Today we’d like to introduce you to Rex Jones.
Rex, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
My story is one filled with a solid number of random twists and turns, so this should be mildly entertaining. As a kid, I was enthralled with the cinema. I loved going to the movies. My childhood dream was to end up working as a film director. I watched and rewatched all my favorite movies from directors like Steven Spielberg, Christopher Nolan, and Ridley Scott. I first picked up a camera towards the end of high school and early college days. The first class I signed up for as a college freshman was a black-and-white film photography course. My thinking was that in order to be a good movie director, I should master the basics of photography and composition. Little did I know that this film photography course would be the beginning of what turned out to be a whole different sort of career.
I worked as a creative professional through the first couple of years in college. My jobs included some photography, a lot of graphic design, some website development, and a bit of filmmaking. Since I was already working in my field of interest, I remember hitting this point where I realized that I already knew most of what was being taught in my classes. What we were learning were skills and techniques that I used on a regular basis for work. So I became an official college dropout and dove into full-time work as a video editor specializing in promotional video content and basic animation.
I spent roughly 6 years at the animation company and learned an entire collection of new skills and abilities. I did hit a burnout point with the job itself, though and found myself looking for new opportunities. At the time I was going through a divorce that drained me of all my emotional energy and I made the decision to aim for a dramatic career shift. I was hired by the Arizona Department of Public Safety to be a State Trooper and began the police academy in 2019. Life as a Cadet Trooper was wild, it was intense, it was a hell of a lot of fun and there are many points today that I wish I were still back there. It was about halfway through the academy that I tore my shoulder during a training exercise and had to be medically dismissed from training.
I took a job working for a company that specializes in cell tower maintenance and fire prevention not too long after my dismissal from the academy. I had mostly healed from my injury and wasn’t sure what to do with myself since the subsequent academy wouldn’t start for a good deal of time later. I remember finding this tiny lump in my armpit during that period of time and got myself looked at to make sure it wasn’t anything dramatic before heading out on the road for several months doing the cell tower work. I was told I had a mild infection, was given some antibiotics, and was sent on my way.
Over the course of time between April and July 2019 that armpit lump grew from the size of a pea to the size of a racquetball and was excruciatingly painful. The moment I returned home from completing my cell tower route in Oregon I had the lump biopsied and examined, only to now be told that I had lymphoma. The cancer diagnosis hit pretty hard, I honestly didn’t know if I was going to live much longer or not. It forced me to take a dramatic look inside to see if I was living out my life the way that I really wanted or not. I decided not to let cancer drag me down any further than I had already gone. I wanted to somehow make it a positive thing. So I dressed up in the most outrageously absurd costumes for every chemo appointment. I was the weirdo, dressed up like Where’s Waldo, or Woody from Toy Story, in the infusion center.
I realized that no matter how bad things can get, someone out there will always have it worse. I saw then that each day was an opportunity to put something positive out there, even if I’m not feeling positive inside. That, and many more realizations like it, helped shape my perspectives for work life, home life, and how I wanted to live out the rest of what time I have on earth. My professional ethics a derived from this belief that in order to justify taking money from someone, I want to make sure that I’m doing something that obviously makes their life better, or easier, in return.
Early in 2020, I had a friend from high school reach out to me and asked if I would be interested in doing a job for him, he needed photos to promote Mad Moose Rentals, his UTV rental business. Of course, I said yes! We spent a week together riding some of the most epic scenery in Southern Utah. We had discussed a basic price point for the job and had a loose agreement for what value my assistance would be worth. Then Covid hit and the entire world had to recalculate. He asked if we could be flexible with my pay because nobody knew what would happen with the entire economy. I told him not to worry about it because I still had my cell tower job and didn’t want my involvement to end up putting him in a bad spot. Fast forward to November 2020 and I was offered a job on the spot to work for him full time and I pounced on the opportunity.
