We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Zay Lewis . We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Zay below.

Hi Zay, thanks for joining us today. One of the things we most admire about small businesses is their ability to diverge from the corporate/industry standard. Is there something that you or your brand do that differs from the industry standard? We’d love to hear about it as well as any stories you might have that illustrate how or why this difference matters.

I think a number of my practices, as both a creative and a business person, deviate from industry standards. Some of the more interesting ones stem from my approach to marketing and merch sales.

By way of example, in 2021 I began implementing a merch concept that allows me to achieve CD era unit sales on single releases without printing a single T-Shirt, CD or poster. The product is called a Zay Zip. It’s a stylized Zip file that includes an episode of The Sessions (a docu-series chronicling my journey as an artist. I film damn near everything these days), an exclusive lookbook, all the stems to the associated song, a hi-fi copy of the song, cover art and other cool surprises.

Listeners order a Zip file, usually sold at a price point of about 10-12 dollars, and receive a download link in their email. It takes me about 25k streams to make a 100 dollars, it takes me 10 Zay Zip purchases to match that. It’s a tool that is proving useful in shifting how I approach the game and orient my goals. My goal isn’t 10 million streams, it’s 1,000 dedicated fans. The overhead is next to zero and I regularly have fans tell me they’d pay 3 times as much for the value the zips provide. If even just 1,000 people were to mess with me heavily enough to purchase a zip with each release, I’d pocket nearly 10k per drop.

The core concept is all about ownership. No one owns anything anymore. We rent our, homes, we rent our cars, we rent our movies and we rent our music. I still remember, owning CD’s, or download tracks from itunes or shared thumb drives. All of that is gone, from physical ownership, to digital ownership to digital renting, the process of alienation from everything around us has been swift and all encompassing. In this small way, I’m giving my listeners something that is truly theirs. Once it’s in their hands they can do what they want, repost it, remix it, whatever.

There is a second example of deviating from industry standards I’d like to speak on, but I realize this is running long so I’ll save it for the time being.

Zay, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I’m a rapper and producer based out of Brooklyn, NY. I was born and raised in the midwest to Brooklynite parents and I think those two worlds really shine through in my music, aesthetic sensibilities and even speech.

As a musician, the services I provide varie pretty greatly from person to person, but end of the day I’m a thought conveyer who gives people art they can interact with and dissect (or not) in any way they please.

I’m proud of my ability to think outside of the box and evoke emotion. I think we live in a reality defined by contrast and the constant saturation in all facets of life leaves a lot of us feeling washed out these days. I want to make people feel something that actually cuts through the thick cocoon-like glaze of apathy this digital world can smother us in.

Where do you think you get most of your clients from?

Live shows. A running theme for me is trying to engage people beyond the walls of social media. That’s not to say I don’t actively work to take advantage of what those platforms have to offer, I simply recognize their limitations and alterior motives.

I recognize that succeeding on Tik Tok looks like being an effective employee for the platform. My job is to keep eyeballs on the app in exchange for exposure. That’s all well and good, but when there’s a misalignment between those two goals, it’s suddenly not so fun to be at the whim of the platform. Moreover, there’s often a cap on impact via any social media platform. How many times have you seen something, beautiful, horrific and hilarious within a 10 minute time span, only to shut your phone off and forget all 3 by lunch?

All that to say, giving people a memorable experience live is everything. It doesn’t matter how big the venue is as long as your goals are centered around quality of connection more than quantity.
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Are there any books, videos, essays or other resources that have significantly impacted your management and entrepreneurial thinking and philosophy?

Not in particular.

Contact Info:

• Website: zaylewis.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zaylewismusic/

Image Credits
ROOGA Ryuta Hironaga