All right. Today, we are talking about how to make it in a creative agency, how to build a creative agency and scale it up, get lots of clients, that sort of thing. My guest today is Brett Nguyen. I'll tell you more about him in a second. So stay tuned. Welcome to the Smart Business Revolution podcast, where we feature top entrepreneurs, business leaders and thought leaders, and ask them how they built key relationships to get where they are today. Now, let's get started with the show. All right. Welcome, everyone. John Corgan here. I'm the host of this show. And you know, every week I talk with interesting CEOs, founders and entrepreneurs from all kinds of companies. We've had Netflix, Kinkos, YPO, EO, Activation Blizzard. Check out the archives. Lots of great episodes for you there. And we've had lots of digital agencies and agency owners, creative agencies on this show. So Carl Smith, David C. Baker, Roger Herney, those are all good episodes that you want to check out if you want to go into the archives. And of course, this episode brought to you by our company, Rise 25, where we help BDB businesses get clients referrals and strategic partnerships with Dunview podcast and content marketing. And you can learn more about what we do over at Rise25.com. All right. And my guest here today is Brett Nguyen. He is hails originally from the Great Garden State, New Jersey, now based in Los Angeles, not too far where I'm originally from, LA Valley area. He's a filmmaker, founding partner and executive creative director at The Refinery, which is a LA based entertainment marketing agency. And he started his career at Ithaca, Ithaca College, where he studied theater and film and production and eventually went on to work at FX, Fox Broadcasting, and at Disney, and a bunch of different roles before he co-founded The Refinery in 2008. He's also known as the co-director and editor of the award-winning fan favorite film, My Date with Drew, which we're going to talk about in a moment, which was an interesting story as well. But Brett, so great to have you here. And I love to talk to people that worked in the entertainment industry. I did a hot minute in the entertainment industry like most kids do when they grew up in LA like I did. And I want to hear a bit about what your experience was like, but you as a kid discovered selling blowpops. And I could do a whole series on this podcast with entrepreneurs who discovered blowpops, who discovered that one, kids like to buy blowpops, and two, if you buy them in bulk, you can make a higher profit margin. So you actually did that. And of course, the inevitable getting busted by the principal. So tell us about it. Yeah, yeah. You know, I realized my mom would go and buy those big bags of blowpops and I bring them to school. And I think someone offered me a quarter for one. And I was like, Oh, of course. And I gave them one. And the next day I came in with like 10 of them. And then I sold 10. And I think I sold 20. And before I was making enough to buy like five or six bags at a time. And this went on for a while. I pocketed a lot of cash until the principal caught me. And of course, I pleaded innocent because I didn't know that wasn't that was a thing that you weren't allowed to do that, even though I kind of had an idea. But yeah, it's funny. All those years later, I'd never thought of that as entrepreneurial. But obviously that's a hundred percent entrepreneur. For sure. For sure. I saw a need in the market and met that need. Yeah. Was there something driving it? Like a lot of times I interviewed people that didn't have a lot of money when they're growing up, or they had entrepreneurial parents that encouraged them, or it was just something they don't even know what it was. They can't even identify what it was in them. It was just a natural reaction that they had. Star Wars, it was Star Wars toys. You know, the first came out and I had a best friend in elementary school. And we would always argue over who got the newest Star Wars toys. And he always won. And so I was always trying to save money to get the next one before anyone else. So motivator. Yeah, it's just bigger and bigger toys as you get older, right? Tell me about it, right? And you loved cars. You had over 50 cars in your lifetime. And I see a collection of guitars behind you. So you like guitars also. But your first vehicle was you actually were mowing lawns and saved money to buy a tractor. That's right. That's riding tractors. Anything that I could ride or drive. And so yeah, I mowed lawns made enough to buy a tractor and then would drive to all the neighbors houses. And really, I didn't really care about mowing the lawn. I just wanted to drive my tractor. And so I had a sister who's 10 years younger than me. And so I started early also doing wagon rides with the tractor for her birthday parties. So nice. Charging your parents or charging the attendees at the birthday party? I think I think my parents paid for gas to take them. Well, hey, at least I got the words. Yeah. And you also discovered film. I think you and I are similar in age. And my father had a camcorder, had a couple of different camcorders when I was younger. And you couldn't do much with them. It was like you could record something and stop. And then you could record something else and stop with a very advanced it wasn't like today's iPhones. But you discovered that and discovered editing through an early video camera. