Brian Podnos & Donna Dotan: Disrupting Real Estate Marketing & Photography!

In this episode, Nikolay and Yuliya (Julia) are joined by Brian Podnos and Donna Dotan, who are the cofounders of DD Reps, an NYC creative agency in the real estate industry with a special focus on photography!

Tune in to hear Brian and Donna share how they've built and grown their business, what sets their product apart in the industry, what they've learned from working together as business partners, as well as the challenges they have overcome along the way!

As a bonus - listen to the end of the episode to learn about a SPECIAL GIVEAWAY OPPORTUNITY exclusively for our listeners!

And as always, DM or email us at info@nyglobalgroup.com if you have a story to share!

To learn more about Brian, Donna & DD Reps:

Webpage:  https://ddreps.com/

Instagram: @dd_reps

To learn more about Nikolay & Yuliya:

Webpage: http://nyglobalgroup.com/

Instagram (Nikolay): @Nikolay.NYC

Instagram (Yuliya): @Julia.Afanasyev

Transcript

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This is Success & Setbacks in NYC podcast with your hosts, Julia and Nikolay, coming to you from New York City with some of the most amazing life stories of how various people turn their challenges around. Tune in to get inspired, learn more or simply enjoy. Hi, everyone join me here on our yet another episode. Thanks for stopping by! Today we have wonderful guests, Brian whom I met two, three months ago - I feel like I've known you for a long time now - you know way too much about me! We have Brian and Donna from DD Reps, a real estate marketing company. Brian and Donna are husband and wife, and they also own a business together. So we are very excited to learn about their journey, where they started, where they were before this business, where they are now and where they're headed. Challenges, we're probably gonna get divorced. So no, you know, it's funny, because give us hope we're married as well. But every single time I say that we're business partners, though, you know, the thing that I get back most is I could never do that with my significant other. Do you guys hear that a lot. There's no middle ground, it's either works extremely well, like it does for us. And I'm assuming it does for you. Or it doesn't work at all. There's no like, well, some days it's good or bad. Absolutely. So you guys started the business after the yoga. You are already? No, no, no, no. We were engaged. And should we should we start with the story of DD Reps and how it started? I guess even before that we like Ray is successful and had another career and started this or were you like, No, I'm trying to find what I'm going to do in this life. We? Well, right. So So I graduated college in 2007. And I didn't really have a direction when I when I graduated. So I moved into New York City. And my father who was a broker of goods, he worked in an office and on the other side of the office was a commercial boutique real estate agency. And my dad's like, just come work there. And we can get lunch together. And we can, you know, you can figure yourself out basically so I got a job. And I was doing commercial work. And I basically had a front row seat for the economic crash of 2008. So when when I first started, you know, I would hear all of these incredible stories where people and in this office, you know, you would basically try to match up the buyer and the seller, and you brokered the deal, right. So a lot of people were cold calling, but it felt like it was really, really lush with opportunity. And so I would hear stories of everyone having so much success and like then how easy of an industry it was. And then I got there and everything just crashed and burned. And, and you know, some of these people were pretty superstitious, and started looking towards me and saying, You're the guy that came in now, but now I know what goes behind the crash. But But I had a front row seat at it. And it you know, it made it very, very difficult. So I spent almost three years there, developing a system that didn't work, you know, cold calling every day, getting my numbers and speaking to people, learning the lingo, learning the language, learning the industry, but I can never quite make the big deal. And it was starting to get very, very difficult. And so I'd say around 2010 2011 I started having that kind of like crisis, that professional crisis of what am I going to do? And you know, maybe I'll let Donna take over from here because that's where Crossroads happened to me. But she was doing some really cool stuff at the time, but she's got her own story. Yeah. So I also grad graduated in 2007. We went to school together. So you guys have women freshman year. I won't get into that story. Yeah. So right out of college, I moved into the city as well. My mom's been a real estate broker for over 30 years. So she convinced me to get into real estate. Was she a real estate broker in Manhattan? Yes, she was well, so I got my license. Does pretty easy back then. I don't know if it still is, but unfortunately, I had my first job at City habitats. And I was basically focusing on rentals just to get started in that industry. I got set up a few times. I was just it was too hard for me just emotionally. I felt like, I didn't want to deal with these people. You know, it was, it was not for me. I always I always knew I'd have my own business and make my own schedule, do my own thing, whatever that meant. But I don't think I have thick enough skin for the real estate industry. Fair enough. It's good to identify that early. Yeah. Yeah. So but your kid to you are the straight out of college. 22? Yes. So eight months later, I got a job at the Carlyle hotel on the upper end. One of our team members know whom I work together with an Hyatt. He used to work at Carlyle before he before he switched to work in real estate. I was there and I think like, Oh, 809, then no. So I was the Operations Assistant there just kind of, you know, running day to day stuff and assisting all sorts of all sorts of people and directors. I was also taking photography classes at the International Center of Photography in Midtown. And my TA in photography school was an architectural photographer. And I was very intrigued by what he was doing and like following his career. And then my mom asked me to shoot some listings for her. And I dabbled in that and had no idea what I was doing. And then I also decided to shoot some rooms at the Carlyle because they have spectacular rooms. They have rooms at 50 grand a night that they do. I mean, the design is just amazing. It doesn't want to be like here in New York, but it is. It was a really special opportunity. They were very open to it or like sure, you know free photography. Why not? That's amazing. The photos were absolutely horrendous. But what it did do was it it made me realize something that I felt like I was born to do, between the real estate photos and the