Welcome And Guest Intro

Speaker 0:31

Dan Davis, welcome to the Film and Family podcast. Almost forgot the name of the podcast, and uh we're super excited to have you. Um quick introduction: Dan Davis is a filmmaker, husband and father, Utah local, um, and owner of Stiry, a documentary story house, is how I it's described online. And he's also the director of um a feature film, Breaking into Beautiful, and also a recent short film, The Luckiest Man on Earth. Is that what it's called? Yeah. I couldn't remember if it was in the world or on earth. I got it right. Okay. Um, I haven't seen the latter, um, but I have seen Breaking into Beautiful, which is a wildly awesome movie. Like Oh, thank you. It's it's it's this, you know, I think about the word document, you know, and you've documented something that is so painful and so uh it's tricky because I think I know I can't imagine, I I'd love to ask you about this. Um but why don't we just start why don't we just start there, kind of jumping into the midst of things, and maybe we can pedal back and get more context. But I'm really curious where your feelings are, because I know that um when you document, and this is not the first time this has happened in the world of many wonderful documentaries, um when you document someone who's passed away when the when the film comes out, um, and or just even just documenting people who've gone through really hard stuff, which is pretty much what Stiry is all about. I mean, people going through struggles and writing their own stories, right? Um do you ever feel like conflicted? Like um what like because I just made a documentary that's about a bunch of people going through a bunch of really hard stuff. And sometimes I go, I mean, we were our story was part of that documentary, but I still sometimes feel like, am I like taking advantage or or how do I honor these people uh without um I don't know using them? That's me, my own self, you know, doubt. I don't know if you ever I don't know if you ever feel the same or similar or how you think about that.

Speaker 1 2:47

Yeah, I mean it's um it's it's hard to document something hard and that something difficult. Um but I I think in in many film circles, you know, you document things with an agenda, and um we do it very differently. Our agenda is um not something that we bring to the table, but something we decide on together with our Storytellers. And so because those align, um, there's a deeper connection. Uh, there's a way that we honor their story in a in such a positive, uplifting, um, accurate way that makes them feel comfortable in the process. And really, if you were to look at our our secret sauce, it's it's that it's being able to just be genuine and authentic with somebody and making sure they know that their story is the most important in the world in that moment. And we make sure that we our staff, our our production crew, everybody is on the same page with that. Um, and that means we just there's certain people we won't hire, certain people we won't work with, or certain companies we won't work with, because they don't have that same agenda. And so we just make sure that we keep that pure um motive going into each film that we do, just like breaking into beautiful, and make sure that we capture it in a way that truly honors them uh with no hidden agenda.

From Sports Entrepreneur To Film

Speaker 4:13

Yeah, yeah. I think that's awesome. I um I want to ask you a little bit about um kind of pedaling back, like when did when did these creative fires start burning for you and you said, okay, I want to make films. And was documentary always part of that picture? Or or did you grow into that or kind of find that later? Or did you not want to go into film and then I don't know what's that story look like?

Speaker 1 4:39

Yeah, very, very different for me than I think a lot of filmmakers, where uh it wasn't something that was on my radar. Um I went to business school, always wanted to be an entrepreneur and always had been an entrepreneur and wanted to work for myself, but never saw myself running a documentary film, you know, Stiry house. Um that that just wasn't wasn't in my my you know vision as I graduated from business school and and went to go create. And um I thought sports was gonna be that because sports was a big part of my life and competitive sports was um just everything to me. And so I created a business around that because I loved it and uh trained youth athletes, trained thousands of them, and and felt like, oh, this is great. This is my calling in life. And then when that business all kind of crumbled through some various mistakes that I made and some others made, I felt like I was lost for sure, trying to figure out what I was supposed to do next. And um, I mean, it would take too long for this podcast, but eventually I I the long story short of it is I ended up getting hired as an entrepreneur to run uh a film production company for a director. And that was my introduction truly into the the power of film. Uh I knew the power of film before, but until I actually got into it and ran the business and saw the creative and everything around it, I I didn't like fully understand it and appreciate it and love it uh until that happened.