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I obviously had a bunch of toy cars because I was a car nut. And I realized quickly that you could set up the camera on a little tripod and hit record and pause really quickly and move the car a little bit. And I discovered stop motion animation probably by accident. The coolest thing ever. And then I realized as you're transferring your video camera height to VHS, that it could actually hit record on the VCR and hit play on the camera and then pause in the VCR and switch to a different scene. And that was really my first introduction to editing and found it was so cool that I could shoot anything I want in any order and then put it together on the VHS tape the way I wanted it. And it was incredibly exciting and made for I became a hot commodity in school. And it came to projects, especially projects that we have the videotape with friends. I remember we recreated the opening to the wonder years, probably because I look so much like Fred Savage when I was in my early teens. So. That's great. I love that show. And you end up going and studying theater and film at Ithaca. Why study theater and high school? And when I graduated high schools looking for a place to go to college, I decided I would go for film and television to get behind the camera because I knew early on that the only way anyone was going to hire me as an actor is if I hired myself as an actor. So I think a college to study film and television. I actually was in a soap opera, a college soap opera in Ithaca, which I later took over and wrote and produced and starred in and. It's like an on campus soap opera or this was in the city. No, it was on campus soap opera in Ithaca. It was called semesters. And believe it or not, you can find some of them on YouTube. It's embarrassing, but I had a huge mullet and a big air and they're pretty funny. Brave of you to mention that it's on YouTube. But yeah, more parts. People who know me best already know. So there's no right there. Sure. It's been used against you. And you found your way to Los Angeles where, you know, kind of the heart of the film industry. I love to hear stories of how bleak that is for someone who oftentimes shows up in LA and doesn't have connections. And what did you do? Did you wait tables like many people? How did you break in? Well, I was pretty lucky. The very first production job I had was for a company called Weller Grossman and they were doing home and garden shows. So I was a set PA and I think I worked on props for a couple of those for a while, which is not ideal. It's not really what I had in mind. All those great experience. I definitely have an aversion to donuts from being on sets every day early on. Donuts on the craft services table. And then I ended up getting a lead for production assistant at a brand new network called FX right they launched. And I was telling the story just the other day. I went on five interviews for a production assistant job. The same one. The same job. They called you back four times. Call me back four times. It was an explain to the listener that that's usually not the type of role that requires four callbacks. By the way, I mean, if yeah, it's the kind of position where if you have half a brand and can have a licensing to drive around town and pork up a coffee, you're probably a good job. Yes, which I did one summer in college, by the way, it's a really fun job when you're college. Yeah. So after the fifth interview for a job in on-air promotions, which again, at the time, I didn't even know what an on-air promo was. Friend, for those of you who don't, it's just a commercial for a TV show. So that's called an on-air promotion. So after the fifth interview, I didn't know any better. And I called the vice president of marketing at home on a Saturday morning and said, Hey, it's Brett. I'm the guy who's been on five interviews for the production assistant job. Tell you what, why don't you let me come in next week for free. I'll work the entire week for free because I really want to work for the network. I'm really in love with what you guys are doing. Let me work for free the week. And then at the end of the week, if you don't want me, I'll leave. And if you want me, we can talk about it. And she said, okay, come in on Monday at nine o'clock. And by the way, please don't call me on Saturday morning ever again. And so I got on Monday and she said, listen, we have to pay you. I can't not pay you. But let's try it for the week and see what happens in the week turned into two and the two turned into four and the four turned into a year. That's great. I love that. That's such a great story. And so that was kind of your foothold. And tell us a little bit about how you worked your way up because you eventually ended up as a vice president of creative film services at Disney. But you had a couple of stops along the way before you got there. Definitely a couple of stops along the way. From FX, I went over to Fox and became a post production producer in the on air promotion department. It's a mouthful. But basically, I supervise the online sessions. I supervise the mixed sessions. I directed voice over talent. But I really wanted to be in the creative. I really wanted to be a writer producer of promos. And so one summer, I decided I was going to stay late, work really hard, and try to prove to everybody that I could be a writer producer. And so I made friends with a creative director. And there were movies of the week at that time that ran all summer on Fox. And she really didn't want to do them. And so I offered, I said, hey, how about I do a couple of them for you to take some weight off? And she was like, okay, go ahead. And so I wrote a couple scripts. I sat in the ed up a I cut a couple promos. I think the first one was for Demolition Man was Sylvester Stallone, which I'm a huge fan of. And so they got approved and got put on the air. And so she asked me if I would do it the next week. And they got approved and put on the air. And everyone thought that she was doing them. No one realized it was me working the night shift, even though I'd been working all day. And so after the summer, I had a full reel of promo packages. I probably worked on 10 movies over the course of the whole summer. And so at the end of the summer, I went into the president of marketing and I said, hey, listen, I've been writing and producing at night. I've cut all these promos. They've all been on the air. It seems like they've been successful. How do I make the leap from post production to a writer, producer, and step up the next level? And he looked me dead in the eye and he said, I really think you should find another job. And I'll tell you, it just crushed me. Why when that gambit had worked calling the woman on Saturday morning, you know, it turned into a job and that you do kind of something similar? Was it just a different personality? But why do you think you got such a negative reaction? At the time, I didn't