Creatives Grab Coffee

Micah David of STUDiiO on running a Las Vegas video company at 21: learning the business side, a fixed workday over the grind, pricing from an hourly rate, selling social media retainers to restaurants and cafes, losing a Fiverr account, and role-playing cold calls with Claude. Chapters: 0:00 Intro 0:16 A fifth-grade YouTube bet that started it all 2:57 Running a company at 21 3:55 From hobby videos to paid work 6:38 Learning the business side 9:12 The details of selling yourself 10:49 Does being young cost you clients? 14:59 One thing a day compounds 16:14 Why the always-grinding mindset backfires 21:16 A website built in a trade for video 23:27 Claude, ChatGPT, and using more than one AI 30:12 The Las Vegas video market 32:16 Why social media retainers are hard to sell 34:14 Pricing from an hourly rate behind the scenes 37:47 Selling benefits, not features 39:07 Restaurants and cafes as retainer clients 41:00 Why retainers are harder with corporate clients 45:00 Video company or marketing agency? 48:51 Inbound leads vs cold calling 52:49 Instant verification on Google Business 55:43 The risk of relying on Google 56:57 Losing a Fiverr account and owning your leads 1:01:07 Role-playing sales calls with Claude 1:03:49 AI-built call lists and finding decision makers 1:06:06 Email and LinkedIn outreach is a volume game 1:07:11 Training AI on your books, calls, and emails 1:14:22 Why the next generation is ahead 1:16:06 Ten thousand hours in the age of AI 1:19:41 Where to find Micah and STUDiiO Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company.

Kyler Beal of Minivan Productions on moving a production company from Virginia to San Diego with a city scoring system, a partner who fired himself from the day-to-day, slicing pie equity, quarterly profit sharing in four buckets, moving owners onto salary, why Minivan avoids retainers, and the grant funding behind its documentary work. Chapters: 0:00 Intro 0:31 Meet Kyler Beal and Minivan Productions 1:47 Why Minivan moved from Virginia to San Diego 3:20 From a bedroom office to a team of three 5:35 A scoring system for picking a city 6:38 Travel days and documentary work 7:42 Team size and the San Diego studio 8:52 The partner who fired himself 11:48 Replacing a partner's many roles 17:02 From creative to company leader 19:17 Slicing pie equity after a partner steps back 24:16 How Minivan sets its profit sharing 24:56 Four buckets of quarterly profit sharing 27:10 Why quarterly beats annual 30:08 Moving the owners onto salary 33:05 The fear of guaranteed payroll 34:27 Salary and a lower tax bill 37:28 Why Minivan avoids retainers 41:01 The first retainer, by exception 43:54 Retainers at agencies vs production companies 46:50 What is next for Lapse 48:37 Seventy percent commercial, thirty percent docs 50:33 A grant-funded documentary series 52:05 More funding than people think 54:00 Business brain or creative brain? 56:55 Do grant funders check the final film? 59:07 Is most work out there mediocre? 1:01:59 Gambling ads and AI content 1:04:33 Filtering for client fit 1:07:24 Lessons from non-creative industries 1:11:30 The story behind the Minivan name 1:15:20 Where to find Kyler and Minivan Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company.

Carlos Foster and Stephen Alberts of San Diego's Blue Barn Creative on fourteen years of owner-led production, earning 70 percent repeat business without retainers, using AI to buy back human time, why testimonial clients now want the stumbles left in, and how they kept the company going after losing a founding partner. Chapters: 0:00 Intro 0:43 Meet Carlos Foster and Stephen Alberts of Blue Barn Creative 2:40 2012 and the birth of the brand film 3:45 First steps: an office and a glorified freelance outfit 6:55 Early clients, cold calls, and wedding films 9:17 Small jobs that grew into big brand relationships 11:40 Be the helper, not the hero 13:04 Moving beyond word of mouth 17:09 Yelp, Google, and ChatGPT referrals 20:41 Seventy percent return clients, no retainers 22:24 Differentiating on relationships 26:01 Owner-led as a brand position 28:17 Why early competitors did not survive 31:10 The Lapse parallel 33:38 Using AI to get hours back 38:26 When a client's AI invented sound bites 39:55 Why people-driven work feels protected 41:40 A reality check on generative AI 45:55 Testimonials that keep the stumbles 50:23 Authenticity, UGC, and coaching interviews 55:25 Why Blue Barn runs the interview 56:53 Leading clients instead of following them 58:25 Losing a founding partner 1:00:13 Partnership paperwork and owning your shares 1:02:19 The week everything changed 1:06:28 Visionaries and integrators 1:11:47 Grief, restructuring, and leveling up 1:14:13 Choosing to keep Blue Barn going 1:17:52 The story behind the Blue Barn name 1:21:40 Where to find Blue Barn Creative Guest: https://bluebarncreative.com/ Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company.

Vlad Lapich of LV Productions on going from free promo videos to tech launch videos, rebuilding his website with AI, automating proposals, why cold email died, SEO vs Google Ads, scaling post production, and what to do when a client stops paying. Chapters: 0:00 Intro 0:38 From Belarus to San Francisco: photographer turned videographer 2:06 Free promo videos and the Instagram DM that changed everything 4:46 Wearing five hats at a startup, then going solo 7:21 GPT-3 cold emails and the first big clients 8:13 The team: freelance editors, animators, and DPs 8:52 The bottleneck: scaling post without losing quality 12:12 Junior prep, senior storytelling: the editing pipeline 14:44 Paying editors: hourly vs per project, and picky clients 17:30 Rebuilding the website in a week with Cursor 22:03 AI for lead intake, proposals, and Video Galaxy 27:41 Pricing on the website and the proposal tool 30:04 Cold email is dead: 80 percent SEO, 20 percent referrals 32:22 SEO takes years, and one Google update can undo it 34:00 Why Google Ads did not work in San Francisco 38:37 Weddings vs corporate at Lapse 41:28 Networking for introverts 42:11 Premiere vs DaVinci Resolve 44:44 Animation: from 10K videos to offshore competition 47:43 Goals for the rest of the year 50:53 Claude as bookkeeper: margins, salary, and a missed invoice 54:08 LLC vs corporation 59:02 Clients who do not pay 1:03:46 Invoicing: 50/50 deposits and net terms 1:06:38 The story behind the name LV Productions Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company.

Rob Arevalo of 17 Projects on launching a video company two months before COVID, marketing with no budget and then with real money, cold calling in New York, government RFPs, toning proposals down for corporate buyers, and why client retention drives growth. Chapters: 0:00 Intro 1:46 Meet Rob Arevalo and 17 Projects 3:13 From the Air Force to launching during COVID 6:35 Why keep going when the industry stopped 8:13 Corporate clients and the easiest path in 10:31 Client retention beats chasing new clients 12:59 Systems that keep clients happy as you grow 14:38 A two-person core with a deep freelance roster 15:57 A thousand cold emails: marketing with no budget 18:56 The marketing bets that took 17 Projects full time 20:18 How Lapse grew: SEO over paid ads 22:40 Evolving the marketing mix year to year 24:03 Do mass cold emails still work? 27:32 Cold calling in New York 29:07 Timing, brand awareness, and staying on the radar 32:08 Government contracts and RFPs 38:38 What RFPs teach you about proposals 39:32 Corporate proposals: make them boring 44:24 Expanding to LA, Chicago, and Miami 48:54 Competing in NYC: do your recon 51:01 Why the name 17 Projects Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company. (https://www.lapseproductions.com/). To learn more about the show, visit: https://www.creativesgrabcoffee.com/