantly surprised by just people being innately nice and
00:15:36
Speaker
I think the more you push yourself out there, the more we'll be surprised. And I think that inherently makes you optimistic because you realize like, Oh, it actually wasn't so bad. Um, so I think just putting yourself out there, try new things and you'll be surprised. And then you'll start being optimistic. That is all for today's episode. As always, we will get all of Max's social media handles in the description below. Yeah. Thank you so much for having me.
00:16:03
Speaker
If you liked this episode, stay tuned for our next one with YouTube Artist Gox. Thank you so much for your support and keep changing the world!
00:16:15
Speaker
We hope you guys enjoyed our conversation. We had such a great time. Make sure you leave us a review. You can also follow us on Instagram at changemaker.c to keep up with all of our new content. We also have a Facebook page called changemakersc, but you'll need to look down because I honestly don't even know how Facebook works.