We recently connected with Travis Ruiz and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Travis thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What do you think it takes to be successful?

to be successful…you have to fail, alot. you have to do thing the wrong way and learn every time and keep coming back. ive tried to cut corners, tried the easy way the fast way, the dishonest way. NOTHING worked. the only time i found sucess was on the tail end of long days, long nights, literal blood sweat and tears, consistency, integrity, hard hard work and a little mental illness lol. you have to be crazy, crazy enough to believe it will work then give it everything you have, then a little more. I’ve failed more times then i have succeeded but man once you get it right, no better feeling in the world.

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?

my name is Travis Ruiz, I’m an American based photographer from Albuquerque NM. Also entrepreneur who owns few successful businesses.
got my start working in the custom car world working for World famous lowrider painter and builder Rob Vanderslice. i was his marketing manager and started shooting the cars he had done and new builds. he has build multiple world champions so the work was awesome, i started cars on my own cause i was cheap and dint want to pay another person to do it, we launched our website in 2007. not long after that i got offers to shoot for national magazines. Lowrider Magazine hit me up , my fav magazine all time since I was a kid. I started covering the southwest area for various assignments (NM,AZ,TX,CO). in time i ended up Shooting 3 Covers, multiple centerfolds and numerous features for the mag as well as few other publications over the years DUB mag, Impalas mag, American Bombs mag, DC magazine etc. it been a whirlwind the past 17 years, i feel like i haven’t put my cameras down in all that time. they have taken me around the world, shoot stars, my fav cars and meet some of the coolest people and artists along the way. im forever grate for all the opportunities the camera has brought my way.

Being in the Lowrider Culture for so long we decided to mesh another passion of ours, Making Beef Jerky lol We started Lowrider Beef Jerky Co in 2020 right when covid started. Our company is a little different than most we include lowrider art with every purchase. I put Lowrider trading cards in every pack, images i have shot over the years. Also give away posters and lowrider merch. my lady and her family made Jerky and si did mine. So we joined forces and made a official company. We won Business of the Year with the Albuquerque Hispano Chamber of commerce in 2022. that was huge honor of us. We are expanding and improving constantly. our growth has been a blessing.

Have you ever had to pivot?

Covid hit and my photography business was dead, zero business we were all shut down. I’m self employed so that meant zero income. we launched our other passion of beef jerky cause food businesses were allowed to stay open during the shutdown of the country. We put everything we had into launching it and was a huge success immediately. thta was a huge pivot business wise for me. food business is completely diff ball game. we had to learn alot fast in few years but was worth all the stress lol

Any advice for growing your clientele? What’s been most effective for you?

although i hater it. marketing yourself alot is key. you have to use all the platforms. FB and IG have been our biggest help. i jtry to always post our products from photography, jerky and the print business. i make sure that if any of those needs ever come up, im in the conversation. you aren’t gonna sell to everyone but at least be in the conversation and only way to do that is to show them and post, daily. the platforms are free advertising, why people don’t post their businesses to death ill never understand

Contact Info:

• Instagram: fishbowlmediagroup
• Facebook: LowriderBeefJerky

Image Credits

all images taken by Travis “fisheye” Ruiz