Humans Of Berkeley – Sam Price

My professional life has been nothing if not varied. I’ve been an actor, a presenter, an entertainer, a director, a barman, an estate agent, a customer experience specialist and now…a writer. Each job has been different from the last, some more so than others, but there is one key element that has underpinned them all – and that is the importance of storytelling.

A background in telling tales

One of my earliest memories is of a story I created, albeit not a very good one. I was stood queuing with my mum in Woolworths and quickly got bored. So, to spice up the wait, I decided to throw myself on the ground, point at the man behind me and shout ‘Mummy, that man just shot me!’ as loud as I could.

He hadn’t, of course. And according to my mum he was mortified by the whole event. But regardless, I’d created my first dramatic narrative. A villain in the midst of a department store. An assassin waiting in the Woolworth’s queue. Granted, it was a pretty short story and could have benefitted from some context, but it injected drama into an otherwise uneventful queue and sparked in me a passion for storytelling.

As I got older, my stories became more structured and far less accusatory. My childhood works included a novel about an inept and somewhat reluctant secret agent[1], a series of comics about a dog with superpowers and, at around the age of 12, an autobiography. I also had a poem published in one of those anthologies that went around schools in the early 2000s, though I can’t for the life of me remember the name of it.

I fell in love with reading and performing as well. I was enticed by the power of language; the way in which a sequence of words could transport you to new worlds, completely change your mood and even alter your beliefs. I figured that the ability to work the English language was all anyone really needed in life (in English speaking countries anyway), the rest they could quite convincingly blag.

Storytelling for a living

In 2011, having just graduated university with a degree in performing arts, I landed my first ever paid acting job. It was a tour of Aladdin, in which I played the titular role, and I absolutely loved it. I travelled around the UK with a fantastic group of people, taking audiences away to a fantasy land of magic, mystery, and multiple innuendos about rubbing a lamp.

The next eight years were spent working as a semi-successful actor, entertainer and presenter[2], with intermittent bar work to fill the time in-between roles. While storytelling might not seem immediately applicable to the role of a barman, it honestly made up a good 80% of the job. I worked in a real ale pub, frequented by the local old boys, and most of my time was spent sharing life experiences with them as they knocked back their pints of Old Speckled Hen.

Eventually, towards the end of my twenties, I stopped moving around and started writing and directing shows instead. While I’d kept up writing as a hobby, it felt great to be able to dedicate more time towards it and determine the direction of the story, as well as how it was told.

And then came the pandemic. Performing arts died, money dried up quickly, and I was left wondering where to go next. Life events prompted a move back down south, and I started looking for a new career path. Real estate was one of the few industries still ticking along during the lockdowns, so my search started there.

As it happens, telling stories turned out to be a great way of selling a house. I would get potential buyers to picture what their new life could look living in that property, selling not only the features of the building but what those features could mean. I know it sounds super cheesy, but it worked.

The role of an estate agent, however, wasn’t for me. It was pretty dog-eat-dog, and I’m more of a dog-make-friends-with-dog-and-both-dogs-help-each-other-to-thrive kind of guy. I quickly moved on to a new job as a CX specialist for a start-up pet food subscription company, which is where my love for business storytelling began. I wrote marketing emails, newsletters, product descriptions and blogs – selling the company by merging my creative flair with some newly acquired marketing skills (having taken a number of courses to pass the time over lockdown).

Eventually, that led me to the doors of Berkeley Communications. Don’t get me wrong, it was a considerable change of pace switching from writing about cats and dogs, to writing about B2B technology. But what a great change of pace it was. Over the last couple of years, I’ve had some of the most interesting and engaging conversations of my life, and told the story of the technologies that are changing the very world we live in.

So, I guess you’re probably wondering what the reason for all of this is. Well, I think it’s probably to emphasise the point that stories are everything. Our whole civilization is built on our ability to tell stories, our individual lives are intricate stories in of themselves, and being able to share our stories is what makes us relatable to the people around us – regardless of who or where those people might be.

Who’s your favourite storyteller? Terry Pratchett.

What would you sing at a karaoke night? Depends on the number of drinks I’ve had. 0 – 2 drinks: Parklife by Blur. 2 – 4 drinks: Total Eclipse of the Heart by Bonnie Tyler. 5+ Drinks: Hot N Cold by Katy Perry.

What is the most used app on your phone? Duolingo. I’m on a 280-day streak and if I break it, I don’t think I’ll be able to convince myself to carry on learning.

[1] Written before the film ‘Johnny English’ came out. I’m not saying they stole my idea…but the shoe certainly fits…

[2] Successful because I was rarely out of work. Semi because the work was rarely anything major.