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

Evan, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?

My mission is to primarily share content about local/small businesses (especially new ones) and events in our community as well as the great things our nonprofits do and some free, fun ways to get healthy around the Upstate. I create and curate content basically for free to build brand awareness and to develop partnerships and other relationships with area companies and organizations (I love to tag them in my different types of content I share across all forms of social media). To me, this is a unique way to put a face to a name and bring my business and its services to their attention rather than just handing them a business card (and when I do hand them some literature later, they’ll already have some knowledge of what EC Media is).

My goal is to offer these businesses marketing and public affairs consulting and fill in some gaps where needed with graphic design, social media content creation and management, Website content creation and management, copywriting, photography and video editing and production.

Having grown up in Spartanburg County in the Upstate of South Carolina (Arcadia, just ten minutes from Downtown Spartanburg), there are many locally-owned businesses and organizations that have served our area since I was a child, so I want to support those businesses that I’ve supported with my family that we know and love with my services. I also want to help the new businesses and people in our area get started and plugged into our community so they can see great success and growth in their formative years! The thing I love about these longtime businesses (or the excitement of the new things happening in our community) is how it brings people together: families, friends, couples, parents and kids, and the rest of the area in sometimes unexpected ways. These might be your neighborhood or local Downtown merchants or places you get to take a fun drive/road trip out to, away from some of the hustle and bustle, just with you and your friends and loved ones, having great conversations or listening to great music (or perhaps podcasts!). My prime example of this is trips with my mom and dad, uncle and aunt or sometimes my grandparents and cousins (and I’ve even taken friends) to the Tadpole Fish Camp in Greer (off Highway 29 right outside of Duncan and Lyman). Great food, service and family atmosphere. Unfortunately their building caught on fire back in April 2023 and they have been raising money and in discussions trying to decide whether to repair their longtime current location or to find some property and move to or build a new place. Their fundraising page can be found here if anyone can and would like to donate: https://www.gofundme.com/f/tadpole-fish-camp-fire-relief?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=p_cp%20share-sheet&fbclid=IwAR3EuN8XTvl8AKO6KOTuluzScf-yilrQZBeG4K5nfsjMSPHJwGpqsrT_5pk.

My initials are CEC for Christopher Evan Carr, but I also like to rework these initials for my vision and values: Community. Engagement. Connections.

I came up with the EC Media name years ago (as early as 2009-10) and wanted to do some livestreaming (before it became a hot commodity today along with audio podcasting; this was a thing in Hollywood, New York and a few other entertainment metropolises, but was not common around the rest of the country at the time). EC of course are my initials, and media is what I do. Some people do one thing, then another and eventually group these projects under one “media” or “corporation” umbrella. I’ve been doing most everything with the EC Media brand but am preparing for a future of diversifying and branching out/spinning off the specific content sections of my company (think: “EC Eats”, “EC Drinks”, “EC Thinks”, “EC Travels”, etc…all under the EC Media umbrella).

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I specialize in public relations and some marketing and advertising for local businesses (particularly food and beverage-oriented but not limited to that), and I use my social media and status as a customer of many businesses to reach out to them to share my great experiences with others as free marketing. I believe this creates greater awareness for both them and EC Media (and when they see a brand over and over again, they will see that I offer mobile and other photography as well as other services I can help them or their clientele with. This includes social media management, email management, web content creation, videography, graphic design and copywriting for PR). I am most proud of the engagement we have gotten, particularly on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook (and more recently TikTok) and for getting over 1,000 followers on Instagram there (and on my @cevancarr page). I am MOST proud of being followed by what I consider my first major brand following me – the Spinx Company of Greenville, SC, a chain of gas stations serving the Carolinas. I also love it when other major influencers, public relations and marketing agencies, journalists and media personalities (even a TV station and radio station) follow me and my brand. I am local, homegrown to South Carolina, the Upstate and Spartanburg. I stand out because I appreciate my community, know where many of the best spots are for everything, love discovering spots I’m surprised I didn’t know about before and I know and understand my area’s history and past while embracing what the future holds for it. I also have a unique functional skill set and background experience from trying many different things and jobs in my life and pivoting so many times to where I am today.