Carlisle photos. Add love to being alone in the room. I loved styling the room for the camera, setting up the shot, fixing the pillows, getting some fresh flowers, and really having all this creative freedom to capture a lifestyle home environment. I also love seeing how people live how people design I love homemaking, I'm anything to do with home I'm sort of obsessed with. So this just clicked for me it just you know, it was just one of those life changing moments where I just feel this is it for me for the rest of my life. I'm going to be shooting homes, interiors, architecture, that's my category. And also as a photographer, I think it's so important to identify your category. You don't want to be one of those photographers that shoots everything weddings, portraits, events, you want the niche, you need a niche, and then you can you become a specialist in that niche. So I found an agency called Gotham photo company, they they would send photographers to shoot real estate in New York City, they would I would be shooting rentals or sales or whatever it is. They would send me they hired me first of all, that was as my starting Why did you need a job I left I got laid off from the recession at the time. But you got to leverage the the personal photos. So that was really great. As I was hired by Gotham photo, and I, I was shooting real estate in New York City and I was shooting I would say on average, four or five apartments a day. So sometimes it was good into the seven. But I'm like in and out of the subway with my equipment on my back. What can I can I jump in? Yeah. So I think this was a really, really interesting time as it pertains to real estate marketing, and photography in general, because it was really, really around that time that I think that like DSLR equipment, digital photography was really, really becoming more and more popular commercially. So before, if you remember, like, like 20 years ago, you know, how did real estate get marketed? I mean, newspaper, newspaper, right? And what kind of photos would there be? Would there even be photos circled in the newspaper? So the idea and you know, before if you were going to do film photography, I mean, you would have to spend the entire day, you'd have to spend a ton of money and you'd get four or five shots if you were lucky, because it took forever to set up the angle because you had to set it up to light it right. But to get it in in the moment with digital photography, you know, the idea was you could do a lot more a lot more quickly. And there was all sorts of cool technologies like HDR programs so that you can blend it automatically in post production. So exciting. It was very, there was entire courses and very people, very famous people, you would reckon exposures from the brightest to the darkest. And then the software blended together automatically. And it would look like a painting. Right, you would see the view, but everything was also Ultra saturated. Right? Well, yeah. But compared to like, if you're going to use your phone, which is probably like a flip phone back then Right? I mean, this is magic. This was literal. Photo. Yeah. Right. Right, which was very, like candy at the time. And it was fair. So this, this change that is happening in 2010 11, or this is probably happening closer to around 2005. Change. So and Donna had gotten into the industry a couple of years after that. And you want to continue? Oh, sure. So I wasn't using HDR software, but I was dropping in the view by hand. So I always, you know, I learned the editing techniques that I needed to learn where, you know, you would take a bright exposure and a dark exposure, and you would trace all the windows in the room and drop in the dark exposure. And voila, you can see the view, which is very important to New York City Real Estate. So here I am photographing apartments. Or last five or six or seven days a week you were you were busting your hump. You know, this is my bootcamp my career. It sounds like it was a really good, yeah. But, but because of that Donna needed to develop a better system for herself, right. And she wanted her photos to look more like the things that she admired to you know, which was not real estate photos at the time, trying to recreate photos that I admired the way that other photographers would shoot interiors, for magazines, I always wanted to replicate that. And I could never figure it out. It just took me so long to you know, over time, I was definitely improving. But in the moment, I get better. And I was very self motivated. I was constantly watching YouTube videos buying, you know, any seminar I can get up. And that is really interesting. So because this, this industry is so new, right, and the process digital photography within the real estate community, there was no classes you could take on that it didn't exist, right. And Donna started sourcing classes from very, very, you know, famous portrait and an event photographers and learning their techniques, and then taking the elements of those, those classes and those those techniques that apply to what she wanted to do, and created her own retouching process that could allow her to process digital images much more quickly, and yet come up with an incredibly more efficient and beautiful looking product and what existed with HDR and when other people were doing digital photography at the time. My favorite wedding photographer is Daniel you Sanko he actually photographed our wedding. So he was putting out these tutorials for editing wedding photos. And he had this method of adding contrast that made the subjects come to life and look three dimensional and I thought what if I apply that to my real estate photos? So I did and boom they just looked so much easier the contrast and it just really popped and I absolutely love that so I I wrote out all my retouching steps and I really created a process for how I edited every photo I did that I usually did my editing overnight so from dinnertime until one or two in the morning I would be editing my photos from that day. And you know so real estate industry so you're an agent you want your photos yesterday always a day late Yeah, but you can imagine that what kind of toll that might take on a person that's actually where we kind of crossed paths is because she was going through professional crisis because she was getting burned out and she didn't want to do real estate photography anymore. She wanted to advance her career she wanted to do Interior Design she wanted to do high end work right architectural hospitality because I wanted to shoot for people who really cared about the process not just quantity but quality agents she was sending me to sorry quality not quantity, right? Yeah shooting empty apartments so shooting places disgusting people's beds and fold their underwear on the floor, which is like did I have a long night yesterday looks like bongs you know from the coffee. Oh, she was good. It was a