Bill Giofu 09:43
Yep. Exactly. Okay. And then. They might be, you know, if you want to, Dr. Jeremy we will put you on the site.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 09:51
That’s a scary thought. Actually, I have been on some infomercials, but. But more from my chiropractic background. Not for looks wise. They weren’t.
They weren’t hiring for that. But talk about the difference. We have models and talent. What’s the difference there?.
Bill Giofu 10:08
So talent are more towards the acting side of things. So we’ll have individuals that want to act and can act and, you know, are used in videos and TV commercials, mostly modeling. You know, in actuality, modeling is acting. You know, you know, you’ll have somebody standing there and they’ll the photographers say, well, pretend that you’re, you know, seeing a bird in, in the sky or you’re seeing a beautiful, you know, bouquet of flowers or something like that. So you have to react.
Even if you’re modeling, you still have to act. So, you know, they go hand in hand. You’ll notice a lot of celebrities that were models are now actors and, you know, vice versa. You know, a lot of celebrities that are actors are now doing photoshoots and videos, you know, for advertising campaigns, right? So it goes hand in hand.
But, you know, to separate them, we kind of do. But, you know, we really shouldn’t basically. Well, yeah, it is what it is right.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 11:14
Talk about Amazon for a second.
Bill Giofu 11:18
Yeah Amazon was a great client. They came into Calgary and you know they used our agency. And I think we had five individuals on and we had a couple with their little girl on filming in their house. And then we had actually we have a young gentleman that is blind. He’s a teenager.
And we I submitted him to Amazon and he plays piano. So he was playing his piano and he was playing the piano on the actual advertisement, the video that Amazon did. So yeah, it was fantastic to have Amazon here in Calgary and do their shoot here. It was a very good paying job for the individuals. I think they got something like 2500 bucks for the job that they did each. So the family was really happy with all three of them on.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 12:21
You know, talk about Working with those clients for Amazon. You know, how did these companies. How did Amazon find you?
Bill Giofu 12:29
Well, I think because they were in Calgary of course. Then they searched, you know, the Calgary agencies. And that’s basically how they find us is if they’re in a city then, you know, clients usually, you know, search in that particular city for an agency that can supply individuals. So I believe that’s how they found us.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 12:50
And talk about the International side, because I know you go all over. I mean, including Ukraine.
Bill Giofu 12:55
Yes. Well, the fact about. You’re right. Ukraine. Ukraine. We have hired a girl. Her name is Elena, and she’s been with us for over a year now. And she was an international scout agent in Kharkiv, Ukraine. And so she’s been working in the industry for over 25 years. I’d say she’s one of the top international agents in Canada, without a doubt.
I’ve seen her work. I’ve seen what she does. So she promotes along with, you know, myself, of course, I have input too. And she has a lot of input because she knows what she’s doing. So she we find girls and she promotes them to her agencies that she has connections with long-term connections, I might add, because she’s been in the industry so long, so they know her.
These agencies, like in China, in Japan and Korea, even in Italy, we have a guy in Italy right now. His name is River and he’s in Italy right now. And so she placed him to all these individual countries. And her connections are amazing. And so when I first met with her and talked to her and seen all her connections, I’m like, wow, this girl has to be with our agency.
So yeah. So that’s all. That’s the way we kind of operate, you know, we’ll promote a girl to say Korea or China and we get, you know, responses from them. We have to send them digital pictures of them and a walking video most likely. And then they’ll say, yeah, we want to have a zoom meeting with that individual, see how they act and react.
And then we, of course, we have to send a whole bunch of pictures because they require that they want people who are somewhat experienced, and then they go off to that country, they have to get a visa and they sign a three year contract, sorry, three month contract with that particular agency. And they have tons of clients, you know, in these international cities, right?
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 15:11
Are sometimes the people local? They’re like, if they’re filming in Korea and you have talent in Korea, or is it mostly they’re kind of flying from wherever they are to the destination.
