This week, we speak with an entrepreneur that is truly a jack of all trades, pop culture podcast host, comic book author, video game voice actor, and so much, Brimstone. He’s here to talk with us about how Renaissance Entrepreneurs try new things and become so diversified! You will want to take a listen to hear his advice.
Welcome to Business Talk Sister Gawk! I’m Bekkah! And I’m Ruthie! And today’s episode title is “How to Become a Renaissance Entrepreneur” and with us today we have a guest who has a singular name, Brimstone! He has had a successful and rewarding career spanning over four decades and I’m really excited about all the different things he’s done including professional wrestling, radio host, podcaster, actor, voice actor, author, musician, food critic, philanthropist, horror model, comic book and animated children’s book, and video game hero! Okay! There are so many things here and thank you so much for being with us!
Brimstone: Oh, man! Finally Brimstone has made it to Business Talk Sister Gawk! Love you Bekkah and Ruthie! It’s gonna be so much fun! Listen now! I can’t see you guys so I’m gonna hopefully figure out who’s speaking to me at what time so if I call one of you the wrong name I am apologetic right here at the get-go. *all laugh*
What Is a Renaissance Entrepreneur?
Bekkah: Oh, yeah, you’re totally fine! We are so excited to talk with you because I think that a renaissance entrepreneurship is something that many people haven’t really heard of and I was wondering if you could give us a definition of it.
Brimstone: I mean you know it’s funny because, you know, it is in my bio, and but for all intent and purpose I mean it was given to me by multiple people in the media who they’re like, “You know, he just does everything! He is a renaissance man!” In, you know, the grand scheme of things being a renaissance man or woman essentially is having your hands in many different cookie jars, being able to kind of float from one area of the industry into another seamlessly and kind of know what’s going on.
I’ve been doing that for many years. I mean I started my career you know as a child actor. Then I went into music, then I went into you know pro wrestling, then you know this and that the next thing. I’ve kind of studied each industry. I know a lot about each industry.
I can’t say I know everything about any industry because you never stop learning so being somebody who is pretty much always on it and always looking to learn and to build and to grow. I think especially moving in into the way we’re going in terms of the world itself, I mean just this morning I was looking I read a new thing about – I don’t know if you guys are familiar with Neon it’s you know this artificial intelligence where it’s like all actual – they’re making these AI’s that look like real people and they function as real people.
You actually talk to them it’s through Samsung but it’s a different company. It’s so weird and you know like they’re thinking well these are the type of people the AI – I can’t say people! They’re not people, but these AI are gonna wind up taking positions from people in terms of whether it’s ordering something at McDonald’s or going to the bank and meeting a teller and so forth.
The people that are kind of growing up now really need to kind of get their grip on being multi-faceted in this world because there are a lot of jobs that are not going to be here for much longer when they start bringing in more computers, AI, and so forth. I mean I think it’s really important to kind of have your hand in a bunch of different cookie jars at every point in time! I hope I’m making sense.
What Are You Doing As an Entrepreneur All At Once?
Ruthie: Yeah, and I was just thinking like you had said that there are jobs that are phasing out and even more than that there are jobs that are not even created yet and so like you’re preparing for jobs that don’t even exist. Which is crazy! Yeah so you’ve given us a really cool overview of where you’re at and what you’re doing so tell us a little bit about what you’re doing right now.
Brimstone: I’m talking to the two of you on Business Talk Sister Gawk. *Bekkah chuckles*
Ruthie: Well played.
Brimstone: Well, you asked so I figured I had to tell you! *all laugh* So right now I mean I’m doing a bunch of different things. A couple things that I cannot discuss simply because they’re NDA, but
Ruthie: Booo!
Brimstone: There are some big things that are coming, but I am currently doing a couple of different video games in terms of voice-over work. Oh my god. I have a new product coming to the market very shortly. I have you know additions to my sauce and seasoning line as well as a couple of old favorites that I’m bringing back. Oh my god, I mean the list goes on.
I’m always doing a bunch of different things all at once. So for me you know like there’s just so much to talk about! It’s like I don’t want to bore people! I’m always doing I do the Grindhouse Radio on iHeart and we do about 30 other networks. We’re doing between like three and a half four million listeners weekly worldwide with that so that keeps me really, really busy!
