S1, E49: Acme Camera Co. - Jacob Nuttall

What if one man's journey from a small-town upbringing to owning a successful camera business could inspire an entire community? Join us on the Small Lake City Podcast as we explore this intriguing question through the life of Jacob Nuttall, the passionate founder of Acme Camera Co. Celebrate the 11th anniversary of his thriving business as we share the heartfelt stories of how Jacob's childhood in Vernal, Utah, and his encounters with photography shaped his dreams and ambitions. Hear about the vibrant community of photographers that has blossomed around Acme, spotlighting the notable employees and their enduring connections.

Through nostalgic recollections, Jacob takes us back to his formative years, giving listeners a glimpse into the sentimental value of preserving family memories through photography. From carefree bike rides to high school darkroom magic, you'll discover how these cherished moments sparked a lifelong passion. Jacob's reflections on the digital age's impact on documenting life's milestones add a modern twist to this heartwarming narrative, reminding us of the timeless power of captured memories.

Transitioning from an employee to a successful entrepreneur, Jacob's story is filled with resilience and dedication. Learn about his experiences in the camera retail industry, the trials of the 2008 financial crisis, and the pivotal moments that led him to establish Acme Camera Co. Gain insights into community building through photography networking and the thrill of helping customers grow. As Jacob shares his dreams for the future of Acme Camera Co., you'll be inspired by his vision for continued growth and the creative community that fuels his passion. Don't miss out on this captivating episode that celebrates not just a business, but the people and stories that make it truly special.

Please be sure to like, review, follow, subscribe and share the podcast with your friends and family! See you next time 

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Chapters

• 0:52 11th Anniversary of Acme Camera Co
• 6:31 Childhood Memories and Photography
• 13:36 High School Photography and Creative Beginnings
• 26:17 Photography Career Development Through Experience
• 35:47 Community Building Through Photography Networking
• 40:59 Transitioning to Entrepreneurship
• 46:37 Challenges and Success of Entrepreneurship
• 57:10 Expanding Photography Services and Community
• 1:04:44 Acme Camera Co Expansion Plans
• 1:13:25 Excitement for Future of Acme Camera

Transcript

Erik Nilsson: 0:53

What is up everybody and welcome back to another episode of the Small Lake City Podcast. I'm your host, eric Nilsson. And it's no surprise that Salt Lake has a pretty creative scene From the inspiration of the mountains and all the beauty that it has. It's no surprise that people want to capture it in different ways. We've had a lot of artists on the podcast that have captured it through that medium, but there's also a lot of photographers that have captured it through that medium. But there's also a lot of photographers and there's one place that has helped people get into photography in an easy way via rentals and upcycling to help get people into photography in the easiest way possible.

Erik Nilsson: 1:26

And the place that is doing this is Acme Camera Co. Which was founded and owned by Jacob Nuttall, and we sit down with him today to talk about how he got into photography growing up in the Uintah Basin, how he found this passion and how he still chases after it today. So a really great conversation with him of hearing about this path that he's on and just celebrating 11 years of Acme Camera Co and their new space on 13 South and 3rd West. So definitely a great episode to hear about how he built this business and a lot of the pains and joys along the way and a lot of the familiar faces that helped make it what it is. So, yeah, enjoy.

Erik Nilsson: 2:07

But, jacob, I'm excited because and we talked about this when I first I mean swung by the shop of kind of my history of exposure to Acme, yeah, because I mean I had friends that worked there. I mean swung by the shop of kind of my history of exposure to Acme, yeah, because I mean I had friends that worked there. I mean Jet Renner, right, carlos and Kirill and those guys the rollerbladers, the rollerbladers Like that, like I remember when Kirill moved to Salt Lake from San Jose when I was probably like 15 or 16. Oh really, he was living on Draper and like that, oh really, yeah, thankfully, no right, but like very interesting and I'd always see them work there.

Erik Nilsson: 3:01

And like I was curious because like obviously like acme camera co to do with cameras, and then I would see jet like fixing cameras and it wasn't until I kind of looked around more and I came in that it made a lot more sense yeah, that was a fun era for sure.

Erik Nilsson: 3:11

Like we, we had a good time as I mean even when I came by goofing around and some productivity as well best in tandem, because it's like and I'm sure that's not the first time you've had, I mean, great people come through work for a little bit, go on to do something else. But it was fun to see that time of them. I mean it's kind of when they all got into photography and and really jumped in. So we're doing some cool work for sure. Yeah, like even at the 11-year party which I went to, it was fun to see one of Carlos' pictures on the wall.

Jacob Nuttell: 3:40

Yeah, we tried to get some of the other guys but we didn't hear back. But it's all right, probably out fishing somewhere. Probably could have just pulled some from the archives. But yeah, you get what you can you get what you can?

Erik Nilsson: 3:51

Yeah, it's all good well, jacob, I'm stoked to have you here. I'm obviously founder owner of acme camera co. Been around now for 11 years.

Jacob Nuttell: 3:59

Celebrated it two last week two weeks ago, august 1st, was the technical date yeah, 801 day.

Erik Nilsson: 4:05

yeah, that was a. That was a busy day because I went and stopped by your guys place, had some tacos hung out and then there was at uh second summit cidery they had a, a Utah Day or 801 party, where they did a cider with the women who run CityCast Salt Lake and who, ali Vallarta, I had on the podcast I wanted to go support. It was one, oh. And then after that I went to at Bewilder Brewery they had a I'm a big Rick and Morty fan, oh yeah. And they had a screening of the Rick and Morty anime which fan?

Jacob Nuttell: 4:38

oh yeah, and they had a screening of the rick and morty anime, which was interesting, but anyway it was. It was a busy night, but I had a neighbor who had a tattoo of one of the characters.

Erik Nilsson: 4:43

Good man, yeah, he was actually a quality individual for sure, like this checks out like I don't know about you, but here we are, no it's great.

Erik Nilsson: 4:51

But I mean, yeah, I'm excited to talk to you more because I love, kind of the community that you've created around the company and it's so fun to see at the party just to see how many people showed up, how many people supported and how many people believe in it. Yeah, I mean especially to see like I always love celebrations like that because it brings everybody into a place. That is usually people that are impactful or meaningful to your life and you just get to, like, sit back and hang out with them all.

Jacob Nuttell: 5:23

Yeah, it was a good feeling, it really was. And uh, so we had a employee past and present uh exhibition of their like one photo from each, from each person, and uh, we had them do a google form, uh, when they submitted their photos with their name and all that stuff. And they had a little comment section and, like some of the comments from previous employees over the years, like total tear jerkers, like phenomenal I don't know that, that's what that feels special. Yeah, just to get like, oh, this was some of the greatest years, or you know, I made forever friends. Sounds like a little yearbooky, but it was really nice to hear.

Erik Nilsson: 5:58

But I'm sure it goes both ways. I mean they, I mean you've probably impacted their lives in such a way, and it's rare that you get to be able to get that feedback from people and be like, oh, like, cause you never go up to him and be like no, tell me how much I mean to you.

Jacob Nuttell: 6:10

You know, luckily one of one of the employees kind of put that together. So I kind of have a degree of separation there you go Makes it a little bit more natural.

Erik Nilsson: 6:18

Yeah, Well, I mean, it is natural that way for sure, Right, right. And even then, if you went to him and be like, hey, it was a hard day, Like I miss you. I hope things are good. He's like I miss you. Like you know, were you born and raised in Salt Lake or where was the original?

Jacob Nuttell: 6:34

home. Yeah well, I was born in Vernal Utah.

Erik Nilsson: 6:38

So was my grandmother, my mom, so my grandpa's from Roosevelt, my grandma's from Vernal. My mom was born in the basin, so very familiar with that area? Yeah, cool.

Jacob Nuttell: 6:53

They're probably the age of my siblings, I guess, because I have my parents. No, no, Anyway, they moved there in 66 and moved down in 75. Okay or no, not? 75, 82, something like that. So.

Jacob Nuttell: 7:01

So what was growing up in the basin like, yeah, I was just I was a little kid, you know, and we moved when I was eight, so it was probably the ideal place to be a little kid, because you could just ride your bike everywhere. You could really not get in trouble at that age. My teenage brothers and sisters got in a lot of trouble, though, but you not. Not, there's a lot of uh illicit stuff going on in for all of those, those years.

Erik Nilsson: 7:25

Things have changed since when was my mom born 1956 yeah, so it was like nice and cute. And then now it's like oh yeah, it's a little.

Jacob Nuttell: 7:33

Yeah, I have a brother who's probably her age.

Erik Nilsson: 7:36

Wait, what's your last name?

Jacob Nuttell: 7:37

Nuttall, I'll have to ask her. We had a. There was. My dad had a business called Beast and Nicolads.

Erik Nilsson: 7:43

Okay.

Jacob Nuttell: 7:44

That, I think, just shut down a few years ago. Actually it's a small area, yeah, very small.