Running A Production Company As Business

Speaker 6:13

So you got hired by a production house, like a director who wanted to have a production studio. You got hired to run it. What what does that mean? You were like the producer, or were you just like a like a production coordinator? Uh what does that mean? Because I think that's gonna raise some eyebrows from some listeners who are gonna go, oh, how how'd you how'd that happen?

Speaker 1 6:31

Yeah. So I mean they they were looking for somebody that knew how to to run a business, not somebody that just knew how to run a production. And uh they had had somebody prior to me that was a traditional producer or production coordinator running their business, and it just didn't work for them. And so they said we want to bring somebody in that has management experience, leadership skills, um, has the ability to take our business to the next level. And so that's why I ended up getting the position over a bunch of people that had experience in film. Um, and it seems really odd for a lot of people to say, well, you didn't have any film experience. How could you, you know, build that company and grow that company? And and I think it was because that director thought outside the box and said, you know, we need to run this like a business, not just a creative studio. And we need to pair those things together. And so I I brought my creative expertise, my marketing, you know, expertise and background and and business management background, and was able to successfully run it as business for him while I was there because I I feel like in a lot of ways I was at an advantage because I wasn't sucked into the you know existing processes and procedures that maybe you know some were effective and some were ineffective. I came into it really, really blind and was able to look at everything, you know, um bird's eye view versus you know, boots on the ground. Uh sometimes you get a little too close to it in business. And I looked at it from kind of the top down and then got you know my boots on the ground and was able to figure out how to run that business successfully and uh really allow our director to do what he does best, and that was the creative side, yeah, production side. So so that's that's where I think it was a a success for both of us is I wanted to do something um creative and meaningful, and he wanted to to do the same thing, but didn't want to worry about the business. Yeah.

Choosing Meaning Over Commercial Work

Speaker 8:29

So so how did you end up becoming uh you know, um step into this more creative author role where you're actually directing now and you're actually making these documentaries? Like, did you did you feel that happen internally, I guess, is my question. Like I actually now have a creative appetite where I want to start creating things.

Speaker 1 8:50

Yeah, I mean, uh I had a lot of experiences to be creative at that uh production studio that I got hired into. Um at first it was just you know all business side, and then I got into the you know, the weeds of production and creative, and I was able to launch a feature film while I was there and be involved in some of those final creative decisions and manage the post-production process and uh able to see how we can impact people through film, and I started to to kind of lean into the creative side of me that had always existed in my entrepreneurial ventures, and I loved it. I loved that part. I became less interested in the business part and more interested in the creative part, and that was more fulfilling, and I was able to, you know, luckily do both, but I wasn't able to do as much creative as I wanted. And um, the director wanted to take the business a different direction than I than I felt inspired to um take it. It was more commercial work, it was projects that weren't as meaningful. Um, we had clients like Verizon and Intel and these massive companies that we were working with, massive ad agencies across the nation, and doing work all over the world. And I think from the outside looking in, people would say, oh man, that must have been so cool. But I can't tell you how uncool it is to do work that doesn't mean anything. We were making commercials for products we didn't care about, companies we didn't really have an emotional attachment to. We were just taking, you know, checks um to do creative work, but the creative work wasn't filling us. And so I eventually decided to resign from that position. And um actually before I started Stiry, I became the CEO of a healthcare company in Arizona and did that for a time, thinking that maybe if I found my way into something that was a product that was uh more about caring for people and connection, that I would I would be fulfilled. But once again, the business side got in the way of it for me, where I wasn't able to, you know, truly live up to what I felt like was my potential uh in that. And so I resigned again, and then that's um really where Stiry was born. I I took all my entrepreneurial experience, all my creative experience, and said, if I was to do something that you know really lent itself to what I feel like I'm called to do, it would be tell people stories and use the power of film, use my business experience to bring uh stories to life and that actually make a difference, that that help people. And that's that's really where, you know, through a lot of failures and a lot of really rough times, um, I ended up, you know, starting Stiry back in those moments where I was trying to figure out, you know, what what I was meant to do.

