WHERE BRAINS MEET BEAUTY™ brings the unique, personal stories of our industry’s most interesting people to a wide audience. It also shares the stories of the original WHERE BRAINS MEET BEAUTY – the team at Base Beauty Creative Agency. Give a listen to Jodi’s episode with Carey Segal. She’s an important part of the agency and podcast marketing. She works with us in between dance and acting auditions. Plus she’s not our only hyphenated-multi-talented team member…
Announcer |
Welcome to Where Brains Meet Beauty, hosted by Jodi Katz, founder and creative director of Base Beauty Creative Agency. |
Jodi Katz |
Hey, y’all. I’m here with Carey, who’s on our team as a part-timer. Hi, Carey. Welcome to Where Brains Meet Beauty. |
Carey Segal |
Hi, Jodi. Thank you for having me. |
Jodi Katz |
Where are we sitting right now? |
Carey Segal |
We are sitting in the C.O. Bigelow Store in Manhattan. |
Jodi Katz |
Why are we here? |
Carey Segal |
We’re here because we are testing this spot to do a live podcast with some awesome guests next week. |
Jodi Katz |
This is really cool. |
Carey Segal |
Very cool. There’s so much history here. I just learned that there’s 200 years of beauty and pharmaceuticals here, so it definitely feels like a Manhattan staple. |
Jodi Katz |
Okay, so let’s let our listeners get to know you a little better. You can totally reluctant to doing a podcast this morning. Where does your accent come from? |
Carey Segal |
Oh, you picked up on it. From Memphis, Tennessee, born and raised. Though I did try to get rid of my accent so whatever’s left, you can only imagine how much stronger it used to be. |
Jodi Katz |
And were you a debutante? |
Carey Segal |
Kind of. I did go to a private girl’s school my entire life. They all did cotillion and all those proper, southern things. But I did skip out on that because I was always dancing. |
Jodi Katz |
Okay, so tell us about dancing. |
Carey Segal |
I’ve been dancing since I was three. Always took it super, duper, duper, seriously. The story I like to tell is that in order to get me out of diapers my mom said, I wanted to be in a show. I think it was Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. And she said, ‘Your diaper can’t fit under your costume.’ And I said, ‘Okay.’ So I was in big girl panties the next day and I said, ‘Mom, can I be in the show?’ She’s like, ‘Oh, crap.’ So, yeah I’ve always been super serious about dancing and my parents took me to New York when I was 12 for the first time and I fell in love. I was lucky enough to go to college and get a degree in dance and have a few professional jobs since. I’m living the artist’s life in New York City. |
Jodi Katz |
So you work for us part-time and then the rest of the time you are auditioning, right? |
Carey Segal |
A couple of other survival things as well, but yeah auditioning, teaching, choreographing, gigs here and there, assisting. |
Jodi Katz |
Is it a hard life? |
Carey Segal |
It’s a lot more challenging than I even anticipated coming into it. What’s crazy is everyone is like, the biggest and best and the most talented where they’re from but you come here and you’re just like a little fish in a huge pond full of talent. So it’s really been eye opening as well as push me a lot. |
Jodi Katz |
Do you think you’ve gotten to be a better dancer since being here? |
Carey Segal |
Better dancer, better business woman because you’re your own boss and you’re marketing yourself and you’re pushing for yourself. No one’s, I mean I guess I have an agent but you are advocating for yourself. And definitely broken me out of my shell in ways I didn’t expect. Just to keep pressing forward. |
Jodi Katz |
What does it take for you to be able to make a living just doing dance? Is there a possibility? |
Carey Segal |
Yes if you book a fantastic contract like Broadway or Cirque de Solei or a touring show or one of the bigger shows that are more consistent. But as far as the gig life, quote – un-quote, it’s a lot of, it’s really just side hustle. A lot of people can use their dance skills and talents for teaching and choreographing and stuff like that. But, unfortunately in New York, in order to survive it’s a lot of the outside of the dance world jobs that, some are great like Base Beauty and some are not my cup of tea like serving at a restaurant or front desk at gyms or kinds of things. |
Jodi Katz |
But you’ve had other side jobs? |
Carey Segal |
I, in the two years I’ve been here, I have done a little bit of everything including operating an elevator at a roof top bar. That’s my favorite. |
Jodi Katz |
You were the person in the elevator pressing the buttons? |
Carey Segal |
Definitely. I mean, I only did five shifts but I talk about it like I had a whole other career in this elevator job. |
Jodi Katz |
So, I once had, I’ve also had a lot of gigs. I don’t know if they were side gigs. They were just like, ‘Oh, I just lost my job. I just got laid off or fired, so I need something to do.’ So I was really like the clean, what are those jobs called where you just have for a short time? |
Carey Segal |
Temp. |
Jodi Katz |
Temp jobs, right. So I was like the star temp. And that’s only because I knew how to literally type on the computer and answer the phone. All the phone systems, really, that was very stressful for me with all buttons and all these lines ringing, transferring, all that stuff was really hard for me. But, using a computer, I knew how to do. So, one of my temp jobs was at a man hole cover factory. And I talk about that like I was welding, which I wasn’t. I was just in the office, moving papers from one file to another. |