definitely an experience. But I was I was itching to further If interior design and architecture because I wanted, I wanted to work with people who valued the process and would create art with me, you know, and I think we're now approaching 2011. Yeah. aligns with Brian's own personal crisis. Right. We were engaged at this point. Yeah, we were engaged at this point. So we'd been, you know, we were aware of, you know, what the other person was doing. And, and from my part, I mean, I was looking at her, and in my head, I'm like, watching this girl, she's like, revolutionising this, this this product, right. And I was, like, in love with, with the work she was doing. And the fact that she was so popular, she was so busy. And she hated what she was doing. She hated it. Right? And, and I was going through this big, big crisis, where I didn't know what my next steps were. And Donna was came over to me, and I remember, I was just like, like, I guess I'm going to become like, a server or something. I don't know, you know? And she's just like, No, you're gonna, you're going to join forces with me. I don't want to be shooting real estate anymore. You're going to be taking what you have learned with what you've done. And you're going to apply it to me, and you're going to get me bigger business, and we're going to work together. And, and yeah, it's like, you know, it was just this, like, big aha moment. It was this wonderful, wonderful time years ago. Yeah, this is 10 years ago. And, and that's, that's what I did. I basically woke up every morning, I, I got out my spreadsheet. And I just started making my calls and start sort of trying to get her in the door, with architects with interior designers with new development with anyone that could provide bigger business. And nothing happens for I'd say, I'd say like, 10 months, we got like one meeting, it was an that was becoming a grind. And it was becoming a big question mark of if this could actually happen. Though, the way he listed all the places he called, he knew exactly when to follow up, how to follow up. And it was just I was, I would call with different voices put on a moustache and walk in the door, working here five minutes ago. So you got your first meeting? Did anything come out? Well, it was weird, because like, nothing had happened for so long. And then all of a sudden, we got 12 meetings in a month, takes time with the follow up and everything. It just it just a natural progression. Yeah, especially for higher ticket items. Tomorrow, they might be working on a building or project and you know, it's gonna be ready in eight to 12 months, we don't know. And then you have to really catch them at the right time. And we happen to catch people at the right time. And we converted like half of these meetings into clients. And they supported us, right, they helped the create this foundation, that, that, you know, Donna could then continue to get better and slow down and think about a process more and stop doing real estate. Yeah, once I had enough clients, you know, to support us and support us financially, which didn't require much at the time in our early 20s. I was able to leave bath and photo company and really focus on your own business and my own business. Yeah. Right. So it was just the two of you. It was just Yeah, so would that be around 2012 or 2011? Still? I'd say 2012 or so. married in 2012? Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, the theme of our wedding was we're 26 and we're fine. That was literally on our wedding cake. Because we had we were we had nothing, you know, like it was just it was one of these things where we were like constantly reminding ourselves that we would be okay. That it was okay to be where we were in life because you're constantly like thinking these this stuff over. If you're making the right moves, it's right. And then we would have these like a hot things where we would look at each other like, we're fine. And then it became like a slogan. It was literally on our wedding cake. It's funny. No one understood it, but it was for us, which is fun. But look, so we started getting really really busy. And it I'm trying to think of what happened first if you started teaching me the process before we went into compost or after, I believe it was before was it while I was pregnant? When I started teaching, you know, I think it was before. Well, what happened was Dominic started getting really really busy again, and so we were making more money, which was great, but like the quality of life wasn't great. And so I was looking at her and I'm still like really, really impressed and kind of in love with what she is Dun and how she had created this process, and I was watching her and she was retouching until midnight sometimes. And I'm just like, let me help, like, teach me how to do it. So that way you don't have to eat all day. So he's, you know, he wanted to get involved in the creative, and we were getting ready to do business, you know, it was it was fine. It was like we, you know, like, stop working so hard, go out and focus on doing the photography. And I'll handle the retouching if you can teach me the process. And so Donna's like, but can I teach you the process? And I'm like, let's find out really hard for me to like, get this high. I think we all should agree that as a business owner, it is hard to let go sometimes, because you said no one else can do it. But you, which is not true. Yeah. Donna really felt that she really, really cracked the whip. You know, I was even doing my own accounting back then. That's amazing. Looking back at like how we were able to do what we did with as little as we knew. No, absolutely. But if you you have to do everything in some way in yourself to know every aspect of your business before you can give it to someone else to do. Yeah, I'm firm believer of doing it yourself and getting it wrong. Because the faster you get it wrong, the faster you get it right. Exactly, exactly. So from the moment you learn how to help done and edit photos, until you hired your first employee, or, well, well, what happened was, you know, once she started teaching me how to retouch. And then she started teaching me how to do the photography as well, like so and this is all like condensed and like, over the years, we're talking about, you know, where, where we were sharing the the retouching. And then we started going out and actually doing photography projects, to the point where we really like a team, like we really, were going, we were having these big, big projects, we were doing these big productions, and we were coming up with these really cool angles. And it was just, it was a really fun, cool time. Really great when he understood my photography process and could almost replicate it. But then he told me something is almost the key word or still to this day almost is the key question that was born, I was like, Who is better? There's no doubt about that. There's