I Did It My Way: Behind the Scenes of TBlake’s YouTube Channel

Blake: It’s funny to me because I was looking back to when I was about to graduate from Babson and had job offers from Adidas and Nike. But I thought to myself,  ‘You know, if I work for either of those companies I’m not really going to be able to do YouTube reviews.’  I started coming up with plans and ways I could still be involved in the sneaker industry but have it be sustainable. I started my websites, Kicks Under Cost and Clothes Under Cost – those became pretty sustainable for me and at the same time, I leveraged what I knew about sneakers. If you watch my videos, I don’t do anything bombastic really. If I do sarcasm, it’s very clear that it’s not me. Much like Stephen Colbert, I’m playing a character.  I really try to put out content that, if an employer or future employer saw a video, it wouldn’t be something I’m embarrassed of. For that reason, I was able to, after college, embark on some consulting opportunities and use what I’ve learned from managing a personal brand and my education to create a business from it.  The way I look at it, I have the best of both worlds: I am able to stay involved in sneakers, I get to make content because I enjoy it, not because I’m worried about paying rent. I’ve been able to make a very successful business out of it as well.

 coiski: Where and how would you say your best ideas come about? Is there a method to the madness so to speak?

Blake: Honestly, I’ve never written a script for any video I’ve ever done, and I do pretty much everything in one take. Whether or not that’s good or bad, I don’t know. I recognize I don’t have the time to do the editing that other people do. So I’ll bang out five videos in one day. I’ll do all the filming and editing for them and get them uploaded in one day and during that period of a week, I’ll think about stuff I want to make content about. It really is, though, about how I value my time.  If YouTube was making me more money, I would invest in the right studio equipment, the right lighting, a new camera and other tools I need for editing.

 coiski: What has been the best moment you’ve experienced so far while making videos?

Blake: There’s a lot of stuff I’m involved in that I don’t ever talk about. I do a lot behind the scenes for brands, but the best thing from YouTube has to be something totally unrelated to sneakers. I got invited out to an event for an Estée Lauder product for men’s skin care. They wanted a sneakerhead – someone that didn’t have anything to do with men’s skincare – to come out and do this trip.  We went to Vancouver and took a helicopter to a glacier, and we went snowmobiling, flew on a private jet and went to wine tastings. I’m upset I went because now no other trip or vacation I plan will live up to that. It was just the coolest memory that I’ll ever have, and it literally had nothing to do with sneakers but everything to do with them finding me on YouTube. I did a couple videos from the trip, but the third one I couldn’t post because I was drunk. We were out there with this guy, Fearless Pete (he’s a professional bodybuilder), who has a crazy following on YouTube. He and I were just going head to head, eating and drinking everything. They took us to a vodka tasting at the world’s coldest vodka room and him and I are just whipping them back. We had such a good time and got along with everyone there. It was such a cool experience to meet with people and share ideas.

Blake: You should definitely do it because you love it and not with the expectation that you’re going to get something from it. If you do something you love and enjoy, you’ll at least get that. If you’re just trying to start a YouTube channel to be like your favorite Youtuber or starting a business because you see an area growing but you don’t actually love it, you’re gonna be doubling down on your disappointment if it doesn’t go well. So you really have to make sure when you’re doing projects, they are passion-based, first and foremost.