Building a Strong Partnership (ft. Old Saw Studio)

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Kyrill00:01All right, welcome everybody to another episode of Creatives Grab Coffee. I've already lost track of what number we are at this point, you know, I think after you get to episode 50, that point you just kind of stop counting. And anyways, today we have Jesse in Denver from Old Saw, a production company based out of Edmonton, Alberta. Welcome guys.

Jesse00:21Thank you very much. Thanks for having us.

Denver00:22Thanks for having us.

Kyrill00:24So is this like your first podcast that you've been invited on or are you guys already seasoned pros at this point?

Jesse00:32Um, it's our first podcast in this, in the industry for sure that I've been on. I've done other podcasts with friends just on various things, but for sure, like, like of this nature. Yeah.

Dario00:43That's how we started. We did like our friends. We tried to do a podcast with our friends and then we decided to actually turn it into a little something, a little bit more professional.

Kyrill00:43Or was this like?

Denver00:43This is my first.

Kyrill00:47Yeah.

Kyrill00:53Yeah, like the COVID board podcast that everyone tried to do. Denver, you said it's your first?

Jesse00:54Totally.

Denver00:54And this is.

Dario00:57boredom. Yeah.

Denver01:01This, yeah, this is my first podcast. Always kind of wanted to try it out because exactly like you said, you have all your friends gather around and you're a bunch of idiots, let's be honest. Nobody wants to listen to that, but you always think it would be a good time.

Kyrill01:18Yeah, we basically did like one recording and then we listened back to it. I'm like, yeah, this can never see the light of day. But then Dario and I were thinking to ourselves, that was, that was, was it four? I thought it was like two. Yeah.

Dario01:24We actually did, we did like four recordings. We did four, yeah, yeah. We started this podcast called the Well Gents podcast, which I think our Facebook page is still up for it. And we had this whole like line order type of opening for it and.

Kyrill01:34Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jesse01:37Weld you.

Kyrill01:42It actually was pretty cool. But then we decided not to do it. And, but then we decided, you know what, Daria, we should probably, we should probably both do something like this. And then we came up with this idea and just, here we are more than 50 episodes later. But anyway, we kind of digress a little bit before we dive into it guys, tell us a little bit about yourselves and Old Saw.

Jesse02:04Yeah. So Old Saw was actually started by a friend of mine as his own little classic kind of freelance gig where you give it a little name back in like 2014. So it's actually been around for a long time. And then he did that for a few years and I would collab with him. And then in 2018 we incorporated and became Old Saw Studio which is what we are now. He went to Vancouver to pursue the DP route. So, you know, had to go off for bigger, better things. I bought the company from him and then Denver came on just at the beginning of 2023. And we're a year and a half into business together now. So Denver and I own the company and we've just been grinded it out. This new post-COVID world, figuring it out, figuring out how to do good work and what's needed. And yeah, that's kind of where we're at now.

Kyrill02:59Wow, that's a very interesting story. I don't think we've ever had a guest with that kind of story in place where you've been in it for like 10 years in a certain way and then having somebody kind of join in as a partner much further down the road. So Denver, what was that experience like kind of jumping into somewhat of an already established company and try to make your footprint in there?

Denver03:20Yeah, it was interesting for sure. I had worked for a media agency before working with Jesse and kind of, you know, started pretty early on in the agency and grew with the agency and, you know, just mutual parting of ways and decided to do something else. Coming into an established business, it was kind of cool because You know, obviously, we had a lot of clients, you kind of had an up an up on that already, you had some clients established already, some recurring clients, you could look at the books and go, okay, these clients, we know are going to give us x amount of income every year, because they've been doing it for the last five years, which is great. But it's also, I'm a very, I'm a very technical person, a very process oriented person. And so coming in and basically, you know, from a bigger agency mindset with more employees, more people to something that was a little bit smaller, a little bit more boutique, a little bit more niche was pretty interesting and fun. It felt like we were back in the early days of the agency again, where you're, you know, you're kind of figuring things out and just kind of going with the flow. Like you're doing everything. Um, but at the same time, there's a history there with the business itself. There's a history there with, you know, I know I had done it before and I'd been in a business that had grown before and could grow it again. And, you know, lots of, lots of, uh, skills and expertise were kind of gained through my experience in a bigger company, let's say. So that was kind of what I felt that I could bring to the table and what I tried to bring to the table in the first year.

Dario05:17Are you guys friends? Like how did you two meet?