only one. But what did I teach you, I don't remember this. The importance of the detail shots. So at the end of shooting a room, Brian would pick up the camera and say I got to capture all his details. He would photograph, you know, the materials and the way the chair met the rug. And he just had a whole new perspective on things that I never thought about so focused on capturing the room and never thought about the details. And so he added all these detailed shots to our photoshoots. And our clients were loving them. And we were doing so many more photos, all because of that. So combining the wide shots and the detail shots became our thing that we did together. The details. Yeah. Brian? Brian, yeah. We're big on those types of Oh, that's amazing. I mean, everybody contributed a little bit to what became your perfect product at the end of the day. Yeah. And it was going so well, actually, that we were getting rid of all of our real estate clients. So we were exiting the real estate industry altogether. But now you're still we are we are very much in the industry. Because I was like, What did you make? Yeah. But you know, what, what happened was around 2014, I want to say or 2015. One of our last remaining real estate clients who were very friendly with personally, I joined a new company called the urban conference. And he said, you know, you before you believe completely, why don't you take this as an opportunity to come in and meet with executives, and pitch them? And we're like, yes, we will do this. And so we had a meeting and we came in and we before that, you know, we were really thinking about what we could do to kind of take what we do and apply it to to the industry to kind of change the game a little bit. The real estate industry, right? So so we came in and essentially our pitch was that we were going to take the the Architectural Digest photoshoot, the editorial photoshoot, and we were going to apply that to the real estate industry in New York City. Because because the people that are buying these million dollar plus apartments and homes are the people that read dwell Elle Decor Architectural Digest, yeah. And so they want to be sold on a story, not so much see what the numbers look like. The lifestyle, you know, how are they going to live in this space? What does it look like? What, you know? How are you going to design it? And that was just as important as the square footage, right? Not to say that that's that's not important. The numbers are very important. But if you're talking about getting someone in the door, right, that's the only way to actually get I mean, of course, you have price. That's one thing that will get people through the door. But then you have the marketing because people are scrolling through images. And we actually like we're so used to New York City Market and like I go and StreetEasy. And then I see nice pictures for the most part. And I see floor plans and stuff like that. And we recently bought a property in Jersey City, and we went there, it's like, can't understand what's happening with pictures. Right? There's no, there's no floor plans. I'm like, I have no idea how this place looks. Maybe everything was here. cific part of it. Maybe downtown is better. But when you go a little bit further out here, like, not too far out. Yeah, not too far. The way I think about it, though, is is that the competition in New York City is insane. It's absolutely insane. Like how many million dollar apartments you think there are on the market at this moment, right? Yeah, there's way too many for any one person to look at over one weekend, right? Like, if you go out to the suburbs, you go for a million dollar home and probably three or four. So you can see them like knock him out over one weekend open housing, right. But in the city, you have to pick and choose, right? So how do you differentiate that stuff you have to do with marketing, you have to but it's also your business card in a way how your listings look like that. There's always been a discussion recently, we had a conversation with the seller, and I was like, Oh, if at any point you would like to take a look at our profile, see what type of listings we have and how we market them and stuff like that. She was like, You think I didn't think look at that before I called you. I was like, Why do you think it's because like, I don't want to have a listen, that's not going to represent us in the best possible way. It has to, it has to look right, it has to be staged many times as well and photographed the right way. That's what's gonna get people inside the door. Yeah, if you have one that really looks bad, you know, maybe it's a less this lower budget apartment. You know, if you get another client of our budget department, they're going to treat me like that one. There is no such thing as lower budget department. This is like a real story. I had a client who was looking for like a small studio, one of our team members went out with him. Next thing you know, a family member turned out to be looking for like 10 million plus or selling actually like a $10 million plus property. So one thing led to another. Exactly. Because there are a lot of wealthy people and they have friends, they have cousins, and like, if you service and treat everybody properly, everybody's gonna feel good. And there's going to lead to more business. Like we went to a store to pick out some of the finishes for the apartment. And we told the guy like, like this developer recommended us going to you. But we're like, we're really small project with a tiny kitchen and we have a tiny bite. We'll be like your smallest clients, probably any like, I don't know, 20 square feet of backsplash. That's like no business almost. He's like, Yeah, and some other things. And he was like, no, no, I'm still gonna treat you. Service. I felt like we're spending half a million dollars. Yeah, it was great. And it's like, I feel like it really convinces me again, in regards to my belief that you just got to treat people, right. Oh, yeah. Because you're basically using that as the opportunity to audition for what's next. Correct? Correct. And again, it's it's your image, how do you want to be remembered in this industry? Yeah. And that's what I mean, there's a lot of people that no matter what the project is, whether it's a rental or to $10 million listing, they, you know, they're they're bringing us in, because they know that they're gonna, what product they're going to get from it, because they can use it to pitch on every other project that they have coming up next, you know, what you're talking about, he kind of reminds me though, of doors. So one of the things that we're doing so we, we went in, we pitched for Kompass day, like, loved it, they loved the idea, the concept, they're like, we're gonna do this, you're approved, and we had to, obviously we raised our rates to accommodate that style of product they're like, but you're going to