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A Case-Study in Proactive Sales with Aaron Straight
156 Plays6 months ago
Dive into the innovative—and risky—world of proactive sales with Aaron Straight, Founder of the film studio Soulcraft Allstars. Moving beyond traditional sales methods that rely on clients voicing their needs first, Aaron has built a remarkable track record by uncovering untapped opportunities before they are even visible to the client. Using the recent success of his "Western Flyer" project (narrated by Nick Offerman) as a case study, Aaron shares how he anticipates hidden needs, crafts visionary pitches, and manages the inherent risks of misinterpretation. This episode offers a deep dive into transcending conventional sales models, mastering the art of opportunity, and the invaluable lessons learned from both triumphs and setbacks.
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Crossing the Axis' and Proactive Sales
00:00:05
Speaker
You're listening to Crossing the Axis, the podcast that explores the commercial side of film production with your host, James Kebles.
00:00:24
Speaker
Welcome listeners and thank you for tuning in to the show. Today, we're peeling back the curtain on a topic that's as innovative as it is risky, proactive sales. Or said a little more simply, what happens when the idea for a project doesn't start with a client reaching out, but rather with you reaching forward. In the conventional workflow, a project kicks off when a client presents a
Proactive vs Conventional Sales
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need.
00:00:46
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We ensure a fit by assessing their ambitions, our capabilities to meet their goals, and budget alignment. If everything checks out, we move forward together. But sometimes the spark of an idea comes from us. We spot an opportunity or a need that a potential client hasn't even recognized yet.
00:01:04
Speaker
Proposing an idea to a potential client about their product is very dangerous, however. That's because it's likely you don't have enough information to be able to prescribe anything, and offering advice without having all the necessary information is akin to malpractice. But when your understanding of the market and your gut is telling you there is an opportunity to be seized, there can be justification in proceeding.
00:01:24
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The challenge lies in approaching potential clients without being presumptuous. Success requires a rare blend of a deep market point of view combined with humility, curiosity, and strategic thinking.
Aaron Straight's Unique Approach to Sales
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Speaker
My guest today, Aaron Straight, embodies all these qualities. Aaron is the founder of Soulcraft All-Stars.
00:01:41
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a purpose-driven film studio that's been a leader in the corporate social responsibility space since 2014. A prime example of their proactive sales work is a recent short film campaign they made for the Western Flyer Foundation out of California. They proposed to spark curiosity in marine research through a unique blend of historical narrative, an old sardine boat, and celebrity influence, landing the much-loved actor Nick Offerman as the film's narrator in the process.
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Speaker
This campaign has not only been a triumphant call to action for the client, but now serves as an anthem for the organization and marine science. Today, Aaron is here to talk about the origins of that campaign and how he approaches proactive sales in general. Aaron, welcome to the show. Hey, thanks, James. This is awesome. Good to see you, brother. Good to see you too, man. I'm so excited to talk about this. I have to say, I just want to talk about Nick Offerman the whole time. That's really what I want to do. I know. I know.
00:02:35
Speaker
what a guy. And it was super fun how we connected with him and then his involvement, his generosity. And as you know, people are always like, is he as cool as he seems? And you're like, yeah, and then some he's a cool cool cat for sure. Yeah, him and his wife, Megan Mudlali, their relationship have set so many standards for many of us, including me and my wife. Oh, man. Yeah, seriously. And like their chemistry together and
00:03:00
Speaker
You know, he really said even in like private conversation, just how much she taught him about comedy. It's just fun to see two people having so much fun together. I guess we probably should talk about you too. We don't have to. We definitely don't have to. We can talk about Nick all day. That's fine with me.
00:03:18
Speaker
I want to get into the story of The Western Flyer. It's fascinating how you brought the job together and your approach in a lot of ways. But before we do that, I think it's important to describe your journey into film production and what made you focus on purpose-driven commercial work. How'd you get here? Oh, man. I mean, what a winding road.
