Hello, my name is Tiffany Weddle, and I am a professionally trained branding, family & food photographer born and raised in Hampton Roads, VA. I graduated from the Culinary Institute of Virginia in 2009, where I studied not only food preparation and technical skills, but also hospitality, management, and business.
After three years in the food and beverage industry, I decided to pack up my knives and pursue a career in sales. Driven by a desire to take my culinary degree to the next level, I set out to learn how to fuse my love of the restaurant industry with my passion for helping people. My initial goal was to gain ten years of sales experience to combine with my culinary degree in order to meet the qualifications to become a food broker, which is essentially a person who sells food from a manufacturer to a distributor, who then sells it to restaurants and grocery stores. That, however, is not where I ended up.
I did acquire the ten years of sales experience I was after and learned how to fuse my love of food and sales together, just not in the way I thought I would. In 2011, after leaving the food industry, I became a car salesperson, and fell in love with it. During my sales career, I became a master negotiator, a consistent leader in gross profit, developed a repeat and referral business that accounted for 80% of my sales, and maintained a closing ratio nearly triple the industry standard. As a salesperson, I was responsible for responding to online leads and learned how to sell myself, the dealership, and the product over the phone and via email in order to gain the customer's trust in an extremely competitive market. I learned to withstand the competition I had to explain the benefits of buying from me, the brand, and the company I was working for, in a way that made the customer want to come in to do business with me.
During my sales manager years, I was known for increasing the bottom line through process optimization, sales training, consistently closing deals and keen attention to detail which lead to decreased spending and increased gross profit. I have sold over 2 million dollars in products, managed millions in inventory, and lead multiple successful sales teams into record-breaking months.
Mastering the art of sales meant so much more to me than profit. My desire to help others is what initiated my career and kept it thriving, with the key to my success being exceptional customer service. I became a professional relationship builder and was known by my customers as being authentic, trustworthy, direct, and transparent. I believe that without the consumer there is no business, that the customer's perception is their reality, and that everyone should be treated with respect and kindness. When I say everyone I mean everyone, whether they can or cannot buy, whether they want or do not want to buy, and whether they spend $1 or $100,000.
I have always genuinely cared about each person I encounter. I treat the children, spouses, and friends of the buyer with the same respect as the buyer because I love people. My customer service-centered approach to sales made me unique and kept customers returning. It is also why I loved my sales career so much and what made leaving the car industry a difficult decision. In March 2020 I gave birth to my second son and decided not to return to work. I used the time at home with him to decompress from my sales career and explore my creativity, including photography.
Prior to culinary school when I was just seventeen years old I had a dream to go to art school and become a professional photographer. I studied photography for three years in high school and my teacher agreed that I had good enough work to apply to art schools. She encouraged me to build a portfolio and submit my application, but I didn't. Instead, I believed the lie that artists had to struggle to make a living and that I should go to regular college like everyone else, so that's exactly what I did.
I went to college for a year and was bored out of my mind, thank goodness I had enough courage to drop out and attend culinary school. As much as I loved cooking and car sales I always had photography in my heart, it was my dream job, my dream life. Throughout the years anytime a friend got married or there was something to celebrate, I showed up with my camera, ready to capture all the moments. I really loved photography and took pictures all the time, I just didn’t think I was knowledgeable enough to do it for a living.
I considered the idea of art school several times after graduation but the timing was never right. I got married in 2013 and in 2014 I became a mom, which is still my favorite job. Being a new wife and mother with a full-time career left me no space in my schedule or energy to go back to school. So photography remained just a hobby, the dream I kept pushing aside so I could focus on practicality.
Finally, after having my second son, I decided it was time to pursue my dreams with everything I had in me. I bought a professional-grade camera and became an apprentice through VAPC: Video, Audio & Photo Classes. Not having the demanding schedule that comes with working in sales, I was able to focus my attention on my photography classes. I built upon the knowledge and experience I had collected over the years and soon started taking my first assignments. It wasn't long before I completed my first photoshoots and launched my business.
Now I have the career of my dreams as a professional branding, food, and family photographer. I have taken my unique skill sets acquired from my sales career and culinary degree and combined them with my love for people and photography. As a branding photographer, I truly enjoy empowering entrepreneurs and business owners to show up in their market as their unique selves. I love capturing people's personalities in a way that is authentic to who they are while also showcasing how they represent their brand.
My extensive experience in sales and marketing helps me create branded images that convey a company's message to potential consumers in a welcoming and confident way. Being the face of your brand is more important in today's market than ever before, and having digital marketing materials readily available is essential. I created Tiffany Weddle Photography to provide entrepreneurs, business owners, and salespeople with high-quality, intentional branded images that accurately represent what they're selling, starting with themselves.
I serve the Hampton Roads Peninsula and surrounding areas and love to travel. I'm excited to help people who need photos of themselves and or their business to use for marketing, such as salespeople, real estate agents, actors, politicians, business owners, entrepreneurs, hair stylists, news anchors, musicians, artists, dancers, fitness professionals, models, and massage therapists.
I am also happy to provide staff and location photos for businesses such as restaurants, car dealerships, dance studios, real estate teams, attorneys, sales teams, insurance offices, or medical offices such as dentists, chiropractors or physical therapists, and non-profit organizations.
I appreciate you being here and look forward to getting to know more about you, your brand, and your vision. If you have any questions or are ready for your free consultation please contact me, I would love to chat:)
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