have to go you're gonna have to convert every agent individually. So you're an approved vendor and your rates but you're gonna go out you're gonna get the business and we slowly were doing that. And another pivot in our and I and I think our products came when we were we were doing a photoshoot, it was in Williamsburg and we were shooting this this big, big living room really tall, like 15 foot high ceilings, this crazy view of the backyard is beautiful day, and we were shooting it and we there was people there. It's I don't know it was furnished. Wasn't that first one. Oh, yeah, yeah, I was thinking of something else. But you're right, that was the one. So we were shooting, we were shooting the apartment that was empty, excuse me. And there was still a big window there. And the agent that was with us, we were like, I was thinking, like, you know, like, the best way to show context for this space is to put a person in their right to show scale. So we we asked her to stand at the, at the window and look out, Oh, my God, and we got this incredible shot of this giant space. And there is this girl that that was there. And it was such a beautiful moment was a beautiful picture. It helps show the scale. But it also sold lifestyle in an empty home. And so we started doing that more. And, and so the one that I was thinking about ended up becoming like this big campaign photo, if you remember, right, so we had this big, this big photo, this big room, and then it was furnished was beautiful, but there was something missing to it. So we had one of the I think was like one of the developers friends was there. And we had that person stand out and look out the window. And you guys were one of the people who were with urban compass, which has no compass in the beginning. And we only plan I both used to be the company and we the lifestyle photos were a big thing at Compass a couple years ago. So you guys were kind of, we were at the 14 dinners, like we have foreigners for. And that's what we pitch to them. And I think compass was really the first I believe they were the first real estate company to be open to such creativity and thinking outside the box. And they their vision aligned with ours. And that's that's how we came back. So kind of like spread like wildfire a little bit. You know, we started off with one agent there. And you know, as they grew, we grew, you know, your servicing agents from compass and a few other big brokerages in the city. Right. Right. Right. So well, you know, as we grew, and, you know, we started realizing that we needed you know, some more help. Donna was pregnant with our with our first child and and I think there became this moment where it's like, is this is it just us too? Is that what we're doing? Or we are like, what do we want for our for our company. And at the time, we weren't DD reps. We were Donna though 10 photography, right? And we had this this this another moment, we were like, it's time to pivot. It's time to turn this into an agency. And so that's what we started doing. So we started buying it just being us as photographers and retouchers. And we brought on our first Retoucher. And then we brought on our first photographer, and we decided that we were going to make it so that the photographers at the photography and the retouchers did the retouching. Amazing. And probably, that was also really hard to let go control to have someone else. Someone new retouch. Right, right. But you know, it took time but but he did a great job. And there's nothing that feels better as a business owner than knowing you can trust someone else to take off a chunk from your plate. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, as we mentioned earlier, it comes with I mean, the first time is hard. Yeah, second times a little bit easier. And then it gets easier. And now you probably feel completely tired. I'm like, wait, you want me to do work? I'm sorry? No, no, we delegate this out. We have a podcast. podcast 2016 When DD raps was really born? I think it was yeah, I'd say around 2016 Probably 2015 Even standard for Donna tan represents because it was you know, we were representing these other photographers to shoot on our behalf. But it's also reps is real estate promotional services. Oh, very clever. So we realized that about two years after I woke up in the middle of the night. I had a brilliant thought. It's actually funny. You mentioned that. Our organization is called NY Global Group. People assume that it's just New York. It is. But it's also Nicola and Julian. Really? Did you wake up in the middle of the night to call everyone? That's amazing. So you guys founded the company only five years ago then? Yeah. talking to Brian, I know you're on a pretty big scale now. How did it grow? And was it like a slow growth first two years and then just kind of expansion after or no one is not been rapid expansion. We've always trained one or two photographers at a time. I mean, and then we started bringing on more people as it organically felt right. So we started expanding our services. And the idea is that we're elevating the production value from traditional real estate marketing, right. So So we brought on video and we're doing high concept work with video, we're bringing in architectural architecturally trained floor planners, we're doing Virtual Staging, but we were not doing it. We're not doing like, whatever's in the virtual warehouse is what you get. We have an interior designer that works with people that that, that, you know, customizes every single virtually states staged photo to the demographic they're trying to sell. So so we're trying to kind of go take what is and go one level up. And that's been our one of our one of the things that we've been trying to just kind of push forward as, as DT reps has grown. But it just even though it feels like we've grown very quickly, like we've been trying to actually limit it to like, a very sustainable level of growth each year. Because the company now? Well, we have 10 plus retouchers. We have 10 photographers, we're bringing on our 11th we have two videographers, two floor planners, and we have an entire Virtual Staging team. Wow. So how many projects in a week? separate projects? Would you say you guys cover? Well, it depends on the time of year because real estate's really seasonal. So I'd say on the low end, we're doing like 50 right now. And then a week yeah, projects, then on the high end, we're doing around 100 projects a week. And in how many of them? Are you involved? Personally, everyone, we touch every project in terms of actually photographing, photographing, but kind of like overseeing what's happening? Or is there some things that are happening just like really on autopilot, I touch every project, Donna touches every project, we look at every previous email that goes out and make sure that at the quality is is pretty busy. Yeah, but but we can we can touch it quickly, if that makes