Transformative Power of Storytelling
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My poor parents had to endure my convoluted journey to finding my
00:03:40
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my calling in life i should say you know and i think the short version of it is that i was from from a very early childhood and kind of growing up in rural virginia pre-internet my access to the universe was through books and music and it was those stories that brought the world to life for me
00:03:58
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and showed me what was possible. And I was always drawn to the exotic, the magical, the parts of human life that are mystical, where truly amazing things happen and transformation happens. And so that created an idealistic kid who is going out into the world and trying to make sense of it all. And music was a huge part of that. And so I got involved early on in
00:04:21
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producing wild multimedia events and creating wild festivals and nightclub events, but ultimately it was the depth of great music that really moved me in these live performances. So I started working with African musicians because I had kind of followed jazz and electronic music to some of its origins that were
00:04:40
Speaker
in african music that were just blowing me away and i got this wonderful opportunity to start tour managing groups from nigeria and send a gallon and other places and you don't need me in twenty five nigerians traveling around north america together and as you can imagine that was a chaos behind the scenes and once i hit the stage everything was beautiful those are the best forty five minutes two hours of my life the rest of the time was
00:05:07
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Chaos and just in such a lovely way but in one of those tours was working with the great musician use in a door from Senegal and and we had done Carnegie Hall for residency and then
00:05:20
Speaker
toured all around North America and he was a goodwill ambassador to the UN and he was doing, had all these groups working with him. And I was very environmentally minded, social justice minded, you know, humanitarian interests. And he was incorporating that like real efforts in his music and surrounding his music. So I met some folks who were working on this new, this new project called Fair Trade. And they said to me, Hey, look, we're trying to, uh,
00:05:46
Speaker
raise awareness around, hey, if people pay a little bit more, that money can go directly to the living wage of farmers around the world. And it can really improve people's quality of life. And I just said, hey, it sounds like you need to tell this story to people. And they said, could you help us with that? And I was like, well, I don't know, I'm sure they could find the music for you. And I could probably write the script and I could find a camera operator and I could maybe help put it together and
00:06:10
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By the end i was like i made a movie and i didn't know my job was like google my job title and it was like you were director producer made this movie fair trade and it was really a powerful experience of like all the things that i love together in one effort it was that collaborating with other great artists
00:06:30
Speaker
it was doing it for a purpose that we felt like was bigger than us and that could move the needle towards something that was benefiting real human beings and it was using all of these different skills that i wanted to try to pull together so that was the beginning and that was in two thousand five and use the very first films i ever made was about fair trade.
00:06:50
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And from there i was hooked i just wanted to use the power of storytelling to do things that i felt like were meaningful for people on the planet there's easier ways to make a living but it's been a wonderful journey and so that's really like where it started and that was my transition and that was my transition out of full time music world into being a filmmaker.
Keys to Effective Proactive Sales
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The reason I think that story is important for this conversation is because one of my points of view on proactive sales, if you're going to try that move is you better really know your market. You better know the market for which something is being proposed better than the person who's working at them, you know, that you're talking to the potential client. And I think that's why it's worked for you so well that you've been so them. It's almost a lifetime's worth of work in this space. And so your understanding of the market is,
00:07:39
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deep. So you can propose ideas and see things, your market understanding of it is so superior to that who might even be selling products or services or anything else in it. So it gives you some credibility and authority to be able to actually approach a client with an opportunity that they don't even know exist, which is, you know, like I said in the beginning, it's kind of risky. But it all goes back down to that kind of niche and market and understanding where are you specifically and expertise? Did you agree with that?
00:08:07
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I do. And I also think that James, as you well know, it's just like interesting combination between, you know, an important level of humility and the ability to listen and learn and know that you can be wrong and that you're also really invested authentically in the success of whatever field you're investing in. Those are these key elements that like along the way, I've really had to
00:08:31
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grow up and learn and listen and check my ego as much as possible to recognize what is our goal here collectively what are we trying to do we trying to change the way capitalism works so we move it towards something that's so much more healthy for people on the planet are we trying to leverage this tool.
