Have You Ever Mentored Anyone in this Business?

Back in 2007 we were at the Vent Haven ConVENTion. JET was still doing latex puppets back in those days. In all honesty they were not very good in those days. (This is an understatement.)

There was a man who came to our booth several times that year. His name was (and still is) Gary Owen. He is on the Board of the ConVENTion. He was very friendly and was interested in our puppets.

After several days of conversations, Gary said, “Your puppets are awful”. That will get you attention. He went on to say “You are in the wrong style of puppet. You should be doing soft sculpture. I can see that you have a great amount of potential, but you will never see it realized in latex.”

Many people would have made us angry if they had said that, but Gary had a way of saying it without offending. So we listened. JET told him she would be happy to do soft sculpture but she did not have any way of learning how.

To make a long story short, Gary did not know how, but he very kindly offered his time to help if there was anything he could do to help. Over the next year we took him up on his offer for many hours. Gary and his wife Teddy are still among our closest friends in the Vent World.

Naturally you already know that JET did figure out how to learn soft sculpture. The real point to this is that JET’s entire career path changed that day because one person saw something in her work and was willing to offer his services.

The question is how many of you have had someone help you in this business? Now the next question is, How many others have you helped learn something in this business.

Look around and watch for someone that you can help. You never know when you help someone just who you might be helping out. The next Jeff Dunham or Terry Fator? Or just the next person who is in love with this craft and needs a hand up.

Thats all for now. We will talk again next week.

Steve and JET