Bill Giofu 15:25
Yes. You’re right. They, they from Calgary, they’ll fly to that destination and work in that city for three months. Of course, in China there’s so many other, you know, big centers that they’ll fly out of, you know, one of the cities into another city and do a job there and fly back the next day or something like that. We have a girl in Kosovo that applied to our agency.
We got her set up with a few photographers in Kosovo, and now we have a couple of clients in, I think in Istanbul and also in Korea that are interested in having her come to their cities. So we’re still working on that. But yeah, so we, we, we booked people from other countries and push them into the locales where it’s busy. Right. Because Calgary isn’t as busy as those other centers.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 16:17
I could see, you know, it’s really I would love to talk about use cases. Right. TV commercials is obviously a big use case. And I mentioned film talk about film. What type of, you know, context you get in with the film industry and, and jobs for, for the people.
Bill Giofu 16:36
Yeah. So right now we’re having a movie being shot here by the name of The JonBenet Ramsey story that happened in Colorado in 1996, so we’re booking people on that. We had a young lady audition for Miss Virginia. It was a scene that the mother of the daughter, JonBenet, was in her past history, I believe in her early 20s. She was in Miss Virginia.
So they did that. We book, you know, things on Billy the Kid. That’s a series that’s being shot here right now. Also, the abundance was here under the banner of Heaven was here. So we’ve worked on all of those and submitted people for stand-ins for, you know, photo doubles, background people.
So, yeah, so that’s kind of how it works when they’re shooting in Alberta, in Calgary especially, you know, they’ll come to the agencies here and book people.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 17:42
You know, what’s interesting is, you know, a lot of people growing up, I mean, maybe they maybe they are. I mean, for most people aren’t, like, I want to start a modeling agency when I grow up, right? So when you were young, what did you want to do?
Bill Giofu 17:58
I wanted to be a basketball player or football player.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 18:00
Basketball player?
Bill Giofu 18:01
Yeah. Or football? Okay, yeah.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 18:04
Not hockey.
Bill Giofu 18:06
Yeah.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 18:07
I’m stereotyping Canadian.
Bill Giofu 18:08
Skates and tuition and all that stuff. Right?
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 18:11
It’s expensive.
Bill Giofu 18:13
Football and basketball is my sport in high school. All-star in both. Back in Regina, Saskatchewan, where I’m originally from, where I was born. So yeah, that’s what I wanted to do. And then my daughter, I had a daughter when I was younger, early 20s, and she wanted to get into modeling, so that’s how I kind of got started.
I took her in and then my other daughter got in and they both did TV commercials. And then how did.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 18:46
You navigate that as a parent for them? Were you just contacting because like now it’s professionalized and people are contacting you, but back then how were you getting them into different gigs?
Bill Giofu 18:58
I contacted that particular an agency, a small agency in Regina did photoshoots, and then my daughter’s got TV commercials and photoshoots from them. One for Kentucky Fried Chicken. At that time it was Kentucky Fried Chicken and not KFC as it is now. So. And the radio stations and stuff like that.
Then the agent asked me to model and at first I was quite hesitant. I was still married at that time after I split up and, you know, went to a counselor because I was distraught of being, you know, in a separation from a marriage. The counselor told me, hey, why don’t you try what your dream was? And so I had in the back of my mind. So I went back to that same agency and they got me started and then I.
Yeah, then I just branched out. I was supposed to go to Chicago, actually, I think Dallas to your hometown and or Toronto, but I wanted to be near my daughters and I stayed closer. So I was eight hours away from Regina, Saskatchewan. I came to Calgary here, and that’s where I started my modeling career, basically.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 20:09
That’s so you kind of got into it because your daughters, it sounds like. Right? Yeah. Correct.
Bill Giofu 20:13
Yeah.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 20:15
And you know, you did I don’t know if it was professional football, but you played some serious football. Talk about that.
Bill Giofu 20:24
Yes. Well, when I was modeling in Spain, you know, you always want to look for connections. And, you know, somewhere you can, you know, lay your, lay your bed type thing. And so I, me and this other fellow was I just met him on the on, you know, at a restaurant. And so we were out and about and this guy came up to us and he says, hey, do you play American football?