Erik Nilsson: 7:49

Like my mom actually just went back for her 50 year reunion at union high school and she's like there's a lot of people that aren't there anymore.

Jacob Nuttell: 7:57

I'm like yeah, it was a Uinta or union or sorry union.

Erik Nilsson: 8:00

Did I say Uinta you?

Jacob Nuttell: 8:01

said the other.

Erik Nilsson: 8:02

Oh, okay, good yeah. Union high school, where she was in the science club and the cheerleader once upon a time.

Jacob Nuttell: 8:08

Yeah.

Erik Nilsson: 8:08

She still has her cheerleading outfit. I know exactly where it is in her house and it fits perfectly. It hasn'tly yeah, hasn't missed a day, nice. But I mean at this time, I mean, was photography any sort of part of your life, or were you involved with cameras, or were you just worried about where you were going on your bike that day?

Jacob Nuttell: 8:23

Probably one of the earliest memories was my mom. There had just been like a kind of maybe a late snowstorm.

Erik Nilsson: 8:31

Okay.

Jacob Nuttell: 8:37

So it was a big storm and it was like, oh, let's go out. She wanted to take pictures in the snow probably snapshots of me as a little kid, whatever um and I remember like kind of handling the camera and taking some pictures and training, training spots and just kind of playing in the snow and whatever um. And then I remember asking something about what kind of film was in the camera or something along those lines. And she said, oh, it's black and white film. And I'm like really I mean, obviously there's deep love for black and white here, but at the time for some reason that registered as an important thing one way or the other. So I guess that's probably my first time. I was like must have cared about, you know what was going on there, so what was being preserved, and everything else isn't capturing it the exact way I see, like yeah and then the pictures actually were pretty good yeah, do you still have any of those pictures from?

Erik Nilsson: 9:30

yeah?

Jacob Nuttell: 9:31

they're all in like photo albums oh, that's awesome my mom took quite a few pictures over the years. And it's like I always sorry, oh, I was just going to say it just kind of etches those memories in your brain.

Erik Nilsson: 9:41

Totally and like my mom's in a project right now. I think she's been in the project for like two years but she's going through all of our childhood photos, organizing them by people lot, and I always like mom, just go have someone else do this, like you don't have to do this, you don't have to scan this all and make it happen, but yeah, they'll always send pictures, as she's going to be like oh, remember this or like that, and it's, it's so fun to have the journey to go down.

Jacob Nuttell: 10:03

Yeah, my, uh, my one of my daughters is turning 19 this year and it's her golden birthday, so it's the 19th on. Yeah, 19 and 19. So anyway, we've been printing a picture every day this month and so you go back to each birthday of over the years and, yeah, it just conjures up so much stuff. It's so fun to do mostly good, a couple couple bad things, but yeah, not, not everything's sunshine and everything with her was great, though yeah, that's.

Erik Nilsson: 10:31

That's a good way to put it, especially when you're being recorded.

Erik Nilsson: 10:33

Yeah absolutely um, because I was, so my was always. It was kind of ironic because he was a photographer and would always take pictures when he was there, but he wasn't really around a lot so we wouldn't take pictures. Yeah, but then that inspired my oldest sister. I mean she went to BYU to study photography. I mean she's, I mean, full-time mom, oh wow, but still I mean there's a lot in there. Yeah, but she'll still, I mean, shoot as a second wedding photography. I mean at weddings for friends do family pictures and that. So there's always been someone in our family that's been deemed like the photographer. Yeah, but I'm always so envious of the kids that grow up now, cause it's like, oh, like, for example, like my niece and nephew who are eight and nine. I'm like we can go back to the day you were born and almost fill in every single day, know everything that happened and there isn't a couple hours of the day, probably, if when they're young.

Erik Nilsson: 11:16

Oh, absolutely. And so it's funny now when, like, look, he's got food on his face, let's take a picture. Yeah, take a picture. Take a picture Spaghetti's everywhere. Take a picture. He's outside naked. Take it like those sort of dates and and then now it's fun to have those moments to capture, especially, I mean when you have I mean a 19-year-old, because that wasn't always smartphone time and especially growing up and you went to Basin like that's a very different smartphone. I mean smartphone time, yeah, or no smartphone time, I should say so. Your parents are there from 66 to 83. Yeah, and then is that when you moved up to Salt Lake? Yeah, yeah, so the yeah.

Jacob Nuttell: 11:51

So the economy tanked there because it was all based on price of oil and gasoline. So anyway they sold their business there. We moved to West Jordan, utah, which you know wasn't my favorite spot at the time, kind of still isn't. Wasn't much going on out there. You know the people are good, that's all fine it was just it was a weird transition. For some reason it felt almost more small town than Vernal, just because it was very suburban but kind of really spread out at the time. So like you had to ride your bike 15 minutes to go to like a store you know go get candy or something.

Erik Nilsson: 12:31

Yeah, and it's not like Vernal or like those towns where it's like here's the downtown, here's everything.

Jacob Nuttell: 12:36

Oh yeah, and everything was just right there. Yeah yeah, you could go to a little grocery store. You could do everything really fast. So, anyway, that kind of was a. That was sort of a formative period, though in relation to my opinions on, oh, community and maybe city planning even just started to develop some opinions on those things.

Erik Nilsson: 13:00

I mean, what other stuff started to develop during that time? I mean, did you have any sort of passion started to come up? Did photography start to take a grasp, and what was taking a lot of your time? Yeah, not quite so.

Jacob Nuttell: 13:08

yeah, just being a kid, you know toilet paper in people's houses on the weekends, uh, trampolines, bicycles, just very standard stuff, I'm sure just a good yeah but liking to draw and some of that stuff too, you know would you say pretty.

Erik Nilsson: 13:25

I mean, I mean at least artistic or creatively inclined growing up, or yeah I was always like.

Jacob Nuttell: 13:31

I like to draw pictures like cars and trucks okay, I was like my gig cool because I was into cars too. So yeah, so there was. There was that a bit of that creative side, and I tended to like my mom was always disappointed that I was like picky about what clothes I wanted to wear. I was like can't why why can't we? Just buy you whatever. Yeah, like no, I don't like that, so I don't know.

Erik Nilsson: 13:53

You look at back at those like little little strings of information that kind of turn into something else later yeah, it's always funny with your childhood because, like you see I mean especially in hindsight you see all these little things that are little like anecdotes, which I mean slowly start to form these like data points because, like I too was someone's like, yeah, I'm pretty opinionated about, like the shoes I wear, the clothes I wear, right, and I think all my siblings were, so it wasn't something like super new to me, but in, like, comparing to friends and their upbringing, like, oh, I didn't care, my mom handed me clothes and I wore it.

Erik Nilsson: 14:36

I was like okay, yeah, there was no part of that yeah, no, boredom was not allowed. So so you find yourself in west jordan, utah um, after growing up in vernal um, starting to get informative years having some opinions. I mean did you have? I mean, how many siblings did you have?

Jacob Nuttell: 14:52

were you pretty close with gigantic family. Oh, oh, yeah. So I have eight brothers and sisters, so eight siblings and we're all quite a bit older than me. Okay, I'm the very youngest by like seven years. Oh, wow, yeah, so they're all. They're all you know boomers and geriatrics.

Erik Nilsson: 15:07

So and you're the one that carries all the youth with you.

Jacob Nuttell: 15:09

Yes, yes, that is my responsibility. No, but I had. I had really good experience growing up with with my siblings yeah, and I have some sisters, especially that, like I was so spoiled, cool yeah.

Erik Nilsson: 15:25

And just attention and good times. I mean that's always the best way to have, because I because I have two older sisters and the oldest sister was the mother figure of both of us, and me and my next oldest sister I mean we're best friends now, like I'm usually at least here and our kids once a week and we pow out and debrief whatever, but not when we were growing. I mean she, uh, we wanted to go bungee jumping, uh, once upon a time. So her idea was let's just tie a bunch of karate belts around your waist, um, we'll put for safety, we'll put a mattress underneath the balcony, oh, and we're going to have you jump, just go for it, yeah, and so I'm like sure what's the worst that could happen and so literally jump off like a two-story balcony and I jump and then about three feet above the ground just kind of have this like and just like

Erik Nilsson: 16:11

and I'm hanging above this mattress and sure enough she's like, oh shit, but she has to go in the house, down around, down the stairs, around the back again and then trying to untie these really cinched knots that have just been tightened. And that's just one of many of the experiments that I've got to be part of, but I mean, it's all fun memories now All attention at the end of the day.

Jacob Nuttell: 16:33

Oh yeah, I loved it. Yeah, it's when you're ignored. That's the worst. Oh yeah, right, so it was teasing is far better than than nothing.

Erik Nilsson: 16:41

Oh yeah, Would rather that than be shot. Well then she everybody went to high school eventually, and then I got left behind, but I still.

