We recently connected with Rowdy Domstead and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Rowdy thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Are you able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen?

I graduated college almost assuming I’d be able to drum up enough work to live off of, but I ended up getting a job for a record label and music publisher when it quickly became clear that would not be the case. I ended up working there for 5 years, eventually earning the title of Art Director, all the while building my contacts in the industry and around Nashville. In February of 2022 I did leave that position to pursue freelance design, so I guess the biggest thing that could’ve expedited that process was focusing more on growing my circle of contacts. My dad always told me, “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know,” and I’ve learned that advice carries a lot more weight that I realized. I also think that diversifying my skillset has been crucial to my ability to earn a living. I was extremely fortunate at my job to benefit from the company’s continuing education initiatives and to learn while I worked. The first time someone asked me if I could take their headshot for the company website I just said yes and then ran to my office to furiously Google how the company camera worked before they got back from lunch. For the simple reason that I wouldn’t be able to sustain myself if I could only provide one of the many services my clients come to me for, I also think that wide-ranging list of services is certainly another one of my most valuable assets. And it keeps my work feeling interesting: I’m doing photoshoots one week, animation the next, video editing after that, and so on, usually all for different clients as well

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 was born in Dallas, TX and moved to Nashville in 2014 to attend Belmont University. I graduated with a degree in Music Business with an emphasis in Pre-Law, so I’m not using any of the skills I went to school to learn. I’d always wanted to work in the music industry in some capacity and designing for artists, labels, and businesses seems to be the best intersection of my skills and my interests.

I currently own and operate my own company specializing in design, project management, content creation, and branding not only for musical artists, but also for businesses outside the music industry. In short, I do anything visual that accompanies music, in addition to branching out into brand development, advising, and business strategy. I personally have a clean, simple style, but pride myself on being able to adapt my style to the client brief to get them exactly what they’re looking for. And to be frank, I am shocked how often being kind, professional, honest, and punctual elicits a surprised reaction from clients claiming they’ve not experienced that treatment from other freelance designers before!

If someone learns anything from this piece it’s that being easy to work with gets you more work

We’d love to hear about how you keep in touch with clients.

I’ve found the best way to keep in touch with clients, and even to gain new ones, is to actually socialize with those contacts. Working in the music industry, lots of my friends and business contacts host live music events, throw parties, meet for happy hours, anything you can think of. By attending those events I’ve found I accomplish two really important things (at least as far as how I personally want to run my business): 1) I make friends with my clients. It’s one thing to do business with someone new as an opportunity to get a bigger paycheck or break into a new market, but I’d much rather invest my time in people and businesses I care about, and who care about me. That also usually dissolves a lot of worry around getting paid, being treated fairly and professionally, and having conversations about expectations, logistics, etc. 2) My friends become my clients. My favorite thing about having a lot of friends in the industry is investing in them. I personally know a lot of independent musicians that I do work for because I care about seeing them grow and prosper. AND because I’m friends with most of my clients I usually don’t have a problem asking one client to push a project a day or two to make room for album art for my old roommate or merch for a friend from college, which I find to be a refreshing and fulfilling way to do business as a whole.

We’d love to hear your thoughts on NFTs. (Note: this is for education/entertainment purposes only, readers should not construe this as advice

I see NFTs as a money-making opportunity and probably not much more than that, almost akin to day-trading or gambling. I created an NFT project with a friend during the big boom in 2021 but we never released it because we saw the market start to dwindle. Right now, I’m sitting on this project and am prepared to release it whenever the possibility reemerges that there’s some real money to be made. As for anything more substantial than that, I don’t think I see NFTs as some economy-altering, world-changing force. I do think the experiential aspect is exciting, like attaching a meet-and-greet or a limited edition vinyl to a digital token, but that can be accomplished in other ways too. Most excitingly, I think of it as a way to potentially monetize my art at a higher rate than I’m used to: If someone is willing to pay for it, I am willing to take their money

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.rowdydomsteaddesign.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/letsgetalittlebit/