Good Neighbor Podcast: Cooper City
Bringing Together Local Businesses & Neighbors of Cooper City
Good Neighbor Podcast: Cooper City
EP #309: Enrique Olivieri Photography
Ever wondered what separates a smartphone snapshot from a professional photograph that truly captures essence and emotion? On this episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast, host Jeremy Wolf sits down with Cooper City resident Enrique Olivari, whose remarkable journey from Marine Corps to NYCDOC supervisor to professional photographer offers a fascinating glimpse into the power of pursuing passion.
"If I don't give myself a chance to do photography, I'm going to die unhappy," Enrique shares, revealing the pivotal moment in 2005 when he retired from law enforcement and committed fully to his lifelong passion. Having purchased his first professional camera in 1982 while stationed in Japan, photography remained a constant throughout his diverse career path.
The conversation explores Enrique's recent relocation from South Dakota (where temperatures plummeted to a bone-chilling -54°F) to the warmer climate of South Florida, where he's quickly established himself in fashion, portrait, and commercial photography. His candid insights into the business side of photography are particularly valuable—explaining why professional services shouldn't be haggled over ("You don't go to a restaurant and try to negotiate the price of whatever you're ordering") and how low-cost photographers often deliver disappointing results.
For business owners and individuals looking to elevate their visual presence, Enrique offers practical wisdom about investing in quality photography while demystifying common misconceptions about the craft in today's smartphone era. Whether you're a photography enthusiast, entrepreneur seeking quality visual content, or simply enjoy stories of people bravely following their dreams, this episode delivers genuine conversation and actionable insights from a passionate local professional.
Discover Enrique's work on Instagram @enriqueoli_photo or through his website euophoto.com, and join our community of good neighbors supporting local talent and businesses. Give him a call at (347) 453-1121 or visit his website www.euophoto.com.
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Jeremy Rolfe.
Speaker 2:Well, hello, hello everyone, friends, family, wonderful community. Welcome back to the Good Neighbor Podcast. Our guest today is, in fact, a resident of Cooper City, so he is, by definition, a good neighbor of the show here, and we are happy to have him on the show to tell us all about what he does. I'm here with Enrique Olivari. Enrique joins us from Enrique Olivari Photography. Enrique, good to see you, brother. Hi, good to see you guys too. Yes, yes, okay. So I think most people have a pretty good idea of what a photographer does. In fact, I think most people. Nowadays, with our cell phones, we all think we're professional photographers, right? So, with all that said, though, why don't you tell everybody a little bit about your business, specifically what types of photography, what types of services you provide, and, and then we'll get into, like the backstory, how you got into this?
Speaker 3:okay, so, oh, what I do now I do a fashion portrait headshot photographer. Okay, I also do commercial work. Not a lot of that. Most of my stuff is I would say most of its in the fashion fashion, in the portrait work headshots. It's into fashion Fashion, into portrait work headshots. It's starting to pick up now. I've only been here a year, like I've only lived in South Florida for a year now I'm really new here.
Speaker 2:Well, we're happy to have you. Where are you from?
Speaker 3:I'm originally from New York. I'm originally from New York. During when they shut the world off, I moved to South Dakota, to Sioux Falls. I spent three years there. I was able to. During that time I was able to. I had one company, the photography company. I was able to start another company, a media company, and we did well. It did really well, and I said, okay, it's time to leave the cold weather and go where it's warm.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a welcome shift. I'm actually from New York originally. I moved down here gosh 30 plus years ago. What part of New York are you from?
Speaker 3:Last place I lived was Astoria, New York. Okay, I was in Astoria, so you know I raised on the Lower East Side. Long journey, long journey to make it here.
Speaker 2:Now have you been doing photography most of your professional career. What does your trajectory or background look like?
Speaker 3:So the first camera was a neighbor. I learned about photography through a neighbor's, my neighbor's daughter's husband. He was a professional photographer. He's the first one introduced me to it, showed me pictures, took us to a darkroom and I saw like, while we took the pictures early, we developed them. After that I was hooked. I bought my first professional camera in 1982. And I was in the service and when I got to Japan I was in the Marine Corps. When I got to Japan the first time, first thing I bought. Two weeks later I bought the professional camera. I knew what I wanted. I'd been reading about it. It was magazines back then, it was nothing online. So that's where it started and I've always stayed with it.
Speaker 3:My other background I'm retired from law enforcement. I did 20 years with New York City as a supervisory officer. I'm not going to say where, you know where I was, but I retired from there in 2005. And after that I said if I don't give myself a chance to do photography, I'm going to die unhappy. And I said let me take a chance and take a deep dive. And so far it's been great. It's more than I expected, Definitely more than I expected. I just feel blessed that I've been able to progress throughout the years the way I have, especially in the last four or five years, I've really taken off. I've become definitely a name.
Speaker 2:That's great to hear, man. A year ago you came down here to South Florida. What would you say has been one of the biggest challenges ever since you came down here to start up, and then, on the other side of that, maybe the biggest reward aside from being away from the cold.