And I’m like, well, I play Canadian football because I’m Canadian. He goes, well, why don’t you come out and try out for our team? And I said, well, sure, okay. Because, you know, I thought, well, connections and who knows what can happen from this and all that. Right.
So football in Spain in 1989, sorry, 92 it was at that time wasn’t very big. And so, you know, I played throughout high school even before high school. So I knew the techniques, the football there was very new. So the guy says, come on out and try out. So I said, okay.
So he gave me these old cleats and put on these old pads and all that. So anyway, went out and practiced. He goes, hey man, he says in broken English, go down, you know, do a post and, you know, turn in and catch the ball. I said, okay, no problem. So I go and catch the ball.
Boom, defensive half was in front of me, so I just leaned down and gave him a little bump. He went flying. Like I said, these guys had no technique. And then the coach came to me and he’s like, wow, man, I want you on our team, you know, let’s go. So it ended up we ended up in a Spanish final in the in.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 22:05
This was like tackle football with full pads and helmets.
Bill Giofu 22:08
It was American League football full-on cocktail tackle, everything you know, four downs, all that. Everything to do with American football. Boom.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 22:18
How big are you, Bill? I can’t tell on zoom. How tall are you?
Bill Giofu 22:22
Well, well I’ve shrunk. I’m. I’m 510 now. I used to be six foot. But, you know, in the modeling world, you always say it’s your, you know, at least you’re at least, you know, two inches taller, right? Oh, actually, I was I was actually five, 11, five, 11.5. I would always put.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 22:42
So you got to add that half in there. What are — talk about some of the challenges with running an agency like this.
Bill Giofu 22:54
Sorry. Question again sorry.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 22:55
Some of the challenges of running an agency like this. I mean, it seems like there’s a lot of logistics involved because it’s international. There’s gigs all over the place. What do you find over the years? That’s been kind of a challenge.
Bill Giofu 23:12
Well, I would say, you know, the social media has really affected our industry. You know, before, you know, to do a photo shoot, you know, they would have to come through an agency. So it’s kind of hard these days. Not hard, but, you know, it’s harder, I should say, because social media, they can go to somebody on, you know, Instagram and say, hey, you want to do a shoot for $200 bucks? And but you know, they’re not they don’t get a professional person a lot of time.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 23:50
Yeah. In your case or it’s kind of vetted obviously it’s professionalized where maybe people are. I mean, I guess that’s with every industry, right? You can go on and find cheaper labor on the internet, but if you want something more professional, you kind of have to pay for it.
Bill Giofu 24:06
Yeah, exactly. I mean, you know, you hear talent, they say, well, can we hire a model? You know, and I said, yeah, sure. No problem. How long is this going to take?
I said, well, professional model, you know, if you really want to do one, one shot, it can be done in an hour, but, you know, two hours, you know, whatever. Right. But they go, oh that’s short. And I go, well it’s a professional model. So they don’t know how to move.
You’ll get your shots and all that right. So yeah it’s and sometimes they’ll pay, you know, a non-professional for five hours. A hundred bucks an hour. Right. Whereas you can do it for a shorter time for professional models. So yeah.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 24:43
Talk about I want to hear just the hiring process and what kind of key hires you made over the years with Sophia models like internally as the staff goes.
Bill Giofu 24:55
Okay. Well, yeah, I mean, you definitely people that are excited about the industry, if they’re not excited about the fashion industry or the industry as a whole, then, you know, they have to have a passion for it. So those are the type of people that we look for. Even like I said, Elena, she doesn’t know anything else. And she’s told me that she says she will not work for any other business or anything.
Modeling is her life, you know, so, you know, as far as she is concerned, this is going to be her life for who knows how long. But you know, it has been for life for the last 25 years and definitely want people who are fashionable. And, you know, I used to be fashionable. I don’t know if I’m fashionable anymore, but you know for sure, you need to find that type of individual. And those are the individuals that we look for our photographers to, you know, we have to have photographers that, you know, are fashion sense sensitive or, you know, have the sense for fashion.
