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Professional Oversharing
(Or: How I Not-So-Gracefully Collected Seven Careers)
People ask me what I do all the time. I never know how to answer.
The short version is Creative Director. The longer version depends on how much time you have and whether Puerto Rico or bourbon is involved. More on that later.
Over the years I've been called a Brand Strategist, Designer, Photographer, Musician, Recording Engineer, Creative Operations guy, Consultant, Business Owner, Web Designer, Writer, and occasionally, "Hey...can you come fix this thing?"
All technically accurate. None particularly useful.
So instead of trying to pigeonhole what I do into a LinkedIn-ready title, it's probably easier to explain how I got here.
Chapter I
Builder Mentality
Toilet Paper Rolls, Comic Books & Building Worlds
I grew up in Pell City, Alabama, where there wasn't a whole lot to do except make your own entertainment.
Fortunately, that turned out to be my favorite thing anyway.
As a wee lad I drew constantly. Fred Flintstone was my gateway drug before I graduated to superheroes. By fifth grade I'd already won a couple of drawing contests hidden in the backs of comic books and accidentally started my first business selling superhero sketches to classmates.
Ten cents for a headshot. Twenty-five cents if you wanted a cape.
Even then, custom work cost extra.
Then Star Wars happened.
I was seven. Completely obsessed. Unfortunately, my parents couldn't exactly finance a Rebel fleet, so I built one myself out of paper towel rolls, toilet paper tubes, cardboard, tape and whatever else happened to be lying around. I didn't know it then, but that became the recurring theme of my entire life.
If I couldn't find what I wanted...
I'd build it.
Chapter II
Pursuit Of Creativity
The Rockstar Plan (Which Was Clearly Foolproof)
Music became the next obsession.
My mom unknowingly started the whole thing when she gave me my first KISS album, 'Love Gun', at eight years old. My discovery of Prince in the early '80s inspired me to pick up a guitar at age 13. By fifteen, I had my first band, which wasn't exactly a common activity in rural Alabama during the mid-'80s.
After high school, I enrolled at Jacksonville State as a Music major with a Psychology minor. Apparently, my long-term career strategy was to write deeply philosophical songs about being unemployed.
That lasted about a year when I realized I didn't want to study creativity, I wanted to chase it.
So I packed everything I owned into a car, moved to Atlanta, attended the Atlanta Institute of Music, graduated Salutatorian, and spent the next several years trying to become a rock star with all the confidence in the world and absolutely no backup plan.
There were regional tours, original bands, albums, EPs, and a handful of record deals that came painfully close before disappearing into the music industry's black hole of "almost."
Do I ever wonder what would've happened if one of those deals landed?
Sure.
Then again, I'd probably be terrible at Photoshop today.
Chapter III
Music, Tech, Design & Learning
Something Funny Happened On The Way To A Music Career...Adobe
The music business led me into recording studios. Recording studios led me into engineering. Engineering led me to an old Macintosh running MIDI software. That ugly little computer quietly changed the direction of my life.
When the studio eventually folded, I quickly landed a "Computer Services" gig at Kinko's.
(Bills to pay and whatnot.)
Most people remember Kinko's because they printed term papers and band flyers at two in the morning. I remember it because I was introduced to the CorelDRAW Graphics Suite and Quark; this led me to Adobe products. First came Photoshop, then PageMaker, then Illustrator.
Well...Hell. That escalated quickly.
Armed with just enough knowledge to "fake it", I immediately started freelancing anything Kinko's couldn't offer: logos, magazine layouts, print ads, marketing pieces, etc. I discovered something that still defines how I work today. I just enjoy pushing my limits.
If a project required photography, I learned photography.
If it required video, I learned video.
Editing as well? Absolutely.
Packaging? Sure.
Websites? Why not?
Business strategy and development? Turns out that became pretty interesting too.
I've never been all that interested in flaunting or protecting a job title.
I've always been more interested in expanding the toolbox.
Chapter IV
Advertising, Ops & Strategic Thinking
How Some Stupid Billboards Taught Me About Me
Through being a go-to man for a client I met at Kinko's, I was eventually asked to join their outdoor advertising company as Art Director, "officially", designing hundreds of OOH ads (both print and digital) across the Southeast and Puerto Rico.
Unofficially, I also became the network administrator, production manager, client liaison, operations guy, computer nerd, print expert, technical support department, and the poor bastard everybody called when something stopped working.