Building Stiry On Gut And Values

Speaker 11:43

Yeah, yeah. No, I love that because I often am trying to figure out like the the blending of creating a professional product that you can sell and telling impactful, meaningful stories that that exist for their own sake. Like they should exist, they exist for their own sake, but someone's got to pay for them, or at least you gotta be making enough money to pay for your mortgage, you know. Like, and so like how have you found that with Stiry? Because because I'll just, you know, of my own experience, I've watched a couple of your shorts on your website and I was like, oh, these are really cool stories. Like these are actually maybe some people that I recognize. Um but they're all moving. Like they feel like any one of them could feel like, well, this was a passion project. It doesn't feel like I was h, you know, for the most part, I feel like you guys are achieving that. Like that it's it's uh it's especially breaking into beautiful. It's like this is a this is a work of of passion and and entertainment, you know, the story's compelling, but I don't get this sense that there's like um so-and-so hired them to make this because of a paycheck or because it was like an ad, you know, like because there's narrative-driven ads and they're sometimes really good, but like actually making them a work of entertainment that people spiritually feel drawn to for their own sake, like I want to watch this, I actually want to. That's very hard to do. So how how have you blended that? Because I guess, you know, you have this mission to make documentaries that you say are fulfilling. Um how have you positioned yourself in such a way that like you're able to make a living doing that? I guess is my question.

Stiry-First Marketing That Scales

Speaker 1 13:21

Yeah, I mean, it it all goes back to you know, what did I feel called to do, and then how do I create a create a business around that? Um and my business experience really, really helped in some ways, and in other ways, I feel like when you go down these paths, I'm reminded how many times, you know, what I don't know. And um, one thing that was for sure when I started this company is I was gonna live uh and and make my decisions based on my gut, based on what I felt like was a spiritual, you know, prompting or experience. And I would take those promptings and I would make business decisions. And I didn't create a business plan that actually, you know, came into fruition. And that's really, really hard to give people advice to say, hey, just follow your gut and you know, do whatever you want. That's not what I'm saying. I think what you should do is follow your gut, make sure that you, and in this instance, it was my wife, my partner, uh, in life, make sure that she could back what I was doing and support me as things got difficult, as I did follow those promptings. And so I went into it with this: hey, I'm gonna follow those promptings. I figured out what my calling was. It was bring these stories to life. It was to connect with people on this deep level through film. That's why I had that film experience, you know, years in the past. Um, and how do we make a smart uh business out of this? Um instead of doing what many people do where they bleed themselves, you know, dry or in the negative doing passion projects. And that's what the film industry is full of. And I I knew that I couldn't support my family or other people's families if I did that. So I went into it and I said, How can I make what we do replicable? Um, how can I make this a product, a service, um creative um licensing, distribution, all those elements um that we that deal with production and storytelling replicable? And so from the very beginning, we weren't just, hey, we're gonna go tell stories. I hope somebody hires us, you know, for uh production to do their story. We said, how can we actually flip everything on its head that I knew and um and be smart about how we approach each of these stories and doing do them in a way where people will actually watch them, and that would be our best advertisement. And so we could have easily done what I did in the last production company I ran where we just did commercial projects and we eventually just succumbed to whatever their desire was with the film. Instead, we said we're gonna make films that people actually want to watch, and we had no idea that when we approached it that way, that our watch times on YouTube and other platforms, social media platforms, and really Instagram was starting to take off at the time 10 years ago when we started this. We didn't know that our watch through percentage would just crush so much other content out there, and it was because of that the storytelling that we put into our projects. And so we did that first and created an inventory of of you know products, uh films that people would want to watch. And then companies started to say, I want one of those. How do you how do you make content that people will actually watch? Stiry's doing it somehow. People are paying attention to what they're doing. And I'll never forget, we were with a very large fitness um technology company approached us. We got a meeting with them, and they said, We we went in there with kind of a pitch deck and all these different things, because that was my experience in the past getting you know closing deals. And we threw that all out the window when the guy walked in, the marketing director of the entire company, and said, I want you to do what you're doing on your website, but for us, for our brand. And then we said, Well, then you have to be okay with the fact that it'll be Stiry focused, not brand focused. And um, that's when the light bulb for him clicked and many other companies that we've worked with going into it. They they don't have this expectation that we're just gonna shove the brand down people's throats. We're gonna do stories that matter and have your brand associated with them. So see how that's much different than we're gonna create this with a script that matches your your brand identity. We're doing that, but we're doing that through somebody that represents their brand. But that's just the production side of our business. There's a whole other side of our business with licensing and and distribution and stuff where we get to still tell stories without companies associated with them and and find homes for those. And um, that's been based once again on inspiration, on topics that matter, content that people want to see, content that people can relate with. And we've just focused everything we do on that, and we don't do anything else. We don't take other jobs that people offer us. We've said no more times than I can count for very lucrative deals because they didn't fit what our mission was, and that was to help people find their own potential through our stories. Yeah. That's that focus is has carved a niche for us that has worked well.