Right? You know, I’ve had other, you know, portrait photographers or landscape photographers or product photographers there. They don’t have what a fashion photographer has. You know, you have to have a certain look, you have to have certain, you know, lighting and stuff like that. So yeah, it’s a different dynamics when you’re looking for individuals, for a fashion industry like ours. So there’s a lot of variations, there’s no doubt.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 26:30
So for A business like yours. You have any photographers you need? Kind of like talent agents, obviously. Models and talent. What else is kind of behind the scenes that people don’t see as far as staff goes?
Bill Giofu 26:46
Well, we need stylists. You know, we need somebody to style the outfits that individuals where we need makeup and hair people. Usually I look for an individual that does both makeup and hair. A lot easier one individual instead of having two. So we look for those type of individuals.
And usually, you know, people behind the scenes, you know you need a director to, you know, to tell the model how to move if they don’t know how to move. And a lot of times that’s who we work with. We work with individuals that are their first time doing a photoshoot, and we find them on the street and they go, oh, I had no idea I could do this. Yeah. You have a great look.
You’re thin, you know. You got the look. Like I said before, you don’t have to be thin anymore. But, you know, you have the good look. That would be fantastic. Give you an example. We had a girl. She’s half black, and she has curly, curly brown hair. Right. And a fantastic looking young lady.
She’s in her middle or early 40s and, you know, she’s gotten probably about in the last year she was referred to us by another one of our models. She’s a hairstylist, actually, and was cutting our model’s hair. And he said, hey, why don’t you think about modeling? So she came on with us probably about a year and a half ago. She’s probably done somewhere around five TV commercials, six, maybe one of the bigger ones.
She did a Skittles commercial out of the USA. The Skittles company came up and shot up here and she was cast for it. So great little gig for her.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 28:40
I’m curious, Bill, you mentioned, you know, you don’t have to be thin anymore, right? I’d love for you to talk about how stigmas have changed a little bit in the modeling world.
Bill Giofu 28:48
Yes. Yeah. Stigma. That’s right. Well, it’s not us agents that ask for individuals to be a certain way.
Back in the day, I had a client by the name of Marques. Still work with him. Actually, I’m just booking something for them next week. Marques is a huge. They used to be, only it used to be called Mark’s Work Wearhouse.
Now they’ve changed the name just to Marques and they book, you know, female, male kids, all that type of stuff. So now before five years ago, they used to ask for individuals that were Our girls, five foot nine and up and 35-inch hip. Now, that’s not the biggest part of the but 35in. Can you imagine that, Dr. Jeremy? That’s thin.
Anyway, they now are asking for all types. It doesn’t matter, you know size. They’re even asking for plus size, which is fantastic for us. We love that. It opens up our market to, you know, submit girls and guys that don’t fit the quote the modeling look. They’re still models, but it’s not the old stereotype like you put it of the five foot ten, you know, 120 or 110, 100-pound girls, you know. So it’s a lot different nowadays.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 30:21
What’s changed? You think?
Bill Giofu 30:25
Society, I guess. Diversity, inclusion, all that stuff.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 30:35
You know, it was interesting. I was in London and there was Naomi Campbell exhibit at the museum, and it was very interesting, just it was like everything from her childhood all the way up to her, her whole, her whole career. I’m getting that wrong. Hold on. Who was it?
I mean, it was. It was named Campbell. The supermodel? Yes. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And it was just interesting to see, because at the time, it seemed like, you know. She broke the mold, you know, with from because everyone else was white. Right.
And so it was really, you know, quite interesting to see the Like you said, kind of the evolution of the times through this exhibit. So I totally, totally kind of experienced it. I never didn’t think of myself, I’m going to go to a supermodel exhibit or something like that when I’m going to the museum, but that that’s what was there. And it was quite interesting.
Bill Giofu 31:47
Yeah. Cool. Yeah. That’s. You’re exactly right.
Yeah.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 31:51
You know, you there’s some challenging times you go through in our life. And I know you’re mentioning something before we hit record on maybe to talk about just from like an overcoming standpoint some things you’ve, you’ve had to overcome.