00:08:48
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towards something better and if that's the case then you're putting aside sometimes your personal goals and expectations to fit that and thinking about how you can work together with groups to do those things you know i always think when you have these greater. These things that you can collectively agree were working towards that's when really that's when magic happens and that's when i think we see different organizations work together in a mutually beneficial ways.
00:09:14
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And I think ultimately what we're talking about, sales for me is like an ex hippie. It's such a five-letter word.
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And it's been such a journey for me to be like, how do you operate in a creative field where you have to sell in order to survive? But how do you do that in a way that matches your values? And so learning that this is, when done right in the world that I believe in, we are mutually beneficial. That's what's going on. We're identifying people that we have a mutually beneficial relationship.
00:09:45
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because we're after the same things. And what I offer is just a different part of that process to get to where you want to go. And that, in turn, helps my business go where it needs to go. And that's where the magic happens, in my opinion, is that intersection of my skills and your dreams, my dreams and your skills when those things come together.
The Western Flyer Campaign
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Speaker
And so you must be using those skills when you are somewhere talking to someone about this old sardine boat or something like that. And then what's what's the origin story of the western flyer? I want to take what you just said and apply it to this incredible campaign film that you've made. It's beautiful. It's powerful. It hits all of the marks for what a it was. It's perfect. It captivated me and I just want how did
00:10:34
Speaker
Where did that idea start? Well, it's so interesting to me like these journeys that happen in life, right? You can have all these concerns and fears, especially as a creative, I think, that there's no pathway that's laid out for you that's really straightforward. And you have to follow a lot of intuition and follow your own dreams and your own curiosity.
00:10:58
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And sometimes i can seem like a waste of time and then other times you realize no that's actually where the best parts are you know and so for me. This project was a culmination of all these things that i've that i've fallen in love with over the years which is a great deep respect for the ocean and a passion for its continued health.
00:11:19
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a great love of John Steinbeck, a great love of Joseph Campbell, a great love of adventure and storytelling and the connection between art and science that I've really inadvertently found myself involved in for 20 years is being able to add storytelling components to a scientific community. And so
00:11:42
Speaker
The Western Flyer, in short, was John Steinbeck's boat that he commissioned with Ed Ricketts right after he'd written Grapes of Wrath and the whole country was freaking out and burning his book. And he said, I'm not writing anymore. I'm going to go do on this science mission.
00:11:59
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with this motley crew of people right before world war two is gonna break out and we're going to the sea of cortez to do something people haven't done before and it's an extraordinary mission in its own right but they chartered this 75 foot tuna boat that was made in washington state and and they had this adventure and steinbeck in his classic way he wrote about it with the
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depth of an incredible philosopher, he brought the art and the science together in this way that that Ed Ricketts has become kind of like this unofficial father of modern oceanography and their relationship has long been kind of documented as this wonderful bromance of art and science. But the boat was lost and it was sunk and for 75 years it was gone and people were trying to find it and figure it out and it was found
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and pulled from the bottom of the ocean and this guy spent $6 million renovating it to return it to its original state. Now, why would someone do that? And it's because these things represent these extraordinary moments in history when two people took a risk, major risk, and they brought together two worlds
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to create this alchemy that wouldn't happen otherwise. It's that same thing that happens like at the shore break where that's where most of the life from the sea exists is where the ocean and the shore meet. It's the same thing where art and science crossover is the most
00:13:27
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wealthy and light and full of life kind of overlap so anyway this guy he does this project his name is john greg he's a marine geologist and explorer an ocean guy an inventor he's a unique character i just so happen that i was filming ocean health project in hanes alaska.
00:13:44
Speaker
And we were filming with this young woman from the Haida tribe who is returning to tell the story of her father's subsistence fishing and how it's affected by climate change. A little piece called Alaska that we made that just recently won the Anthem Award. Congratulations.