Any resources you can share with us that might be helpful to other creatives?

I underestimated the power of Google searches early on in my career (crazy as it is to admit, I felt like I was cheating anytime I would use it to get help!). When I realized everyone did it and it was a skill, I think this helped me further my journey. You can look up almost anything on Google (or sometimes even on Facebook, LinkedIn, Quora or Reddit – or Twitter/YouTube/TikTok in some cases). Also, I used to LOVE using open-source anything (especially video editing software – it was free and did as great of a job as Adobe software did given the scope of projects I was doing at the time; plus, we did not have the budget to invest in a lot of the more advanced computer software). I wish Canva were around back in 2012 (it wasn’t started until 2013)! Then I didn’t find out about it really until five years later. :\

I will say one thing I’m glad I knew about at the time was being able to go use my alma mater’s library to work on my side projects in Adobe Photoshop and Premiere Elements/Pro (I went to USC Upstate), and it was also an alternative to going to the public library branches and often had later hours both during the week and on Sunday nights. I also frequented the Spartanburg Community College and Wofford College libraries during this time (especially when I didn’t start out my career owning a laptop). At Wofford you could even print for free! (Plus there is a cool art gallery downstairs in the same building, or you could hang around and go watch a play, concert or ballgame nearby afterward!) Some things have changed since then, but I think all are still open to the public various hours depending on the season (and with some limitations).

I also got into more networking in 2012/2013, but would have done it even sooner if I knew where to start back then (especially in college), and started volunteering at many local/regional events soon after!

I do possess a bachelor of arts in Informatics (also called Information Management & Systems) where you learn about how computer science and technology merge with business, sociology and communications. Even with that, a lot of my knowledge of business comes from reading, self-teaching and work experience. My journey has been a truly humbling experience while giving me more of the confidence I need at the same time. It also has allowed me to meet so many new, different people and form new friendships and business relationships.

Have you ever had to pivot?

I’m going to answer two questions here: I’ve had to pivot a few different times during my career, my most notable one being around 2017 when I got more involved in nonprofit work. I also had to have the resilience to not quit the job I had before (when at times I got discouraged and didn’t feel I was good enough for what I was doing) as well as to try out new opportunities until I found my fit and was able to further fulfill my passion and life’s purpose.

My degree plus experience I had from my jobs in 2012-16 and even my internship, two college communications jobs and almost seven years at Regal Cinemas I think had given me the mix of hard and soft skills I needed to pivot more smooth, seamlessly and successfully at this point in my career. I felt the not-for-profit organization bug starting back in 2015 when I started volunteering at Partners for Active Living, and began managing professional social media pages and content for the first time. I had gotten to know more of the nonprofit community previously by volunteering at area events pouring beer and wine, selling tickets and applying wristbands and getting to meet some great folks on both sides of the tent! I would then go onto doing this kind of work and picking up new skills in volunteer positions and leadership and governance skills from serving on local boards and committees.

I think these experiences and meeting these people combined have helped me pivot in a big way, reinvent myself then (and now whenever needed) and set me up for a successful future both with my business and in my current role (plus other future roles)!

Contact Info:

• Website: www.threads.com/@yourecmedia
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/yourecmedia
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/yourecmedia
• Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/company/yourecmedia
• Twitter: www.twitter.com/ecmedia5
• Youtube: www.youtube.com/@ecmedia5
• Other: www.tiktok.com/@yourecmedia Evan Carr’s personal/professional contact information/social media: www.linkedin.com/in/cevancarr www.twitter.com/cevancarr www.threads.com/@cevancarr www.youtube.com/@cevancarr www.instagram.com/cevancarr www.facebook.com/cevancarr
• Other: www.instagram.com/theevancarr

Image Credits
Headshot: Jessica Smits Other photos: Misty Fant (the 80’s balloon bouquet), Antonio McClintock/myself (selfies) Photo of Jamarcus Gaston with Big Ben (of Big Ben’s Desserts): Evan Carr