Casey Adams|Rise of the Young|DH033 - a podcast by Shawn Walchef

What do Larry King, Tilman Fertitta, Rick Ross, Chris Voss all have in common? For starters, they’re all very successful. Secondly, they’ve all be interviewed by a 19-year-old from Virginia.

That talented teen entrepreneur? Casey Adams.Casey Adam has amassed 219k Instagram followers, created a Top 50 podcast, and interviewed heavyweights in media, business and entrepreneurship. All before his 20th Birthday. https://www.caseyadams.com

 His success didn’t happen overnight, but it did happen online.

“Looking back, social media has opened up every door of opportunity,” reflects Casey Adam on an episode of the Digital Hospitality podcast. “One of the early ‘oh shit moments’ on social media was when I reached out to Ty Lopez.“He was someone who I looked up to and I was in his programs. After I spoke at this event, I sent him a DM to say, ‘thank you.’ From that DM two weeks later, he was flying me and my mom out to Los Angeles to meet him. To see that a digital gesture led me to getting flow out to LA? This is crazy, let’s keep doing this.”

 A decade back, many considered social media and the internet a separate world from reality. In 2020, the young see no barriers.

Knowing how to best use social media is especially important for businesses.“If you don’t have a presence on social media as a brand, are you even a brand?” Casey Adams questions.
“If I can’t go on social media and look up your brand it’s not that you’re not relevant, it’s like you don’t even exist. There’s a level of communication for businesses that can happen on social and it’s super important that people adopt it. For anyone that hasn’t bought into it fully they’re going to be left behind.”Casey Adams knows that sometimes you’re just one DM away from your dreams.

 Rise of the Young:
At 19-years-old, Casey Adams is busy building his own brand to new heights in Scottsdale, AZ with a team of young creatives. At 15, things were much different.“When I was 15 years old, I was almost paralyzed playing football,” Casey recalls. “I was in a neck brace for a little over six months and that’s where I really started to dive into personal development, learning more about social media, and building a personal brand. I started to document my journal as an individual to build a personal brand. Long story short, that negative situation opened me up to a new opportunity and I fell in love with it. Four years later it’s led me to podcasting and I’ve found my voice.”

Recreating a new identity at any age is tough, let alone amidst the insecurities of being a high schooler and the trauma of a life-altering injury. Turning a negative into a positive, Casey dove into his new passion of media and even published his own book on the experience when he was still a student. 



“When I first wrote the book, I was just building a brand,” says Casey Adams to Digital Hospitality podcast host Shawn Walchef. “I looked at it as just another piece of content and I wrote about turning your negative situation into a positive outcome.”The book didn’t make any nationwide best-sellers lists, but it did make a huge impact locally.

“Now, every single semester at my high school they give out the book to the students!”Rightfully so. The book was designed for the kids who needed it most.
“I wrote it for the young individual that’s lost hope and gone through anything that’s changed their focus. Within 24 hours I had to recreate this new identity and how I looked at the world.”That book and new identity led to speaking gigs, getting verified on Instagram, and a digital footprint that’s cemented his place in the media world today.A maven of social media at only 19, Casey Adams grew up on apps like the rest of his generation but has worked hard enough to master and understand them.

“Social media is something we grew up on,” Casey notes of his generation. “I got an Instagram when I was 13. The way that I look at social media,

Further episodes of Digital Hospitality: A Cali BBQ Media Podcast

Further podcasts by Shawn Walchef

Website of Shawn Walchef