00:13:59
Speaker
Thank you. Yeah, that was really sweet. And it was such a wonderful experience, full of its own challenges. And filming in Haynes is an extraordinary honor, just a beautiful place and so challenging. You're just surrounded by grizzly bears and lots of things that can kill you.
00:14:18
Speaker
And it's my favorite kind of filming is to go someplace unique and work with local people and tell a story that matters. And so in this process, we're on the ferry up to Haynes through the strait and we meet this guy, John Gregg, and we're going to be working with him for a couple of days.
00:14:34
Speaker
on this project and he is just the sweetest guy so humble for all the things that he's done in his life and i was just learning so much from him as he's you know as we're going through the inside passage and he's being he's like imagine what this looked like without water let's let's take ourselves back millions of years and understand what this geography this geology is about and it just
00:14:58
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I'm not a scientist and for him to paint it in those pictures was just so wonderful and I learned a ton from him and we had a wonderful time being together and he was so patient and fearless as we're filming with grizzly bears and running up and down the river and doing all these things. But as we're in this environment, he starts to tell me this story about the western flyer.
00:15:20
Speaker
And I was in love with John Steinbeck, but I knew nothing about this mission. And as he started to tell me this story, my storytelling brain is just lighting up. I can barely contain myself. It's just unbelievable. And he's talking about why this was so important. And you can hear in him this thing that we all have. We want to return to this wild sense of curiosity. That's what sparked so many of us
00:15:49
Speaker
to keep going is like even when we see there's so much destruction in the world around us and so much environmental destruction, our curiosity, our ability to see how people connect in unique ways, it gives us hope. And this boat really gives him hope for the future as the ocean has been his livelihood and he wants to see it healthy for his children and his grandchildren. He's telling me more about this, I'm just thinking.
00:16:14
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my God, we have to tell this story to increase the amount of people who know about it, to build a community around it, and to inspire so many people who think that the ocean is not accessible to them. People who didn't grow up on the water, people who don't have boats, people who don't have that kind of life. There's so many people like that who can contribute to the ocean's health and be inspired by her if they're given the right kind of access. And I think the arts give people another way in.
00:16:43
Speaker
So he's he and I are just having this wonderful time together and I'm having to kind of hold myself back. Just like, Oh my god, let's do this, you know, a number one in practice. Hold back, hold back. And that's hard for me. I really it's really hard for me. So it was just lovely. And I just I was learning so much just from the way he carried himself. As I'm as I'm there with him, I was just realizing
00:17:09
Speaker
He and I represented in a way, I'm not Steinbeck, but he and I represented in a way the same partnership that he was science and I was art. And I'll never compare myself to Steinbeck. But in this role play, if someone had to be Steinbeck, it might be me.
00:17:28
Speaker
So it was just a moment where I realized we need each other, at least for this project, at least for this moment. And so as John and I got to know each other better and we spent time together, I just tried to more or less let him see that that's the
Collaborations and Shared Values
00:17:45
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case. See me at work, see what my passions were, see my commitment, and understand my history and how it links to this and how
00:17:55
Speaker
Yeah. And that there was some magic involved in this, that that's part of great things happening is great relationships have, they have to have a little bit of magic. And I believe in that. And so this, we had this kind of magical time together and really, I think deeply connected in some ways on the nonverbal level.
00:18:15
Speaker
And that was really interesting to get to spend time and space together in that way. But I resisted the temptation to be direct and just really realized how much this would move things in the direction that both he and I believed in, in terms of bringing people together, using this powerful connection between art and science and storytelling to grow his community and to reach the goals that he wanted to reach.
00:18:42
Speaker
So that kind of cultivates over this time period. I really had to let go of it. We finished the trip, I went back, we were working on some other things, and I was waiting for him to just to reach out.