know. Looking back, I think they tried to promote someone the same way and it didn't work out so well. So someone had come up from the post production into the writer, producer job, and it just didn't work well. And I think he wasn't trusting his instincts, maybe, I don't know. And so I was, I was pretty down. But a friend of mine said, Hey, why don't you check out this couple other companies you should check out? You've got a pretty good reel of stuff. Why don't you check, you know, give him a call. And so I called over to a company called Studio City, which was a boutique agency that did on air promos. And I walked in with this real full of Fox promos, which he was impressed by. And it was a total Hollywood thing he sat down. We had a conversation, he's like, wow, I really like you're real. I'd love to, you know, you'd consider working for me. I'm going to write a number on a piece of paper and slide it over to you, which he did. And I remember looking at the piece of paper, putting it back down and saying, thank you very much. I really appreciate the offer. Can I have 24 hours to think about it and get myself together and get back to you tomorrow. And he said, sure. And I hopped in the car and drove down the street. And at the time, I stopped at a pay phone because no one had cell phones at the time. And I called my girlfriend, who was now my wife. And I said, Hey, listen, remember that three bedroom townhouse in Studio City we wanted, but we couldn't afford. Tell him we'll take it because I just doubled my salary. Wow. Yeah. Wow. Wow. So turning a bad situation to do a better one. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Was this guy, when he slid the number over, do you think he thought that he was lowball you? Yeah. I think I think he probably thought he was lowballing me. I think coming from Fox, if I had been a really truly seasoned guy from Fox, it would have been a lower offer. But for me, making that leap at the time, it was perfect. Yeah. Oftentimes making that switch from one place to another just, you know, makes a big opportunity. Well, that yeah, that's always hard and again, not to totally take a tangent, but I'm sure you've gone through the process of hiring and firing and firing is always so challenging. And yet in the back of my mind, I've had every job I've ever left has always led to a step up. And there's part of me, maybe I'm just the ultimate optimist, but there's part of me is like, this can be a good thing for you. If you only, you could take a step back and see that, you know, you're about to take a huge step forward, even though this feels like a step down. Yeah, no. Now, where did date with you come around? You had been friends with the other filmmaker and the star of this movie. And it was actually made for around $1,000. $1,100 to be exact. But yes, $1,100. And this is at a time when equipment was more expensive, when I don't know if you were shooting on film or in video, but film was expensive. So yeah, everything was expensive. At the time I was working at trailer park as an as a producer editor. So I was cutting movie trailers. I made a big step up. And my buddy Brian, who I've known since we were kids, and he had come out to LA, followed me out to LA, and he was an executive assistant to an executive producer. So he was on Chicago Hope, he was on Ali McBeal. And after Ali McBeal, the executive producer decided to take some time off. And so he found himself without a job for an extended period of time. And he called me one day, probably six, eight months later and said, Hey, I really need to talk to you. Can we meet for lunch? And so we went to hammer her hamlet. And I remember sitting in the booth and he said, listen, I came out here to make movies that we went to Ithaca College to make movies. I'm not making movies. I'm out of work. I'm out of money. I need to fold it in and move back to New Jersey. And I remember saying, you can't do that. Come on, dude, you're here to make movies. You can't move back. We got to figure it out. He's like, how I've got nothing. I said, well, what if we just made a movie on our own? What if we made a documentary and we'll shoot it on a camcorder? And I've got some editing equipment, both in my office from cutting trailers. But I also had some editing equipment at home. And he was like, well, that's ridiculous. What are we going to what are we going to make a documentary about? And the first thing that came to my mind was quite honestly, he's had a lifelong crush on Drew Barrymore. He's tried to meet her a couple times and every time he's been in her presence, he's gotten tongue tied and hasn't been able to follow through. So I said, maybe we can just try and get you a David Drew Barrymore and we'll document it and see what happens in best case scenarios. You get a date worst cases. We probably have a pretty funny journey. I could think of some other worst worst case scenarios, but sure, we'll go with that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so we also reached out to my buddy, John Gunn, who's a director now as well, but at the time had made one film and asked him if he would participate with us. And at first, he said no. And then we hung up and he talked to his wife and told her the idea of Brian trying to get a David Drew Barrymore. And it was actually his wife, Lisa, who said, if you can get Brian a date with Drew Barrymore, I would pay money to see that. And so we didn't have any money, obviously. And so we went to Circuit City and we bought a video camera, fully prepared to take advantage of the 30 day return policy. And this was what year? This was 2003. So we documented us buying the camera. So we did it with a still camera. We shot photographs of it. And the camera didn't start rolling till after we'd purchased it. And that gave us a window to get a date with Drew. We had 30 days to get a date with Drew Barrymore. The $1,100 from the budget was from a game show that Brian was on called Taboo, where he won. The winning answer was Drew Barrymore. And the prize money was $1,100. And I couldn't make this up. It was all very, very real. And what's interesting is for us, stopping down to make the film was all about chasing a lifelong dream