You know so between that and doing the other shows I do and doing the voice work and doing you know all the sauces and seasonings I’m doing pre-production like I said for a project that is gonna be hitting a major streaming service soon. That’s you know another thing in the works! It’s just – you know that’s before I get to spend any time with my family. You know what I mean and then social media you know how it is!
I do a lot of a lot and that’s just happening like this week. Next week you know I might have a whole bunch of new things to work on. I know I’m gonna be doing a lot of influencing like you guys and I discussed prior to coming on air. You know there’s just a lot! It’s always like a moving platform and the fun thing is I like it that way because it doesn’t get boring you know what I mean?
You’re always doing something new, something creative, something different, and I have to always be creative. I hate being in a slump and not being able to do anything. One of the greatest things that happened during the pandemic even though I was hating being in the pandemic was the fact that I was able to do more with voice work.
I was able to kind of catch up on things that I didn’t have the time to do prior because I’m always out and about. I’m always on the road like even as we speak my agents are messaging me about different events that they’re looking to book me at and different projects and so forth so you know during pandemic I was able to slow down a little bit, take a breath while I could because then I got Covid and that was not good!
Ruthie: Couldn’t take a breath!
Brimstone: So I couldn’t take a breath! But when I was able to again you know what was really cool was that I had gotten picked and for a couple of main roles for a couple different video games and some animated things and I wound up getting Covid and thankfully they wanted me so bad that they actually waited until I was better to go in and cut the lines which was amazing because one of them’s for the Oculus what do you call it Quest 2 which is the new virtual reality headset.
I play Wyatt Earp for Finger Gun which is the game new technology, really cool stuff and a couple of other video games. I had Viking Vengeance that just released on Steam which I played on. So there’s a lot of stuff like I said there are a lot of things going on that I wouldn’t have necessarily have the time to hone in on you know what I mean if I was constantly running and you know doing all the normal touring things that I do when the world is open. Hope I’m making sense.
Ruthie: Practical rest.
How a Renaissance Entrepreneur Responds to, “What do You Do?”
Bekkah: My question for you and I recently had this happen because I went to like this chamber of commerce event and somebody said to me, “Oh, what do you do?” and I literally stopped and I didn’t know what to say. I literally said, “Whatever I want.” But how do you answer that question when people ask you as a renaissance entrepreneur?
Brimstone: Well, I mean since I do have a lot of different titles it does become a little difficult here and there. You know, if I’m signing in an event or doing an appearance or whatever it is sometimes it’s like, “Alright, well how do we bill you? How do we put you out there?” Like you know some people will go with the whole celebrity appearance type thing. Other people will be like you know “Brimstone Entertainment Entrepreneur.” You know a “Serial Entrepreneur.”
It depends! You know what I mean? It depends on what I’m doing. Like if I’m doing business events sometimes they’ll you know throw a mixture of both in. So really it’s difficult when people say to me, “Well, what do you do?” I’m like, “Well, that’s a trick question and how much time do you have?” Is what it comes down to –
Ruthie: Get comfy.
Brimstone: Yeah, yeah and I don’t like to be – I try to be as unapologetically authentic as possible, and if you want to know I’m gonna tell you and sometimes people take that as me showing off but it’s not! It’s just that’s my life! That’s what I do you know and it’s very difficult sometimes for people to understand. It’s hard for them to figure out and hard for them to categorize but I think that the more people are hearing about what I do and other people like me I think that they’re realizing the value in it and trying to kind of figure out how they can do certain things as well.
I mean one of my things is I always aspire to inspire and a lot of people, I get on the daily people that message me whether it’s on social media email on the website whatever it is and they’re like, “You know, I just wanted to say thank you.” And I’m like, “What? For what?” Like, “You know, you inspired me to kind of go for broke and realize my dreams and now I’m doing this and it’s because of you, and thank you!” And I’m like, “No! It’s because of you! You know what I mean? Because you believed yourself and maybe I inspired you to do it but you believed in yourself to kind of jump on it and make it happen.”
For me, again, I’m just happy you know when people like, “Hey, Brim, you know you inspired me.” But going back to the original question most of the time it depends on where I am and what I’m doing when people say, “Well, what do you do?” If I’m just at a party or if I’m at a family function – oh god! Those are the worst because then it’s like all right now I’m the elephant in the room.
Ruthie: Just hand him a copy of your resume at that point.
