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

Hi Hania, thanks for joining us today. What sort of legacy are you hoping to build. What do you think people will say about you after you are gone, what do you hope to be remembered for?

I hope my legacy is one that my daughter is proud of, that women can look up to and one that honors “mi patria”, Puerto Rico and all Latinxs that have had to leave their homes and start over somewhere new.

I have so many dreams and goals that I am so eager to complete, and while the journey is part of the process I can be comfortable knowing that I do everything honestly, to the best of my abilities and with the best intentions at heart.

When I think about my legacy I don’t really think about what will it be but on how it will impact others, because at the end of the day what I want is to leave something that will contribute in a positive way to the community furthering visibility, accessibility and equity.

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?

My name is Hania Sánchez, I was born and raised in Puerto Rico. I am the oldest daughter of two, my sister Michelle is amazing! I was a Girl Scout from kinder all the way until I graduated from high school. I have a 3 year old daughter named Sabrina. I love to bake brownies and cookies, I love reading and writing, I love to travel and sometimes to decompress you can find me playing computer games. I am almost 30! (my birthday is in September) My ultimate dream job is to be the host of a travel show.

I have always been interested in movies and plays, I love how a stories could come to life and how everything together could make you feel things for situations you have not and never will live through. Since I was young I liked taking pictures and videos of my sister and me, friends and cousins. We would do skits, dance, sing a long and just regular day to day.

In high school I got to experience summer programs for theater and film, ultimately deciding on perusing a bachelors in Film. In 2010 I studied in Full Sail University in Winter Park, Florida. This is a technical college and in two years I finished my bachelors. I moved back to Puerto Rico and started working as a Production Assistant for Do More Productions. In 21014 I went to live with my aunt in New York City for 8 months and worked two internships: RSA films and Go Gorilla Media. I later worked as a Production Assistant for Project Runway, did expense reports for LinkedIn executives, and there is no good New York story without dog sitting.

After that I moved back to Puerto Rico and worked as a Travel Production Assistant for Amazon’s Mad Dogs. Deciding what my next move was I enrolled in Atlantic University College for a masters in Graphic Design.

This is where my head was: I was thinking, what do I want to do with my life? I like to do film (in between all that I had worked on many short films) but I wasn’t loving the long production hours, 12 to 16 hour days. I knew all my skills in Film where transferable to many industries and positions but I felt I needed something else. Right after college I had started dabbling with Adobe Illustrator and started doing business cards and invitations for family and friends, I even took a weekend course to further my skills but I already knew what they were teaching so I decided to do the masters.

While studying I began a part-time job in the first digital news paper only in Puerto Rico, NotiCel. The part-time was for Graphic Design and Ad Traffic. Then the job became a full time with social media management added to the mix. I later was promoted to Multimedia Manager, I was doing graphic design, I was editing videos — even filming some press conferences and working along the sales and marketing team with promotional materials and ad execution. I learned a lot. I was with them for 5 years, it really opened my eyes to be more aware of current events, it forced me to face my fears of the reality of the world and it allowed me to work on my own stories to tell.

Three years into working in NotiCel, hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico– in September 2017. My parents relocated to Florida, my sister was in Louisiana for college and my boyfriend had gotten a job offer in Georgia. I decided to move to Georgia with my boyfriend and we’ve been here ever since.

In 2019 I registered my business, Hania Sanchez Corujo LLC but doing business as H92 Creative Studio. Now after all the experience I have been harnessing over the years I can only describe my business as a content creation business, all these skills are usable in all industries. The digital era has created a great space for visual and audio storytelling and that is what I love.

In 2021 I registered my other business with my partner Manuel, Little Ghost Media LLC, since we both have a film and photography background we decided to work together in it and last year we were able to complete two video series for the Latino Community Fund. “Vacunando a Georgia” was a series interviewing different people, teachers, faith leaders, mothers and health professionals, about getting vaccinated for COVID-19. The second series was for the Latinos for Democracy coalition where we visited all 11 members and did a profile piece on what the did and why is civic participation important. Additionally to video projects we do photography, engagements, family portraits and product.

Since 2021 I have been working with the Latino Community Fund and I love it! I can say it has opened my eyes a lot on so many things, and I am so grateful that I am able to contribute to this amazing organization. It is hard wanting to fix and change policies to make the world a better place but it’s a good feeling when you see the impact of the work. It is amazing being out in the field and talking to the community and listening to their inspiring stories.

I can definitely say that after working on a newspaper and then with a non-profit my heart is happiest when I am able to help others find their voice and tell stories. Whether is with a video, image or audio– that is what I look forward to.

Any advice for growing your clientele? What’s been most effective for you?

1. Don’t be everywhere at once! It is exhausting keeping up, creating for every platform– I bet is even hard to remember all the passwords. 2. Try and fail, tweak and try again, fail three more times and try again.
3. Look into who you want to serve and create a client persona. This will help you understand them as a person and reach them.
4. Do research, do surveys, ask many questions to peers, clients and mentors.
5. Be true and honest, don’t pretend to be someone you are not– that is not a sustainable plan.
6. Keep trying, be consistent and have patience. Not everyone goes viral and that is ok.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My goal is to be able to grow a business that allows me to contribute and be useful to society and also one that allows me to live life. Finding purpose and balance is important to me, especially now that I have a daughter. I try to see my self through her eyes and I want to show her the importance of being in the moment, of caring for others, of care for your well being and loving what you do. I know a lot of people take a moment to figure it out, I still feel there is more for me to find and I am ready to keep transforming the creativity that I already love and applying it to what’s next.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.h92creativestudio.com | www.littleghostmedia.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/hihania | www.instagram.com/littleghostmedia
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/haniasanchez
• Other: https://vimeo.com/littleghostmedia

Image Credits
Manuel Rosario (my portrait) and Hania Sanchez (all the other pictures)