November 26, 2019

Meet Sam Krochman

Local Stories

Today we’d like to introduce you to Sam Krochman.

Sam, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
My name is Sam Krochman, I am eighteen years old, and I am the CEO and founder of 191Above. I started my company back in California when I was thirteen. I wanted a drone for a school media project I was working on so that I could attach my action camera and get a really cool shot of the school! At the time, commercially available drones were just starting to hit the market and become popular. I had always wanted to run my own business, stemmed from my father who and owned and operated several, who I very much look up to and see as the biggest role model in my life. Almost everything I know about business, from pitching ideas, cold calling leads, sharing stories, I learned from the several hours I spent with him at his office. Over the years, I slowly grew the company, while keeping my main focus on succeeding in school. I hosted tables and expositions, went to several networking meetings, and met many great people who I now look to for advice and guidance. In the beginning, I mainly focused on aerial photography, and when I turned sixteen I became the first recipient of a high school drone pilot scholarship, where I got to study and pass my Part 107 exam! In recent years, I changed gears slightly and put more and more focus on the real estate industry. Since moving out to Arizona for school, I have restarted from the ground up, beginning the year without a single client. Now, I am currently doing real estate photography for homes up to $2.5 million dollars. I am working hard to build my client base and grow my business even further into the future!

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It has not been a smooth road all the way through. Part of the biggest struggle was building my company while also putting all of the necessary time into my studies. I graduated high school with the highest honor for my GPA, and I am now majoring in Aerospace Engineering. It is hard work to balance both of these things at once, but my determination allows me to work hard and push through. Another hardship was that I am still learning. I am so young and I still have many mistakes to make. I learn new things every day and apply them to my life. These mistakes are unfortunate, but I can take them and make myself better, and better serve people in the future.

Please tell us about 191Above.
191Above is best described as a digital marketing company. While I focus primarily on real estate photography currently, I have served so many other industries such as construction, architecture and development, new home builders, and more. I serve to be a solution to companies and individuals that are looking for marketing materials that will make them stand out from the competition. I am currently specializing in high-end real estate photography and videography, and aiming to provide these services for clients all over Phoenix and surrounding cities. The thing that I am most proud of as a company is that not only did I start it at a very young age, but that it still exists and is still growing to this day! It was also this hard work and dedication towards succeeding that has allowed me to buy my own car at the age of seventeen, and to fund my own college education. I always make sure to thank my clients for their support, because It is allowing me to study my dream major at one of the top engineering universities in the United States. What sets me apart specifically is that my clients get my attention. I work very hard to make sure that if any of them has an issue with a product, that I personally will be there to make sure that they are happy. I also am bringing a new point of view to real estate videography, and provide a service that not many photographers are.

Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
This one is easy! My favorite childhood memory was when I had just started my company. I went into my dad’s office with him over the weekend so that I could help him assemble new office chairs, clean workspaces, and other little tasks around his office. I had finished all of the work he had for me quicker then he had expected, so he sat me down and gave me a video to watch on his phone. It was a speech given by one of my now role models, Art Williams. It was titled “Do It” and it was given in 1986. The gist of the speech was how to be successful in America. And at the very end of the speech he had a bit about how no matter how scared you are, how impossible it seems, or how many times you fail, to get back up and just to do it. This speech really stuck with me and I watch it every month. This speech really meant something to me when my dad took me to a real estate convention one day. He had a booth there for his mortgage company, and he gave me the last foot of his booth so that I could set up my drone and a little stack of business cards. What I was not expecting was the host of the entire event to come up to me and ask if I wanted to go up on stage and talk in front of the room of 600+ real estate agents. I was incredibly nervous being only thirteen and going up in front of so many people. But then, I remembered that speech, and I looked up to my dad and said, “Just gotta do it.” So, I went up and spoke in front of all of the agents. It was the biggest moment of growth in my life, and because of this, I no longer have a fear of public speaking and I can get up and talk in front of just about anybody and do it very well. The memories I have of being with my dad at his office are some of the ones I cherish the most.

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