Brimstone: Yeah right, it’s just nuts but yeah it’s such an interesting thing because people don’t – they can’t fathom. You know what I mean? And I’ve had success in every area that I’ve been so it’s like all right well how do we describe you which is why it’s like “Celebrity Entertainer” and or you know “Entertainment Entrepreneur” or “Serial Entertainment, Entrepreneur.” Yeah, I hope that was a good answer.
Ruthie: Yeah, so when you – say someone is looking to do a whole bunch of different opportunities and they’re wanting to kind of become this renaissance entrepreneur how do they evaluate whether an opportunity is worth their time and aligns well with what they kind of are working towards?
How to Pick Businesses That Align Well as a Renaissance Entrepreneur
Because it seems like there’s kind of – there’s at least a thread of a consistent theme throughout the different things that you’ve pursued. How do you kind of decide this is worth my time and this aligns well with the trajectory of what I want to do?
Brimstone: For me my whole outlook when I’m doing things is what’s the next thing that makes sense? What kind of connects to what I’m doing. Like here, to give you an example, the music to wrestling was the biggest jump. You know what I mean, in terms of – but it was still entertainment it’s still showy and so forth but once I was in wrestling I said, “Alright, well what’s the next you know possible move from here? What’s the next step and how can I expand this?”
So now I have the character and what are wrestlers? Wrestlers are big superheroes! They’re just like real live superheroes, right? So, you know what did I do? I said, “Okay, well, let’s take the Brimstone character and pull it out of the ring and let’s build him into a comic book character.” You know, then the comic books, what’s the next step from there? Children’s books, you know what I mean? And the same characters in the children’s books.
You’ve got the Brimstone comic book character, the Brimstone, well, Lil Brim in the kids books, you know, my readers the adults read the comics and then they have their kids read the kids books so they could vibe with each other on the stories and characters. So you know, it’s very similar in that aspect but then you take it and within the comic books – okay within the comic books there’s a place called “Hell” in the middle of Heaven. Err “Heaven” in the middle of Hell so what do you call it – Heaven is a bar and grill that all the main characters go to in Hell again.
Again, it’s just a gimmick, people. It’s not – I’m not a Satan worshiper. I’m Jewish! Jews don’t believe in Hell! It’s you know – it’s a big – it’s a story! But that being said, I didn’t want to freak anybody out there, but Heaven complete with stairway you know – if you guys are – You know Led Zeppelin, “Stairway to Heaven.” It’s a joke but you guys might have a younger audience but the older cats will understand what I’m talking about, but the younger ones will have no clue.
But anyway inside the bar in the comic book they’re eating “Sweet Heat Treat Wings” and “Grind House Burgers” and “Grub Munchies” and so forth. Well, all of those things are actual, real products on the market because now I have my – I have my Grindhouse Seasoning. I have my “Flavor Behavior” seasoning. I have my “Sweet Heat Treat Wings”, “Awesome Sauce”
Bekkah: Subliminal marketing! Look at you!
Brimstone: You see what I’m saying? My grub munchies, all the candies! All the candies that are there are all available; “Wasteland Sand”! So all of this stuff is actually there in real life so if you’re a comic book fan, well, you know you’ll get to see and realize, “Oh my god! These are real products!” and if you have nothing to do with comics you can go, “Oh my god! This is actually from a comic book!” So you know what I mean? It hits a bigger market and so forth –
Bekkah: They cross-promote to one another.
Brimstone: Exactly, exactly. Now on top of that if you notice I said, “Grindhouse Seasoning” and “Grindhouse Burgers”, Well, I do the Grindhouse Radio so do you notice how everything is kind of all attached. Everything I do is attached in one-way shape or form so it all makes sense. You know, but for everybody who’s listening in my professional capacity – if I’m gonna say you know what do you know, how do you figure out, what do you do? You gotta listen to your heart.
You gotta listen to your head. You know what I mean? Does this make sense? Is this something I wanna do? Sometimes it makes no sense in the world to do it. You know what I mean? But you know but you look at it and you go, “I’m going to do it anyway.” You know what I mean? And that’s good too.
You know you got to do what makes you happy and you know the thing that people don’t realize is when you work a nine to five you’re building someone else’s dream. Most of the time people are miserable! They’re not doing what they want to do and they’re only making a tiny piece of the pie. When you – why not invest 200 percent in yourself? You know, yeah the hours are longer, you know, it’s harder work, but at the end of the day it’s so much more fulfilling.