Breaking Into Beautiful Gets A Home

Speaker 18:35

Yeah, yeah. Well, that's super helpful um for me to hear. And um, I I I wonder about I that that caveats right into what I was gonna ask you about because that's really clarifying that you've you've got some that clients are like, can you help us find and tell a Stiry? It's like, yeah, we can do that. Um on your website you talk about how like every human has a compelling Stiry behind you know, behind their facade. There's something going on there. Um, but then at the same time, you've left yourself room or space to pursue stories that just reach out to you. You're like, hey, we want to tell this Stiry. So no one's no brand has greenlit us, we're just gonna do it and then we're gonna distribute it like a you know, you're a movie house, right? So with Breaking the Beautiful, was that you guys' first feature that that you directed and you guys made as Stiry?

Speaker 1 19:25

Yeah, yeah, that was my first feature one that I directed from start to finish. I you know, managed other feature projects, but um that was yeah, a a different experience. And um, yeah, really, really happy with how you know it ended up. But that was a uh a huge risk and huge reward.

Speaker 19:45

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, that's awesome. I'm I mean you should feel super proud of it. The finished product, most of all, but also um it seems that it's been it's been watched by many, many, many people, so that's really exciting. But with um with Breaking the Beautiful, I wanted to ask you, you guys premiered at Ziff 2022? 2023. 2023. And then you guys went live on the Angel Studios app. So that was your distribution deal. Like that was when you first came out with the movie in about two years later.

Speaker 1 20:22

So it was uh let's see, 18 months or so later. Yeah, a little more than that. Yeah, I think it was like like November, December of 24. So January 2nd of uh 2025 is when it came out.

Speaker 20:39

Okay, yeah. So really, yeah, yeah, just under just under two years.

Speaker 1 20:41

Not even a year, yeah.

Speaker 20:43

So what um what took so long and what was that process like? Because you know, with the feature, it's like, okay, we've really got to find a home that we feel confident is gonna actually get people to watch this because you could shock it out and I'm sure you had correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm almost positive that you had offers on the table from some distribution distribution companies that were probably not good, not good offers. Is that the case or was it not the case?