sense, right. And we have we have quality control measures so that people are kind of like they're overseeing each other's work. It's like very big family. So we make sure that you know, they're keeping each other in line. And then we can spot check after, it's really important for retoucher to have another set of eyes look at their photos, because they've been staring at them for so long. So it's good to have a fresh set of eyes make you think, oh, you know, maybe these are a little too warm, or you know, whatever it is, we review each other's work. And now we have photographers reviewing where we have other retouchers reviewing each other's work. So we use, because we use Slack for all of that kind of constantly in communication all day. Make sense? So from you guys describing the story, how it started 10 years ago to now it seems like okay, you know, it was hard, hard, hard, you work hard, that he had an aha moment that things went better than he had another aha moment. And thanks, things went even better. I'm sure there was like to say that there were some challenges. And were there times when you were ready to give up on the whole project and just completely go on at and do something else. Oh, yeah. All throughout the ride through. So there's even now there's always issues that pop up. There's growth issues now, right before there's non growth issues, right. The biggest issues like when we were first getting started. Well, let me just give more context. I in college, I studied English, I was an English major. Donna was a psychology major. Donna went into photography, and I went into business. So very different from what we decided we didn't have the relevant experience to do things that we wanted to do. So the biggest challenge was recognizing that was, you know, knowing what you don't know, right? Or not knowing what you don't know. However, that phrase is supposed to go. So what what we were really good at, though, during those times was hiring consultants was bringing in the right people to guide us along the way. Because we were throwing it up against the wall, and we're seeing it that stock and that was kind of what we were living by. And that's a challenge for most entrepreneurs winter's day for most business owners. I mean, we all go through this and some are smart like you to get an opinion from outside. And some just keep trying. I think the hardest part is is recognizing that you need to outsource. Yep. Find someone to help you with a certain issue. Yeah. Because, you know, the true opportunities that come by not too often. So you have to be prepared for that that stuff, right? And so, you know, the way to be ready for that is to prepare yourself, right? And so the sooner you can recognize that you need help, is the sooner that you can fail successfully. Right. So that makes sense. Because you can you can you can do something because you don't know what you're doing. And you're not gonna learn anything from that. You know, but if you are bringing in the right know how and something doesn't work, you know, there's more of an education there. I think that you can really benefit from And you can you can learn from and you can adjust your strategy too. And so we did a lot of that, because we got a lot of nose at the beginning, right? I think that's a very valuable lesson for anyone who is struggling to grow their business and who is in the beginning stages. And yeah, a lot of people just, they just try doing it on their own. Yeah, yeah. And that you don't have to, you really don't have to, you don't have to. And I agree with that. And that's when we also started looking for eel, and we have an outside coach as well. But we were super careful selecting where we're going to be and who we're going to be with like, it was pretty scary. Like when we hired our coach, we're paying more money to the coach, and we paid for rent, right? We're like, Oh, my God, like, are we insane? Like, it's such a risk. And it's a risk. And it's like, I like I don't know, I mean, I won't trust this person. But we spoke a couple of times on the phone looks like he has good track record by credit card, or credit card. And there is this, there's this big thing, but I also noticed that there's like almost everybody wants to like Coach these days. And it's like, I think you just got to be super careful in selecting who you're going to trust. Like, our decision. I don't think it was easier to lightly in regards to EEO or in regards our coach. Yeah. On that same token, though. I mean, school cost money. Yeah. Right. If you're not willing to get the education somewhere, then how are you going to go? Yeah, absolutely. Exactly. So with I mean, the company, your company is pretty big now. And you guys are I know how busy you are? How do you handle it with kids and family and being husband wife and working together? You know, part of the struggle, you know, as we started growing more was letting go. That was a big challenge too. For me personally, like I went from being, you know, developing business to one of the head creatives to then I needed to pivot again, as we grew and brought on more people to doing kind of more of a managerial type of position overseeing the company operations. And so there is this constant pivoting and, you know, including family life into that as well. That that was that was difficult to do is learning new roles over and over and over again. And the hardest part of that, though, was the point when I was saying, I can't control everything. I can't I can't do anything I struggled. Yeah. Right. So anything I can control everything. Well, you know, you know, like, Donna had to let go of her process of her baby of her photography. My, my son, Liam on photo shoots with me when he was a newborn. Whoa. And either my mom would come and help or Brian was there or, I mean, it didn't happen often. But I always felt like, you know, the same with business, it was hard for me to let go let go of my son like who's, you know, letting someone else watch me for me while I was working. But we found a good daycare. And it you know, putting your baby in a full day daycare program is a big decision. It's really scary for first time parent, not so much for a second time. That first time, you know, you have to really adjust and new city daycares that cost more than the rent, you're paying for your apartment to talk about things that cost more than your living, right? Yeah, yeah, we found a great daycare, we loved the teachers, and we felt like we tried, we could trust them. And slowly, I was letting him stay there for more and more hours of the day. And I was able to balance my work and my mom life, it's kind of The Art of Letting Go though, right? Every aspect of it is the art of of letting go, whether it's letting go of the responsibilities of you know, parenting your child to a daycare, or letting go the responsibilities of doing the photography on your own as you kind of delegate it