You’re working for yourself. You’re building your own company, your own brand. You’re making your own money and then you can eventually have people working for you and you can pay them to help build your dream. You know what I mean? Like build and grow! Leave a legacy and that’s what I look to do. I always look to leave a legacy so when people look at me when I’m gone or look at the Brimstone moniker they go, “Wow! You know that guy he did a lot! You know he did a lot in a short amount of time! And you know and was successful with it.”
And for my family to be able to be supported well after I’m gone. You know, so that’s my goal. To leave a real solid legacy and you know and also you want to give back just as much as you put in. You know everything I do like, I mentor people still! I give back. I do a lot of charity work. I do you know what I mean you find the time for things that you want to make happen. That’s- hopefully that helps!
Why Did You Choose a Career as an Entrepreneur?
Bekkah: I have maybe you can kind of summarize this one because I know I have another question and we’re like getting really close on time and there are so many things that I want to get through! How was this originally like the path you took? What is your “why” of how you went this way with your career?
Brimstone: I got sick of working for somebody else. I did, I worked. I worked at places before. You know it didn’t I didn’t pop out of the womb and say, “Hey, I’m gonna do this!” But, you know, I did start as a child actor you know on Sesame Street Romper Room when I was a kid.
So I had the taste of it and you know my father was a self-starter and he was an entrepreneur within the insurance industry and – what do you call it – my mother was – she worked for other people but she had her own business. She had done a confectionary business and did chocolates and cakes and so forth. I’ve always been around it growing up. So and I was also around entertainment growing up.
My father was a would-be singer and – what do you call it – he should have been a professional golfer but my grandfather had him go into the family business and he didn’t get to realize his dreams with that. But at the end of the day I saw what they were doing and I was working a bunch of different jobs and that’s good that I did that because I was able to learn the ins and outs of a lot of things.
I was drawn to media so I worked in for publications and so forth. That helped me when I built my comic book company because I knew publishing! So why not open up a publishing company? The same thing with sales. Sales was – is a very big thing to know! Sales, marketing, building of relationships, and this is all stuff that I got when I was younger and working for other people and kind of learning from the people around me.
When I finally made that decision was right out of college. I mean I was on tour. I was doing music stuff I was doing well and then I was working at a company making six figures here on the island you know for Newsday which is another publication doing sales and wrestling making big money at the same time. It was kind of like why not just stop doing everything and just do it myself.
You know? And I did it myself! I started doing it myself and I just – I continue to build and brand and market my myself and some people would like to say selfish promotion or whatever and I’m like, “Alright, well, who – if I’m not gonna promote me who else will? And you know -”
Bekkah: It kind of sounds like you a little bit like you did a side hustle into – not necessarily side hustle but like low risk because you were still working for someone while you were getting into the professional wrestling aspect, right?
Brimstone: Yeah, yeah but also what I didn’t mention is that I had my first business when I was 16, 17. Yeah, so I had already had like that background behind me, funny enough.
Ruthie: So then when you’re kind of like deciding all these different things and you’re seeing all these different things that you want to do and things like earlier you were talking about like sometimes you just want to do things but you also have to survive –
Bekkah: And be profitable.
How to Pick What Is Going to Be Profitable as a Business Owner
Ruthie: And be profitable and make money so how did you – how do you kind of decide like what is like just a pet project and what is actually something that’s worth the time value that you’re putting in to be able to pursue a specific project?
Brimstone: Everything for me, if I like it, it’s worthwhile and I turn it into a business. You know like the Grindhouse Radio was something that I was like, “Alright, well, I want to do something.” And it came from – I wouldn’t say failure on that one although failures are the seeds to success but with this situation I wanted to start a radio series and I contacted all the local, terrestrial radio stations and I said, “Hey!” You know they’ve known me for years I’ve been doing interviews for them over the years I know all the DJ’s and the people above.
I said, “I’d really like to maybe do a show. This is my idea!” And I heard crickets so I was like, “Well, if I’m not gonna get any help here from you guys I’ll just do it myself.” And – what do you call it – I spoke to a couple of my interns at the time who are now my partners and I said, “You know if you guys are interested – let’s do this and if it works it’ll be a – we’ll turn it into a business,” and yada yada and here we are you know seven years later! We won four years in a row best radio station on Long Island where we’re from!
Ruthie: Wooo!