Speaker 1 21:10

It was it was a little different with this project. We had shopped it around to a number of people, and we had some uh theatrical distributors that wanted to launch it theatrically first. Um, and so we went through down the road of that to see if that was the right move for us. Documentary films typically don't, you know, go to uh theatrical release first. Um that's just not not it's not really a pattern that we had enough hiStiry and data to to follow. We want to be change makers and and and make a big splash, but we just didn't feel comfortable with that route. And then we had a major network that had watched the film. We were able to get to the the top of the totem pole there, and they absolutely loved the film. And they had a whole plan to launch documentary content on their uh cable network, and that plan failed miserably before they had a chance to launch um Breaking the Beautiful, before you even got the chance to go pen to paper. Um, they had a documentary film that they launched prior to ours that didn't do well on their network. So they actually scrapped um that strategy.

Speaker 22:20

That's such an that's such a common Stiry that they go. I had a bad experience with one documentary. So we don't do documentary anymore. I had a bad experience with this thing that you made, but it was similar. Yeah. So we're all done with that it's like a tips.

Speaker 1 22:33

Yeah, it was a bummer. It was, it was a great, it would have been a great partnership and I it would have done really, really, I'm convinced, uh still would have done really, really well on their network. And the Stiry that they compared it to just by nature of it being a documentary too, there wasn't really a lot of similarities, but yeah um was was not as well done. And so it we were not surprised when it was their first one they launched and didn't do well. And so we we were kind of left after two years of building that relationship with the major you know major studio um major uh distributor for us it could have created a huge pipeline for the rest of our stories. But because they decided to go that diff that direction they were in it they ended up being acquired by another major network during that time as well. And as it got messy we were left wondering okay what do we do? This is this was where we thought you know its home would be they loved Kim they loved this Stiry um and if I and I won't mention their names who it was but if you knew who it was you would say oh this would have been perfect uh with them so we were kind of left going what do we do with this and so we during that same process we got into the Zions Indie Film Festival we submitted to a few other festivals but um we had met and and had great relationships actually with a few people at Angel Studios and so we just kind of told them our plans for the film and then that we wanted to you know submit it through you know their process which is very different than other distributors. And there's a a voting process where the members vote versus just the the owners and so we we decided okay let's look into this and after gosh it was probably a good 18 months of going back and forth with them as they were figuring stuff out on their side because they had changed their processes and procedures and they didn't have a lot of content on their platform and we were worried that you know that that could be a great thing on one hand um but on the other we were just worried there wasn't enough of a subscriber base to to support our film. And so we just we rolled the dice a little bit and kind of courted and dated them long term I would say um to try to figure out if they were the right partner and then as soon as it clicked it clicked um and we said okay they're growing we're growing um it's a good time to distribute this film with them. Some of the other distributors and contacts that we had in the industry were just didn't feel as solid uh didn't feel as promising and so we just decided to go with with Angel Studios and um it's been a huge success for them um and really really helped their subscriber base it's been uh really cool to kind of watch it draw people into to their community and it's been good for us to to be able to we're just in year one of that distribution deal but it's been good for us to see you know what we can expect with the success of our films and trying to figure out how we can make that sustainable moving forward with films that we distribute through them and other places and just seeing you know the feedback and all the data that comes back from that has it's been a giant case study that's been you know really, really helpful for us to see what we want to do moving forward. But I think most importantly Kim's film deserved a home somewhere that honored her Stiry and her legacy that we portrayed in her film. And Breaking into beautiful wasn't meant to be let's just put this on YouTube set it and forget it. It was it was meant to go to the world and we needed a partner that that would do that with us. And and Angel became that partner for us and we're we're happy with how it has reached people and her legacy continues and the lessons that she taught in her film continue.

Speaker 26:18

I love that I think that's what's so powerful about documentary is that when you walk away with a finished movie, you're not just walking away with like a this was my neat thing that I put pen to paper and I created it from myself, which there's value to that and we shouldn't undercut ourselves but there's a degree of responsibility I think that comes when you're like this is a person's life this is a this is a person who's not me and maybe it's a whole community that's not me that that's relying on me to get this into a place that none of them have anything to do with film. Like that's what's so beautiful about documentary as well is that it's a film about not filmmakers again. Yeah and it's just their it's their real lives like it's their hearts and their stories and so I totally relate to that. The uh I'm super excited I now we're all about real talk but also respectfully you're totally welcome to share whatever you do or do not want to share um uh in terms of like your data how much can you share with us uh in terms of like expectations versus performance in terms of viewership or or ROI or anything you might not be in a place where you want to talk about that yet and that's totally okay.

