I drew up detailed business plans (not particularly interesting works of fiction that have few words and lots of numbers) and secured major investment from an investor who liked the idea of an agile business that made A LOT of money making valuable IP out of very few customers.
Thing is…
Rich customers are not (if memory serves me correctly) the easiest and because they’re rich doesn’t mean they don’t want value for money. Especially if it is valued at $12,000 per annum. Whats more, what value to place on a scaffolding rack full of dusty guitar amps, or a hall full of warbling tape machines. But also every-single-month? We were on the brink of entering into a world of pain.
Things were not going well for me. I had no cash, and at that point, a very uncertain future because of the cancellation. I had no idea what hell my return to public life in our very small corner of the internet would bring my family and I. I knew the rich composers, I knew many of them supported me and I knew that with serious cash coming in from them and our investor we could get ourselves on our feet quickly.
But everything I had come to – I wouldn’t say hate – dislike about my last job was a necessity to make tons of cash. We had mouths to feed and they were all shagging their partners and having kids. What I missed was the huge highs of meeting people from all walks who had decided to take up music, find opportunities and inspiration. Had changed the course of their careers and cast off the shackles of life in the corporate world often referencing something we had done or said.
I had made some small mark on turning the world of orchestral music on its head and had helped (again in some small way) to make it inclusive and accessible. But there was still work to be done. There was still fantastic tails to hear, opportunities to give and imaginations to spark. Sometimes there were tales of salvation from the grips of bullying bosses and mental health struggles which touched and haunted me in equal measure.
So at the brink of a truck load of cash being dumped into a freshly unribboned bank account I decided to perform a pivot and literally 180 the business model and plan.
The new idea was slower, harder, and less guaranteed to succeed.
The truck of money never reversed up to our bank and we would have to build Crow Hill from a standing start. BUT with an audience of 120,000 odd YouTube subscribers and a not insignificant number of instagram followers.
Every penny would be spent on production with no money for PR or marketing. No fireworks, no ads, nothing. Just what we had already and some 1s and 0s I had scraped the last vestiges of my bank account to record. This was the point I started squinting, grimacing and doing a small prayer to a god I don’t believe in every time I went to an ATM or tapped my debit card at a coffee shop.