A new up-and-comer in the world of media and marketing is open for business in downtown Shreveport.
Savage Creative Solutions is the creation of owner Paul Savage, who comes to the job with a background of media skills. His most recent position was as Director of Communication, Marketing and PR for the Greater Shreveport Chamber of Commerce.
At Savage Creative Solutions, he is a one-man shop, a single solution for guiding and promoting small businesses. It has been a dream for ten years, something he was already thinking of while a student at Centenary College. He has had clients follow him since then and is now eager to hang a shingle to introduce himself to even more. 
Savage offers help with graphics, web design, social -and-traditional media design and placement, direct mail marketing, overall marketing strategy and business signage. He knows that the best and most effective business provides information about itself, its products and services in a way that is smooth, seamless, cohesive and attractive.
Savage has long admired the guts and pluck of small businesses and helped guide them in his other jobs- at KSLA in their sales department, at a local advertising firm, and most recently, at the chamber… but it was a terrifying health issue that encouraged him to finally venture out on his own. Just prior to the darkest days of the Covid lockdowns, when being alone was encouraged and hospitals were filled with local victims of the virus, Paul was diagnosed with a particularly aggressive testicular cancer. This is not a common cancer. Johns Hopkins Medicine states only some 8,000 to 10,000 men across the entire United States develop it each year. That was cold comfort to Paul, who underwent multiple rounds of chemotherapy and a significant surgery- during Covid. He is now, thankfully, cancer-free.
Paul is a glass-half full person, forever grateful that his diagnosis was timely enough to catch his illness. “It actually worked out well,” he told me. “It was during the Covid lock down, so I had time to recuperate at home and didn’t feel guilty about missing work.” To most people, missing work during a life-challenging illness is a secondary thought, but this tells you something about Paul. He credits his religious faith and family support for bolstering him during the roughest patches, and during his illness and recuperation he came to an important realization- life is short and it’s not a dress rehearsal.
Paul intends to spend his time now sharing the message of the importance of shopping local. “It’s all about community,” he says. “They hire locally, invest locally, donate locally. They give to us. We need to give back.”