What Distribution Data Really Means

Speaker 1 27:24

Some filmmakers are and some aren't I don't know if there's any of that that you want to get into or that would be um just for the sake of listeners being able to learn and uh and myself to be able to learn yeah I mean uh what I will share is just it your success here film really just totally depends on your distributor's ability to market it. There's there's a lot of stuff that you can do on your side to drive attention and we drove a I mean make no mistake about it we drove a ton of people to their platform tens of thousands of people that were in our network and and in Kim's network that was the um Stiryteller in Breaking in the beautiful um we drove a lot of traffic hundreds of thousands of impressions you know to their app um to be able to watch the film and so so that helped it you know be very successful in the beginning but then you kind of turn the keys over to them and and they've got distribution rights now so what are they going to do with it? And we have different press things we've done different things we've done on social media campaigns. We've had anniversary dates of you know um when she passed away to to kind of remind everybody about her legacy and there's different dates in the calendar that we can push with the the focus being part of the the film being cancer, you know, making sure that people are aware that there's a film out there about uh somebody going through this experience and everybody's got somebody in their lives that has been influenced by cancer. And so there's different things you can you can do to kind of push that message and that mission of the film. But the distributor really holds a lot of the cards. So um are they going to advertise it? Are they going to send it out to the world? And we know that you know with Angel that was one of the reasons that we went with them is we knew um going into it at least a sliver of what we know now which is that they were going to advertise it and push it at but what they didn't know is that our film would bring so many people to their platform. And so because of that momentum we created with them in the very beginning, they spent a lot of money on the advertising to get people to watch the film after that. It was converting people to paid memberships and it was also converting people to watch her film and watch other films on their platform. And um so they shared data with us about you know watch times, watch hours um you know how many people were watching it all the way through versus jumping to other pieces of content. And all that data was really really good for us and for them. And as we move forward looking into other projects like the luckiest man on earth we had enough data to say okay this is going to get watched if we put more content on there and people love this theory model. They love the way we tell stories they love the Stirytellers that we tell stories on um they love our cinematic you know uh the the way that we film the content and so every almost everything that we put through their voting process has passed. And so we have a series that we're working on right now that is a bunch of other stories of of people that are just as incredible and extraordinary as the other you know the past stories that we've told and so we're taking all that data to say is this the right home for all this content and the difference for us is we have been doing this for 10 years and have filmed over 600 films 600 stories. Wow like finished films wow so so when you look at all of those we come to the table uh with something very different than most filmmakers and so when we go to those meetings it's not hey we'll take whatever deal you can give us it's we have this massive library do you want it? Do you want these stories on your platform? And so we have opportunities to self-distribute. We have opportunities like we have with partners like Angel and and they've been a great partner for us in distributing the content we've given to them. And then we have other partners that we're working with to distribute content to figure out where's the best home for the Stiry for the the uh you know maybe type of Stiry or topic uh the length of the Stiry is really important um all those things we're taking that into consideration and saying is this going to be worthwhile and then can we fund more stories through whatever that mechanism is. Yeah and that's how we kind of determine you know what we want those deals to look like is because if they don't allow us to fund additional stories then we're we're just taking you know hopefully a check that covers just the production costs and then we're moving on trying to raise money somewhere else and it's just not sustainable and and most filmmakers know that is production dollars Stiry was never I'll back up Stiry was never started to just receive production dollars to just cover a project um that's what I knew of the film industry in the past and I knew it wasn't sustainable. We lived and breathed by this like crazy roller still roller coaster of production dollars where it's like either feast or famine and the famines were rough yeah and the feasts were great but everything you know in between wasn't that great um and for sure when the famines hit we were like gosh what's where's our next project who's gonna hire us yeah so when I saw the Stiry I was like we're not we're not doing it that way we're looking for long-term deals we're looking for uh sustainable you know content that we can build that we can license or distribute we're looking for clients that want to tell lots of stories not just one or two and because of that it's it has kept us being a pretty healthy company over the years not every year um we've had our years of struggle just like everybody else um but it's allowed us to say okay at least next month we have these stories coming down the pipeline and so we're not like hey we have nothing what do we do um and and thankfully that's kept us going as well as some deals that came in that were like hey you guys have a bunch of mental health content I want to license that for my mental health platform or you know whatever and that was all because we stayed true to stories that stir that's what Stiry stands for. Like we we didn't do anything outside of that um and that that has kept us kept us going.

