by Stephanie Ingalls
Founder and CEO of Brass Media, Bryan Sims.
From the halls of the Business School to the classrooms of the Journalism School to the conference rooms of potential investors, Bryan Sims, CEO and founder of Brass Media Inc., can be a hard man to track down. Juggling the responsibilities of running his own company with the demands of being a college student can be a daunting task, but as Bryan gears up for the launch of his magazine, BrassCU, he proves that it's not impossible.
A few years ago Bryan never imagined that this is where he would be. "I had envisioned myself on Wall Street, not the magazine industry," he said. Bryan started to become intrigued by finance when he was in high school. Watching his parents manage the family's budget fascinated him, and he developed a profound interest in money management. This passion drove Bryan to start a teen investment club in high school, which eventually became the largest one in the country. Always driven to succeed, Bryan began to realize that he held a power to help young adults such as himself to better understand money and the impact that it would have on their lives.
Bryan began to explore different avenues to get his message out to young adults and came up with the idea of publishing a magazine. Thus, Brass Media Inc. was born. A magazine allows him to reach young adults in an appealing and informative way. Bryan has the vision and tools to connect with his audience.
Bryan began developing his business plan in high school. Since then, it has been through countless revisions. "Sometimes we would present it to someone and they would rip it apart, so we would head back to the drawing board and start over," he said. At the time, Bryan's father, Steve, was between jobs. He jumped on board to help his son and became the chief operating officer.
"At first it was kind of weird - having my dad work for me," Brian explained. Together they wrote draft after draft until they were finally able to come up with a truly original formula. Bryan took the Brass business plan to various competitions around the country. Although he was young and competing against business veterans, he said, they usually placed quite well.