and chasing your passion for making a film. It really wasn't as much about Drew. Although, of course, if he wins it, he gets it. But I think that experience really related to people in a way that there's something out there, everybody has a bucket list. And so to take time and take a pause in your daily life and go after something, I think is really aspirational and inspirational. Now, were you saying that at the time? I'm wondering if a week into it, you're thinking like, we haven't gotten much footage yet. We're not getting paid for this. Like, is this even interesting at all? No, we didn't use doubts crop up in your head. Well, honestly, we didn't have a whole lot to lose. And so we didn't know if it would be anything. I think at some point, we probably thought, well, maybe our parents will watch this, you know, I know things can be interested. And we certainly didn't think about it in those terms. But the more everything started unfold and we used the six degrees of separation to try and get to Drew and crazy things started happening, the more we realized, like, oh, we were bonding, having such a great time trying to get to her and the experiences were so fun that we're like, I wonder if people would be interested in this. And if not, you know what, I have no regrets. It was a great experience for the three of us to go through it and our families, you know. Yeah. Now, did that in a weird way or maybe directly, did that lead to the refinery? Like, did that experience of creating something from nothing? You know, we eventually sold the film. Did that kind of give you the idea or the courage to start your own business? Yes. Maybe indirectly. I mean, I don't think it was necessarily my day with Drew. But what I found out through the process was I like to be able to do things myself. I want to have an idea. I want to make it the one I want to make it and then I want to try and sell it. And I think that that part of that entrepreneurial journey is what I really fell in love with. And it's interesting because my two buddies, John and Brian, went off to build directing careers. And I got offers to direct as well. But I chose to go back to entertainment marketing because I love the business side more. But I think I also didn't want to direct anyone else's project because I only wanted to do what I wanted to do. I couldn't imagine being handed a script that I have heartedly light and have to spend the next two or three years invested in it. And I think maybe that's the part of the entrepreneurial journey where it's like, I know what I wanted. I want to do it by way. And I want to, you know, I don't want anyone telling me I can't. Of course, once you have an entrepreneur and you have a bunch of clients, you also have to do things that they're happy about, right? All the time, all the time. So there's always compromise. Yeah, I think, especially opening an entertainment marketing agency, you know, our job is to make any movie or series look great, even though we know that the chances of it actually being great are slim to none. Yeah, we could have a whole side discussion about now, you'd mentioned, I think, before we started recording that Swingers was one of those movies that inspired you and part to do date with Drew. Yeah. And that's a movie where you could see, you know, launch Vince Vaughn's career and a bunch of others. And, you know, a lot of the folks that came out of these indie movies, they ended up having to do that balance between taking a script that comes to them, getting a payday, and then doing something that's more, you know, satisfies their creative juices, more of their own individual project. And, you know, some people I think in Hollywood have done a better job of that than others have kind of balancing. It's not easy to, you know, forge a career like that. No, and I think it's been interesting. Look, we always want what we don't have. So I'm always comparing my agency with the other big agencies that are out there. And there's always someone working on a bigger film or like, oh, someone just did the trailer for Joker 2. Damn, why didn't we do that? And yet at the same time, I think we built a career on working closely with our clients, forming really good relationships. And sometimes it's more fun to do a great trailer for a terrible film than a great trailer for a great film because work that goes into it and the problem of solving the ability is inherent, you know, not that it doesn't take a lot of work to make a great film look great. But I think it actually takes more to make a bad film look great. It's interesting because, you know, I think today now it's a different world. There's so much more information coming at us, but that the movies that are coming out, I remember like 20 years ago, like a great trailer would come out and you'd be like, oh my God, that's amazing. And everyone go rushing to see it. And then it would just die afterwards. And that doesn't seem to happen as often now. In other words, I think like you can't completely dissuade the movie going public because they're going to find out sooner or later whether the movies are done or not. Yeah, I mean, I still think the world falls for a great trailer, which I love and I love great trailers too. And I'm subject to my competitors making something. I'm like, oh my God, I have to see that we're not working on it. You get there and you're like, wow, you guys did a great job because that's rough, you know. But at the same time, I feel audiences are evolving, you know, earlier on in my career, the types of not necessarily trailers, but TV on-air promo or TV trailers that would error would be heavy hand and be like, it's the one movie you simply can't miss, don't myth. And we were sold to. And we believe it and it's not that it doesn't happen today. But I think audiences today are not only does it not work as well for them, they're actually kind of turned off by that. Like they don't want to be told that they have to see it, like, give me the material I'll choose for myself. And what's interesting is that social media marketing and creative content is what we called it, where it was making materials to market the movie, sometimes without the movie materials