We recently connected with Jerry Zayas and have shared our conversation below.

Jerry, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

My mission has always been to bring people together.

I do that by way of how I design websites for individuals or businesses. I design with usability in mind to help people navigate through the content, and lead them to connect with those who they might be seeking.

I also try to achieve this by volunteering. Which is a completely different method altogether, but is a very fulfilling way to bring people together. My main volunteering focus is on the church and its events. I get to reach a lot of people that way.

Couldn’t really tell you what brought in me the desire to bring people together in anyway I could think of, but it started about 20+ years ago. Initially it started through the church, but once I became a designer, I figured that in a way I could also bring people together that way. I’ve only been lucky enough to have done one mission trip back in 2014. I went to Haiti to a small village to help build a well and paint the hospital. Talk about bringing people together, that was a real eye opening experience.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers?

Let’s start from the beginning.

As a child in Puerto Rico I was always interested in art and dancing. So I pretty much grew up Break Dancing in the 70’s, as well as drawing Comic Books style of art.

As the years went by, I kept doing art and dancing different styles. Once I reached 16 years of age, I got interested in Jazz and acting, so I put art aside, and focused on dancing.

After a year or so of dancing Jazz and acting, my teacher said that if I wanted to get better I needed to take Ballet. So I as you guessed it, I wanted to get better. I obviously started Ballet rather late, most kids start somewhere between 3-5 years old. So between 16-18 I focused all my energy in learning the basics and getting as good as I could at Ballet. By 18 I was offer my first company job as a soloist. From there I moved to New York and danced full time, the ended up in Greenville SC to kind of finish my dace career around the age of 25, because I had my first child and decided to go back to school and return to art to get a degree in Graphic and Web Design.

I focused on my art until I was 30. At that point a local company reach out to me to see if I wanted to dance again, during that time I was working full time as a Designer and dancing part time. As a got older I stop dancing around age 47, and then just focused on doing Character roles to still stay involved in the Performing Arts world.

Today I’m 50 and only focus of Web Design and Project Management. Although, the word on the street is that they want me back on stage to reprise some of my Character roles.

Today I pride myself if creating the best UI | UX designs from websites, to web app, to mobile app design for all types of businesses. I do work for a small company, but I also have my personal brand Just Call Me Jerry (justcallmejerry.com). With my personal brand I help individual or small businesses that can afford to high prices of and agency, by offer an affordable solution.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

Being creative is rewarding in itself. I love it because I don’t ever stop creating. Sometimes I take the time to put together a concept for a potential client, to show them what I can do for them.

Sometimes I play around with ideas, and I’ll sit down a design what I would consider a better version of Instagram on the Web Browser. So my portfolio contains official work that I’ve done and some ideas that I’ve had through the years.

Have you ever had to pivot?

During COVID I lost my job. There was no one hiring anywhere except for grocery stores. So, I had no choice, but to take a job at a grocery store. There’s a longer portion to that story. I wasn’t getting enough hours to sustain myself and afford a place to leave, so I ended up in North Carolina and took a job with Public Health department until things got better and came back to South Carolina when I found a new job as a Web Designer and Project Manager.

Contact Info:

• Website: justcallmejerry.com
• Instagram: just.call.me.jerry
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gerardozayas/