Carey Segal |
That’s one subject that you never even knew you were going to learn about. |
Jodi Katz |
No, and it was not that far from my home when I lived in New Jersey and they make the man hole covers in this factory and I got to work in the factory. |
Carey Segal |
That’s pretty cool. |
Jodi Katz |
I also worked a temp job at a candy company. |
Carey Segal |
Okay. |
Jodi Katz |
Kind of like a really big national candy company where they manufactured gum and stuff and I had nothing to do with anything, I was just literally moving papers from one file to another. Something I was also very good at. |
Carey Segal |
Paper moving. |
Jodi Katz |
Yeah. And another temp job was at a company that owns mall properties all across the country and my job was to file away press clippings about the mall. So it was a mall in 50 different states and they had so many different malls, you can hear my New Jersey, malls. And I was filing all day but I was like a speed filer. Because I was too good for the job because the job should have lasted three days. |
Carey Segal |
Yeah, exactly. Well that’s the problem. Dance teaches you an incredible amount of discipline and professionalism and all these skills that these side nothing jobs, you’re a little over qualified and you’re working with people who kind of half ass things and that’s not in a dancer’s nature so sometimes I’ve had to be like, ‘Carey, it’s not that big of a deal. Take a step back. Care a little less. It’s okay.’ But I will say, grinding so, so, so, so hard for my performance career, it has been nice and fun to take a breather and do other things that are not even arts related and use those skills sets. Because honestly before moving to New York, I had never, ever, ever, ever, ever had any sort of job not dance related. So that was extremely eye opening, getting here. |
Jodi Katz |
So New York burst your dance bubble? |
Carey Segal |
My job bubble. |
Jodi Katz |
Your job dance bubble. Yes. You were in a dance bubble and you were [crosstalk 00:07:33] |
Carey Segal |
Yes. |
Jodi Katz |
So why were you reluctant to do the podcast? |
Carey Segal |
Just because I didn’t feel I had, not connected, but been emersed enough with Base Beauty, I didn’t feel like I was integrated enough into the team to tell my views as a team member. But I’m definitely feeling connected and involved a lot more. |
Jodi Katz |
Well, I think with Base Beauty, like many small companies, once you step that foot in, that’s it. You’re just part of the team and a lot is expected of you. So you’re part of making our podcast happen and one of your jobs is you’re in charge of the transcripts. |
Carey Segal |
Yes. |
Jodi Katz |
And each episode. So we started transcribing the episodes because they’re really good for CSO. So for anybody who doesn’t want to listen, they just want to read, you can find our transcripts on our website. Tell us what that process is like. |
Carey Segal |
Well, another thing I’m so fascinated by. I was showing off my skills because I’m helping with trademarking Base Beauty and a friend had questions. I was like, ‘let me tell you. I know all these new things.’ But there’s a great website, shout out to rev.com, maybe and probably friends of mine are the side job people typing the words per minute. If I had that, typing skills maybe that could also be my side job, but no. Just send it off and they get it back to you super, duper fast.
What’s funny is neither of us realized that the way the website is set up, you have to input, every time the speaker changes, it’s a different line. And so, I thought it was going to be cute copy, the whole transcript paste. Oh no, you’re putting in each line individually. But it’s almost like a therapy, people like to garden or wash dishes, it’s, putting the transcripts on line. And it gives me a chance to kind of read through all of your speakers and I’ve learned so, so, so much because I’m definitely in the trenches phase of my performance career where I’m just like, ‘Oh, when’s the light going to come out of the tunnel.’ And every single person that’s been on your podcast has gone through that and has now come out and achieved some of their goals and dreams and found success. So I’m almost reading them like a form of therapy being like, ‘What was their journey like?’ as I’m uploading them on the website. |
Jodi Katz |
Once you told me that, for you to upload the transcripts quickly, you have to actually go speaker by speaker. I realize that every time I say, ‘mmmm’, or ‘ah’ or ‘wow’, I mean it’s more of your time. |
Carey Segal |
Oh, don’t worry. I’m in my head right now, trying to complete thoughts and go back and forth and you know, no. |
Jodi Katz |
Well, thank you Carey for being a guest on our show. |
Carey Segal |
Thanks, this was a lot less stressful than I thought it would be. |
Jodi Katz |
For listeners, I hope you enjoyed this interview. Please subscribe to our series on iTunes and for updates about the show, follow us on Instagram @wherebrainsmeetbeautypodcast. |
Announcer |
Thanks for listening to Where Brains Meet Beauty with Jodi Katz. Tune in again for more authentic conversations with beauty leaders. |