Speaker 3:I would say one of the big challenges was here we go again. So you're in New York, you establish some type of a um, a customer base, client base. So I go to south dakota. So it took me a year before I could start.
Speaker 3:Uh, anything out there it was, it was like that, I would say, competitive there they don't have community like they do here and in new york. It was a little more cutthroat out there in the Midwest because there's not a lot of photographers everyone. But I had. I guess I had been swimming with the sharks in New York for so many years. I come down here, I know I knew a lot of people and, uh, I was. I could say it was like, it was like a blessing. I ran into people that I knew from New York and they say we need, we want to work with you because we know you, you know we've worked you before a long time ago in New York, we know you. Then, by perchance, I met a CEO of a media company who she took me on as a Florida features photographer for her company and that's been that's like this big saving, that's been like the super blessing I've had.
Speaker 2:Good stuff, man, big saving, that's been like like the super blessing. I've had good stuff, man, so like, like I mentioned at the top of the show, nowadays with bones, everybody you know thinks they're a professional photographer. I know, uh, my wife's pretty good at it.
Speaker 2:I'm not so good but and you're doing more, a more niche area in photography with your, your portraits, business headshots and things like that right, but do you find that's been a big obstacle for you in terms of bringing on new clients, that everybody thinks that they could do this stuff on their own, and if so, what are some other myths and misconceptions that people typically have surrounding the photography business in this day and age?
Speaker 3:A lot of. I tell friends and close anyone who's a friend or anyone who wants to buy a camera go on a vacation, buy a camera, say, buy a hard drive, use your phone, use your phone. And so why? Because the pictures will come out. They'll be a lot better for you. Drive, use your phone, use your phone and said why? Because the pictures have come out. There'll be a lot better for you. They're processed right. You know that's the way the camera takes a picture. As you see it, they're fantastic. Stick with stick with shit, like you're going on vacation unless you're doing something really special. Use your phone, it'll. It'll get the job done. It'll definitely get your job done in what, like it, happens a lot. You have a small company, small startups. We're gonna get our camera okay. By the time you get going, you're five thousand dollars in the hole on camera equipment and no one knows how to use anything that's the trick that's, that's what it is.
Speaker 3:No one, um, and if you and the drawback on that is that you do have young guys who, um, you know, they buy a camera, they want to be a photographer, they, uh, they'll, they're not ready, they're not at that level, but they'll try to get into the and it kind of hurts the business. Uh, what they'll do is they'll try like a thousand photos for like $25. Like they'll, they'll try to charge you, oh, we're going to do a hundred edit photos for this price. And when you look at it you say you know you're going to get what you pay for.
Speaker 3:And a lot of times what happens is like even recently it happened I mean, at the drive to Boca for a dental clinic, they went to the cheap guy for headshots and the guy calls me and says you know I spent this much money and I said, okay, well, this is my price. There's no negotiating with it. It's not like you go to a restaurant and try to a restaurant especially, I use a restaurant a lot with this as an analogy. You don't go to a restaurant and try to haggle on the price of whatever you're ordering. So this is what you're going to get and this is what I promise and I can guarantee you're going to like my work and you're going to see my work as it progresses, cause I'll let you look at, I'll tether it where as I take a shot. You'll see what exactly what you're going to get and I'll just touch it up a little bit and you know I'll have it delivered. Um, one of my biggest things I could deliver in five days. I've uh, I've been doing this for a while.
Speaker 2:I've invested enough into the business, so you know I can deliver in five days and that that's usually my selling point when it comes to most of my work yes, it's funny you said that about going to a restaurant and trying to negotiate, like there's certain things that you just don't do that for and then there's other things that you like you're almost expected to right. It's almost like like common parlance, like when you go get quotes for things. You're always trying to negotiate down and like my goal. One of the reasons, one of the things I love about the show and one of the things I love about kind of what I do in the community where I I help prop up local businesses and support local building relationships, is that, like I, I strive for relationships where I don't ever have to do that right, where I hire somebody to come in and I trust their judgment, I trust their professionalism and I don't want to put them in a position where it's like, oh, can you do any better on the price? Then you're taking away from you know like, hopefully they're giving you a good quote right and they're not padding it with fluff.
Speaker 2:And that's one of the problems is that there's a lot of fly by night people and professions and you're dealing with. But if you can deal with people that you know like and trust, people from the same community like you, you live in montero. We're all part of the same area. If I hired you to come out for photos, I I would. I would trust your judgment and I wouldn't really question the price on it. That's just me. It's um. The older I get, the more, the more I get like that.
Speaker 3:I just try to yeah, like you don't want to. You don't want to go with like I when it comes to like, like choosing someone like I. I say look around, like you know, the cheapest guys and the guy you want, cause you're going to get. You know you're definitely going to get what you pay for.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I mean anybody.
Speaker 2:Back to the idea that everybody has a phone, everybody can take a photo, right, and everybody can take a very nice photo In many cases you'll look at it and it looks beautiful, but there are so many subtleties and nuances in photography and especially I, I've learned a lot more ever since I started doing a podcast, like I started doing this, I wasn't even doing any kind of video.
