► Tell us about you and your podcast
We're Shea and Michelle Watson, married and loving the dynamic that brings to podcasting together. We met in church, neither of us expecting to find someone there AT ALL (we're also 18 years apart, which actually enrichens how we relate to one another and what we each bring to the table). Michelle is a graphic designer and artisan by trade, Shea is a biomedical engineer technician and US Army Veteran.
The Pantry Podcast came about after a prayer asking God to use us and a sudden surge in people telling us they loved hearing the two of us banter and conversate. People suggested we go live on Facebook more, get on the radio, or do a podcast. That last suggestion stuck, and we named the podcast The Pantry for two reasons:
1) We're always talking about God, often while Shea cooks amazing meals with Michelle leaning against the pantry door.
2) A pantry has ingredients you pull out almost daily, those you pull out for specific recipes, and things that really don't need to be there at all. We consider The Pantry Podcast an outlet to serve up spiritual nutrition for one's eternal pantry, and we ask the question, "What's in your heart?" in some of our promos to help people see the analogy.
A new episode drops every Wednesday, following the season's theme. Our overall goal is to equip Christ-followers with God's truth and priorities for their lives through challenge and encouragement. Our listeners span gender, age, and locale but they all have three things in common: they want to know more about Jesus, they don't mind being challenged, and they want more out of life than platitudes.
► Why & how did you start this podcast?
Podcasting strikes a great balance for us. There's the opportunity to edit audio without listeners seeing the cuts in video, but there is a challenge in putting yourself out there to be assessed by others. Neither of us listened to podcasts much before starting one, which allowed us to launch without being confined by too many comparisons. We've found communities of podcasters, though, that brought a lot of shows to our attention that we now enjoy.
From the beginning, we said if one person heard something that benefitted their life, our job was done. Sure, that goal technically gets checked off with your very first listener, but recently we heard that someone accepted Jesus, told their mentor, and that mentor sent them one of our episodes and it altered their perception—in a really healthy way—of what a walk with Jesus is about. In that moment, we both felt a level of fulfillment we hadn't accessed yet.
We started planning The Pantry Podcast in February before 2020 became what it now is. We setup a launch plan that completely deteriorated when COVID came on the scene. We realized there was no need to wait—if us podcasting was God's will, the launch plan could be sacrificed in order to start encouraging people when they really needed it. So, we dropped the first episode at the end of March and haven't missed a week since.
► How'd you find the time and funding to do this podcast?
Since it's a calling for us, we knew we'd have the funds (somehow, someway) to afford it. It's also been an interesting season where Shea's home a lot more (Michelle stays home to work and raise our daughter, Calia) so there is ample time to fit in interviews, record episodes, network, brainstorm, and tweak what we've got. Episodes drop weekly, but we plan seasons a season in advance and aim to record it all before five episodes of the current season drops. This gives Michelle time to edit (she's the editor and designer, Shea is logistics and hardware).
There always seems to be time, which seems to be the case for everything God wants you to do when you put Him first. Episodes take anywhere from 20 to 60 minutes to record, depending on if it's the two of us or if we have a guest or two. When we have guests, we tend to hang out on Zoom with them after the formal recording ends, so those probably last around two hours, total. Editing episodes takes around 2 hours, since Michelle takes out a lot of "ums" and pauses just so listeners can get through the full episode in a short car ride.
We fund the podcast ourself, and have a breakdown of what we use for hardware, software, and hosting on our website (thepantrypodcast.com). We've spent under $2,500 at this point, when you count the set we're putting together for live shows (the visions always expanding and leading us to interesting opportunities). If we don't count furniture, about $700. Recurring annual costs are about $200.
► What do you gain from podcasting?
It's amazing what the podcast does for our marriage—seeing the balance of waveforms when we're editing episodes between Michelle and Shea's tracks shows we're getting a lot better at listening and being brief, ourselves. It also gives us something that constantly brings us together for a joint purpose that isn't life or death or money-based.
We haven't dived into sponsorship yet, and if/when we do, it would be a very intentional relationship that makes sense. We do sell merchandise via Michelle's faith-based apparel store, Thirtyone25 (shop.thirtyone25.com), that relates to our show and our current season. We prefer to focus less on the logo and more on what listeners would actually want to wear.
