I’ve lived in a few places in my life.
And in every one of them, I noticed the same thing.
We walk past extraordinary people every day without knowing it.
The person who runs the shop on the corner. The retired teacher who walks the same route every morning. The kid who just opened a small business with more courage than most adults I know.
We say hi. Maybe we chat about the weather. And then we keep walking.
The idea
Hey, Neighbour! is a simple idea.
Short conversations with people in our community. About ten minutes each. Video and audio.
No scandal. No hot takes. Just good stories, told by the people who lived them.
The tagline came quickly, because it’s exactly what I believe: extraordinary stories, right next door.
Why me?
Fair question.
I’m a designer. I build websites and brands for local businesses. But I’ve also been making podcasts, music and audio for a long time. Conversations are one of my favourite creative forms.
And my work already puts me in rooms with people who are building something. I hear the stories behind the logo. The risk behind the opening day. The reason behind the name.
Most of those stories never make it to a website. I think that’s a loss.
Why now?
Because social media made us very good at knowing what strangers on the other side of the world had for breakfast.
And not very good at knowing the people on our own street.
I’d like to help with that, even a little.
A community is not a place. It’s the stories people know about each other.
What this is not
It’s not an advertising platform. It’s an independent series, produced by I LOVE IT because I care about it.
Being on the show won’t depend on being a client. And being a client won’t mean being on the show.
What’s next
The series is still in preparation. I’ll share the process here on the blog, the honest version, including what I get wrong.
In the meantime, you can visit the Hey, Neighbour! page to follow along.
And if you know someone whose story deserves to be heard, I’d love to hear about them.
