Today we’d like to introduce you to David Castaneda.
Hi David, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
Never, in a million years, did I ever think that I would end up being what some people might call an “influencer.” I started my Instagram page simply to showcase the new restaurants I had enjoyed and recently discovered to show my family and friends. I’m originally from the LA area, so when they would come to visit, it was always pretty difficult to choose where to go, or I’d forget the spots I wanted to take them. It was simply out of convince to show them all my favorite spots on one page: choose something that looks good, and we’ll go there! For the first 6 months, I only had family and friends following my Instagram, until one day, my friends suggested I use my DSLR to take pictures: why not combine two of my favorite hobbies? Over the course of one month, I went from 250 followers to over one thousand. Pretty soon, I had restaurants contacting me, saying they loved my photos and would love for me to come and try out their food. I had a few posts go pretty viral on Instagram and TikTok and loved hearing from restaurants owners how much of a positive impact I had on their business that I became hooked on trying to shine a light on small and independent businesses in the area. The rest is history!
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
At the beginning, it was a very smooth road, mostly because I had no expectations, and I was doing it for myself. As I started to gain more followers and meet the owners of some of the establishments, I began to mount pressure on myself and became obsessed with numbers and what constituted a post with “good” engagement. Then, a few posts hit a few hundred thousand views and even a couple with a million+ views; that’s when things went sideways: trolls came out of the woodwork and commented on anything and everything that was “wrong” with me, my posts, or the business itself. I thought about quitting and wanted nothing to do with social media, but eventually, I decided the best thing to do was to ignore them and move on. After a few years of doing this, I know that engagement comes in ebbs and flows, and, in the end, if I can get a person or two to check out a new spot, then I think it was worth all the hard work.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
When people ask what I specifically do with my food social media accounts, I tell them I’m just trying to highlight my favorite spots. And, realistically, that still holds true: I won’t post any place that I did not enjoy. I’ve seen plenty of influences critique places and tell their followers never to go to a specific place. Realistically speaking, food and taste is subjective: what may taste good to someone may not be someone else’s cup of tea, so I don’t want to tell anyone to not go somewhere simply because the food was not to my liking. In addition, I’ve gone to a few places where the server may have been having a bad day, and as a human being, I get that: we are all allowed to have bad days, weeks, or even months; we all have highs and lows in life. I’m not going to bad mouth a place because someone may be going through a rough patch and wasn’t able to mask it that day at work. I’ll simply won’t post them, but I always leave the option of going back and posting if my experience changes. My philosophy is this: there’s enough negativity on the internet, so why not add more positivity?
Let’s talk about our city – what do you love? What do you not love?
I moved to San Diego 10 years ago for an opportunity to add some experience to my resume, but the plan was always to move back to the LA area after a year. However, one year turned to three, then a decade later, I’m happy to call San Diego my home. The weather here is always about 10 degrees cooler than LA, and the people are significantly nicer. Overall, you can’t beat San Diego, it’s California’s best city. I strongly believe that!
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/sandiegofeed?igshid=OGQ5ZDc2ODk2ZA==
- Other: www.tiktok.com/@sandiegofeed