We enjoy several hundred downloads each month and see consistent growth as we go. We really want to interact with our listeners behind the downloads, though, so we're developing some cool opportunities to do just that with plans to launch them at the end of 2020.
► How does your podcasting process look like?
Tascam US 4×4 USB Audio/MIDI Interface with Microphone Preamps and iOS Compatibility (amzn.to/3d9hWls)
Microphones: Pyle 3 Piece Professional Dynamic Microphone Kit Cardiod Unidirectionals Vocal Handheld MIC (amzn.to/3eaiHff)
Microphone Stands: Pyle Desktop Tripod Microphone Stand (amzn.to/30PuFXU)
Suspended Mic Stand: InnoGear Microphone Stand Adjustable Suspension Boom Scissor Arm Stand with Pop Filter (amzn.to/2BfzGy2)
Windscreens: On-Stage Black Microphone Windscreens (amzn.to/2YIHi4i)
Headphones: Audio Technica ATH-M20x Professional Studio Monitor Headphones (amzn.to/3d6Mog1)
iPad/Phone Holders (for show notes): Gooseneck Tablet Holder (amzn.to/2Y7TEUt) and Desktop Tablet Stand (amzn.to/3e8AD9X)
Portable Recorder: Zoom H4n Pro 4-Track Portable Recorder (amzn.to/2Biy5aL)
Memory Card for Portable Recorder: SanDisk Ultra 32GB Class 10 SDHC UHS-I Memory Card up to 80MB/S (amzn.to/2YFjA9c)
We use Adobe Audition and Macs, as well.
Our host is Castos (castos.com/?via=michelle).
We use Zoom most of the time (especially thanks to COVID), and Zencastr to grab the audio. We like to see our guests, hence Zoom as well. Our podcast is conversational rather than strictly Q&A, so we don't send advance questions unless someone were to really need a few.
We come up with topics when we determine the season, and we're really prayerful about it. Then we look at which episodes we can run best with the two of us and which would really benefit from a third voice. We're prayerful and research the topics, always using Bible verses, and armed with those parameters, we batt around ideas of who we could ask that we know or know of and then we reach out accordingly. It's so cool who we end up getting to talk to!
► How do you market your show?
We're pretty much searchable everywhere. If someone says they can't find us on their preferred platform, we find out how to submit to it. Having our own website that streams our episodes independent of any other player is useful for those who aren't used to podcasts yet, as well as when other stream sources haven't updated the RSS yet but people already want to listen to an episode.
Our top three streaming sources are Apple Podcasts, our website, and Overcast, with Apple way out in front, though all are healthy numbers. Word of mouth from our listeners to others has gotten us some of our most avid listeners, but Instagram is also a good source of traffic. We also wear our own merch a lot, which has a habit of opening up conversations in real life (yes, even with facemasks people want conversation!).
► What advice would you share with aspiring (new) podcasters?
If you follow Jesus, we would say pray about it and ask Him to reveal to you if a podcast is in His will for your life or if you're trying to do one for all the wrong reasons. If you don't have Jesus (of course we gotta say you should hit Him up!), then again we challenge you to ask yourself why you're doing this. Podcasting is not a get rich quick road, nor is it a quick way to fame. Do it for your listeners because you're interesting and have something people will benefit from hearing. That advice goes for everyone.
Podcasting is, in general, probably really competitive. It's cool as a Christian podcaster because if you're called by God you don't need to worry about competition—your success is aligned with His plan, so you can trust it'll be an awesome ride! But, in general, we find podcasters from every genre to be super cool, kind, generous people that are great to talk to and ask for help.
We have learned more about ourselves, one another, and many unexpected people; our skills and capabilities to learn; how to be better listeners; how to ask even more engaging questions; what really matters in this ministry; and that even though we're new ourselves, there's always someone we can help.
Hit us up, seriously! thepantrypodcast.com or on Facebook and Instagram @thepantrypodcast.
facebook.com/thepantrypodcast
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