That job, working for Mad Moose Rentals, is what sparked an entire spectrum of employment that I simply couldn’t have planned to obtain. I took the job because I knew it would allow me to show off with the camera and take some super cool, super fun, super flashy content. It did exactly that, but what I did not anticipate was how that would ultimately launch me into different professional positions that were simply not on my radar. I was given the chance to become the brand manager for Mad Moose, which took my skills with content creation and put them to more of a strategic use. I was getting paid education in the worlds of ads management, digital marketing, market research, financial management and more.
Taking the best pieces of a business, identifying the right client who would benefit most from working with that business, and making it easy for them to find exactly what they need is the very heart of what I do. Obviously, my job is to boost sales, but it’s so much more than throwing money at a social media ad and calling it a day. When people ask what my job is, I use the words “brand strategist” because that’s really what a business needs to actually make more money. Building a brand, creating an identity that is recognizable and trustable, that’s what really helps drive more traffic. People purchase what they can trust, what they can understand, and what they can see will get them exactly what they’re looking for. That’s marketing, in a nutshell. Take what you have to offer, find the people that need it, and make it easy for them to obtain it.
I have since been offered a new position as the CFO for Artisan Homes, the development company that is building Pecan Valley Resort, what is soon to be Southern Utah’s most fascinating destination. What I do for my current employers goes way beyond the base duties associated with my job title. I am actively working on building the company brand image with duties such as graphic design, website construction, photography and cinematography. I also am heavily involved with building our sales teams and coordinating the development of high-quality network partnerships. I relate it to playing the game Tetris, I look at all our active pieces of this puzzle and simply find the quickest way to put it all together.
I’m not entirely sure where things will go from here but I am honestly not worried about the future. The number one lesson that I have learned is to make sure that I add value before worrying about the paycheck. Yes, we all want to get paid, but nobody “deserves” to get paid simply because they can perform a service. I am confident that the money flows in just fine when our priorities are set on helping others, doing what we can to enrich the lives around us. It’s more rewarding that way, but it’s also much more financially viable. That simple principle, help others, is what makes up my core beliefs in both business and home life.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
I think the biggest challenge throughout my profession has been finding the right way to manage my time. I absolutely love what I do for work and I tend to want to accept most jobs that come my way. I have two W2 employed positions working for both Artisan Homes and Mad Moose Rentals. I also still have requests for base contracted work and I would love to work with as many people as possible, but I’m hitting a point where I just don’t have enough time to balance everything. Learning how to balance work life with personal life when I really do love what do for work is often tricky and I’m constantly having to reevaluate how I spend my time so I don’t end up with mixed priorities.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
My full-time job involves a lot of statistical analysis and strategy. It’s not as creative and adventurous as some of my previous employment, but it is a solid consistent income with an employer that I respect and admire. My work outside the company is almost entirely commercial photography and video production for the tourism sector. I have a full deck of clients that I work with on a regular basis to promote various tours and activities in multiple states. I am incredibly proud of the dynamic range of subject matter I have managed to capture. Filming horses is different than helicopters, shooting e-bikes is different than shooting boats. All of it is fun, and a lot of it I have to figure out on the fly.
What sort of changes are you expecting over the next 5-10 years?
The tourism industry is only going to keep expanding. The most market analysis points to people being more interested in spending money on experiences instead of spending money on things. The businesses that take the time to invest in themselves to make things easier on their customers will be the ones to come out on top.
Clean, fast, mobile-friendly websites are a must. High-quality content that depicts the actual experience is important. Being proactive in the channels that their target demographics use is paramount. Streamlining and optimizing systems is going to be what helps the guest experience be better than that of the competition. Creating a brand identity, something that people can recognize and trust are what will put businesses on top.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.rexjones.photo
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rexjonesphoto
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rexjonesphoto
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/rexjonesphoto
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYuDnam9dZBh_W4xk72dyBQ
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/user_details?fsid=IwOjbdaUQEbAGsPWBj6DtA&userid=9K6q0xE_fYlf0Zgzql5gAA
- Other: https://500px.com/p/rexjones
Image Credits
Rex Jones