Jacob Nuttell: 16:55

I still had. My first introduction to photography was just taking a high school class and it was just, you know, the first photo class you could take. But back in the day, you know, there was dark rooms. Digital photography was like in someone's brain somewhere. It was, you know it was going to happen soon, but just was like the first thing I really enjoyed doing at school like actually look forward to the class, liked who I was around, I like one of my classmates like who went to like homecoming together and like just had like all these positive associations and then just learning how to take pictures all in black and white film with a nikon f from like 1967, uh, with no meter in it, with a handheld meter and just tons of mistakes, and then you know two shots, maybe on a roll, that are kind of cool and so, yeah, it was enough. It was enough to like I was glued in. I was.

Erik Nilsson: 18:00

And I'm like always envious of that part of high because I didn't take photography in high school and in hindsight I wish I would have. I mean, in hindsight I wish I would have taken a lot more creative classes, because I was a creative person who didn't know they were a creative person until like 20 years later. Not who didn't know they were a creative person until like 20 years later. Not 20 years later, but around there. Yeah, and again, like my sister who I mean that was her foray into photography as well was high school photography she got to, I mean, take pictures, go, develop it all in the dark room and have so much fun having the entire magic process. Yeah, and like the only the closest thing I had to that in high school was like graphics, where I mean making stickers, t-shirt, graphic design type stuff.

Erik Nilsson: 18:36

Yeah, and it was just I mean me and a bunch of my friends I just wanted to make stickers and t-shirts and we did right and it was fun, I mean especially as I go to um. I mean like as I kind of talking about going to like these huge printing presses now and I'm like, oh, like this is like what I used to do, but actual, like real ways of doing it and it's's and it's so fun to see and like I wish I would have had more of that, but it's also those same experiences I've found are so many and so many other people. That really is like that high school photography, really. There's something that clicks and people are like, oh, like I can go out, see something, capture it, create something, capture it and have that be I mean a great experience Cause, but I mean before then in school, there really isn't anything like that, like no one's going to trust a I mean eight, 10, 12 year old with, I mean a camera of any sort of expense and hope that it goes well yeah.

Erik Nilsson: 19:23

Just a little bit.

Jacob Nuttell: 19:31

Yeah. So yeah, part of the magic of that too was, you know that age. You have a driver's license at least I did and so you just get to go out and just sort of be by yourself and be chill and look for things to photograph, you know, based on your assignment, I guess, um, but it was just a time to have like some solitude, but with something on your mind, you know, not just drifting, it's like directed solitude, yeah, yeah.

Jacob Nuttell: 19:52

So I think I remember really enjoying that. You know, know, it's when you're like take pictures of textures yeah, or something silly, but yeah, so you have to think about what that means, but, um, their patterns are, you know, very simple in the beginning, uh, but yeah, that time was really enjoyable was there any type of photography you were like drawn to or any direction you were going, or was it just kind of wherever?

Jacob Nuttell: 20:16

you were told. Actually not really just because you're shooting black and white, you're just hoping to get like a vaguely interesting photo that will also be printable and that you can get a decent grade with.

Erik Nilsson: 20:27

So it was, I think I kept it fairly agnostic or whatever you want to say, cool, I mean, it's also nice because, like, I'm going to be daunting, for if somebody like, all right, here's a camera, go, do whatever you want, yeah, that's a lot to take in. But to be like all right, like let's go take a picture of a tree, go to the landscape, go, yeah, portrait of this here, do this in black and white, do this in color, is at least a good like checklist of things to go down, yeah and I had a.

Jacob Nuttell: 20:52

I had a great teacher horse holstein is his name shout out but um, so he gave us. He gave us a bit of a art history to go with the, what we were doing. So the first few classes, or whatever, were all just about studying the, the classic, so to speak. And then the assignments were kind of based on more like broad ideas versus like a picture of that thing or this thing. It was more concepts and that was a. It was a fun. That's a great way to start.

Erik Nilsson: 21:24

What high school, was this at.

Jacob Nuttell: 21:25

West Jordan high school.

Erik Nilsson: 21:26

There we go.

Jacob Nuttell: 21:26

Yeah, it renewed my faith in the West Jordan community.

Erik Nilsson: 21:30

There you go. There's gotta be something else. You're like well, burn this place to the ground, leave it in the rear view mirror. We're going somewhere else. No, not at all. No, a lot of good people out there, yeah for sure. And so I mean, obviously this is like high school formative years of kind of quote, what you're going to do for the rest of your life, or what you want to be when you want to grow up. I mean, how did that.

Jacob Nuttell: 21:51

I mean, these experiences shape that to it pretty fast. So, you know, I kept taking whatever classes were offered, so I didn't skip any time. It was like all the photo classes, um. And then it was Jordan school district, um, and they had a big vocational programs for all kinds of things, so, uh, you know, diesel mechanics and, uh, hairdressers or whatever and lots of things anyway, but they had a photography program, uh, which I hope is still going, but it was half a day Basically, it was like three periods long, and you went offsite, well off from away from the school, to uh their facility, um, and we had a color dark room with a auto print processor, um, a studio space, a gigantic black and white back room, our dark room, um, just everything we needed, uh, photo paper film, uh, extra cameras. If we needed it, everything was covered and it was just like just do it it's like a kid in a candy shop.

Jacob Nuttell: 22:57

Yeah, I can have access to all this and use all this yeah, and you get to sink your teeth in because you're like can work on a project for like two hours and there wasn't a lot of like uh, it wasn't a lot of instruction time, it was kind of like they just checked in with you, make sure you're like progressing, but it was very just up to you what you wanted to do and also like really cool people in there from all different areas.

Jacob Nuttell: 23:22

You know different high schools in the in the district. So I ended up doing that for two years. So it was like basically half a day for two years in high school. I was like I was pretty spoiled about that really. You know, if you think about it. Um, and then I ended up working there too, like as like they called it lab aid, but we did a lot of work for the teachers and different people that needed let's see maybe slides for a presentation, various things that were kind of photo lab oriented we would do for teachers in the district got it as the service provided.

Erik Nilsson: 24:00

I mean that's nice just because. So then, not only do you have I mean this almost half day, every day to have that time, because, like I was thinking about it the other day, about like, if I took art in high school especially I mean because I love to paint, and so the thought of like, oh, if I took painting in high school would especially I mean cause I love to paint, and so the thought of like, oh, if I took painting in high school, what would that have looked like? I was like that would have been weird, cause I would have had like an hour and 20 minutes to like get to class, set things up, get started, clean up and go. I'd be like I'd be painting for like 30 minutes. This wasn't worth it.

Jacob Nuttell: 24:27

But don't, I have.

Erik Nilsson: 24:36

Sometimes our attention depends on it. Attention span at that age, about right, yeah, that tracks. No. No, especially undiagnosed adhd kid over here I would have been like so are we done yet?

Jacob Nuttell: 24:40

or like, can I just do anything else? No for sure, yeah, no, so yeah, it was a great experience. So there was just the self-guided education part, um. And then, yeah, working there after school, for I think it was four dollars and sixty60 an hour and it topped out at $4.67 an hour, making the big bucks you like, really proved yourself. Nice, yeah, and paid every 30 days as a high school kid. A little rough, yeah, but but it was worth it because it was just fun and you know, it just was more what I wanted to do.

Erik Nilsson: 25:11

So that's the way to do it, be like I get paid something to do what I want. Like, yeah, okay, like, don't, don't tempt me with a good time. Exactly. So you're getting paid less than $5 an hour to be a lab aid at this at this school district program? Yeah, I mean, at what point did you start making it more of like a I mean a full-time thing, or like, yeah, what were your next steps after?

Jacob Nuttell: 25:34

though you know, along the way, uh, you know some of my siblings would. They were kind of like pseudo graphic designer people and they would do like newsletters for some businesses and things like that, and so they'd ask me to do a few like photos of like this little event. Come and take some pictures, or we need pictures of uh kids like boarding a school bus for just this, instead of buying a stock image like it's easier for me to send my little brother to take some pictures.

Jacob Nuttell: 26:01

He'll do it for like seven dollars, you know, so don't worry about it. Um, so I started doing like little minor assignments like that, and that was fun because sounds like the.

Erik Nilsson: 26:10

I mean at least some of your siblings were also some sort of creatively inclined.

Jacob Nuttell: 26:13

Yeah, yeah, exactly so, um they. So the family business back in Vernal was, um, it was called Basin Nickelad, so it was a pseudo newspaper, but really just classified ads mainly. But it was in the era of everything being assembled by hand and then photographed and then printed, so like no digital anything of any sort to use. The best tool they had was a typesetter, which is this weird machine. I mean, all my siblings learned to use it where it would. Basically, you could type like a font and it would come out on like a little ribbon, and then you could cut that up and paste it on the board with the photos and all that stuff, and then you take it in a room and you literally take a big photo of each page and then that's what gets printed.

