Meet Chad Castle

Today we’d like to introduce you to Chad Castle.

Hi Chad, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
Appreciate the question! I started this business endeavor out of my 1-br apartment in Inglewood—literally assembling frames on the floor of my living room. At the time, I was juggling CCF projects while also working full-time at a spot in the neighborhood called Jewel Box Platinum, where I built gold and platinum plaques for various clients in the record industry.

Eventually, I wanted to prioritize CCF, so in January of 2020, I decided to take the leap and move to a 2-br apartment in Highland Park where I built an in-home framing studio in hopes for success—and more importantly—cool projects.

In time, it all got too much for a bedroom operation, so I decided to seek more space and take the risk of signing a lease at our spot on Figueroa. It wasn’t that easy to find the right brick and mortar, tbh, but I’ll spare you the details.

Now, we’re up to a team of four (including myself)! Just waking up every day and looking forward to that next project.

I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
Not by any means, getting your name out there can be quite the undertaking (as I’m sure others in crafty fields can attest). There’s been a lot of marketing trial and error on top of the pandemic—in general—which I’m sure you already know has been a blessing and a curse for creators.

Not soon after I got all set up for business in my apartment, COVID hit and I thought for sure CCF was doomed. To my surprise, once things opened back up, my phone was ringing off the hook with clients in the area looking to liven up their ‘Work From Home’ situations! Most sought me out directly from our carefully curated Instagram as well as Yelp and other platforms.

A lot of hardship has just stemmed from my anxiety and understanding of when to make ‘the next step’ in terms of business growth.

In my experience chatting with other business owners, I’ve realized that nobody *really* knows what they’re doing and more often than not you just gotta make decisions based on your gut.

I’d also like to take a second and acknowledge anyone reading this whose looking to do their own thing; don’t ever hesitate to reach out to me via the shop’s Instagram DM (@castlecustomframing) if you have any questions about getting off the ground. I’d be happy to help answer questions or bounce ideas.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
CCF is a custom picture framing business that proudly puts emphasis on frame design and client relations. We strive to push the idea of ‘framing-to-the-art’ rather than designing frames based on interior decor trends which *could* be more temporary at the end of the day. My mentor, Micah, cemented this philosophy back when I was working for him up in San Francisco.

Shout out to Micah, his new shop (@orioncustomframing) has been killing it up there in the Bay Area.

If you’re curious about what we’re all about, feel free to stop by the shop in HLP and say hi! You can also peep our portfolio on Instagram. We really care about what we do and I like to think it shows.

What are your plans for the future?
No real plans as of yet. It all depends on the volume of work we get and our team.

Just focusing on growing the brand and meeting new people! Ideally working more with artists and helping them tackle any conceptual framing ideas they may have.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://castlecustomframing.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/castlecustomframing/
• Facebook: https://m.facebook.com/Castlecustomframing/?refsrc=deprecated&_rdr
• Yelp: https://m.yelp.com/biz/castle-custom-framing-los-angeles