This story is one of my favourites! It’s how TableTutors DJ Training Academy came into my life!
It all began because of my other business Fil-Can Clothing. Keeping it alive, I posted pics of my merchandise here and there on Social media. I got a message from Relly aka DJ Relik asking me about one of my sweaters. At the time, me and him knew of each other, but didn’t really know each other. More like, a cool acquaintance, because
we have a lot of really good mutual friends. He ordered the Filipino Food Hoody and told him I’d get at him when it was ready.
I got the ordered made and holla’d at him asking where he wanted to meet up. He asked if I know where Studio604 is? I most definitely did because I also knew the partners of that establishment. Told him I’d meet him there at the time we agreed on.
When I walked in, I first ran into Maricar (Studio604 Partner) and greeted each other. I told her that I was meeting Relly here. She then replied back with enthusiasm if I was part of the team of the DJ School that’s being set up at the studio. I told her I wasn’t, but I thought that was a dope idea though. She said that Relly is with Rico (Owner) in an office discussing plans of opening up the DJ School.
I went to the office and briefly interrupted their meeting so that I could give Relly his hoody. I greeted both of them and told them I heard you guys are opening up a DJ school! I thought that was really cool. It was such a great idea in my mind. After some small chat, I made the transaction, then said bye and wished them luck on that venture.
Months went by and by that time I took an online course on Social Media Marketing. Part of the program was to find a business that didn’t have any social media marketing and do a marketing campaign for them for free first, just so you can show the results. It was around that time of the program where I would need to find a project to work on, so I had to find a business that would let me do a marketing campaign for them.
Here’s where things get awesome….
I got a notification on IG because I got a new follower. It was a @tabletutors [TableTutors DJ Training Academy]. I checked it right away and saw that it was just getting started as it only had 1 post. It has been a while since I last ran into that meeting, but I was really curious to see if it was Relly. I messaged him and asked if that was the school him and Rico were discussing when I met him at the Studio. He replied back saying it was him. I then asked if he had anyone doing any Social Media Marketing and replied back that he’s the only one right now doing everything and would love any help he can get. I told him that I needed to work on a project and build a Facebook Ad Campaign for him.
He accepted the help. If you into the technical side of things you can read my article on my project I wrote a few years back here => [LINK]
Being involved with the business more, I got to meet the other instructors. I knew Eric (Wundrkut) from a mutual friend of ours and this was the first time I met Glenn (Gnius). On top of the Social Media Marketing, I helped out with events and made consistent efforts to be there as much as I could. I could remember one of our first Open Houses. It was during the winter season and on that particular day, it snowed heavy. If you know anything about Vancouver, BC. People can’t drive in the snow. They usually stay in and avoid unnecessary driving.
It was Relly, Myself, and May (DJ Maiyah) that showed up that day to set up for the open house. We had everything ready and good to go. When we looked outside, we noticed that the snow didn’t stop and had gotten thicker. The place was empty, but we had the “show must go” on mentality. I laugh at it now, but I can say that only 2 people showed up that day lol. After the event was officially over, the snow stopped and looked like it was safer to drive. Some other DJ’s just dropped by wanting to jam in the octagon room and just chill. There was a lot of leftover food and just let the guys have it. All in all, it ended up becoming a good night.
From that point on, I have always been involved with the brand and company. I recorded some interviews with some legit DJ’s and posted it on youtube. Hosted some of our open house events and proudly involved in building this community. We had some real good momentum going on, then we got sudden news we had to move because the owners of the building had different plans for the space. Since we were under Studio604 at the time, we had to leave when they left. Operations had to be seized temporarily. Eventually, we found a spot not far from the old location.
Although the move was successful, we really didn’t have any room because the part of the building that was supposed to be ours was still being leased by the current tenants for the next 3 months. We had to share space with Studio604. We pretty much just had a storage space with a standard DJ Setup for private lessons.
Finally the time arrived when we had possession of the space we currently have now. Some renovations needed to be done, so their was still more of a wait. The floors were done by professionals, but we did all the painting ourselves. As the time went by, we started building as we things got finished. When things started coming together, we contact more of the previous students from our old location to start up again. We had more space than before and was separated from the Dance Studio. We started slow and I did some marketing campaigns to attract more students to sign up for lessons.
It looked like things were getting a bit stable and we built a community of loyal members that we now call family, are the reasons why we are still here! We did a couple more open houses and looked like we were gaining momentum again. I really like how things were going. Relly saw how dedicated I was to make this project move forward, that he offered me joint partnership with the TableTutors Brand. I was honoured and jumped on it right away as I can say that I co-own a DJ School. How Dope is that!
I was still working full-time at Canaccord Genuity and I started to slip at that job. My mind was more focused on the DJ School. I was drawn to be more persistent with running the DJ School than wanting to become a Stock Broker. I was always on my personal cell phone doing stuff for the school and I thought I was being discreet about it, until I was given a warning. Let’s just say that this was the first sign of things to come with the decision I made.
Im currently still writing about what had happened at Canaccord Genuity and the link to this future article will be posted here