out to other people or letting go the responsibilities of the operations of the business so that you can expand your team and you can kind of do more high level work and let other people kind of handled the day to day stuff. And at the same point, it's like when you can do that, and you can learn how to do that. And you can develop processes around doing that, then, you know, suddenly you find yourself actually having more time to spend with family, finding, you know, more time to think about these high level things and it's being being okay with the idea that, okay, no one is going to do things quite like you. But that's okay. Right? Because everyone's going to be their own person. Right. So how can we do this in a way that that is beneficial to the company vision, right? How can we do this all in a way that works too as we move forward? And as we think about growing even more? Yeah, yeah. So Brian, and I have always we've always been very involved in our kids lives, we now have two kids, they're ages three and six. And we're almost always doing dinner together, we're almost always taking them to school in the morning together, we're always there on the weekends. And we know, luckily, we've been able to adjust our lifestyle. It's amazing as the business has grown, we've it's given us more freedom to spend the time with the kids. And I have a little bit more freedom than Brian does. But we you know, even so that a priority, you have to decide what your priorities are. So did the decision to let go a little bit with business or to outsource or to give project to do to other people? Did that come after you realize you have kids? You have a family? You want to spend more time with the kids? No? Or was that more kind of like simultaneous? No, it's like I need I need to grow the company, I can't grow the company if I'm in the company, right? Right, if you're working in the company can't work on the company. So so it was really, really requisite to be able to get to 10 photographers, right? I cannot do that unless I had someone that could could assist in these operational duties that we had. And so so we're consistently now. Now I got to think about what's next. What else do we need from an infrastructure standpoint? Now remember, I'm I did not go to business school. Right? Right. So it's all like a big adventure. And this is something that I think a lot of entrepreneurs, they ask themselves these questions, is these growth issues? At what point? Is it time to grow the infrastructure side? What's more important? Is it is it growing, the infrastructure side are growing the sales, getting the sales funnel going, right, like these types of questions about strategies and stuff. And so while I always was, I still miss the creative aspects of photography, right, and going out and shooting and, and FaceTiming, more more with clients in that, in that regard, I find the growth of the business to be way more creative than I would have assumed before, because there's just so many opportunities out there and strategies that have so many moving things to think about. And you have to get creative, because, you know, like, before, we needed to figure out how to store the data of just our photography, which is not that hard. Now I need to store the data of 10 photographers, right. So how am I going to approach that? How am I going to think about that in the future? Right? How am I going to think about, you know, the incentive structure for photographers as they grow within the company, right? Like, how are you? How are you letting allowing people to reach their highest potential, right, all of these things require creative thinking, right. And I find that really, really satisfying as we move forward. I can relate, I feel like that's my favorite part of the business. Actually, one of the favorite parts, is the creation aspect of strategies of business and the systems behind it as well how it's going to scale. This, that was like actually big reason, because when we originally were recommended, your your accelerator, it was from an attorney who is a member of eon. And a side note, for anyone who's not familiar. He O is an organization where Brian and I met. That's right. It stands for organization. It's a group, I guess that a business owner can join to learn from other business owners, other entrepreneurs, how to run your business, to run your ideas and your challenges by your peers and to keep growing together. Right. It's a great, great praying trust, basically, where people kind of share experiences and share the things that are going well share the things that aren't going so well. And we learn from each other, as you know, because it doesn't matter what industry you're in. Everyone, every industry goes through the same types of rooms. Yeah, absolutely. That was my sight. No, no, no, yeah. And I think originally, I started looking into it. And I reached out and I interviewed with somebody, I don't remember who interviewed with, but they were like, I think Julia is going to be just so much better. By going to this then then I'm going to be I like learning. But I know that there is it's not a networking group. But there is a networking aspect to it. If that's the way to put it. I was like, I think she's just gonna be a lot better and she should do one thing like, that is kind of like a byproduct. Yeah, it is really about this personal journey that Kurniawan through your professional career and, and how you can better yourself and also how you can kind of more clearly define how you are going to grow your company. Correct. And we've always had the debate of like, Judo was like I want to go and like let's say do my MBA and I was like, honestly, I really like learning but I like self study like I can find on YouTube in the books and podcasts. Like, whatever I need, I can find that I think many times education is. It's good in many cases, but there is also it's very expensive for especially in New York, if you're going back to college. And it's also, I think, ultimately almost like paying for a network there. Again, if you're going to one of the large colleges, so it's like July, I think this is going to be a really good fit. I think you've been really happy there for a number of months. Yeah, I have been a huge shout out to Brian, who has been a great mentor. And to the organization. I mean, I met so many wonderful people. And I take no credit. This that's not true. You know, I mean, I appreciate that sentiment. But I think what's great about the group, right, is that we serve as the accountability partners for each other. So any growth that you get out of it is is all yours. Yours, yours alone? You know, you get out of it. Wait, put into it. Yeah, yeah. So I'm women. I mean, I met and I'm sure you have to met so many wonderful people, so many business owners, some are in the beginning of their journey, some are way far ahead of some of us. And it's just inspirational to see all these