Jacob Nuttell: 27:01

Very different times, yeah so, and then more people, other people will know more about that process, but they all participated in all of that. So, graphic design yeah, what they called clip art these big books you'd cut out like a graphic or an image or like an arrow even, or something like that, and you'd literally take a glue stick and glue it on this big page and they would assemble the whole thing that way. So all of my siblings worked in that Got it. My oldest brother ended up being a graphic designer and making his money that way. My sisters did the typesetting thing. While that was still relevant for a while, this yeah, it was formative for everyone, I think.

Erik Nilsson: 27:41

It's nice to have. I mean it's nice for everybody, because siblings get involved, they get experience. But then parents are like it's a lot cheaper to have you guys come around here than to hire anybody. So let's give you guys some like great experience.

Jacob Nuttell: 27:52

I'm not going to buy you anything more.

Erik Nilsson: 27:53

You're making money yeah, like you're making me money, just go go play with the, the stuff I need you to and we can. We can do it that way. Yep, so you're, you're helping your siblings I mean especially the graphic designers taking pictures and such um. I mean, was school in the picture? Did you go study anywhere?

Jacob Nuttell: 28:09

no, yeah, so you know, that's the high school experience. Um, I had, you know, and I was putting together like a portfolio at the time. You know was part of why we were there. And then there was a portfolio review that they did at Spanish Fork. There's a big art museum there that's really cool forgetting the name of it right now, but you all know what it is.

Jacob Nuttell: 28:35

So they do like a an annual portfolio review for high school students. And then you get sort of you end up going there and then meeting with instructors from different universities and they'll look at your portfolio and tell you whether they're kind of interested or not. And tell you whether they're kind of interested or not, and then you know, if they see something that they like, then they'll actually take it and review it back on campus. So, anyway, I got selected to do that with the U University of Utah. So they took my portfolio and like we'll contact you, and so I did that and I ended up being like first runner up for a full ride like art scholarship, but first runner up.

Jacob Nuttell: 29:22

Yeah, the best loser is always told me, yeah, finest loser of all time, yeah, so, uh, unfortunately, the kid that got it like he didn't pass away or get cancer, so I didn't get it. You know, mixed bag, right, yeah? So, yeah, that was, you know, brush with greatness or something, but um, yeah, you know brush with greatness or something, but um, yeah, so that would have been cool, but you know the story ends well anyway.

Erik Nilsson: 29:47

So yeah, so you runner up in there. I mean, at this point, I mean, what do you want to do with photography? Do you still look at it as like a career and yeah, I was very.

Jacob Nuttell: 29:58

Yeah, I was probably. You know, through my senior year I was pretty fixated on that. That's what I was going to do, somehow. Okay, the trick is to. It's really hard to form an actual photographic career, especially if you're not, like you know, a photojournalist or something that's really kind of more narrow. I started getting fixated on wanting to be like a fashion photographer, got it, so I thought that would be cool. That seemed to be what I kind of gravitated towards. But that's a path you know like, especially like west jordan, there's not a lot of like fashion scene.

Jacob Nuttell: 30:36

Yeah, not quite lake city. There's not even fashion scene, no very different world, um, so I was trying to figure that out and um, trying to get you know a job as being assistants and stuff like that, and it's uh, it was kind of rough, it's hard to find stuff, but um, but yeah, eventually you do a little photo work here and there and worked at park city for a couple of years on the winter ski slopes. You know, taking pictures of that'll do it of of all the uh, the semi-happy uh skiers up there.

Erik Nilsson: 31:09

Yeah, some happy kids, some not so happy parents.

Erik Nilsson: 31:12

Yeah, I mean, that's what we we were big, uh, customers of the like. Even today, we go to my grandpa's basement, because he was the one who taught us all how to ski, and we go down there and it's like, oh, here's the like, all of these pictures of all of us skiing throughout the years. Usually it's like, oh, here's the like, all of these pictures of all of us skiing throughout the years. Usually it's like the exact same place, at the exact same time taken by the people.

Jacob Nuttell: 31:31

Oh, yeah, yeah. So yeah, park city is probably like the the heyday of that stuff, because it was all still film, um, and yeah, you just had to get it right. Yeah, you know, because, like first of all you, it was a commission-based thing, so so the picture didn't turn out. You didn't sell anything, you didn't make any money. Second, like your boss, will be pissed because he's not making any money either.

Jacob Nuttell: 31:55

And then, third, the customer's pissed because they you know they wanted a photo Everyone, you, so you really get a lot of practice cause you're just doing a lot of work every day. Um, you have to make it happen. And then you also have to like deal with people from like New Jersey, or you know places where a 20 year old from Utah isn't used to like this level of like tension, or you know just various personalities from they're spending world dozens of dollars to come here and they have this picture to show all their friends Like damn it.

Jacob Nuttell: 32:30

we're going to have fun and it's going to look like we're having fun.

Erik Nilsson: 32:32

Yes, and if you're not smiling, I swear to God.

Jacob Nuttell: 32:34

Yeah, oh yeah, they'd scream at each other and then I'd be like, okay, so um and smile you know, maybe not hate each other for a picture. Yeah, like you have to be the mediator in these weird situations, but it was. It was very educational and like really cool people to work with, skied a lot, took lots of pictures, got really cold. Um, spent a lot of time driving up and down the Canyon, but, yeah, definitely a formative experience. It's great, really good.

Erik Nilsson: 33:09

And so I know that, um, I mean eventually the retail side of things, I mean especially the service side of things, came together. I mean cause I know you were a picture line for a good amount of time Is that when that started to come into the picture.

Jacob Nuttell: 33:16

Almost yeah. So what I was doing is I was doing winters, um, at the park city resort and then the other part of the year I was working at what was Inklies at the time, which was technically Ritz Camera, but so I was doing like camera sales and so on, and then it would get to the part where it's like basically slow season for retail, which is like right after Christmas, and then I'd go work in Park City for a few months and then come back and it was just kind of a win-win for everybody. So that's how it sort of mainly started.

Erik Nilsson: 33:47

So and how did you like that experience of being more, I mean on like the not necessarily sales side, like retail side, compared to being the one?

Jacob Nuttell: 33:54

yeah, um, it was good, and you know, I guess, to back up a little bit, I did spend a year in richmond, virginia. My sister lived there and uh, we hung out for a while and I was kind of at two jobs for the most part. One was working in a little camera store, one hour photo place, and then also kind of regularly assisting a wedding photographer there, and so yeah, I kind of really kind of got to dive in in that way too. So that was my point being.

Erik Nilsson: 34:30

that's the kind of where the retail end of it started out got it, though it has to get somewhere else and change up the scene a little bit.

Jacob Nuttell: 34:36

Yeah, it was really good, a super good experience. I would do it again. But, um, yeah, so, and then I'm, so I'm working at Inkleys, um, and I essentially got, I guess, recruited, you'd say. Maybe they came in, some people from picture line came in and were like, hey, give us a call, or whatever.

Erik Nilsson: 34:54

So You're like all right.

Jacob Nuttell: 34:56

They, they want it's yeah, so it felt good at that time. You know you're like, you know that's.

Erik Nilsson: 35:00

that was definitely like a step up and and it's nice to be like recognized for like doing something well and being like hey, we see what you're doing. We want you to come be a part of this.

Erik Nilsson: 35:09

Yeah, it was a good feeling absolutely and I mean I'm sure, I mean just as I mean assuming, because I would do and have done the same thing, where it's like people walk in and they're like I need to learn a lot of things really quick, oh, yeah, oh, those first like few months were just like so intense because the hype it's a pretty intense environment.

Jacob Nuttell: 35:29

Um, a lot was expected. Like if you're talking to somebody who's interested in something, you're just supposed to sell it, like if you don't, it's like why, yeah, why didn't they?

Erik Nilsson: 35:39

came in interested in this. Why didn't that work out?

Jacob Nuttell: 35:42

So I was like okay, well, we'll get it next time.

Erik Nilsson: 35:45

Yeah, didn't that work out? So I was like okay, well, I'll get it next time. Yeah, I mean, especially, people are like oh well, I'm trying to shoot this, or like I kind of I think I want this camera. Is this what I want to do? You're like well, let me tell you about my knowledge of all of these things, and this is probably what's going to happen the most, and I'm sure it's nice to see people come in with questions or like trying to learn, and then they come back like well, look at this picture I took, yeah, and see people go, I mean throughout the process.

Jacob Nuttell: 36:05

Yeah, I'm in and out end up being, like you know, support crew for some really talented people, you know, if you're lucky so that, and just some snapshot shooters too, but a little bit of both.

Erik Nilsson: 36:17

Yeah, I think yeah.

Jacob Nuttell: 36:18

so it ended up being a really uh, really like social experience and also like learning to be around all kinds of different people. Um, just like the ski slope stuff is like there's so many personalities out there that you just have to figure out how to kind of connect with yeah, and if you can make a little bit of a connection, then you're more likely to sell something or, you know, happy.

