Alumni Accomplishments: Chris Jay
Photo by Louisiana Seafood
The modern Communications job market is wide and ever-changing. No matter what area of media they work in, typically, graduates must already know how to curate content and craft the right message for the right audience. No one is better at this than Centenary alumnus, Chris Jay. I recently interviewed Chris about his Centenary College experience and how he turned it into an illustrious career.
Chris Jay is the city of Shreveport’s resident social media marketer, blogger, and freelance writer, but his roots are in Sarepta, Louisiana. Jay was a first-generation college student who attended Centenary from 1998 to 2002, all with the help of TOPS. “I was the 2nd person to graduate with a track called Writing for Film and Television. Dr. Hendricks was my main professor,” said Jay. “There really wasn’t a media-savvy department yet. It was just Jeff, but we had a great time, and I wrote scripts for film and television. That’s really what I wanted to do at that time, but gradually my attraction shifted to narrative prose.”
As soon as he entered the halls of Centenary, Chris Jay dove into working for student media. He was the president of the Centenary Film Society for two years and was largely involved on campus. He says that getting the chance to work for the KSCL radio station was a dream come true for him. “They gave me a two-hour show, and it was so cool. It was heaven.” Jay also spent many years in a rap group deemed “The Pillage People,” in which he would write and perform songs. Of course, Chris wrote for The Conglomerate, where he learned how to “write with a neutral voice, like a real journalist.” The Conglomerate gave him a solid foundation to build upon as a blogger and a freelance writer.
Jay’s experiences at Centenary parlayed into job opportunities. During his senior year, he worked an internship for Chimphaven, the local Chimp Sanctuary. Back then, they did not have all of the land and resources that they have today, so Chris helped them edit some of their promotional videos. After he graduated, his point of contact at Chimphaven suggested he apply for a marketing job at Williams Creative Group–the top marketing agency in town. “I felt like I’d made it, and it was cool to work in that environment,” said Jay. “I got recruited from there to start working for the Robinson Film Center. I was the first person they ever hired, and I worked there three years before they had a building and three years after.” While he was working at Robinson, social media started becoming more prevalent. “It was all everybody was talking about. I didn’t have a lot of money for advertising at Robinson. At the time, not a lot of people were buying Facebook ads, so I put all my eggs in that basket and got really good at it.” Ever since then, he has been the top social media guru in town. Because of his background in social media management and his broad range of digital media production capabilities, he has helped a multitude of businesses across the Shreveport area get the word out about their products and services.
Photo by Chris Jay
When the COVID-19 Pandemic hit, everyone’s world was turned upside down. For Jay, it was a transitional time in his life. He was working for the Shreveport Convention and Visitors Bureau when he decided he needed to reevaluate his priorities. “I felt like I was at the very front edge of the great resignation–life looked more precious to me after COVID.” He started focusing more on his blog, “Stuffed and Busted,” a Patreon-funded, independent media outlet dedicated to exploring, documenting, and celebrating food and drink culture in North Louisiana. According to Jay, his blog is what saved his “life, skin, and sanity”. He first started blogging in 1997. “It makes me feel old. I used to keep basically a diary ‘first gen’ blog. I would mostly write thinly-veiled things about whatever girl I was obsessed with. That was my first blog, and then I started blogging about food and travel, and I just thought it was really fun.” Jay never thought that it was going to end up being his lifeline, and it is all thanks to Patreon–a membership platform that provides business tools for content creators to run a subscription service. “When Patreon came along and I launched, I couldn’t believe it. I’m in the top 2% of Patreon earners in the country, and I’m in Shreveport!” Because of the service, Jay gets paid to do what he loves the most, write and tell stories. “I just wanted to write. It’s all I ever wanted to do.” The only thing that he loves more than the craft of writing is the art of “creating engagement.”
This year, Chris Jay decided to invest in himself and get his Master’s degree from Northwestern State University. On top of all of his work endeavors, he started working as an adjunct professor at Centenary last year. “I love to teach. I don’t know if I’m good at it or not because most of the experiences I had were during COVID. I’d love to have a chance to do it when we can all be in the classroom together one day.” In 2022, he has also been focusing more of his energy on freelance writing. He writes for about nine magazines around the South. For Jay, it is not about the money all the time. “Sometimes it’s just a joy to work with these people and be associated with their brand.” He recently started writing for a national high-profile food magazine called Gravy.
Even though Jay has the ability and capacity to trek out of Shreveport and into larger metropolitan communities, he insists that Shreveport is his true home. He first discovered the value of the Shreveport network at Centenary College. “I think the most valuable thing that Centenary did for me gave me a network of people who had access to resources and career opportunities.” That network made it easier to get where he is today. “The other day I found out my dad is cancer-free. I posted about it on social media because I wanted to celebrate, and one of my favorite bakers in town messaged me that they had made me a pound cake. That would never happen in Los Angeles.” Jay says that Shreveport is an incredible community that swirls together. He cannot see himself being a writer anywhere else. “There are stories to tell everywhere in this town…It’s the people here.”
For Chris Jay, clarity and purpose came out of the Pandemic. “I don’t know if I’ll ever go back to an office job. It would have to be the right one.” To students, his advice is to take it easy during this time. “If you’re not killing it immediately, not only should you not beat yourself up because you just finished your education during an incredibly challenging situation, but you can also relax a little bit. Take a minute and figure out what you really want to do. Don’t worry if it doesn’t happen immediately because all of us are facing challenges that we never would have faced in a non-COVID world.” Chris Jay’s career will hopefully inspire you to slow down and remember what you value the most in this life.