Speaker 33:54

Yeah that's awesome no I love that idea of like um leaning into what it is first it exists because it in and of itself has intrinsic value and then letting that value lead as opposed to like what you said like chasing the dollars and then like hire me to make something that you think is valuable but maybe no one else does it. And so um yeah that's really interesting. So I man I had some other questions um I'm just I'm curious about so you have this library of short films and that is not typically what people go into filmmaking to make. Now you just have to go out and make movies uh and even that can be difficult sometimes to translate into anything you know financially especially um so you're out there making documentaries you made one feature which was very successful but you've been making a business out of this way before you made that feature and you've been doing it with short films. And now you're Luckiest Man on Earth for example 30 ish minutes long. Yeah um and it's on Angel now. And I I saw that just today and was like oh so Stiry Now has movies on Angel that are like shorts right so streaming has kind of opened that world up a little bit where it's more of like an episode of television like I mean it's 30 minutes like the episode it's like an episode of a half hour show and and and so now you're starting to release more content like that. I'm just curious like did you ever have any like were you guys ever planning on switching over to feature content after breaking into beautiful or or is the shorts still a model that you feel very strong about um or what's your vision and what's your opinion on on those those on those things we're gonna just do what we feel inspired to do.

Why Stiry Comes Before Directors

Speaker 1 36:08

And uh I'm not in a place to give anybody else advice on that because uh what's right for us could be totally different for you or you know any other filmmaker. For us it has never steered us wrong um to do what we feel inspired to do. And so if there's a feature link documentary that comes around that I feel inspired to do, we're gonna do it. If there isn't we're gonna keep doing the other stuff that we're doing. So for me it's it's very different. And this is where me not having a film background I I think helped in this scenario where I came into it and said you know I I didn't have this like vision of doing featured documentaries over and over again and and becoming a a famous director or you know a famous producer. I all from the very beginning was like this this is about Sturry's brand not Dan Davis's brand um and that's what I didn't like honestly uh and I know this might offend a lot of people but I didn't like that about the film industry when I got into it it was all about an individual's name and not about the entire brand that they represent. And so I I didn't want anybody to know who directed our films. I wanted them to say oh that's a sturdy film. And I think we've been successful in that in in 10 years of people you know recognizing that we have somebody that went to uh Imagine Dragons is one of our clients um along with their nonprofit uh the Tyler Robinson Foundation um it's a pediatric cancer focused uh nonprofit Tyler Robinson was the young man that that passed away from cancer and they dedicated their not this nonprofit and charity to them or to him and his family and have kept it going for years now. And um it's kind of cool because as we hear uh as we produce those stories over the years we've been doing that for about eight years um and we've seen our stories that we've done for other people go out into the ecosystem. We had somebody at an Imagine Dragons concert um where they showed one of our films text us and be like hey I just watched one of your films it wasn't even related to their nonprofit they shared something else um that was related to another nonprofit that we did a Stiry on and so we've created this ecosystem of these stories and and people recognize them if they're at a concert or at a gala or you know at a film festival they're like oh that's a sturdy film and we did that on purpose versus that's a Dan Davis film. Because I felt like when I ran that first production company that I talked about it was feast or famine because if somebody didn't want to hire a director we wouldn't get the job period full stop if they didn't want him we didn't get our company did not get the job and people identified our brand um as him not the other way around and so we couldn't bring other directors in. It was just like well either we hire him or you know we go and hire another company. And if we were to bring other directors in um they would have been like well who's this this isn't the same guy this isn't the same you know brand so I I that's what I was saying is I flipped that on its head with a sturia as I said I want Stiry to be the Kleenex brand of this type of Stirytelling. I want people to recognize it. And you don't say pass me a tissue most people don't I need a Kleenex right um so I wanted people to feel that way about our brand and our stories and recognize it. And so that that's where I mean I don't mean to offend anybody's individual name because I think you know we're all people and and we're all the creators behind these products. But I didn't want my brand to live and die by my creative. I wanted to create something from the top down that any director I brought in they would say that's a sturdy film. And we brought other directors in and people have no idea who who's directing it me or one of them. And of course we give them praise and we we prop them up and and uh we train them we invest a lot in them and their name does matter to us but our mission matters the most and people that are on board with our mission will come in and direct in a way that that fits our mission um and fits our our vision with what we want to do with the business. So you know most people grow up looking at Steven Spielberg's name and say I want to be Steven Spielberg and I I was that's that's not my nature and there's nothing wrong with it. I just decided to say I I I want to be a recognizable brand not a recognizable person.

