‘Young Entrepreneur’ of the month: Terrence Smith
| ABC 21
October 20th, 2018
FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WPTA 21) — Each month, ABC 21 partners with Junior Achievement of Northern Indiana to showcase ‘Young Entrepreneurs’ in our area.
For October, We introduced Terrence Smith, 19, a student at Indiana Tech.
As a student at the Anthis Career Center, Terrence got his start with graphic design and it became a hobby he enjoyed. He tested out a lot of different designs.
“I just said ‘I’ll go ahead and do this and if I enjoy it then I’ll continue doing it,’” said Terrence. “At first, everything you do kind of seems really good, but the more you do it the more you look back on the previous designs and say ‘man, I got way better than when I started,’” said Terrence.
He soon realized he was creating a product he could sell. Terrence started building a portfolio and attending networking events so he could sell himself to potential clients.
Since then, Terrence has done freelance work for several Fort Wayne advertising and marketing businesses.
He’s made business cards, flyers and social media graphics to name a few things.
“For different clients, they want different things, so you have to learn how to adjust and advance with your designs,” said Terrence.
Terrence says he loves graphic design because it gives him the best of both worlds in two different ways.
The first is that It allows him to do actual work, while at the same time enjoy a creative outlet that works as a stress reliever.
The second is that it allows him to work in seclusion, but also go out and interact with and meet new people when he meets with clients.
Now, he’s working on creating his own business. He’s already designed his own business cards and website.
“I can just sit down and talk to people and hear their goal within their business because I’m going to be reflecting that goal, so I want to be able to sit down and completely understand what’s going on, and those conversations can lead to other opportunities,” said Terrence.
He considers himself an artist. Terrence says each graphic design starts by drawing his vision on paper. Like paintings are hung in museums, Terrence says he looks forward to having his art be put on display for many to see.
“That kind of drives me to just keep going forward, it kind of just pushes me because not only not that business is going to see it. People that are going into that business, people that are driving past it are going to see it, and just different things. I just like to feel that somebody is going to look at that, and they may or may not know who I am, but they are going to see my artwork,” said Terrence.