00:18:58
Speaker
I remember I was in the middle of cooking something in the middle of the day. My office is five steps to the back of my kitchen. I don't normally pick up the phone when I'm cooking. I looked down and I see that it's John Gregg. I was like, yes, this is it. I picked up the phone and he's like, Aaron, let's do this thing. Let's tell the story. It was really sweet because at that point, he didn't need some elaborate proposal.
00:19:25
Speaker
What he knew about me was he knew that this was going to be my heart and soul for the time it took to get it done. I wanted it to be as great as he did. And that's what the partnership that we had come to was that as I got excited and started working with his team, I just had to spend a bunch of time listening and learning about the Western Flyer Foundation and what they wanted their goals and what they wanted to achieve and who their allies were.
00:19:52
Speaker
the language that they spoke and all the things that you need to learn in order to be a good storyteller on behalf of someone. In that process, though, it was so exciting to think about who could voice this that would bring it to life, who could embody these wonderful parts of these two incredible human beings that came together. We made a short list
00:20:17
Speaker
it was all pie in the sky i was all like do you have a relationship with clint eastwood no i do not but he's on the list you know like and and it was so it was just around voice in other words that then but it became clear like we have to line somebody else shared values in this they have to care.
00:20:33
Speaker
about this subject matter. And that's a really unique person. And as we started thinking more and more about it, I mean, there was only one person that we could think of at that point. And it was Nick Offerman. And his passion for the arts, his passion for really the US in this very unique way, his passion for woodworking, his passion for the ocean, his passion for conservation. He's a true Renaissance man. And also, there's this whole other component that I had hinted at earlier that came out of this is that
00:21:02
Speaker
One of my greatest inspirations and thought leaders is Joseph Campbell, someone that I look up to greatly and read a lot about and really appreciate his influence and his study of myth and storytelling. As it turns out, Steinbeck and Ricketts, they were best buddies with Joseph Campbell. Joseph Campbell was Ed Ricketts' lab assistant at one point. And it's just like, I didn't even know that.
00:21:28
Speaker
And then here is this part of the story that takes it even deeper into the things that I care about. And it's a big reason why John really cares about this story and is an interesting connection for for Nick and just, you know, Nick's background in terms of trying to understand the power of storytelling hit, you know, a lot of his personal work, which I won't speak for him. So there's all these interesting connections. And so at that point, myself and the executive director of the foundation said, let's go, let's let's figure this out.
00:21:56
Speaker
We found an e-mail address. We wrote an e-mail to his agent's agent. We had a message back in five minutes. It was like, Nick's too busy. Then 10 minutes later, we got another message that said, he might be interested. They ran it by him. They'd said no, and then like, I got this crazy request about this boat from Steinbeck and Ricketts. I don't even know who these people are.
00:22:25
Speaker
And then he was like, what? Did you say Steinbeck? Ricketts? Boat? And they said, is there a script? And I was like, there will be. When do you need it? So I basically had seven days to write a script. And then it was that position that was like, holy moly. So now we've gotten through. And their whole decision of whether or not to participate is based on the quality of this script. So I got to write my ass off.
00:22:54
Speaker
If this fails now, it's your fault. It's 100% my fault. 100% my fault. No pressure. I was channeling my inner Steinbeck and fortunately I sent the script and he was into it and wrote it in his voice and tried to make it playful and fun and still also cover the main points of the foundation and ultimately their goals and something we could accomplish within the budget.
00:23:20
Speaker
these are all the things you have to write a script you can't actually execute so we did that and he was wonderful and saying that you would do it we ended up recording with him and he was so generous with this time and did an amazing job and then we shot all this wonderful footage of the triumphant return.