Honestly, I loved every minute of it.
That's where I realized something that shaped the rest of my career:
Most businesses don't actually have creative problems. They have clarity problems.
The logo isn't broken. The thinking behind it usually is.
And I am apparently pretty good at learning and/or reshaping processes within a business.
That realization eventually became the foundation for everything I built afterward.
Chapter V
Pi2PRO, Inc.
Going From Pimp To Prostitute
The recession hit. The agency downsized.
Like a lot of people, I suddenly found myself wondering what came next.
During my last few weeks in the office, I was trying to come up with a name for my new freelance business. I wanted something clever. Something techy. Maybe even a subtle Star Wars reference...like a droid name. Suddenly, one completely different thought popped into my head: "I'm going from pimp to prostitute."
Pi2PRO was born.
Not exactly the inspirational founder story they teach at business school, I imagine, but at least it's honest.
My mission was simple. Help small and medium-sized businesses look like the companies they wanted to become.
Not by pretending.
By building brands that actually deserved to be taken seriously.
Chapter VI
Kana Extracts
Ahh Puerto Rico: Some Lessons Cost More Than College
Through a vendor I met during the agency years, I was presented with an opportunity to partner and help start a medical cannabis brand in Puerto Rico. That "leap into the abyss" became KANA Extracts and was probably the biggest creative challenge of my career...up to that point.
The cannabis industry was full of loud graphics, neon colors, and branding that felt like it had been designed exclusively for people whose decision-making skills were temporarily impaired. Imagine that.
I went the opposite direction. I wanted KANA to become the Apple® of medical cannabis.
Clean. Modern. Elegant.
The packaging I borrowed more from high-end cosmetics than dispensaries because I wanted adults to feel proud leaving it on the counter instead of hiding it in a drawer.
KANA became one of the most recognized and awarded extraction companies in Puerto Rico.
The brand worked. The business was growing. And somewhere along the way I learned an important distinction:
Building a successful brand and building a successful partnership, however, turned out to be two very different skills.
I was getting very good at the first one.
I was still learning the second.
Chapter VII
Legends Distillery
The Bourbon Biz & Fine Art of Redefining A Brand
After KANA, Legends Distillery gave me another chance to build...or at least I thought it would.
I was brought in to develop the brand and story: redesign the packaging, rebuild the website, improve the tasting room, create campaigns, and generally point the ship in the same direction. My long-term brand strategy was built around three simple ideas: Trust. Taste. Education.
The website became my favorite part.
I didn't want another bourbon website. I wanted a bourbon library; A place where someone could learn everything about bourbon, whether they bought our bottle or not.
Trust first. Sales later. I still think that's how great brands are built.
The work was going well. The brand was growing. And I was getting deeper into the business side than I'd ever expected.
Then I learned another useful lesson: a great idea can survive a lot of things. A business can't.
I was getting better at building the thing. I was still learning how carefully to evaluate the people, assumptions, and circumstances surrounding it.
Chapter VIII
So, What Exactly Do I Do?
In a nutshell? I creatively build things.
Sometimes they're brands. Sometimes they're businesses. Sometimes they're ideas that only existed in somebody else's head an hour earlier.
The biggest compliment I've ever received wasn't about design. It was hearing someone say, "That's exactly what I was trying to say...I just couldn't see it."
That's my job.
Everything else is just software...and now AI has made it to my chopping block.
Oh boy.
Epilogue
Still Building Spaceships
My dad sold cars. My mom sold clothes...then eventually, Elvis (long story).
Both of them taught me that people buy people long before they buy products.
Life taught me something else: nobody is really driving the boat, so take the helm.
The older I get, the more convinced I am that most of us are just figuring it out one decision at a time.
Some people are simply better at hiding it.
I've built brands, launched products, toured with bands, engineered records, lost money, made money, taken a few spectacular wrong turns, and reinvented myself more times than I can count.
Would I do a few things differently? Absolutely.
Would I trade the journey? Not a chance.
Because if you strip away the guitars, cameras, bourbon, software, AI, packaging, websites, and time spent in a US territory...
I'm still that seven-year-old kid sitting on the bedroom floor, surrounded by cardboard and toilet paper rolls, trying to build a spaceship out of whatever happens to be within reach.
The materials have changed. The mission hasn't:
Build something worth remembering.
Leave everything better than you found it.
Try not to step on too many landmines along the way. And if I do...
Well, at least it'll add to an interesting story.
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