We were lucky to catch up with Tony Gunn, Jr. recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Tony, thanks for joining us today. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

The idea to create the first release from Shot Call’a Games came from a small amount of leisure time. I was scrolling on a social media platform and I came across a post from someone that was describing how a person completely did them wrong. As I read the post, I said to myself, “Man, he had to have been drunk and out of his mind to screw that situation up.” It then made me ponder on a similar situation in my past, in which I thought again, “yeah, that [explicit] had to be drunk”. Then, it hit me: I begin to wonder how many people in the world have probably been through a lot of [explicit] up situations, which makes it common, but less talked-about. “I should make a game out of this, with the catch phrase, “That [explicit] had to be drunk!”

After the idea spark, I begin to reflect for months about situations I personally went through, knew someone who went through them, or made assumptions based on statistics then matched situations around it. During this time, I begin to research the market to figure out what products were already out. My goal was to make sure I wasn’t just replicating what was already in the market. Through that research, I became even more confident that I was in a niche that no one had made a mark. I also begin to take a step back and reevaluate my objective and practical scalability, so I did away with the catchphrase, ” That [explicit] had to be drunk,” and that’s when “Shot Call’a: Gettin Litty With My Friendies” was mostly birth.

Now that the ideas where mostly laid out, I put more thought into gameplay. I had already did research about what was already in the market, so from there the thought and goal was to not repeat what was out. This is when I looked at my own background for help. Coming up with a drinking card game is probably the last thing someone who knows me would think I would do. My usual lane is in book writing, youth engagement speaking, community outreach, etc. And again, an idea hit me: storytelling. No other game in the market had it in their rules that the users must tell the story behind how the question/situation applied to them. So storytelling became the focal point for Shot Call’a Games, in the sense that the players must tell the short but sweet story behind the card that made them take a shot or sip.

To test the game concept, I begun to tell people I was going to a couples party and had to come up with crazy, less talked-about questions for a game. This was gave me the opportunity to test the market with what I had prepared. I was able to see if a particular question was good or bad, funny or triggering, insightful but relatable, etc. This was a key phase in the process to narrow down and better explain the questions/situations. And not only that, this phase allowed me to see people’s reactions to my questions, hear stories, capture other similarities from stories, etc. Amongst other features, this was a solidified path forward.

Tony, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

My story starts in my early childhood. I grew up in a difficult household. As a young boy, I had to watch countless times as my dad beat my mom and sister. It was one of the most powerless times I’ve been through. But also confusing, because I would also see how much my dad loved his family and the lengths he’d go to protect his family from outside sources – he just wasn’t strong enough to stop himself from causing harm. This went on for years and years until my mom and dad split when I was 12 years old. I ended up leaving with my mom and sister.

It wasn’t too long after that my mom made us roots across the city and started to really work with me to unlearn some of the things I learned from being in that abusive environment for so long. During this, she also had to work numerous jobs to support my sister and I, while also preparing for a divorce. It was a very sparsed time. Being that my mom had a lot of time tied into work and other community obligations, it left me a lot of time to explore. And being a kid, going through puberty, and pretty social, I naturally find myself in a relationship that led me to being a 13 year old 8th grader with a baby on the way.

After already taking over the “man of the household” role at home, this made me really think harder about life and the path I was on. I was really into sports around this time, in fact, I became the fastest person on my track team back in middle school, but once I found out I had a baby on the way, it really made me consider my future and the future I wanted for my child. Through a class assignment, I stumbled upon my natural ability to write – and I completely fell in love.

I started to pen my first book in the 8th grade. Fast forward to going into my sophomore year in high school, I had published my first novel, “The Erratic Regret”. I am/was a huge “Law and Order: SVU”, “NCIS”, and “Burn Notice” fan so the book reflects that genre. I did a book signing and my son got to see it all. It was a very proud moment. Not too long after this is when I started to get numerous public speaking engagements to talk to other youth about my life story, while still learning to be a dad, do well in school, and a little bit of football before I eventually stopped to get a job and make some money to contribute more for my son.

I was fortunate that the high school I attended had pathways, which were different career paths students could learn about, gain certification, exposure, etc. I originally was in Aerospace dynamics. My school had a contract with Boeing and they assisted with various aspects of that program. I really liked that pathway – I actually received an award for being the top student, but unfortunately, after I did some research, it appeared that funding wasn’t looking to good for that pathway to continue. So I made the decision to pursue a pathway that related more to the space I was in; graphic design/multimedia. And with that decision, I became certified in graphic design, and was able to create my own bookcovers, logos, flyers, etc, all while working on my next novel.

To date, I penned and published 11 books and had numerous youth engagement speakings. This lead me to the opportunity to meet Pres. Barack Obama. Shocked, honored, disbelief, ecstatic, in awe – those all don’t embody how I felt. After meeting with Pres. Barack Obama, about a month or two later, his team from The Obama Foundation reached out to me and offered to put me through some Young Leader Equity training. Over the course of that train, no only did I get to virtually meet with Pres. Obama over the course of those months, but I became knowledgeable about what more I could be doing in the community. Two things came out of that training for me: I started a nonprofit initiative, Project You Belong, which focuses on planting and cultivating the seed in the minds of Black boys and young men that they are afforded the same opportunity in life as the rest of society, through literary expressions, and the other was that I became aware of some of the statistics in the literary space that plague my community. In the children literature space, less than 5% of all the children literature has an African-American protagonist. This is hideous when you think about the fact that a young black boy can’t even see himself in a positive light in the literature he reads. After learning this, I immediately started to engage that space and penned three children books with African American protagonist, that are due to be published soon.

I know that was a lot of information all at once, my apologies.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

A lesson I had to learn was that you can’t do everything yourself. It’s a hard lesson to learn. I grew up assuming that “man of the household” role at a young age, so I was prone to doing a lot of things for myself, and trying to find my own way of doing things. A lot of head bumps and falls, but I strategically made it through, but that’s subjective. That came with the price of some mental pressure and survival mode actions. Nevertheless, with this new endeavor, I’ve been able to open up and let people get involved in various aspects.

Have you ever had to pivot?

This very business idea is a pivot in my life. As stated, my usual lane in life has mostly been with the youth, but now I’m making social drinking card games for adults. But don’t get me wrong, I am still avidly working on more projects that involve the betterment of our youth – that will forever be dear to me.

Contact Info:

• Website: Www.shotcallagames.com
• Instagram: Www.instagram.com/shotcallagames
• Facebook: Www.facebook.com/shotcallagames
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tony-gunn-jr-75098349
• Twitter: Www.twitter.com/shotcallagames
• Youtube: https://youtu.be/ZwgqCiQy0Ok
• Other: https://www.benzinga.com/amp/content/28259361