Erik Nilsson: 36:47

so that's probably, you know, the biggest, one of the biggest things I learned doing that and it's nice too because, like I mean, salt lake in itself does have a pretty broad creative scene and a lot of people do gravitate towards photography because I think, I mean not to say it's like the easiest isn't the word I want to use, but it's a good introduction into how to capture the world around you. Yeah, relatively accessible, yeah, that's the word, relatively accessible way to go about it, and it's even fun. Now, like I mean, I'll be driving around downtown or driving home and I'll see someone with, I mean, pull up a camera and take a picture of, I mean, a building at golden hour.

Erik Nilsson: 37:23

Yeah, or I see people a picture of, I mean, a building at golden hour or sees people walking or like something, and I'm like, ah, like I always appreciate it, cause I'm like I will always appreciate someone that sees beauty in something so simple and wants to capture that. Yeah, absolutely. And so I mean it's, I'm sure, to your point of like the community side of thing and the social side.

Jacob Nuttell: 37:38

I mean you see the same people come through, you talk, they show you something they ask for feedback, you give it like, and just being able to make those friends from that. Yeah, amateurs especially like love to show a salesperson or whatever a photograph and just you say anything about it and I, you know, if I were on the other end I would appreciate it too, totally, um, but it's fun, yeah, and it's fun to see how people like really catch on and learn stuff and progress, and so that's kind of at the root of kind of where we're at, you know.

Erik Nilsson: 38:09

So and I mean did that stay? I mean relatively the same, going from Inkleys to picture line and that experience, or do you feel like I mean?

Jacob Nuttell: 38:16

the Inkleys thing was just so, it was just a bad like corporate environment kind of thing. So you wanted to kind of do that stuff, but you were, you had to sell um, what they call the six pack. So somebody buys a camera, they have to buy five other things at the same time. So, you need some film. You need a bag, yeah.

Erik Nilsson: 38:35

And then yeah.

Jacob Nuttell: 38:36

And then you had to hit all these little weird targets and like if you sell them this other thing, so it was just really convoluted and kind of artificial, you know. So, um, it was good to get out of that environment, honestly, totally yeah.

Erik Nilsson: 38:51

I mean it's because it's picture line, local, local, or are they nationwide as well? Uh completely locally. Okay, that's what I thought, but I wasn't sure. Yeah, cause who I'm trying to think? If I remember, I feel like I know the owner, but I can't remember what's her last name.

Jacob Nuttell: 39:07

Nielsen.

Erik Nilsson: 39:08

Yes, so I, I dated actually I wouldn't even say dated, it wasn't even that far I hung out with his daughter in college, yeah. And so, like I remember, I'd just gotten back from my mission, I was um, met this girl and she's like oh yeah, it's so funny, you're going to start school with you. She's like I'm in a sorority, I'm like I'm thinking about joining a fraternity. She's like don't do it. And I was like, okay, she's like you're just going to turn out like everybody else. I was like, excuse me, and what she meant was that I was going to go make a lot of friends and be distracted by other things except for her and ended up making like the having the greatest experience. But I remember, yeah, yeah, montana nielsen now, and I can't remember last night, but yeah, picture line that always stuck with me yeah um, so yeah, I'm sure that's a better experience when it's like you're like so what's six pack?

Erik Nilsson: 39:53

am I selling like six pack or what like?

Jacob Nuttell: 39:54

we're selling cameras, yeah just having like some buddy and or you know some people in, uh, baltimore, maryland, basically saying like this is what you need to do in Utah. You know, like in in Utah, yeah, and the president of the company came in once to have like meetings. His name is David Ritz and just one of his biggest stores was the one in Salt Lake like a nationwide. It was just really large facility and he did a lot of sales and everything else. But, um, he came in for meeting, he went straight in the front door and did a hard left and went straight to the elevator, didn't like come into the sales floor or any of that at all, went straight up, had his meetings and left exactly the same way. And that made such a big impression of like holy crap, like we're all here, like working for you, and you don't even like walk around and say hi or shake a hand or make eye contact, anyway, so that just that corporate mentality was not fun.

Erik Nilsson: 40:59

Yeah, I mean, that's a good anecdote of like what that felt like to compare to, I'm sure, a picture line where I mean they're there every day. They have, I mean, a large vested interest. They do want to keep you around, they do want to make you, I mean, doing a good job. Yeah.

Jacob Nuttell: 41:12

Yeah, so it was. Yeah, it was vastly better experience, yeah.

Erik Nilsson: 41:16

And because I know you were there like what like 15 issues, 13 years, 13 years.

Jacob Nuttell: 41:20

Yeah, yeah, so learned so much stuff.

Erik Nilsson: 41:23

And I mean, obviously I learned a lot. It was such a large part of that. But I mean, at what point did the idea start to creep up in your head that you're like maybe I want to do my own thing?

Jacob Nuttell: 41:30

Yeah, just like little thoughts here and there, you're like, oh, you know, you start to try to understand, like what maybe the market is, at least locally. And you're like, you know, if you did things just a little different, if you, if you adjusted this and did that, you know you would attract this type of customer and you'd maybe sell more of your higher margin products too. And um, so I just started, yeah, developing kind of a vision of what I would do, kind of in fantasy world in a sense.

Jacob Nuttell: 42:04

So I wasn't always looking to just like hurry and do it, you know. And then they asked me to manage a store in Draper. So it was like their first like satellite store, and I guess only one, unless that's changed recently. But so I got to manage a store, for I think it was about two years, nice, and that was a good educational experience too yeah, and it was right in 2008, so complete like financial, uh crisis era.

Jacob Nuttell: 42:34

Yeah, you know, if you remember so, very dark time, yeah. And then you know brand new retail store selling fairly high-end items. It was kind of like timing was a little, but yeah, and you couldn't predict it, but what we made, it work for a little while.

Erik Nilsson: 42:49

Yeah, and I'm sure there was so much cause again, like from your perspective, you're like, oh okay, well, I might do something a little different if I did my own thing or this might be my like niche of customers, but I'm sure being able to be like, okay, like Jacob, time to run your own store at, yeah, in draper, and yeah, I'm sure that was a lot of great experiences a good amount of support, but and you know, I didn't have to worry about a lot of the fundamental things as far as, like, buying, inventory or you know, a lot of that was just done, which is great.

Jacob Nuttell: 43:16

But, yeah, it was like how do we do? Okay, so, trade secret maybe, but we had to do at the time, 2009, 2010,. We had to do $7,000 in sales a day, which, um, was small for that organization, but for this little store, like that, was kind of a big feat.

Erik Nilsson: 43:36

Yeah.

Jacob Nuttell: 43:37

Like, and you know, we were selling products that were relatively expensive, so it kind of added up. But, um, yeah, there's some real pressure and I wanted to. You know, I wanted to deliver. So we me and a couple other guys that and girls that work there doing that we had a lot of camaraderie and we did so many things to try to be creative and get people in the door and keep them there and, uh, yeah, it was a. It was a really super fun time actually.

Erik Nilsson: 44:08

I mean that's fun when it's like, I mean when people are gathered around a common goal and feel like somehow part of it. I mean that's when, like great thing, like magic happens, when you have corporate America saying, well, here's what you have to do, and I don't know you personally, or really care, but as long as the percentage in this area is not up to par Exactly and then.

Erik Nilsson: 44:28

so when you have that camaraderie I'm sure those are people you still have some sort of contact with today because it's, I mean imagine you all ended up in some sort of same arena. Yeah for sure. But yeah, I mean because, as you alluded to, I mean you have these ideas.

Jacob Nuttell: 44:51

You're like well, if I did this, this is probably how I would do it, blah, blah, I mean, and at what point did those start to become like realistic steps and things? Yeah, so, um, you know, like, as, uh, anybody might experience in a job you've been with for a long time, things start to change gradually. You change yourself, the you business you're working for evolves and changes, and anyway, let's just say we grew apart over time.

Erik Nilsson: 45:10

Happened with a lot of relationships.

Jacob Nuttell: 45:12

Yeah, you know it's, it's fair, I think, um and it was. You know it was difficult at the time and all that, but, um, so I was a little like unhappy at work, and so then I would think about it more. You know, like what would I do if I could just do this, you know, then I started to feel like I could, you know, started to feel realistic somewhat.

Erik Nilsson: 45:34

Yeah, so you're like I can do 7,000 sales a day Like I. I did that here.

Jacob Nuttell: 45:39

If I, if I could do half that or a quarter of that, I'd be fine. Yeah, you know, or a quarter of that.

Erik Nilsson: 45:44

I'd be fine. Yeah, you know so. Yeah, it's when that like confidence starts to build. You're like I could do this, Like it's not no longer this ambiguous dream and seems so far fetched, but instead you're like I'm doing it this way and if I do it that way, I feel like I could do this.

