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

Jenny, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Can you talk to us about serving the underserved.

Small business is lucky if they have a budget for the extras – professional video for websites, showcasing a success story, or capturing a great testimonial. It all seems like a pipe dream. Nonprofit Organizations have something unique to say. How can they reach a new audience if they are only reaching the same supporters. If only they had a video where they could do a deep dive into the who, what, when, where and why of it all. I pride myself in serving a sector of the community that generates $68 of local economic return for every $100 spent. I pride myself in being part of an organizations dreams, hopes and wishes. July 18, 2022, I arrived to a video shoot for Free Clinic of Medina County, this is a non-profit organization that provides FREE medical services to a portion of a community. Executive Director, Nancy Peacock, approached me and said that she seen some of my work at an event she attended and the moment the video finished she knew that her idea for a video, and idea she had on her brain for several years, was now attainable. She said to me, “I didn’t even know about you or we could have done this years ago.” This is why I support my small business friends at all costs, literally. People over profit.

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?

This entire journey, the decision to be a business owner, has been nothing but one of inspiration, experience, learning and self discovery for me.

I had to work very hard to be in the position that I am today. I did not come from a place where I could easily find a role model. I didn’t attend an award winning school. I did not come from a safe neighborhood. I was the first in my family to go to college. My parents divorced when I was 14. I come from deep generational grief and trauma.

Truth bomb. I got fired.

I got fired for having the idea that I could help my community create video. You see, in order to supplement my income as an underpaid FEMALE videographer in Northeast Ohio, I started connecting with my community and filming the small businesses in my neighborhood on the side. And if you are asking, no I hadn’t signed anything stating that I couldn’t freelance outside of my gig. Rumor is, a video I did our Main Street organization had circulated on LinkedIn and got back to my boss. I’m just going to assume the work was so great that he had to let me go. And when he took the videographer gear from my trunk, he looked at me and said, “I think some day you’ll back on this moment and thank me.” Well, he fired me inside a local establishment, so at least he respected the desire to keep it local. Thank you?

Sad and hurt, I set out to the Cleveland area, where I ASSUMED female videographers got paid better. I interviewed for lots of cool jobs, some odd, but had trouble getting any agency to believe my story: I was this one woman show, driving around Northeast Ohio, responsible for everything an agency would hire a team of people to do. Looking back, I am aware not that I was a unicorn to the industry. I was telling people that they were wasting money by hiring an entire production team, because he I was doing it all and doing it alone.

My final straw was my last job interview, where I was denied the position I was qualified for because “I was a mom and they couldn’t guarantee that I would be available when they needed me.”

SHE was born that same day. August 8, 2018.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

Once I was fired that was it. Any extra cash we had saved was for my dreams of taking our son to Disney. I was lucky that the organization left me with a small severance and I was able to use that to replicate the gear I had to turn in. The only equipment I had was a camera I was using to film the community with and snap some family photos. In a passing conversation, someone told me to save 30% of everything I make and put it in an account for taxes, equipment, needs, etc. The fear of what I was starting is likely why I held on so tight to that rule and actually still do to this day. It allows me to market, donate and upgrade when and how I want to. It was a little comment that has become a staple and personal promise to myself, not matter how big or small the payment might be.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

SHE was created in 3 short months. In order to pull off a successful maneuver such as establishing a business in three months, HA-HA, one must hit the ground running like one has never run before. In retrospect, I had no idea what kind of butt busting the next three months would entail, but I knew I had to stay motivated until I could personally reach a point where I no longer had to introduce myself when I entered a room. That was important and that was my goal. I joined all the networking events I could find in my area, held down an average of 8 coffee meetings in a single day, swapped business cards with a fever, volunteered in the community, joined boards for organization I loved, and spoke openly on what I believed in: small business deserves video! December of 2018, a few short months after establishing SHE as a business, the metaphorical damn broke, my calendar was filling up for 2019, and would only continue to challenge my organizing skills from there on.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.shediditvideo.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shediditvideography/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SHEDidItVideography
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shediditvideography/
• Twitter: @SHEdiditvideo
• Other: https://vimeo.com/shediditvideography

Image Credits
Brooklyn Media, LLC