at all, or some movie materials, some behind the scenes, some interview footage, some creative way to get people excited tends to move the needle now almost as much as the trailer. Interesting. So when are you planning that out? Like, are you planning not just the trailer, but you're thinking like multimedia, are you thinking like, is it, you know, where I was like 20 years ago, it would have been all right, we need to create one amazing two minute trailer, we need to create one amazing 30 second trailer, whole stop, that's all you had to do. And now you're thinking like, well, we need to create 70 different shorts for Instagram and they need to have a narrative arc. Is that what you're doing to? Yeah, I mean, I think it was mostly about the TV campaign when I was younger, right? It was about the trailer was big and that was great. But really what it was, it was about the TV campaign and what was crazy about the TV campaign is you could cut 50 30 second spots because you're hitting people live on air. And so we had to go after every single network of like, okay, who's the audience at CBS? Who's the audience at Fox? Who's the audience? And then you'd span out to the cable networks and the MTV generation. And so you'd be trying to craft the movie into 30 second bite size pieces geared specifically towards those audiences. And it was a lot. Now, I think those 30 second spots, well, we still do quite a bit of them for big films. It's not as much because they're finding that, you know, few really good spots go a long way. And where we used to worry about that spots been on the air for two weeks, we need fresh new spots. Nowadays, they're like, well, the spot works and it's good and people are watching live TV as much. You don't know how or where when they're going to see it and they don't get burned out from seeing the same spot. In fact, it's probably not a terrible thing. So that's changed, certainly changed the economics of what we do. You've worked on some amazing films and projects. Just I'm scanning over your website here. But can you think of one or two where the film, the footage came in to you and you're just blown away? You know, just a blown away by, oh, this is amazing. This project and just get chills to even work on it. Yeah, I mean, we worked on Ford versus Ferrari, we cut the trailer for Ford versus Ferrari, at least the first trailer. And that was, you know, that's a bucket list project for me. I mean, I've known this story of Carol Shelby, my whole life, my dad was a huge Shelby fan. And it took them 10 years to really get that movie out and about. And then all of a sudden you realize, oh my God, it's Christian Bale and it's Matt Damon and just this all-star cast and it was put together so well. And so I beg, borrowed, installed work on that movie. And I was just in love with it from the first time I saw it. It's such a well-crafted fun movie. And it's not often the car movie that has all these other emotions going for it. And that's definitely a bucket list project that I love to tell people we worked on. You know, I hope you can go back and look at your career and be like, oh, I got to work on things that mattered beyond everything else. I mean, I remember we got to work on Creed and I was a huge Rocky fan growing up, especially being from Philadelphia originally and then South Jersey. I grew up with Peach Dragon. It was one of the first animated movies I loved and we cut the trailer for the new Peach Dragon. Definitely Ford versus Ferrari. And then another one was Kong. We did a really fun trailer for Kong that I just remember growing up with Kong and Godzilla movies. And it's fun when your childhood comes back around and you get to play with it as an adult. Speaking of that, that's kind of the experience of being a parent. I know you're a parent. I am as well. I took my kids to Disneyland a couple of months ago. You worked for Disney for a bunch of years. That's a company that has been part of the American psyche for so long. What was it like you were there for about six years, six, seven years? I was only there for a year. Okay. Yeah. Okay. What was the experience like being there? It was awesome and I probably was there too early in my career to appreciate it, if that makes any sense at all. So I came right out of sitting in the hot seat, cutting big movie trailers for a big agency to then working as an executive at Disney. And I kind of equate it to the guy who's like, if you're a quarterback, to then get thrown into coaching when you're not quite ready to coach because you still want a quarterback. So I remember feeling a little more disconnected because I wasn't sitting in the bays with them. And I had this moment of realization three or four months in that I was like, oh my gosh, this isn't for me right now. I looked at the president of marketing's job and was like, I don't think I want that job. I certainly don't want it now. And I was so afraid that I was committing career suicide by telling the guys at Disney that, hey, I realized pretty quickly, this isn't for me right now. And it was a really trying time because I literally left Disney to start the refinery with my partners. And I was like, oh my gosh, this is really going to go really well or really not well. And you ended up forming it about a month before the Great Recession started. So fall of 2008, I think this is maybe October or 2000 September. Yeah, it was we started September and then October, everything collapsed. And that was when everything collapsed. Yeah. I mean, the good news at the time. So I partnered with my two partners, Adam and Brad, and they do print. So I did all the AV and they did all the print. So it was a nice marriage balance. Yeah. And so but they had been going for a little while before I joined them. So they had a team of maybe 10 or 12 people. But I had like two other people in me. And so I was used to not making a ton of money. And fortunately enough, we had some work. And so we didn't need a lot to work on to make money. And I think the first two trailers we worked on from the day that the doors opened were old dogs, which was a Disney film. And all about Steve, which was Sandra Bullock and Bradley Cooper, which is, wow, what