00:23:38
Speaker
of the western flyer after 75 years to Monterey and we were blessed with a bluebird day and we had whales all around us and we got permits from NOAA to fly drones through their conservation zones and I had an observer with us to make sure we didn't fly too close to any sort of sea life and we had to jump through all these hoops to make this thing happen and everything worked and
00:24:04
Speaker
everybody was happy to be a part of it because it was something that really mattered it meant something to so many different people people who are invested in literature people are invested in ocean health people are invested in the arts and the party on the other side of that was incredible group of like the
00:24:19
Speaker
people from the Smithsonian to Ray Troll, wonderful artists and different people who have been influenced by Steinbeck, Ricketts and influenced by Nick. We made the piece and Nick loved it and Nick's been sharing it with people. The first release went out with great success and
00:24:40
Speaker
had about 20,000 people engaged immediately and who are now working to support the program. And John sent me one of the most beautiful messages ever just around that this whole thing exceeded his expectations. And I know for him and I,
00:24:56
Speaker
We can look back on this experience and be like, what started on a ferry to Alaska resulted in something really special and something that benefited both of us extraordinarily. And we both got to do what we love to do. So in that way, it doesn't feel like sales.
00:25:17
Speaker
It feels like building relationships towards common goals. And that's the best possible situation. And it's taken a long time to learn how the patients
00:25:29
Speaker
and the skills and the experience to be able to get to that place to do that. But I'm so thankful, because those are the moments, that's the magical life. That's where you feel like you're really solving problems to help people using the power of storytelling, using whatever skill you have, and that both of us are thrilled at the outcome.
00:25:48
Speaker
There are so many things in that story that I could talk about in terms of like, okay, here's your list of things to do. But in reality, you just, you just embodied them just now with all of the pieces. I mean, from developing the relationship with the other person instead of pitching an idea.
00:26:07
Speaker
First, you know, like the way you told that story and the way you let that unfold itself, I think is the takeaway, right? Like you don't go in, you know, you should do you kind of you go in and you really understand each other and you really build that trust and find the common language which to approach something and plant seeds and let's see if it grows or not. I think
00:26:26
Speaker
That's kind of it right there. My question to you is how do you get into the conversations of money when you so you have this, you know, the spiritual relationship that that's going, which can be killed by conversations of money if you're not careful with that. So how do you approach that?
00:26:42
Speaker
Yeah, that's a good question, James. I mean, you know, I think that was harder for me when I was younger. It's become a little bit easier now, because I think that I have a better sense of, hey, this is what it takes to do good work. And so I can be able to present to someone, hey, this is this is what it costs to do a great job. The thing that we're both dreaming of, this is the number, or these are the numbers that that do that. And there's lots of different ways to do things. And I love
00:27:08
Speaker
now being able to pivot to say, oh, okay, your budget is half a million dollars. Okay. Uh, this is what we could do for that. Or wow. You know, our, your budget is half that or your budget is whatever. And we figured out how to way to match the budget to the creative. You know, I always say you can, you can always do something with something and you can't do anything with nothing.
00:27:32
Speaker
That's like the starting point. But I think the conversation around money, what I found is like the more direct I can be and the more upfront I can be and the more we can just agree that money is energy and time. And so if we can just quantify that and it's not offensive or personal, it's just about
00:27:51
Speaker
what it takes to do a great job and i will always tell you what i need to do a great job because i'm not interested in doing less than the best i can it's not worth it to me anymore i think i would add a third element to what money is in addition to energy and time and that's expertise like that's you know that's this
00:28:09
Speaker
compound expertise that you built up over, you know, decades of doing this work, I think is also really valuable. That's the thing that you might have inspired John, but he can't just go anywhere to find someone to do this. He, you've represented yourself as someone, a rare person who knows how to do this really well. And there's not many of you. So why even look around? I think that's another thing about the value that you're bringing in worth the equation of what something costs.
00:28:35
Speaker
Yeah, I know you're right. I mean, that's true. It's like you have to be able to execute and do it well. And the proof is only in your work. And that's so challenging when you're young and starting out. It's hard to get people to trust you, and it's hard to have enough body of work to show that you can execute things. The difference between amateurs and professionals is really ability to solve complex problems. When it all goes well, it's easy to do most things, but it never all goes well.
