We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Tom Karsch a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Tom, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?
I started Camp Flix in 2012 as sort of by-product of the rise of film production in the state of Georgia along with advances in personal technology that produced a new generation of content makers who didn’t need expensive equipment to do so. Camp Flix was created as a creative outlet for teens and tweens, 11-17, who had a passion for filmmaking and provide the opportunity for them to engage and collaborate with other like minded kids. Another motivation, was the business opportunity that it presented since at the time there were not a lot of summer programs aimed at creative kids. There were plenty of specialized athletic camps but not a lot of arts-based summer camp options, and certainly none that were specific to filmmaking.
Tom, 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?
My background was in entertainment marketing having worked in New York in the 1980’s for several different cable networks (Showtime, AMC, Sportschannel) before moving to Atlanta to work for one of my personal heroes, Ted Turner. I was incredibly fortunate to spend 17 years working at Turner Broadcasting, first as Director of Sports Marketing at TNT, and then moving to Turner Classic Movies where I was the EVP/General Manager for 12 years. As a GM at a television network, you oversee all departments, including Programming, Marketing, On-Air Promotion, Production, etc. Your primary job is to act as a brand strategist as well as an internal and external advocate for the network. Early on you learn that it is ll about collaboration and teamwork and trying to get an entire staff to “row in unison”. In 2004, I added oversight of Turner South, a regional sports and entertainment that was sold by Turner to Fox in 2006. All of these were unique challenges since these networks were focused on different programming niches and audience segments so it broadened my experience and business skills. The 17 years at Turner were the absolute best of times. I departed Turner in 2007 and stayed in the community working as consultant and as a board member on several non-profit organizations. This included a stint as the interim Executive Director of the Atlanta Film Festival amongst other activities. In 2012 I launched Camp Flix where so many of the same tenets of my previous professional life, including teamwork and collaboration, became the hallmarks of what we teach.
Can you tell us the story behind how you met your business partner?
I had run in the same social circles with a guy named Danny Lipson who owned a summer camp business called Camp Jam, which ran rock n’ roll summer camps across the country. At Camp Jam, kids 11-17 who had an interest and some minimal experience as musicians and/or singers, would be grouped with other kids to form bands and during the week they would learn about the music business and music production and also pick a song, rehearse it throughout the week and then perform the song at a concert with other camp bands on the final night of camp. I had the idea of a filmmaking camp in my head but I knew nothing about the camp business so rather than forging out on my own, I made an investment into Danny’s Camp Jam business and using his existing infrastructure and camp expertise, I instantly started working on creating an extension of their current business into the world of filmmaking and that is the genesis of Camp Flix. Years ago we split from Camp Jam and are now a completely separate enterprise.
What’s been the best source of new clients for you?
It took a few years to get the word out but Camp Flix started to thrive over time and we expanded the business to include Camp Flix JR, a stop-motion animation for 7-10 year-olds, an expanded two-week version of Camp Flix as well as additional sessions. Our best source of new campers have consistently been thru search engine marketing and word-of-mouth….plus we found that we had a very high return rate of campers, a validation that what we were doing was working. When we started, camp fairs and print camp guides found in local publications were some of the more traditional marketing tactics but I think it was our investment in Search Engine Optimization that really helped us attract most of our early customers. After a year or two of executing a really terrific and unique camp program, word-of-mouth buzz started to really work for us and we saw a real jump in new sales. A growth in new sales and a high rate of return among our current campers really had us on a good path Over time, a greater reliance on social media marketing, primarily Facebook and Instagram, has really paid off for us. Then Covid hit, and we had to go virtual in both the summers of 2020 and 2021. Many of our most loyal customers who were 15+, those who had attended multiple summers, have aged out and we now have to rebuild the base. To do so we are relying on a mix of tactics, including many of those previously mentioned, while also trying to grow our partnership base with local organizations like the Atlanta Jewish Film Festival, Campus Moviefest, and others.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.campflix.com
- Instagram: campflix
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/campflix
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CampFlix