Jacob Nuttell: 45:57

If I scale it right and do all that. Yeah, so, you know, long story short, I got let go in like February of 2013. And so I just like hit the gas with writing a business plan Excuse me, Um and arranging financing, improving my credit score so I could get a good business loan or whatever things. Yeah, Um, and looking back, it's like kind of shocking how fast you can do things sometimes when you're, you know, motivated and excited and everything else. So, you know, mid-February, let's say, kind of started doing everything I could do. I had a really great mentor who was then the president of Celtic Bank, which is here in Salt Lake. Um, so we'd sit down, you know, maybe once a week for a while, and he'd tell me all the things basically not to do. You know, and it was always good to have someone to help. You turned out to be like dead on with pretty much everything. So, um, and he's like nobody, almost nobody, makes it past a year. No, nobody makes it past five years.

Erik Nilsson: 47:04

You know, like okay and like bring it on and like, and here's the. I'm going to do it to the 11 year party, that's right, I'm going to do it.

Jacob Nuttell: 47:11

You know like I might die doing it, but I'll do it, yeah, yeah, so so yeah, and we had most of our inventory and all that ready by June of that same year and then got everything polished up and all our paperwork done and everything else, and so we opened the doors on August 1st 2013. Wow, so you know what is that? Six months?

Erik Nilsson: 47:41

Yeah, I mean that's a lot of action, because a lot of people I mean it's that freeze, fight or flight, right, like I mean you have something happen, lose your job. There's a lot of people who I mean would sit there, feel bad, complain whatever. But instead you're like, yeah, actually you know what? This isn't the fire in my ass. I needed to really start moving in this direction and I know that you had wanted to take things in a lot of, I mean, repair, recycling, upcycling. I mean, was that part of the vision then? Or?

Jacob Nuttell: 48:08

primarily partially, but that's always been in my mind, I think, um, but the main agenda was like rentals. Okay, so it was always aimed at like consuming less, you know, having consumers consume less. Yeah, um, not such a direct thought, but that's the fundamental thing. At the end of the day, it's like you don't need to buy it, just rent it yeah, you don't need a brand new camera to do that.

Erik Nilsson: 48:33

You can use it every day.

Jacob Nuttell: 48:35

Um, you'd have to rent it once a week for a year and a half to pay for it.

Erik Nilsson: 48:40

So just rent it yeah, just come back here every other week and we can make it happen, you know.

Jacob Nuttell: 48:44

So yeah, and then it happen, you know, so yeah, and then it helps people, you know, facilitate their, their careers and things like that that they're trying to grow. So that's the other part of it.

Erik Nilsson: 48:52

I mean, and at that time I mean, were there any like huge learnings that you had along the way or what was going through your head at that, the little golden era of like oh we got.

Jacob Nuttell: 49:03

You know, we got a loan and we got some money and buy up all these cool new cameras and lenses to rent out and bought a little bit of retail inventory to go with it. Um, and you're just like you know, ignorance is bliss and you just kind of hum along and paints new, and you know yeah, like it's working at least a fancy car kind of uh. And you know, I thought I was uh indestructible, but you know, then the hard lessons came about a year or two later yeah and you're like wait, where did all the money go?

Erik Nilsson: 49:36

yeah, I'm not invincible, this isn't yeah I gotta do stuff. Yeah, there's my buddy at celtic bank.

Jacob Nuttell: 49:41

We got questions yeah, no, totally so. Uh, and you kind of get lured into things and you're like, get lured into things and you're like, oh, you should do this thing, you should do that thing, and uh, do these trade shows and you should have this vehicle so you can look good and you can deliver things and I don't know some status things like that. Um, and you know, american express is like you should have a platinum charge card, you should like. I got a call saying like we want you to do this.

Erik Nilsson: 50:08

Like okay.

Jacob Nuttell: 50:09

And like somebody who was, like, was very pleasant on the phone, you know, yeah, they couldn't be, there's no limit, yeah, you just have to pay it back right away, Like okay, so that worked for a while. Then you know, then stuff doesn't go quite as planned. And they're like, okay, no, we need all that money tomorrow. And you're like, well, like do it a week.

Erik Nilsson: 50:30

And they're like, no, tomorrow, no, this isn't the same pleasant nice guy I had.

Jacob Nuttell: 50:34

Yeah, this is not how this started, anyway. So just some of those lessons of like overextending yourself, maybe, and doing things that are unnecessary.

Erik Nilsson: 50:42

And you're the only person that's ever done that. No one's ever overextended themselves in this business.

Jacob Nuttell: 50:47

There's never been a tech company that's laid off hundreds of people because they overextended themselves, because they had to have, yeah, six, yeah, tennis table, tennis tables, exactly.

Erik Nilsson: 50:58

And I mean what I mean at that time was motivating you to keep going, because I mean it's got to be hard, especially when I mean there's people asking for money. There's a lot of demands. I mean things don't go as well as you would think sometimes, sometimes go better than you ever thought they would. I mean, what was your motivation at this time?

Jacob Nuttell: 51:15

Gosh, like something about like you're being still in your thirties I don't know where you're at, but I look back and like there was so much energy. But, um, I looked back and like there was so much energy, I don't know, I had so much more energy and I was committed and excited to do it. So I just like work 60 hours a week without flinching and like run around, you know, like really getting stuff done. Nice. So that was the backup plan. I guess was to work hard.

Erik Nilsson: 51:45

I mean, it's, it's always a good plan because when you plan, I guess, was to work hard, I mean it's always a good plan because when you have, I mean there is something great that when you are the one in control of everything, because again you don't have this huge corporate entity that says here's your numbers and your KPIs, go deliver it. Or even having here's our second store, we're going to have go do this, and if you don't do well enough, you're out or whatever. Or have the market turn and have no control and then be out. But yeah, to have yourself be in control, be in control of the direction, where to go. But then also realize, like I'm the one doing this, like if it goes well, hell yeah, I did it. If it goes bad, it's like well, hell yeah, I gotta fix it now.

Jacob Nuttell: 52:18

No, I had no fallback. Yeah, like I don't have like family with a bunch of money or you. You know that could be like oh, you're having a hard time here. Let me just give you up for a minute.

Erik Nilsson: 52:28

Ships are burnt. You're you're working on it, yeah.

Jacob Nuttell: 52:31

It's so yeah it's like the most stress I've ever had in my life, for sure. But but then at the same time, like you're doing the stuff you really love thing, and um, you have days that are really successful and just kept chugging along, yeah, so you know going through some ridiculous things, but you know people great, you know meeting great people, having great employees. Uh, you know feeling like you're kind of having a positive effect on the community somewhat and you know getting a little recognition here and there. You know we got like city weekly best camera store in utah or something you know. But those like little things that seem minor but they were kind of a boost at the time totally.

Erik Nilsson: 53:16

I mean, especially as you're starting up and you want because, again, like you get a little placard and all that, these things and you do want some sort of record. Like everybody loves recognition, whether they're people who say they hate it or don't Like, at the end of the day it's very validating, especially when you have this vision, this goal, this company you want and for someone to be like hey, like good job, you know, like that doesn't happen a lot, but when it does, it feels good to have.

Jacob Nuttell: 53:38

Yeah, it does.

Erik Nilsson: 53:39

And so I mean you have this place, place which I mean again, like you celebrated 11 years this year, which your buddy at celtic thing is like no one makes it past a year, no one makes it past five and you're like well, I'm already past 10 and it's still going strong.

Jacob Nuttell: 53:50

Technically a miracle, I guess.

Erik Nilsson: 53:51

But and it's fun too, because I feel like there's like a number of places around salt lake that have this. I don't want to sit necessarily at cult following, but kind of do, because salt lake is a very place of like really niche cultures and that bring a lot of people together. Yeah, and like one that I mean I always bring up is like the heavy metal shop. Like, yeah, you walk down downtown Salt Lake you'll probably see six to ten heavy metal pop shirt.

Erik Nilsson: 54:13

Yeah, it's the best and it's like the their logo and their branding stuff is just exactly indestructible and it's like this like a brand of like the counterculture of Salt Lake and I I feel like I mean Acme, like again, like because I had a foray into it for like my skating friends and still see like other places. I feel like it is kind of this counterculture like photography scene in Salt Lake and it's kind of where people go to, I mean again, if they're getting started to like to share pictures and learn and grow and rent when they don't have the money to buy the new camera they want, and I'm sure it's nice to see that community built. That's exactly.

Jacob Nuttell: 54:48

Well, yeah, that's exactly what we're aiming for, like, even if you just simplify it saying like we would like to be the heavy metal shop of cameras in salt lake city oh that's, I mean that's a great place to like so that would be, great.

Jacob Nuttell: 55:01

so, yeah, they've uh put together a really good brand and, yeah, brand is definitely a thing we focused on from the beginning. It's like we can't just simply be a store that sells things. We need to have, like you're saying, a community and a culture and some brand recognition, and we need to go outside of our Salt Lake city boundaries as much as we can, um, be more than just building in one store.