Brimstone: So we’ve beaten all the terrestrial radio stations that we have that ignored me at the beginning and – what do you call it – we’re making very, very good money let’s just say and so that being said, anything you do is worth your time as long as you’re going to spend the time to put into it. Again it’s many people are like. “Well, I’m not going to deal with it! I’m not doing this if I’m not making money,” or “I’m not doing that if I’m not -”
Guess what, man? Do it because if you don’t do it, it’s a woulda, shoulda, coulda thing first of all. Second of all – you don’t know what’s gonna come from something when you do it pro-bono. I’m happy to do things if it makes sense pro-bono you know. Some people have an amazing product or an amazing idea and they just don’t have the money to get it off the ground! You know, look! Somebody gave me an opportunity at one point why shouldn’t I give somebody else the opportunity? Does that make sense?
What Tools and Resources Can Help a Renaissance Entrepreneur?
Bekkah: No, yeah! Absolutely! And with that one of the questions that we always end with in asking is what resources or tools or books would you recommend to someone who is interested in becoming a renaissance entrepreneur? What kind of things would you say these were really helpful to me and anybody else that wants to do this should do it.
Brimstone: To be completely honest, I believe that the biggest thing about becoming a renaissance entrepreneur is – or just a renaissance person in general – is to just follow your heart! You don’t need books! You don’t need to read things! You don’t need to go and watch videos online. You know what I mean?
You could and you should because learning is incredible but if you have an idea or if you have a passion go with that passion! Learn as much about it as you possibly can. If you said to me, “Well, Brim, you know, I want to learn about wrestling.” Well, I can pinpoint where you can go to look for that or if you know you’re looking to do this type of a business or whatever like I would recommend like Score.
Get yourself a mentor and so forth and but they’re – without knowing any kind of definitives like there aren’t any specific places I tell you to go, but I would also say that it’s very important for anybody who’s looking to, to kind of carry themselves like that and to kind of build their career or their brand or their base of operations as a renaissance person. I would suggest that you well verse yourself in sales, in marketing, in relationship building because it doesn’t matter what you do –
Bekkah: That’s what I was just going to ask! It sounds like there’s a strong aspect of networking in your personality.
Brimstone: Yes! It’s huge! It’s very huge and the fact is that if you don’t do this you will get nowhere. Everything in life, whether it’s sitting in and going to the – you can go get a cup of coffee it’s still – that’s networking! You know what I’m saying? That’s communication!
You need to know how to communicate and a lot of the kids nowadays have a problem where they can’t communicate without a phone in their hand. They can’t communicate without a computer in front of them. It’s very important to have these person-to-person relationships, be able to speak! Pick up a phone!
Anxiety runs wild in the generation of today and people are afraid to pick up phones! I can tell you, I had an office full of people that would do anything I needed them to do except for pick up phones, because they were afraid of the person on the other end. You can’t be afraid, people.
You gotta make it work cause without being able to speak, without being able to talk, without being able to have conversations, you’re never – there’s no way that you’re gonna be able to sell whatever product you’re looking to sell! So now it is what it is.
Ruthie: Yeah, and I feel like you have so much more that people can learn from you and there’s so much that like even just in talking with you could even we yeah we could talk for so long! Yeah, but tell us a little bit about where people can find you so that they can keep yeah and picking your brain from a distance.
Brimstone: Absolutely.
Bekkah: Keywords, “From a distance!”
Brimstone: Listen, I am very – I am very active on my Instagram if you guys are on Instagram @therealbrimstone. It’s verified. You’ll know it’s me. I answer all of my messages as long as I see them. Sometimes they go to the “I don’t know you” area and sometimes I just don’t see them so – what do you call – if I don’t respond it’s just simply because I haven’t seen it, but you know rather than DMing me start on the – what do you call it – on my posts.
Write to me there, chat with me there, get involved, and I am happy to respond! I respond to everybody. It’s not my wife, it’s not my assistant, it’s not my intern, it’s all me and – what do you call it – I’d love to hear from you guys and then my official website therealbrimstone.com – there’s a lot there. I do have in the brim blog there are a couple of articles that may prove helpful to people that are looking to become entrepreneurs and so forth and I’ll be adding more in between when I have time to kind of get on there and do it.
Anybody who’s looking to get into like podcasting and stuff like that I do have a couple of great articles there. In terms of that the grindhouseradio.com. Please, make sure to check us out. We have a lot of fun and it’s all pop culture and yeah, man, would love to love to have you guys check us out!
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