00:29:05
Speaker
And so that's where you're really paying for someone that you know that no matter what happens, they're going to get it done. And they're going to execute it in the spirit and towards the audience that we've agreed upon.
Proactive Sales in New Markets
00:29:21
Speaker
And they're going to do it within budget, unless they tell you otherwise. And I think those things are critical. The integrity
00:29:28
Speaker
portion of it is i think what what has kept us in business for a long time is you know that we do we say we're gonna do we do it our absolute best so i think that comes through and it'll always be challenging to figure out how you talk about money but i think that when we can talk about it openly in the context of these things that were talking about then it's easier
00:29:51
Speaker
You have i know there's a quite a few examples that you have of clients that you've built in this kind of a way where you've approached them or presented them with things that they didn't even think they needed yet and it's all most of it is in the world that you're an expert in right this very familiar world of csr and could you apply that in a world you don't know like if you had to sell a candy bar do you think that it works the same way.
00:30:15
Speaker
Would there be different rules? How would you approach someone that isn't working in a space that isn't their expertise? Or maybe that's one of the takeaways is don't try this unless you are an expert and know the market well. Well, I think it's really important to know markets. But I think ultimately markets are really people. It's human beings. And so I think the more you're a student of human beings and how people work and how people learn and how people are moved,
00:30:44
Speaker
then I think you're more capable of reaching people in almost any market. And as time's gone on, James, I really have spent a lot more time trying to understand how people work and what moves us, what moves me. It's that inward journey. And this is why I'm a Joseph Campbell student. This is why one of my favorite books is Sapiens. This is why I try to put myself in other people's shoes
00:31:14
Speaker
and learn as much as i can because i think that it's amazing to think about the power of storytelling and how it is shaped us as a species like one of the major things that. Differentiates us from other animals is our ability to work together.
00:31:30
Speaker
And that ability comes from our willingness to believe in stories. And so I just think that's amazing. That's what excites me so much. And when that's used for good, it is a wonderful tool and it's a powerful way to really transform the way we work together.
Storytelling as a Problem-Solving Tool
00:31:51
Speaker
And that's exciting to me. And that's why I work in the world of
00:31:56
Speaker
conservation and humanitarian work and social enterprise and because i do believe that this is how we can we can change the world we live in and i'm not a scientist and i'm not an inventor and i'm not an engineer this is what i can contribute and so i try to be a student of how we learn and react you know just recently i just like i just a couple days ago return from peru rose filming a brand
00:32:21
Speaker
a brand anthem story that I wrote around a brand of Pisco, which is an ancient liquor that's made in Peru. It's not a straight corporate social responsibility story. This is the birth story of a beautiful beverage made in this wonderful country.
00:32:41
Speaker
And so I got to use my writing skills to write this beautiful poem and film this mythical story as the water falls from the Andes and down to the river valleys to the ocean and capture that in this way that is going to inspire people to want to experience this beverage. And to me, that's another side of life is like the living.
00:33:05
Speaker
something steinbeck talks a lot about right it's like the true life is in the living and so those things are connected to me and so i'm applying the same kind of ideas to an industry it's a little bit on the fringe of what i of the center of what i do but it's something i love doing springing people together and offering them a glimpse of a different magical experience
00:33:26
Speaker
Yeah, it's great. You have this great love of you have this vision. You have this curious mind and kind of combined with your love of people. It comes together in a great way. I'd love to see it. Well, I think it's that and I think that it's also a certain amount of looking around and seeing
00:33:45
Speaker
What is it that your skill offers? And I spent some time really thinking about this stuff. At one point, I think I told you I took a tent and a notebook to Kauai and just hiked and wrote and just trying to get back to what is the essence of what I do and why do I do it? How do I find the energy for the next decade?
