How To Survive As A Wedding Filmmaker?

I hope I don’t lose you with this, but I am a book geek. I am going to talk about the recent one I just finished and the lessons I drew from it that can be applied for the wedding filmmakers trying to stay afloat

(4-minute read)

Alright Runaways,

I almost didn’t send this email.

Not because it isn’t valuable. Honestly, I think this might be one of the most important things I’ve written in here.

But The Runaway Club is a newsletter for wedding filmmakers, and I wasn’t sure if this would make sense.

But I don’t want this to feel like just another industry email that gets blasted to a list. I want it to feel like we’re just hanging out, talking shop, figuring things out together.

So stick with me for a second :)

I just finished a book that completely wrecked me in the best way possible. And I have been thinking about it’s application ever since.

The book is called Endurance.

It tells the story of Ernest Shackleton’s doomed expedition to Antarctica, where his ship, The Endurance, was crushed by ice. His crew was stranded in one of the most brutal environments on Earth for nearly two years.

Now, we’re not exactly fighting for survival in Antarctica, but let’s be real. The wedding filmmaking industry can be brutal. One year you’re thriving, the next you’re questioning everything.

So how do you build a business that actually survives the storm?

These were the three biggest lessons I took from the book:

1. Adapt

2. Prepare for the winter

3. Be obsessively optimistic

Adapt

When Shackleton lost his ship, the mission changed entirely. It wasn’t about exploration anymore, it was about survival. The ones who survive in this industry are the ones who pivot when things get tough.

Are your wedding leads slowing down? Take a cold-hard look at your networking efforts and your social media presence, and make some adjustments if needs be.

Are your clients ghosting you after you have your consultation call with them? Maybe it’s time to reach out to someone in the industry and have them give you some tips, or pay for a mentoring session*.

_{* By the way, we still do this with our mentors.}

Is your local market shifting towards content creation? Stay ahead of the curve and figure out a way to incorporate this into your packages. Or even try doing content creation for local brands to make some extra cash on a random weekday when you don’t have anything going on.

Prepare For The Winter

Early on in the book, right after The Endurance gets stuck in the ice, the men realize they would most likely spend the cold, dark Antarctic winter stuck onboard.

So for months leading up to the winter, they spent nearly every day hunting seals and sea leopards, stockpiling up on food sources instead of needing to take from their supply they already had.

If winter arrived before they got enough food, they most likely would run out of food for the rest of their expedition.

And if you have been in this industry for more than a few years, you’ll know that there exists a “winter”. For us, those winter months are December until April.

Just because the going is good right now, doesn’t mean that it always will be.

In fact, we can promise you it wont’t.

You need to have a plan to prepare yourself for how you are going to spend those off-season months. We focus on education and revisiting our brand to make sure that it is inline with where we want to position ourselves the upcoming year.

But many others prefer to work with more commercial clients (we highly recommend by the way)

Others decide to allocate a yearly budget towards education and invest in workshops, styled-shoots, networking events, courses, etc.. (Also recommend. We offer all those, if you’re curious, just ask us or check out our link at the bottom of this email)

But the point is, you need to have a plan. No right or wrong answer here, but how are you going to hit the ground running when your “spring” comes?

Feel free to reply to this email if you want to bounce ideas

Be Obssesively Optimistic

There was a line in the book that hit home for me.

“(Shackleton) tacitly expected those around him to reflect his own extreme optimism, and he could be almost petulant if they failed to do so.”

Not saying that you need to become petulant if those around you don’t reciprocate your optimism,

but most people who are familiar with this story would argue that optimism had a large role in the crew’s survival.

Multiple times throughout the story, when the men could die at any moment from a variety of different threats, diaries of the men showed that they were all optimistic.

I can’t begin to tell you how many times Jake and I have been at a low point during our journey in building a luxury film house, and finding the good in the moment has led us to snap out of it.

Whether you are in Year One or a seasoned veteran, this is going to be a wild ride.

Hang in there, it’s going to be okay. The good thing is you have resources, and a whole community around you.

Unlike The Endurance, most of what you are experiencing has been experienced by many others in the space, so let them help you. There is always a way up

What’s The Takeaway?

You’re in this for the long haul.

The filmmakers who last in this industry aren’t the ones with the best cameras or the most Instagram followers. They’re the ones who adapt when things change, prepare when things slow down, and stay relentlessly optimistic—even when things feel impossible.

Shackleton’s men survived because they pivoted, planned, and refused to lose hope—and that’s exactly how you build a business that lasts.

If you’re in Year One, you don’t need to have everything figured out right away. That’s why we built Beginner’s Guide To Wedding Videography—to give you the foundation and clarity to navigate these early years with confidence.

And if you’re past Year One and looking for a way to increase your rates, attract better clients, and stop running in circles with low-budget weddings, we’ve got something big coming this summer that we are excited for you to be a part of.

We’ll be sharing more soon. But in the meantime—adapt, prepare, and keep moving forward.

You got this,

Nate

P.S. I reply to every email, so if you’re a bookie like me, let me know. I can chat for hours about this stuff