Meet kevin stahl

We recently connected with Kevin Stahl and have shared our conversation below.

Kevin, looking forward to learning from your journey. You’ve got an amazing story and before we dive into that, let’s start with an important building block. Where do you get your work ethic from?
I get my work ethic from two places. The first was my father, he worked his whole life until his body would not allow it anymore. He worked every chance he could, taking shifts on holidays and picking up when his co-workers called off or needed time off. He sacrificed his time for our family’s well-being and fortune. He would come home tired and sore, but he would somehow do everything else that was waiting for him at home and was able to make time for his family as well. Many people say their father was their hero, mine really was. I learned so much from him when he was alive, I think maybe I’ve learned more from him now that he is gone.

The other source of inspiration for my work ethic comes from Gene Simmons of the rock band KISS. Gene grew up dirt-poor in Israel and emigrated to the United States of America with his mother at a very young age. Gene learned to respect and cherish everything he had as a child. He learned to work hard for what he wanted. He learned to never be satisfied with enough or more than enough. He was a school teacher before putting on make-up and high heels. After KISS had become a huge success he began merchandising the band and becoming an actor in Hollywood. He also became a music producer and ever started his own label. Gene has performed probably more than anyone else in the history of the music business. He has never taken a real vacation to this day. As Gene puts it there are no vacation days, there are only working days. Gene has amassed a fortune from his work and enjoys his life because he lives on his terms. Gene has worked everyday for the past 50 plus years without days off. If you can’t learn anything from that, I don’t know what to tell you.

Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
I started Copper Age Gold in February of 2020. The concept came together pretty quickly. The name was first, then I figured out what I wanted to do and who I wanted to be. I found my vision and my voice by talking about things that I loved which were comic books and toys. I grew up a spoiled kid because I was my parent’s last child (they knew when to quit). So I had just about all the cool toys you would imagine a kid had in the late 1970’s and into the 1980’s. Along the way I started collecting comic books, I was sucked in by the amazing art and story-telling. I loved how I could immerse myself into a comic book and forget about the world for a while.

Copper Age is a time frame for comic books released from the early 1980’s to the early 1990’s and the gold part came because I wanted to focus on the best stuff from that time period. Not only comics, but everything else as well. Toys, action figures, movies, T.V. shows, video games, and even sports. So that is what Copper Age Gold is all about. You can expect to see content from all of those genres and many more. I have been blessed with the opportunity to have met and interviewed some of the top toy companies and their owners as well as many comic book creators. I enjoy connecting my followers with these amazing people.

What I do as of now is not a business. But, I do believe there is a lot of potential there. Just recently one of the biggest toy companies Super7 from San Francisco reached out to us and asked if we wanted to be a member of their Collab team. This allows us to share their products with our audience and followers. After accepting the invitation we also were just approved for the Amazon Influencer Program. This allows us to do the same, only with Amazon we can now create shoppable pictures and videos that can appear on Amazon products all over the world. We are super excited and humbled by these amazing opportunities.

I do every aspect of what you see of Copper Age Gold. I shoot and edit the video you see, I create the images, audio and all other aspects of the brand. I manage all of the social media, including posting and responding to all platforms. Nobody told me this would get so crazy LOL.

We are blessed to have over 4500 followers across our social media. I try to respond to each of them in a timely manner. I try to treat them all as if they were my first follower. I very much enjoy meeting them when possible, usually at a comic book convention or a toy convention. I try to engage as much as I can.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
Learning is the first skill you need. You don’t have to be a fast learner, you just need to be able to learn. There was so much I did not know how to do before I started this brand. You need to put in the time and effort to learn whatever it is you want to learn how to do. There are more resources out there now than there has ever been. Skills aren’t going to come looking for you.

The next thing you need is time. Find a way to make time to do whatever it is you want to do. An hour before bed, an hour before you leave for work, you lunch break, your drive to work, your day on the lake, whatever, whenever try to make time for yourself.

The third quality is learning what doesn’t work and figuring out how to fix it. Never be afraid to fail. Take chances, if they don’t pan out change your strategy. Try to look at things from different points of view. Never get frustrated, get better.

What was the most impactful thing your parents did for you?
My parents taught me how to entertain myself. I don’t mean this in a negative way, like they didn’t pay attention to me or care about me. I mean they encouraged me to create my own fun. In a time before video games and computers took over the world we used to have to use our imaginations to have fun.

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