people. And it was really eye opening to see that. And, I mean, we've talked about this in most of our podcast episodes, that no matter what industry you're in, no matter what business you have, as a business owner, you go through the same challenges, everybody goes through step 1234. And this is how you can face it ABCD these are your options. Basically, as simple as that. It's pretty interesting. But there's no other way than being surrounded by like minded people who are looking to grow and learn and don't mind sharing. I think that's very important. Absolutely. That's how I learned my career is through shared experiences. I took one class in digital photography, and that's the only class I ever took on photography. So I'm mostly self taught, but I had mentors, and it was just about finding and connecting with people. And, you know, I happen to meet some guy at a camera store, who was a real estate photographer, and hated shooting real estate and wanted to become a wedding photographer. And he said, I'll teach you real estate photography, I'll teach you how to edit the photos. And we became such good friends. And he taught me all the editing, that is the base editing that at least I started with. And because of his generosity, and the generosity of all those, all the people that put out those YouTube tutorials, and, you know, everything that I learned from to become the photographer I am, I now feel the need to pay it forward. And I'm constantly mentoring, not only my own photographers, but anyone reaching out to me, I will gladly respond with advice. And, you know, be willing to give critique, whatever I can do to help a growing photographer, because that's what it's all about. Exactly. And I think ultimately, the more you give without thinking to have it back, the better off because in our industry, for example, in real estate, we often notice that some people like we don't want to tell the secrets, for example, to even their own agents who are on their own team. And like the way we prefer to think about it is if the person wants to leave, they'll leave. And maybe it's actually us that we haven't done enough something for that person on our team know that we do love to share our experience. Yeah. And we're hoping that they will stay with us. I feel like that's a generational shift to I feel like yeah, I feel like 20 years ago just wasn't like that. In any industry. Really. I feel like people are very secretive. Right. I feel like we live in just more collaborative times. purchases. Great. I hope so. Maybe that's just my optimistic look if that's the case, yeah. And I think people who like to share and they will attract other people who like to share as well. So ultimately, nobody likes assholes. Sorry. Perfect. Not now. We'll just have to just bleep it out. Future future 13 year old real estate agents or entrepreneurs. I apologize to all venture 13 year olds. So good. Yes, we also would like to do something we'll put you a little bit on the spot hopefully don't mind that. We like to say don't worry if I if I'm not answering I'll just pass it to Donna. We like to do a little giveaway for the listeners from the people who have been on the podcast since you guys do market and maybe you can provide a certain like, I don't know 10% discount or maybe like a free photoshoot and have something that you feel comfortable with for the first person who reaches out and inquires with us about this. Okay, we'll get one be ready for this One free photoshoot of the base to the first person that does whatever you want them to do, what do you want us to reach out? Right a free but as they have to be in the real estate industry, that's the catch, they have to have a real estate project. And they have to tell us why they want a photoshoot with DD reps. Who wait. So that means there's a little bit of a catch to it, right? They have to actually, it's not just the first person that reaches out, it has to be someone who wants to have a shoot, shoot with drf's Yes, and why we'll take letters, we'll take video, if you like any, any way that you want a digital editor. If it's not by pigeon that we will not expect. That's amazing. And we'll share Brian and Donna's website in the description of the podcast. So our listeners can take a look and see and evaluate and ride around based on what they see. And in conclusion, I would like to ask you both to kind of just to summarize what you shared in regards to your business and your growth and your journey. Basically, if if someone is listening to you right now, who is maybe was thinking about starting similar business to yours, or maybe their real estate industry or any other industry, and they maybe they're working out of their basement right now. And they hope to have an office one day or be at the same level as you have 20 3040 people working for them? What would be your advice to them and 123 pieces of advice that you will give them? I know one of them. Brian, you mentioned that you have to learn to let go? Yeah, that's probably one of the most valuable pieces of advice I would share with our listeners. What else would you add to that? You know, when you when you journey across the desert, it always starts with the first step. Right? To take the first step. Right. So don't get intimidated by the fact that you need to go however many miles, because the only thing you need to think about is how am I going to take my next step? How am I going to move my feet? Get to the next day? Yeah, right? That would be my my advice. Because you know, a lot of people I feel, tend to get stuck in what they need to do 10 years from now. And they stopped thinking about what they need to do tomorrow. I would add one thing about, you know, my photography and about the services of DD reps is that it's solid, it's consistent. And it's a product we truly love and believe in, and our clients love and it helps them grow in their careers. So the product itself that we're selling, and that we're offering is an amazing product. And I think if you have something that is truly special, and has you know, it can add so much value to other people's lives. That's the most important thing. The product is everything. Everything else is secondary. Equally, if the photography was was bad, we wouldn't be where we are. No. So that's the most important thing. So you have to take pride in what you do and create good product and be proud of it basically. Yes. That's what it comes down to and create genuine long lasting relationships. Yeah, absolutely. Persistence to Persistence is key. Yeah, absolutely. Well, thank you, Brian and Donna. You're also partners, right? Yes. Okay, D pod, pod and Deepak but now it's from DVRs. All the contact information will be in our description. And the real estate agents who can use their services, of course are welcome to reach out to you directly. But we're also here to connect you guys. Thank you all for stopping by and have a great day. Thank you.