Life & Work with Marcus Ragains of Portage Mi

Today we’d like to introduce you to Marcus Ragains

Hi Marcus , please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
im a young successful creative kid from the suburbs. I was adopted into my new family at the age of two and before i could know it I turned 18. I played sports for 13 years and started to gain social media presence in 2015-2019 hosting bicycle meet ups for the community while posting it to youtube. one of the video’s/posts got a $600 sponsorship which lead to a bigger and stronger following in my community, This was Quite a hobby to get made fun of for. This was the beginning of highschool for me.. Then i got bigger into growing the foundation of my community & network, So I ended up meeting with a guy in 2019 who worked at Phizer co. and lived down the road. I explained to him what I did, I got his phone # to be dropped off on the first day of highschool in a “1999 Toyota Supra” which is a $70k imported car from Japan. I then started to bring more of my photography to life at car show’s hosted by the school group: Or hosted by me called Kalamazoo Performance, These late night shows is how I acquired alot of my Community & Client’s for the next upcoming year. I also Directed a film for our business class in school with the help of the Kalamazoo performance club.
The meets ended up getting out of control and I decided I wouldn’t be hosting anymore..
Fast forward to 2022-2023 Sophomore – Junior year I found myself hanging with the wrong crowd and it was destroying my future as I knew it, The only thing holding me was my one class across town in the city working on cars two hours out of the day, I was failing school and lost my license due to reckless driving.
I didn’t realize a buddy of mine from an old hockey team and my school was watching me closely. He genuinely wanted the best for me, While in school he would be working on his monthly 5 figure business called “Rat Trading” teaching over 10k people how to day trade, while also personally trading and teaching me the basics.
Him and I decided to work a $20 an hour job for the entire summer… We used his truck every day that year working upwards to 12 hour days and 50 hour weeks power-washing houses and painting decks. We also multitasked and would take “swing trades” in the stock market to sometimes 3x or 4x our money while working such long days. The season was coming to an end and I ended up giving that job up to work at a mexican fast food place for 7 months. It was a good idea since the season was closing anyway. The State Of Michigan gave me my license back and I started to go to more car shows again to keep my name in the community. Thats how I got introduced to “velocity visual crew” (Jon) I ran a $200k Mclaren 570s down in a Saturn ion for miles after a car show and became his Content Creator / assistant helping the team grow to over 4k followers in just under a year creating over 50+ video’s / Photographs. At the time it was the beginning of the school year and I worked as the dishwasher and runner, along with doing side jobs for 3 of my family members and now (Jon). VelocityVisualCrew – A motive we started here in my small town with a quarter million doller car ( mclaren )
At my food job I was getting my tips stolen, Un-Equal pay, and accused of everything going wrong, Before I quit this fast food job I made it my task to network with as many folks to grow my business, met many amazing people. I started to take photography more and more seriously, even spending over $50 just to be at events I wasnt getting paid to be at, or drive to city’s ive never been just to meet people. Everthing started to pay off, I grew more of a following and was learning at a rapid rate while also carrying all A’s out my senior year. I realized I could use my network with the car community and the “music industry scene” to create more of a presence and build my business. I then got invited out to my favorite shoot yet, “grindhardE” music video”
my first $4k video shoot. This changed the curve of the game for me I started to learn more about the music industry and understand different niches instead of just “vehicles and business’s” . I started to go for athletes & people I knew had a reason to spend money on content. I spent more time on my ad’s and social media while also spreading word of mouth. I ended Up graduating school with all A’s and hosted a Car Show Grad Party to celebrate. Since then I have been traveling each week and month to new citys and states almost like our politicians, I have been riding presidential in a blacked out caddilac and have been booked for the past 3 months and im currently scheduled for the next 3-4..

( to anyone chasing there dreams it just takes “discipline , constancy , mindset” to get you to your goal is ) although be patent.. my fav quote is : ” an overnight success took 5 years “

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Sure , it was not super easy there are many nights that I will lay awake until 4 AM or 5 AM. I still lay awake just working away on my business for hours. After a while I did acquire like-minded people and friends but in the beginning and for the longest time It was a rough road. I was mostly alone judging and curating everything for myself.

Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I learned having discipline and work ethic is a very important thing along this process. No matter how you feel Physically or Mentally the world does keep spinning. Meaning if I wake up in a bad mood or my body hurts from the day before I will still get up and go get the tasks/job done that I have planned. I’ve also learned taking rest days and scheduling rest days are also very important not only for business growth but your personal aswell. Being consistent is also the bread and butter to this whole operation, If you stay consistent and keep the time cutting you’ll always be ahead the curve of the game.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marcus_ragains?igsh=MXJ5OW5vNnhhZjM5aA==
• Youtube: https://youtube.com/shorts/BsStgZD8n5o?si=FII4vThQCRsR5Dzw

Image Credits
Marcus Ragains.