Erik Nilsson: 55:32

yeah, you know it has to have a soul behind it, or else it's. Why would anybody else go there?

Jacob Nuttell: 55:36

and give people a reason to be like oh, we want to go there because it has a certain feeling and a vibe. And they don't always have what I want because they're not a big place or whatever, but I still go back Cause I enjoy it. Yeah, good people, good destination.

Erik Nilsson: 55:51

You know it's a destination to go to, yeah, and I know I mean again to your prior comment of I mean going outside of Salt Lake walls and other things. I know that you've had a lot of fun like partnerships and collaborations I mean, one of which being like urban outfitters that you have a part on their uh uh site. But how did that come to be?

Jacob Nuttell: 56:07

Yeah. So, um, it's kind of funny story. We had some really great employees at the time Um Alana Beasley is one of them, super cool, um and a couple of people, and we were just browsing through Instagram and stuff and there's a guy in LA selling two Kodak vending machines, which we still have it. So we bought one of them.

Jacob Nuttell: 56:36

It was too much money and it was too much effort, but so we flew out there, rented a truck and drove it back All kind of disproportionate, you know amount of effort yeah, it was a family experience at the end of the day, but we just, you know, made some like instagram story stuff out of that, picking it up and put it in the truck, and so apparently some of the buyers from urban outfitters were following our insta stuff and saw that story and like contacted us Cause they were like that's so cool, like how did you get that? And you know they they were kind of infatuated, kind of, with what we were doing, but also with this Kodak vending machine, which was uh cool, but you know, not really an asset, but uh, these, not not in literal sense, but but anyway they thought that was cool and fun. And so they're like we'd like to do a conference call with you know, a couple of you guys, and so it was me and alana and then a couple people from their staff, and it was pretty nerve-wracking in a way, um, but it was, it was cool and like, well, we'd like to set something up like we want to. We want to buy point and shoot cameras from you, and so it was kind of beginning-ish of point and shoot 35 millimeter film cameras being popular or getting popular. Um, and you know they're a relatively cutting edge company. Um, they certainly know when a trend is happening and know how to address it. So, uh, so we were in Avenue for them to be able to sell those on the regular, so, um, yeah, so they walked us through all these steps.

Jacob Nuttell: 58:21

We had to fill enormous amounts of paperwork, I had to order these special stickers. We had to put in the right kind of box, you know, just lots of check marks for selling to like a big entity like that. Um, but we had good people on staff, we figured it out and then we sold them. We'd send like boxes of like 50, 50 prepackaged cameras at a time, um, and they, you know, pay us in a couple of weeks and we just do it again. And we did that for for a while. So we and then they'd sell out in like 45 minutes just through their website. I mean, that's easy. They didn't sell them in stores, um, so it was just mad dash, like how many can we get? Like one christmas? We're like we need to get 300 for the busy season, you know, like that's the goal 300 point shoots. Like give three months to do it, like go, and we just all.

Erik Nilsson: 59:11

I mean, how did everything we could get you source that many point and shoot camera have to look everywhere. Are you just like on?

Jacob Nuttell: 59:17

I mean do you have something under your couch at your house?

Erik Nilsson: 59:19

hey, can you go over your mom's house and just poke around because I'll pay? I'll pay you something for this, yeah yeah.

Jacob Nuttell: 59:25

So you look at you know various there's not.

Erik Nilsson: 59:29

I don't want to give away I was gonna say I'm sure you have it down to a science by now of where to go who to talk to your own plugs, but I do love that. I do love that story about them seeing your instagram and doing cause. There's a. There's an interview by Tyler, the creator that I don't know why it's come up like three times in the past week.

Erik Nilsson: 59:46

But he's like hey, man, like whatever you're posting on Instagram, whatever you're doing, and you don't feel like people are seeing it or getting the likes or exposure you want. He's like you're just building a resume and you never know who's going to be the person to watch. He's like I'll be on YouTube and I'll go to this channel with like five subscribers Like, wow, this music's great, and reach out to him and then I'll come fly him out. We'll like record a song and he gives a couple examples yeah, anything's possible, exactly. And like you never and I've experienced that to like some like minor effect here, where someone's like oh yeah, you were one of those views that we had. Yeah, it feels good Because it's again like you just have to keep doing what's hard and like again those like 60 hour weeks of like putting in the time and driving around everywhere and putting up with all the bullshit.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:00:28

Sometimes it all seems futile sometimes, but then it works out.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:00:30

But all it takes is like hey who went down to California to pick up this Kodak vending machine and throw it on a truck to blow up here and next thing you know you're on a conference call and getting all these stickers and packages to ship out and then we had the staff that could handle all the nitty-gritty of like putting on these three different foil stickers on the box and scanning it to match up with this other spreadsheet, and so it was kind of having that creative component, but then having a few some people on staff that were like, oh, and we'll figure out the technicalities and make it work.

Erik Nilsson: 1:00:59

So so which is hard to find people that are like I'm gonna do this.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:01:03

I was above my ability, especially alone.

Erik Nilsson: 1:01:06

Yeah, I mean there's just no way and you only attract those people and that talent because you have, like I mean, a vision, a community and something that people wanna be a part of. Otherwise it would be the same thing as is your experience at Inkleys of being like eh, you know what, like I don't like this, and I see what happens when boss man comes through and I don't want that.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:01:23

Yeah, yeah, so yeah, that was a super fun experience, and then we're still doing stuff with them.

Erik Nilsson: 1:01:29

Yeah. So I mean, and obviously, like we've alluded to, I mean, it's been 11 years since you started down this journey and this voyage. I mean looking forward. I mean what else do you hope to accomplish, or what does the future look like?

Jacob Nuttell: 1:01:41

Yeah, yeah, so at this point we're looking to just grow it all. So we have a new facility, we're in a new store that we really love being in and it's really it's a cool space. Yeah, yeah, we really love it. It's really great environment and it's also comfortable. We have in years past we haven't had like great air conditioning and things like this. It's a great thing to have this time, yeah, and so, yeah, there was some suffering for a couple of summers there, but now we just can focus on what we want to do instead of like addressing like where to put the fan and stuff.

Erik Nilsson: 1:02:23

Yeah, it's always nice to level up the problems and things you want to solve.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:02:29

So that's kind of been the goal, for sure is like let's just get all that you know building maintenance stuff just put to bed and let's do what we do instead.

Erik Nilsson: 1:02:41

It's nice to focus on the things you want to do outside of, like admin, like do these like little things that aren't worth my time but still have? At the end of the day, I have to get done, right, right.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:02:50

So yeah, so we're just gonna um. We have a student semester rental program, we do um which has started to gain a little national traction, like we're sending sending cameras like florida and um, like boston area and different things like that in california so is that a high school students?

Erik Nilsson: 1:03:09

college students?

Jacob Nuttell: 1:03:10

yeah it can be either one or both, so, um, largely college students, and the concept is we're not necessarily the first ones to do it. But you know, you sign up for a photo class and you're like, well, you're going to need a camera and you're like, well, I don't know if I'm going to like this stuff, yeah, and or you don't have $300, $400 to buy the right camera, so yeah, so we just offer kind of the minimum camera that meets requirements, sometimes a little bit better, but always adequate, and it's in a bag and it has a strap and charger and just all the basic stuff you need, yeah, and we make sure it always is meeting teachers' requirements for manual controls and all that kind of thing. Uh, teachers requirements for manual controls and all that kind of thing. So we just, uh, have been accumulating those units and then a couple times a year we send out pretty much all of them that's cool, mostly ordered through our website.

Erik Nilsson: 1:04:11

So I mean I'm sure it's nice to see, I mean it all come full circle right, because I mean at one point you were that high school student that's exploring photography, doesn't have enough money to go buy his own nice camera from Inkleys, right. And then now you get to see these same students be like, oh shit, like I'm curious about this, but I don't have the money, and I really want to like, yeah, yeah, yeah, Like this is going to be way more affordable and it's not even one of those like oh.

Erik Nilsson: 1:04:36

I'm going. It's actually like five or $600.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:04:39

And what if I bought the wrong one? That doesn't actually do the things.

Erik Nilsson: 1:04:42

Yeah, Then you're shit out of luck in a lot of ways. So I'm sure it's nice to be able to cause again like it started as primarily like a lot of rentals and getting people the tools they want to do what they want to do and explore and be part of this community, and your point's like oh, I want to.

Erik Nilsson: 1:04:55

I want this to be more than just Salt Lake, this local community, and be able to grow there. So not only with, I mean, the Urban Outfitters stuff and other things, but that, I mean, helps expand those walls everywhere.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:05:05

And that's probably one of our main things. It's kind of scalable.

Erik Nilsson: 1:05:08

Yeah.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:05:08

So that's something we want to really amplify. I think there's a lot of room for growth there and it kind of feels good, it seems like a justifiable, you know, area to be in. So it's nice, um, yeah. And then on top of that, um, when I get a little more retail business going, I need to um, upper rental game. We need to kind of improve some of our gear and get some new stuff. But yeah, so, nothing radically different than what we're doing, but just try to do it better and be efficient.