Speaker 2:I started with audio and then I was like, oh, I might as well record video with it and I started trying to set up video and lighting and equipment and it's like man, there's a lot of moving parts there and there's a lot of these little again subtleties and nuances that you don't really. Maybe you couldn't necessarily pick out directly what it is between, like an amateur photo and a professional photo, but something about it sings in a different way and it just creates a different psychological perspective. So definitely a lot that goes into it. I know I work hands on with photographers all the time. I put out a local publication and you know I see all the work that goes into it and I see the dedication and then the quality that comes on the other side of it. So it's really nice.
Speaker 3:Like I said, to choose the guy who's going to work for you. You'll know who it is, you get a feel. You want to feel that chemistry between you guys, especially, like I would say, about 80% of my work is commercial work. Now, since I've been to Florida, I do a lot of work in Miami. I'm down in Miami about three times a week over here. Yeah, I do a little stuff. I do a lot more portrait work, headshots, and that's slowly building up. I don't have my own studio. That's a drawback. I just haven't… Some of the prices here, I don't know what to say about it.
Speaker 2:Not as bad as New York, come on.
Speaker 3:No, I rented studio space in New York from a larger studio, yeah, and at certain days a week where I would go down and you know I could schedule everything over here. Not so much, not so much. I'm still looking. I haven't found anything that you know I prefer to be like in this area here, which would be great for me it is a great area down here for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, definitely Beautiful. So you mentioned a year, 1982. I was only two years old back then. I'm trying to place age-wise. Do you have kids down here in Cooper City? I know a lot of people come to Cooper City specifically for the schools. It's such a great community. Do you have family down here?
Speaker 3:No.
Speaker 3:My wife has a. You have family down here. No, we have. Uh, my wife has a lot of friends down here. She lived in broward county and she raised her kids for most of their lives down here, then moved to new york, um, but she had a lot of friends and that was a reason why we came down here. Whenever we would go on from south dakota we'd come down to Fort Lauderdale, she said, you know, she'd always have friends and they were here like a great, a lot of support in like making that decision.
Speaker 3:He said, like you know, she said he said where do you want to go? She told me. He said I can't do this cold anymore. And I said you know what? You were crazy enough to follow me to South Dakota. You know, minus 54 degrees at days. Wherever you want to go, I'll follow you, I don't care. And I said, like let's pick the place to live. And and he says, you find it, I I'll, I'll take care of the rest. Like find a place. And so we came down. We had been coming down here a lot because of her friends. That's how we landed here.
Speaker 3:I mean, I wouldn't. It's a big, it's a big change. I mean, you know, we just had a license and took almost a year to get our licenses changed over. Get used to the car insurance here. You know, those are the small little nuances that you have to deal with. But you know, electric bill, electric bill, like everything, was a lot cheaper in the Midwest. But we're here now. So, like I said, I could think of this as I used to pay, you know, but I don't do anymore. But moving down here it's definite Business-wise it's really good. Also, I was like surprised. I was was like surprised I was able to pick up that much like work. Private usually commercial work is hard work to pick up. Commercial work was. It's pretty stable. I deal with with certain companies, certain brands or PR firms and a media company, so that usually helps me out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this is every time I go away now, whether it's to see my brother in New Jersey or I just went to LA for a graduation for my nephew not recommended but every time I go away and I come back and I fly into Fort Lauderdale Airport and I leave the airport and I see the beautiful weather. Everything's so spacious, everything's so bright. I was like I'm so happy to be here and then I land home here in Cooper City. I got kids in school here. It's such a wonderful community and I'm really happy to have had this opportunity to meet you, a neighbor from the community. How could our listeners learn more? Anybody out there that's listening to this, that that needs your services? What is the best way for them to connect with you? Maybe share your social media website contact information? What's the best way to reach your brother?
Speaker 3:I'm on on Instagram. I use a lot more Instagram than tick-tock. I try to take talk. Never happened from never work for me, just just happened. Like you take it like really weird, like we'll let the younger generations keep that one well, like I, I uh I do a lot of uh social media on instagram. I'm at enrique ali underscore photo on instagram. Uh, my website is, uh, I guess, wwweeuophotocom. That would be my, I guess my portfolio. And, yeah, like Instagram would be the easiest way to connect with me.
Speaker 2:All right, very cool. We'll, of course, drop a link in the description to all of your contact information, so anybody that's interested can reach out. Enrique. Thanks for joining us today, brother. It was nice getting to know you.
Speaker 3:Thanks for giving me the opportunity. All of your contact information. So anybody that's interested can reach out Enrique thanks for joining us today, brother, it was nice getting to know you.
Speaker 2:Thanks for giving me the opportunity. Oh, it's our pleasure To join in for you guys, yeah, man, and thanks, as always, to our listeners for tuning in. We will catch everyone next time on the next episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast. Everyone, take care and stay blessed.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast and stay blessed. Or call 954-231-3170.