We were lucky to catch up with Mike Tarantino recently and have shared our conversation below.

Mike, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Alright, so we’d love to hear about how you got your first client or customer. What’s the story?

I have always loved graphic design; I started back when you had to actually cut (with scissors) and paste (with glue) to create designs. In 1995, I opened my only brick-and-mortar business, Creative Corners, a custom picture-framing business. As most new business owners do, I tested many different marketing ideas. Having an art background meant I created my marketing material. Technically, my very first client was my own company. My daughter also runs a filming and photography company, CWC Productions, which she opened in 1998. I helped her with getting the word out to make sure she would also be successful. I quickly realized that marketing was where I belonged, and I sold the frame shop and switched to it full-time in 2008.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Even as a child, I loved to create art. My mother did as well. We would both doodle; she preferred flowers and flowing lines, and I drew cartoons of all kinds. As I got older, I realized people would pay me to do what I loved. The amount of time it took me to create the art in comparison to the money people paid meant it stayed a hobby, or what we now refer to as a side hustle. In the early years, I created logos for local companies and worked on newsletters for my church. I made life-size wood cutouts of Christmas elves to sell at Craft shows; there was a set purchased for a Christmas display at a local water park that is now displayed every year in Canfield. As technology changes, I am always ready to find ways to make things faster, easier, and more affordable for my customers. As computers started to be a household item, I invested in the full Adobe software, which I still keep the most updated version on my computer. As AI changes and grows, we are always watching and researching the latest and greatest ways to help our customers. I am now offering everything from logo design, social media presence, print ads, direct mail, business cards, event flyers, websites, email newsletters, and so much more!

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

As I said before, any business that has a technology backbone is continuously evolving, or it will go extinct. One surprising pivot came from my daughter’s company. As a wedding and play videographer, she had the equipment needed to transfer old home videos to newer media. At the time, it was mostly VHS and VHSC to DVD. She would take the jobs but didn’t like to do them. I offered to take over that part of the work as long as I got to collect the money as well. She happily agreed because it had become a bit of a thorn in her side. I realized there was a lot of potential in this as so many people have home videos that they can’t watch. I invested in my own equipment to not clug up her production time, and even expanded into real to real videos and scanning negitaves. It got to the point that I was able to hire someone to assist me. That part of my company, IM Video Transfers, is now completely run by a long-term employee. We have drop-off locations scattered around town and now transfer to USB key from DVD as well!

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

“Bust Your Butt to Break Even.” I have said this so many times, but I swear I could write a book with that title. So often, you try to create a perfect product (wooden elves, a large event, artwork, perfect audio) that you end up spending more time on it than you feel is right to charge your client. This saying started as we hosted a huge Remember Idora Park event. We rented a large ballroom, collected actually ride parts from the park, hired a swing band, and sold picture frames made of wildcat wood along with other memorabilia. Although the event was enjoyed but everyone who came and we didn’t lose any money we definitely busted our butts to break even. This type of thing could really push someone into a place where they wouldn’t take big risks anymore, but for me, it just filled my fire to find the next exciting adventure. We did not, however, host any more events like that. You need to make sure you learn from your lessons.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.theimagency.com
• Instagram: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theimagency
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theimagency
• Other: https://www.google.com/maps/place/The+iM+Agency/@41.0724276,-80.8013085,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m6!3m5!1s0x8833fd52dd107b41:0x669043d90a82a3f!8m2!3d41.0724276!4d-80.8013085!16s%2Fg%2F11bbt8hy_9?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI1MDQwNi4wIKXMDSoJLDEwMjExNDUzSAFQAw%3D%3D

Image Credits

My daughter from CWC Productions took the only photo included. All other uploads were created by The IM Agency