Erik Nilsson: 1:05:39

Onward and upward. It's like these great things. It's always like these 50 little things that end up being many great things at the end of it all.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:05:46

So yeah, her agenda is always to have five or six revenue streams, and you can have four of them working well at once, then you're doing okay, perfect.

Erik Nilsson: 1:05:55

And then you use those to experiment with the other two and see how those work out. Totally yeah.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:05:59

So but yeah, we've got good creative people. Um, we're not really short of ideas, you know that's just.

Erik Nilsson: 1:06:06

I mean, that's the important thing. Just circling everybody, I'd be like all right guys. So what can we do with this? Yeah, and how can we do it for 20 bucks? No, we always figure it out. But so I mean outside of, uh, I mean the store itself, I mean what else?

Jacob Nuttell: 1:06:24

do you like to do?

Erik Nilsson: 1:06:24

that takes up your time around the area. Yeah, um, still taking a lot of pictures?

Jacob Nuttell: 1:06:27

uh, somewhat, you know it varies less, but more iphone, uh, not too much iphone, luckily. Yeah, it's a trick question. Yeah, no, uh, you know it's fun. Just there's so many cameras at the shop any given day so you can kind of just grab something and go do something and then bring it back and you know, kind of live, uh, live, the dream that you're trying to sell, you know in the sense of like, don't buy it, just use it. Yeah, you know. So, um, yeah, so we've done some fun stuff, like our family Christmas card this year was, you know, tooting my own horn, but it was pretty amazing.

Erik Nilsson: 1:07:06

Walk me through it, I'm curious now.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:07:07

So a little bit of a story there. But before we finally landed in this spot, we're in now with a store. We are sort of in a temporary spot across the street, um, which was a really quirky building, um, with lots of history, and the previous uh previous occupants had just kind of moved out and kind of left everything in place more or less as far as fixtures and different things, um, but there's just all these different crazy rooms and, um, you know they had been in business for like 60 years in that space. So there's just a lot of character there. So we were just like let's just use this for stuff. It's really fun you know.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:07:50

So there's this room. Apparently they called it the Love Shack. So you know, this whole facility is all just like cement floors, metal shelving, uh, pegboard just very utilitarian. And then there's this one room where you go up these carpeted stairs, like shaggy kind of marbled brown and white carpet if you can picture that and then wood paneling even on the stairwell perfect. Then you go up into the second floor space and it's more or less the only second floor space and it's certainly the only one that has carpet and like drops, tile, ceiling, multiple, like air conditioning vents, all these power outlets, it's like kind of bench that goes around the whole room. It's kind of built in carpeted, a shower and a sink, but not a toilet. It's coming, anyway, just like all together. Now, yeah, stuff that like struck us, is like so odd, um, and then what looked like could be a bar, easily, you know um. And and then it had this big green velvet couch, like probably like a 12 foot velvet green couch or velour or whatever it would be.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:09:01

Um kind of low rise and, uh, really epic, so that got used for lots of different photo shoots. But uh, yeah, so I just uh decided like well, we'll just do it up there Like everyone does. I'm just tired of doing like the. Oh, here we are standing outside our house or out in the park or fun with it, whatever, and we've got our cute little christmas sweaters on or something. So, um, I was just like how can we do like a, like a, you know, like an old vegas dimly lit vibe yeah, instead.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:09:34

So yeah, just set up like one light over this couch that was there so kind of just shown down, um, just from one direction, set up a tripod. Uh didn't even have remote, I think. I just kept hitting the timer and run and jump and sit in the frame because it it was just we have a photographer, I was whatever, yeah. So, uh, we just did tons and tons of shots and, yeah, the four of us just kind of lounging on this green couch and we're wearing kind of like black and dark, you know darker tones Cool, the girls have like lipstick on and all kind of glammed up just a little bit.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:10:11

Yeah, and yeah, people loved it. It was really fun.

Erik Nilsson: 1:10:15

Much better than the typical.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:10:17

Put on your flannel or sweater, and we're gonna go take a picture of the canyon yeah, yeah, we've done that and we'll do that again, but it was fun to just like really branch out and do something fun, so that that was a fun creative experience.

Erik Nilsson: 1:10:29

So are any of your kids following in daddy's footsteps for photography?

Jacob Nuttell: 1:10:33

yeah, they're interested in photography, but they are definitely artists though in many respects. So ceramics and drawing and graphic design and all sorts of things, and some photography also, you know it's still general area of exceptionally creative people. Yeah.

Erik Nilsson: 1:10:52

They learned from their talent, oh hopefully. Oh man, no, I love that. Um, well, cool. Well, I want to wrap up with the two questions I always ask everybody at the end. Uh, first, if you could have someone on the small lake city podcast and hear more about what they're doing or what they're up to, who would you?

Jacob Nuttell: 1:11:07

want to hear from. Well, I could probably think of a few places. Um, I'm stumped for a second though.

Erik Nilsson: 1:11:19

Okay, I'm stumped for a second, though, okay, we can come back.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:11:20

I'm gonna have to think about it for a second.

Erik Nilsson: 1:11:21

And then, secondly, if people want to find out more about, I mean, acme and Cameron company and find the store, I mean, where's the best place to go?

Jacob Nuttell: 1:11:28

So really, you know where we put out the most information, and we've been really focusing on this. A lot is just Instagram, so that's our main social media outlet. Um, some of that ends up on Tik TOK, Some of it ends up on Facebook, but that's kind of our main main uh venue. Uh, we have really great social media person right now that works in the store part of the time. She's super excited about Acme and what we're doing and has a lot of energy and putting some really fun stuff together, so that's the probably the best source of information what's the handle?

Jacob Nuttell: 1:12:05

acme camera just yeah at ad, if that matters, but acme camera co. Yeah, and then the website is acme camera dot co and then the business name is acme camera go.

Erik Nilsson: 1:12:16

Anyway, it's all fairly uh and then what's the address of the new? I know it's on third west. I can't think of that, yeah so it's 1388 south, 300 west.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:12:25

Yes, it's called the engine block the building yeah, it's a great built.

Erik Nilsson: 1:12:28

Like there's a lot of industry did a lot of it, a lot of cool places going in around there. Yeah yeah, we got based to have an 11 year anniversary.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:12:34

Yeah it was fun. We had some good outdoor space. Uh, good support from the landlord and everything. They've been really supportive with this move and that's been really great. Good people at.

Erik Nilsson: 1:12:46

Price Good old Price Real Estate yeah, I know them way too well.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:12:50

Yeah, okay, that's good, yeah, and then we have just really fun. Neighbors Jai Bike is there. They've been there for a little while. They're great and supportive. The new place called flat out, which is gonna be like race car simulation- race car.

Erik Nilsson: 1:13:04

I went and talked about it to the tech when I swung by.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:13:06

It's fascinating. Um, they're. I think the grand opening is on the 15th. There we go. There's a little tiny plug. We go, um, yeah, and then shades is moving in and all kinds of stuff. So we're super excited for the next, uh, next this coming year, it's going to be great.

Erik Nilsson: 1:13:22

Yeah, no, I'm excited for you If there's, I mean that whole area is blowing up. I mean it's fun Cause, like my friend, garrett price um, who he always talks about like well, I mean cause half my friends are in real estate, half my friends are in tech and so I get to hear about, like real estate projects that are happening, which is interesting. Interesting because, like I heard so much about I mean that area before I found myself walking into it, um, but yeah, I'm excited for I mean all up and down third west right now there's so many cool projects happening it's kind of like I'm gonna live on 300 west which is if you were to tell me 20 years ago, even like 10 or 15, be like hey no, there's, I'll go get a transmission, but I'm not gonna live there well, I'll probably pick this up.

Erik Nilsson: 1:13:57

like I live on third West, do you? Like my but yeah, I mean it's, everything's changed so much and it's only continuing to do so, and what a great place to be. I mean it'd be part of it.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:14:06

Yeah, it's the right spot to be. It's a perfect balance of being almost downtown, depending on how you and light rail and buses and but then having parking but not being, you know, in the suburbs.

Erik Nilsson: 1:14:27

It's a good little.

Jacob Nuttell: 1:14:29

Good balance.

Erik Nilsson: 1:14:30

Yeah, it's a good little intersection to live between it all. But yeah, I mean I dig like excited for everything you've done, excited for everything to come. If anybody needs any sort of camera equipment, whether to purchase, to rent, go swing by by. It's a cool space, meet some cool people, um, and they'll be there at least another 11 years. So, yeah, go tomorrow go in five years, we'll still be there yep, absolutely thanks so much, jago.

Erik Nilsson: 1:14:52

I'm so excited for the future and, yeah, excited for all that you're going to do more for the community and selling in general yeah, that's our goal.