00:34:07
Speaker
of work that I'm going to do and really understanding that what I love most about it was solving problems. And I think that there's an incredible opportunity for storytelling to solve problems and also to bring people together. So when I started looking at it through that lens, there was all these new ways that I could be helpful.
00:34:25
Speaker
society and it's not just entertainment i'm not interested in being a content creator like that's not that's never my goal and not what i'm gonna be a part of but it's it is actually offering a service to people who have some challenge that they're facing cuz you know as one of my directors of photography you know wrong they always says you know problems or opportunities and that's how we look at everything in the field and that's how i look at everything that people are facing at their businesses are there no profits of the foundations,
00:34:52
Speaker
tell me your problem and i'll show you an opportunity to do something interesting and move people towards the solution that you want to achieve so that's put it through a new filter for me and that's really what like sparks me to get out of bed every morning and just love doing this even with the hard long days and that's led me to these points where i'm like actually taking these next level risks
00:35:17
Speaker
where like right now, James, we're looking at this like a water war, and we're looking at people who are in conflict, indigenous communities and farmers and developers, and we're seeing, wow, there's a real opportunity to use the power of storytelling to at least have people understand each other's perspective and at most be able to see this shared resource is our greatest gift. How do we work together to preserve it and still achieve the things that we want to achieve independently?
00:35:47
Speaker
And we believe, I believe, and the rest of my team here at Soulcraft believe that we can do that with storytelling. We can at least start the conversations. We can at least unite the people who are open-minded. And we'll see how that goes. But that's where our next steps of thinking that way are taking us. Is there any final advice that we haven't covered that you'd want to give to any other production company owners and storytellers out there?
Collaboration Over Competition
00:36:13
Speaker
I would say collaborate instead of thinking of it as competition. There were phases in my career where it starts to feel like there's a scarcity and our industry is changing dramatically and AI is taking over chunks of things and there's lots of reasons to get concerned and people are trying to take care of their families. But I would say in the face of all that, the best thing we can all do is work together and reach out to each other and figure out
00:36:38
Speaker
how we can, as an industry, at least from my perspective, storytelling is one of the oldest professions of all time. And I don't think that these new tools are going to change that entirely. They will change it. But there's always going to be a place for human beings to tell stories to human beings. So I'd love to see all of us just think about how we work together and how we support each other as the world continues to change and not live in fear of change.
00:37:07
Speaker
Maybe that's not direct sales advice but i know that there's a lot of people struggling a lot of people thinking about where these things are going a lot of fear i'm not immune to that at all but i just think if we can work together and think about this together that.
00:37:24
Speaker
we're going to have a lot more fun and I think we'll survive this just as we have all the different evolutions of storytelling tools. I remember when the iPhones in people's pockets and people are like, what are you going to do now that everyone's got a 4K phone in their pocket or 4K camera in their pocket? It's like, well, everybody's had a pen in their pocket for a really long time and there aren't any Steinbeck's and I think it's a message of encouragement. To believe in what you're doing and to continue to
00:37:53
Speaker
be creative and build your skills and so you can really truly offer people a service. And then that becomes a wonderful feeling when you can help people achieve what they're trying to achieve and that helps your business at the same time.
00:38:07
Speaker
Aaron straight. I love your mind. I could talk to you for hours. This is fantastic. You do great work. We're going to wrap it up here. I want to say thank you so much for coming on the show. If people want to check out your work, they can go to your website, soul craft, all stars.com and the Western flyer foundation. I'm assuming that's all in line. You can see all that too. And on their YouTube page, you can see the.
00:38:28
Speaker
The great piece with Nick Offerman and I hope you enjoy that. And James, thank you so much for inviting me on the show. I really enjoy the work that you're doing here and the work that you're doing in the film industry. Thanks for having me. It's a real honor. Thank you very much.
00:38:45
Speaker
Thank you for listening to Crossing the Axis with James Keblis. If you're interested in joining the conversation or have a topic you'd like covered, please drop a note at keblis.com. That's K-E-B-L-A-S dot com.