Bill Giofu 32:08
Yeah. You know, I was high school football star. You know, they picked me as an all-star, you know, in basketball too. And you know, when you’re a teenager, you like to celebrate and you like to celebrate with your teammates. And so I did a lot of drinking in high school and did some really stupid stuff back in high school and then through after.
He also it was continued on my drinking and I a lot of dumb stuff. And you know, I was at a what we will call a Oktoberfest. My sister was a director of this college and asked me to bartend. And I’m like, yes, bartend. Free booze.
So did that. Had my wife at that time we were together, of course, but we were. It was on rocky times. And so, put a long story short, I ended up in jail after abusing her for one night only. Luckily, it was only one night and I realized that, you know, what’s a nice guy like me doing in a place like this?
When I was sitting in that jail cell and I thought, wow, I shouldn’t be here. So I knew a guy who was in Alcoholics Anonymous and I contacted him. And from there I just started going to AA meetings. And that was seven years ago, and I haven’t had a haven’t been drunk since that time. So it was fantastic opportunity for me to straighten my life out.
And I believe truly, that if I had not sobered up at that time, I don’t know where I would have been. It would have been pretty rough road, I think, for myself. Yeah. So after that, you know, for many years, I continued on to attend Alcoholics Anonymous. When I was in excuse me, when I was in Spain, There was Spanish AA meetings, but there was a bunch of, you know, people from Canada and also from England that were in Spain, and they we didn’t speak Spanish.
So we started in an English-speaking Spanish AA meeting. So it was quite unique. And in fact, when I was in Spain, that was when I was playing football and we ended up in the Spanish final. And, you know, I was telling the people at the AA meeting, I was, you know, could be in the final. And this lady who has been sober for a long time, she came up to me and she was so worried for me.
She goes, Bill, I don’t want you to win that championship. I go, what do you mean, why not? That’s our whole purpose. She goes, yeah, but you know what? You’re going to drink champagne after.
And I said, no, no, don’t worry, I won’t drink any champagne. You know. So yeah, it’s interesting. And, you know, I’ve lived a long time without alcohol and I believe it’s only improved my life, you know, being through that. And then, you know, in AA you have to basically have a spiritual life. And so I pursued that. And so I am where I am today.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 35:38
You know, Bill, I have one last question before I ask it. I just want to point everyone to check out Sophia Models.com to learn more about what you and the company does. My last question is mentors. Who are some of the business mentors professional mentors you’ve had over the course of your career that have been influential?
Bill Giofu 36:03
Well. Business I love business. I also own some real estate stuff too, so I had a really good AA sponsor. In fact, he owned a an iron or a. An iron business and supplied iron equipment and products to himself, because he also did the building of these iron structures.
So that’s what he did. His name is Roman, and he was also a man of faith. He went to the Orthodox Church. And when I was a child, I also went to the Orthodox Church and was baptized Orthodox. And after Alcoholics Anonymous, I started searching out what was better as because in AA they always say search out something better to do and watch where the man of the cloth is righteous and also to lead you.
So I sought these individuals out, and Roman was one of the fellows that I really hung on to and looked up to. And today, because of him and because of other circumstances. I am now a strong Orthodox Christian and serving the altar in that church in Calgary here. And of course, the priests at that church. I look up to them and their, you know, their wives and their children, because the Orthodox priests can get married.
And so I look up to our priests in, in our church and the good role models and of course, Roman, who is who is retired now. But still, he was a very good influence on my life. And, you know, there’s also a lot I have to mention the owner of Sophia or of Mode Models, he was the fellow that I worked with for the president, and he showed me a lot of great things. And so We had a good friendship, you know, in the past. And so I looked up to him.
And also, there’s quite a few individuals that own businesses now that I can reflect on and say, yeah, they helped me in my life and in my business. So, you know, showing their examples of their lives and how they carried out their business lives really stood out to me. So, yeah, some of the guys.
Dr. Jeremy Weisz 38:50
Would be the first one to thank you, everyone. Check out sophiamodels.com. Check out more episodes of the podcast. We’ll see everyone next time. Bill, thanks so much.
Bill Giofu 39:00
Thank you.
