We were lucky to catch up with Saunders Staley recently and have shared our conversation below.

Saunders, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Let’s start with what makes profitability in your industry a challenge – what would you say is the biggest challenge?

There are two things I think have a huge impact on profitability as an aerial cinematography/photography company.

One being technology changing so quickly. We have to upgrade our drone units and cameras usually every 3 years, which is a big expense, but having the right tools to create the quality of work we want to produce for our clients is imperative.

The second thing would be one off jobs vs. building relationships. A lot of the big production work flies into the state and then leaves, hiring us for one project most of the time. With that said we have built up local relationships and business across the state that is ongoing, still take the one off production jobs as well, to have a steady stream of income with little to no downtime.

Saunders, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I have always had a passion for photography and film and was accepted to Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara, CA in 1998. We were still developing and shooting film then, which I think made me a better cinematographer/photographer not being able to obtain instant digital gratification and really having to concentrate on your settings.

Graduating in 2002, I was pretty nomadic photographing/filming for myself, working multiple corporate jobs in San Francisco, Telluride, Denver and now settling in Phoenix, Arizona. My Corporate experience helped me excel in sales and marketing during the development of Flying Robot as a business. In 2016 Flying Robot was formed, I branded the company, built the website out with the portfolio work I had shot in previous years and was off to the races.

I had been shooting ground work for years and knew I wanted to enter the cinematography/photography market of the drone wold and not the the enterprise sector but wasn’t sure if it would work. The first 2-3 years were tough. I think my services list on the website was about 15 services deep reaching for business, trying to see what stuck, barely surviving. Then I told myself take out everything off the services page except what you really, really want to excel in. In 2019 Cinematography and Photography would become my main focus.

I shot for myself in between smaller drone jobs weekly, building portfolio work on a consistent basis, sending this work to potential clients and then 2020 hit, knocking out all big production work. Just as momentum was building I had to re-structure everything I was doing. I kept up consistent construction, trucking industry and other “essential” business work in 2020, as well as really building my brand/portfolio.

In 2021 production work was so backlogged things started to blow up! Referrals started to pour in, more relationships were being built, our work was being shared across social media and business was on the up and up!

Since 2021, we have worked with a diverse array of clientele nationwide. Some of these clients include HBO, Google, NFL, PING, LEXUS, Spotify, Nat Geo and Sony Entertainment. We fly FPV, DJI and Heavy Lift drone units, giving us the capability to provide super dynamic content for our clients.

Flying Robot is a register trademarked brand and all of our portfolio work can be found @ www.FlyingRobot.io

Owner/Operator
Saunders Staley

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

No recommended by any means but I cashed out my 401k, paid myself minimum wage for almost 3 years and took out a few business loans. By year 7, I can say all loans are paid and we are moving projecting profits year over year moving forward.

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

I have had to make life changes multiple times in my career. I have worked through the crash of 2009 and 2020, you have to adapt with situations like this and figure out what avenues or skills do you have to take on maybe another roll or something you never thought of during these down times.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.flyingrobot.io
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/fraerials/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FRaerials/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/18562608/admin/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/FRaerials
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_zs8Nj0maA6DRMURvU4wGw
• Other: VERO : https://vero.co/flyingrobot VIMEO : https://vimeo.com/fraerials

Image Credits
@FRaerials