a what a film. That's I don't think I've heard of that one. So yeah, yeah, there's probably a reason. No offense. And and so tell us a little about some kind of the highs and lows of running the refinery over over the years. Well, you know, it's interesting because when I started, we were fortunate enough to jump on the two big campaigns, which doesn't really happen. So all about Steve was her Fox and old dogs was for Disney. And I remember, gosh, it was myself. I had an assistant editor and I had a coordinator. And I remember my Fox client coming over early on working on all about Steve and he came to the office at like six o'clock. And I'd started to put a trailer together and he had some ideas and I had some ideas and we kind of hashed out what a cut could look like. And he left at 10 o'clock at night and was like, hey, I need it in the morning. Is that cool? And of course, I was like, uh, yeah. And just even my most times we take about two weeks got a trailer to one night. But I had a pretty clear direction. And so I worked till about four 30 in the morning, cutting the first version of this trailer. And then we had a coordinated where I would burn a DVD myself, drive it to Beverly Hills. He leave his window, open a crack in his car. I slipped the DVD in his car, drove home, went to bed and and he called maybe two hours later and said, all right, I showed it. They really like it. We need to get back in and start working on it. So I had to shower, drive back in the office and get going. And I think we worked until like 10 o'clock that night. And I'll never forget our CFO at the time. We were fortunate enough to have a CFO from the beginning or smart enough maybe to have a CFO from the beginning. And I remember him coming in my office and going, wow, you look exhausted. I'm like, Oh, dude, you're not completely. I just got my butt handed to me. This was a crazy evening. And he laughed. And he said, you know what, one day, the company is going to be bigger. And some punk kids are going to walk down the hallway and he's going to look at you. And he's going to wonder, what does that guy do here? And when it happens, that's how you know you've made it. So it's a wild ride. We we kind of had a hockey pump. Tie a hockey stick kind of take off where we went from like two films to eight films in the first year. And so I had to staff up really quickly. And I learned one of the greatest lessons in entrepreneurial ship, which was, you better be looking for more work while you have the work. Because you can get more work when you're done the work. And so I was deep in the work that when year two rounded out, I went looking for work and everyone's like, Oh, we love you, but we're all set for now. And so, yeah, that must be one of the challenges, because I don't know how long these projects lasted, but I imagine that you have a kind of a short window where you need to do a lot of intense work, because, you know, films tend to be done, you know, they're edited right up until the deadline. And then you have like probably a couple of weeks to do your work, right? And so, then you have employees that you have to keep busy the rest of the time. Yeah. Well, I mean, we are working on it early on, we'll get rough cuts at films. And so as they're working on fixing, you know, making the film better, we're also working on the marketing. But it really is. Yeah, I mean, I'd say a lot of our work used to maybe still does come in the last three or four weeks before a movie comes out where the studio gets panicky. We're trying a million different directions. We're trying to stay on tracking and making sure that we're keeping up with the progress of the film. And if audiences aren't reacting, how do we pivot? And so, yeah, so the second year, I wasn't really used to not having the work. And so, a couple of jobs ended at the same time, the movie comes out. Maybe you do some home entertainment spots, and then it's over. And then I hit the pavement. And it's not that people didn't want to work with me, they just didn't have anything right then and there. My book of business wasn't so big that I had a bunch of people do. And so, I think year two and a year three, I had to let go of half of my team, which at the time was only like 10 people. Yeah. That's still a really good lesson and hard lesson, right? I had to really figure out a way to survive. And so, I made a vow, I never wanted to do that. You know, I never wanted to build too big, too fast. And so, I feel like you got to always kind of keep it wherever it feels just a little bit overworked, you know, kind of the sweet spot. But you haven't changed so much. It's like the strike. Yeah, so you had the actor and the writer strike, which concluded maybe about, I don't know, nine or 10 months ago now, as we record this. What was that experience like for you when you saw that that was coming down the horizon? Well, the writer strike was rough. And I think leading into the writer strike, we did a little bit of a reduction in force, you know. And sometimes that's good. Sometimes you can kind of, you know, there's maybe people who are excelling more than others and so it's an opportunity, but it was really, you know, those times are always super difficult. And then the actor strike happened. And then everyone was panicking, everything shut down. And again, you remember, there's still stuff in the pipeline. So we just don't know how long that stuff's going to hold us until they run out of material. But it was really interesting talking about emerging of EO in my own business. As last summer, I was prepping to be president. I went to a conference in Boise, Idaho for EO. And coincidentally, I was there at the same time we were supposed to do our quarterly EOS meeting for the office or basically our quarterly setting goals for the next quarter. And we couldn't move the date. My leadership team wasn't available. And so we decided I wouldn't be at that meeting because I had to be in Boise. And I remember talking to them for an hour and a half the day before the meeting and kind of setting a course for what they would talk about in their quarterly review. And meanwhile, I went to all my sessions and was learning what I was