Final Reflections And Farewell

Speaker 40:58

That's really cool. That's really clarifying and I think that what you're doing is very successful because I think that's that you're right. Like I I recognized Stiry based on posters and based on everything you guys are front facing with that with that Stiry brand. Um and I I assumed after I got to know who you were a little bit that you directed all those things. But when you say that you've made 600 nobody directed 600 short films in 10 years, you know, unless it's like a I don't know a vlog counts as a short film. Right. But the it's that's that's a lot of output so you've got to be working together you know and and doing that together and the cohesiveness of that I think is really is really telling and very successful. That's really cool. We're running out of time here but I really um I feel like you've answered a lot of these questions already. Yeah I mean I think that um this has been super educational for me and also really inspiring. And I just I really appreciate what you said about um following that inspiration. I think there can be very few things that are more artistic than that. And um but it's also like you've found a responsible path forward that will provide for your family and and keep a company sustainable. So um beyond all that you're telling stories that are just really remarkable. I've seen your Tyler um Robinson short and um and immediately felt a kinship with Tyler. I don't have cancer I've never had cancer I hope I never had cancer um I cannot relate to that experience but there's something about watching his his Stiry and all the stories that you guys have done um I've seen the uh the Iron Cowboy adjacent Stiry that you guys did. Um I don't know if you've done multiples but I saw one of them.

Speaker 1 42:48

Yeah we've done I think two or three of yeah James the Iron Cowboy yeah yeah I mean just really cool.

Speaker 42:55

I mean it was it was like uh it was the wife and how she had to sacrifice I apologize that I don't remember names yeah um the wife that she sacrificed so much to make this thing happen and I I super identified with that like there was a film project that we did and it took years to get over some of the trauma and just the logistical mess that hits you when you're not prepared for something and you launch into something that you're not prepared for and it crushes you. And and yet and yet the venture was successful. You know? And so what you're doing is so powerful. It's so powerful and breaking into beautiful is awesome and I'm excited to uh uh carve out time in my life to watch the luckiest man on earth I'm sure it will serve me and be a a wonderful emotional and spiritual net positive for me so I just thanks for what you're doing and um and we're excited to keep following what you do and probably have you back on the show uh because I'm sure you're gonna do something that brings up a whole crop full of of questions that we're gonna want to want to have you back for. So uh thanks appreciate that absolutely with that uh we'll sign out on this episode and thanks so much Dan thanks for having me appreciate it