learning. And they had a speaker that night. And the speaker was an amazing mentalist, magician named Wayne Hoffman. If you ever have a chance to check him out, you should definitely check him out. And he went into not just illusion and and mentalist and magic, but he also went into his theory on how to get what you want. He had kind of three tips on how to get what you want. So before he was done, I got a text from my leadership team saying you need to call us right away. We're in panic mode. And I said, all right, I'll call you in 20 minutes when this is done. And as soon as Wayne was done, I went and called them and they said, Hey, listen, we sat down and we were starting to build our rocks. But first we went through our projections for the quarter. And this was the first week in August. They said we went through our projections for the quarter and we're going to miss the mark by 50%. And we're not sure how it's going to be the month after that. So we're going to recommend that we lay off 40% of our staff. And I was like, what? And then they said, and we feel like you're prioritizing EO over the business. So we want to talk to you about that. We're not really sure what your role is right now. You know, these are your partners telling you, you know, this is this is my leadership team. These are not my leadership team. Yeah, yeah, I have a leadership team of creative directors. And so and and look, we've we've gotten very close over the years and I fought them for having the courage to have a conversation like that with me. They're expressing their fears and rightfully so. And I remember calling my CFO back and saying, Hey, how did the wheels just fly off the bus here? He's like, Oh, you know, the projections are what they are. He's like, I can't control the team's projections. And if that's the case, we're going to be in deep trouble. I said, yeah, but it's the first week in August. Don't you think that we can get work before the end of the month? And he said, Well, even if we got work towards the end of month, chances are it wouldn't start to the next month, in which case we'd miss our numbers. And I said, Okay, so the challenge is how do we get work and get it in this month to work on? And he said, Yes, I said, Okay, challenge accepted. And so I flew back and we met in the office the next morning at 830. And I said, Hey, listen, first of all, I need to apologize because I double booked myself. I'm not going to let that happen again. I don't want you to ever think that EO is more important than our business. And I apologize. I said, the other thing is I started thinking a lot about my role here. And I said, I feel like now that I'm out of the trenches and you guys are in the trenches, I feel like my role needs to be I'm here to motivate you to inspire you to hold you accountable and to drive business. And if you guys are okay with that, then we'll proceed that way. And they're like, Okay, yeah, I like that. And I said, now let's talk about not hitting our numbers for the month. And this was the craziest thing. So I just seen Wayne Hoffman talk about his three tips for being successful. And his first tip was make it to do this that you can actually do. His second tip was be specific with what success looks like can't just be I want to be rich or successful has to you have to have your eye on a target that's tangible. And then the third thing was this idea that yes lives in a world of no. What he meant by that was, you know, he challenged some of his friends to go out and ask for crazy things that you're certain they're going to say no to. And the wild part is a lot of times you get a yes instead of the no. And so I threw that back on the team and I said, Hey, listen, in all this time of me prioritizing, I had this great speaker, this is what he taught. So here's my challenge to you, I challenge you to reach out to clients and get 10 knows by next week. I think you need to ask them really specifically in a way that sounds something like this. Hey, how are you holding up in the strike? I'm sure it's challenging. It's been incredibly challenging for us, especially lately. But we've had a great track record with you. We've done a lot of great work over the years. And if you have anything big or small, preferably sooner than later, we'd really appreciate it. And so they accepted the challenge and they went out and my one of my creative directors reached out the next day and said, Hey, I got three knows. I was like, Okay, he goes, but I got two new jobs. Great. Okay. And so by the end of the month, we ended up breaking even and not firing anybody. And I think it was because there's a lot of prescriptive thinking that the clients wouldn't have anything. And you know what? There are some that said, I don't have anything, but there also obviously were enough clients that did have stuff. And so sometimes perspective and positioning in the way you look at things. And you know, I think you, if a no is okay, then you might ask in a different way. If a no is okay, then you might ask in a different way. Yeah, meaning if the expected, you're going to ask for whatever you want to ask for, because you're already going to expect to know not that you want to know, you want the yes, but you're going to ask in a different way that maybe is a little more honest and sincere. Because you're trying to sugarcoat it, you're not trying to butter anyone up, you're just being honest with what you're asking for. Yeah. And if they say no, you're like, Okay, because I kind of expected that, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is going circling back to something you said earlier in the conversation, but I meant to ask it, which was sometimes it can be so hard to be in a creative role, especially when there are multiple masters. And it sounds to me, if I understand your role, you've got the filmmakers on one side, and then you've got the studio, and you're kind of bridging the two. Is that a challenge? Is that a real tough role to play where you got the filmmakers is there, baby, you got the studio that has a vision of what they want, and you've got to kind of satisfy both? Well, I mean, it works a little differently than that most times. Most times, our only connection to the filmmakers is through the studio, under normal circumstances. And so really, it's the studio exec that we're catering to, you know, to align with and make sure we're coming up with the right marketing angle for them. I have had it in the past where, in fact, one of them was for my buddy, John Gunn, who I co-directed my day with through with, and he just did a film called Ordinary Angels with Hilary Swank, which we did the trailer for that. And that was a little more of a balancing act of like John's my best friend, but it was a friend of yours. Yeah. Then I had to kind of balance and he texted you saying, like, you better not f this up, buddy. Well, I mean, he would ask me what we were working on before I showed the studio. And I'm like, I can't really show you that. Like, I have to let you have to go through the proper channels, because we go out of sequence here. This is going to get messy. Yeah. I'm getting trouble. But I do feel like we're in a creative industry, yet we're also in a service industry. And so, what I try to tell my team is that version one, when you send the first version of a trailer to a client, you're a chef, you're a chef. And almost every version after that, you're a waiter. You know, and I think that we're, we're in it with you, right? We're trying to craft this perfect meal. And so you throw out first what you think would make the perfect meal. And they're like, well, I don't think that should have a side of mashed potatoes. I think they should be green beans, and we should have it. Not any salt on it. Yeah, that kind of thing. And then it's a balancing act of, yes, we have to do it. They're asking, but we also, they're coming to us for our wisdom and suggestions. And so if they point you down a path and you're like, can I also try something else? Or do we have to try it this way? Because you never know who the notes are coming from. Sometimes they're direct from filmmakers. Sometimes it's from the head of the studio. At our agency, we'd say we're the king of the alts. Meaning like, you tell us what we want to do. We're going to give you the version that's that as best we can. And if we feel like it's really not working, we're going to give you an alternate version of what we think might work better. And at least that way you're prepared. Yeah, yeah. I'm way over on time. So I apologize about that. We had chatted a little bit about EO. You mentioned EO, Entrepreneurs Organization, which we know each other through. And I just want to wrap up on that last question. Because you said that you had gone to this event and Boise and your leadership team questioning while you were there. And I'm curious, because you are going to be the incoming president of EO, Los Angeles, obviously been very involved in that organization. Why do you why have you thrown yourself into that organization? What have you gotten out of it specifically for yourself personally and for your business? Yeah, you know, I had a friend of mine who's in the music industry and he was in EO and we were talking during the pandemic, actually, and he was like, you really should join. I think you'd find it really helpful, especially given the trials and tribulations of being in the pandemic and everyone's going through stuff. It might be a nice sounding board for you. And I was hesitant. My business partner, Adam, is in YPL. And so I've heard some of his stories. Anyway, long story short, I joined. I got in a forum and I really was going into it thinking, happy to share experiences with these other entrepreneurs are going to have nothing in common with me because I'm going to create a business and they're in retail or whatever they're in. And what I quickly found out was that if you own a business, we're all in the same boat. We all go through the same trials and tribulations. We're all trying to get work. We're all trying to find the right profit margin. We're all dealing with a staff and a team and how to lead them successfully. And I was fortunate enough to get on the board early on. I think I was only in EO for like a month when the incoming president lived by me and was like, hey, you're going to be on my board. And I was like, okay. And had I not been on the board, I don't know if I would have known of everything that EO had to offer. But I kind of threw myself in with both feet and found just a wide array of inspiration and experience shares and great speakers. I kind of rekindled my quest for learning and for self improvement. I can even begin to tell you that even just that first year, all of the growth that happened in me, both as a leader, as a human, as a dad, as a husband, you know, talking about how to meditate and how to have a gratitude journal and all these peripheral things you don't think will impact your business. And they do because they impact you as a human and the impact how you approach different situations. And just to be in an environment with people that you can share entrepreneurial experiences that you can't share with your friends because they just wouldn't understand. And I think that going through that and growing and being able to share my own experience has just made me want to give back as much as I'd gotten from it. And I think I look forward to my presidency to be able to give back and hopefully inspire and delegate really well. But I also look forward to it as becoming a better leader of always improving and how do I take the lessons that I've learned from my own business and apply that to the presidency and then vice versa in the presidency throughout it at the end of it, apply it back to my business. And I'm just really I'm proud to be an EO. I think it changed my life in a great way. I think it gave me confidence. Maybe I didn't have before. Yeah. Yeah. Brad, this has been great. Where can people go to learn more about you and the refinery? You can go to the refinerycreative.com. You can also look me up on Facebook. I'm just Brett when or Brett C went on Instagram or you can look up the refinery on LinkedIn. Brad, thanks so much. Thank you. Thanks for listening to the smart business revolution podcast. We'll see you again next time and be sure to click subscribe to get future episodes.