Kyrill05:18So… Yeah.

Jesse05:21Well, the agency he worked at, they actually hired me to be an actor in one of these little things. And then I had heard of Denver and…

Dario05:26Alright

Kyrill05:26Hahaha

Denver05:31Actually, I hired one of his ex-employees, two long before that.

Jesse05:36Yeah, it's pretty tight knit kind of, you know, industry, I guess, over here in Edmonton. So Denver and I met and I was like, this guy's pretty dope and he does colouring and he had a colouring suite at the old place. And so we, I got him to colour one of our projects and we kind of became friends and then, yeah, sure enough, left that. And I was like, well, I'm looking for some help. So hit him up, we grab lunch and the rest is history.

Dario05:36Nice.

Kyrill05:47Nice.

Kyrill05:59Well, you guys really have had a very interesting kind of journey to how you guys kind of like started partnering together. So just to kind of clarify, was it like a merger or was it like Denver, you left that agency to join Jesse?

Denver06:13Yeah, I left that agency to join and we joined Jesse, well, I left that agency, I took a couple months off just deciding what I wanted to do with my life and if I wanted to even stay in media or not in video production and then, you know, Jesse kind of approached me and was like, no, this is what I think, this is what I have to offer you and we just kind of took a couple months to see if it would work and here we are.

Dario06:41So you guys like split 50-50 now in terms of ownership of the business or how do you have that settled?

Kyrill06:41Nice.

Jesse06:45Well, I think part of the situation, I guess, was Denver was really with that agency from very early on, but never had ownership. And I felt that was something I could offer him that was unique, was saying, hey, come on board. And I'm actually going to let you buy into this company and we can build something fresh from scratch. So he's at 25% right now. We're going to go to 50-50 later this year.

Kyrill07:09Okay, so it was a kind of like first to kind of like test the waters a little bit or like did you guys first test the waters though before joining together for a period and like how long was it did that take before you decided okay let's fully uh join together?

Denver07:13Exactly.

Denver07:22Yeah. Yeah, actually. So, um, Jesse and I had lunch a couple of days after I left the other place and that was more just to catch up and whatever. But when he, which would have been July, uh, when he actually approached me and said, Hey, this is kind of my idea. This is what I think you should do or what I'm, what I'm kind of pitching to you was October. And then so we took a couple months after that basically started we would meet once a month for you know the three months and but also on top of that come October I started joining them on some shoots started just coming on board you know kind of giving some consulting giving some advice and just kind of being a part of it and then we it was kind of it was early December when we had decided okay yeah this is the route we're going to go so we officially partnered on January 1st of 2023.

Dario08:17What are like the, what's the split between the roles and responsibilities you two have?

Kyrill08:17Nice.

Jesse08:23That's a good question. I think like, yeah, I think what drew me to Denver and why we work pretty well together is we're quite different. So, and maybe you guys could relate to that being complimentary with skillset. So I'm much more, well, I'm definitely quite a creative person. I'm more salesy. Definitely trying to like figure out new and interesting ways to do things. And especially when we're on set or on a shoot, it's like… you know, this is too standard, this is too boring, let's make it weird, let's change this up, you know, like really thinking from that angle, and Denver's more like, okay, but like, you need to learn how to like book light, and like, you need to learn, like, you can't shoot in that bit rate, or whatever, you know, it's more like, he brings that technical side to things, and so, you know, I kinda ended up stopped, I don't touch the gear as much anymore, and more so Denver's ticking on that, and then I'm more ticking on clients sitting down. brainstorming with them and obviously we collab on everything, but that's kind of more where the split happens

Denver09:24Mm-hmm. Yeah, the way I like to say it too is, Jesse gets, Jesse is that like, basically we take, you know, Jesse's our deposit from a client, and I'm the final payment. So he gets the client and brings it, and I'm the one who's like, all right, we're gonna get it to that finish line, and we're gonna get paid for it, kind of.

Dario09:24That sounds similar.

Kyrill09:36Ha ha ha.

Dario09:37I like that.

Dario09:44Yeah, that's kind of what we have going on too.

Kyrill09:44Yeah, rolls the ball down the hill. Rolls the ball down the hill. Ha ha.

Jesse09:44We- we-

Denver09:47Exactly.

Jesse09:47We literally like, our arguments are always similar where it's like, Kate, we have to get this client finished up through the door, we gotta keep moving, you know? And he's like, yeah, but we need to do a good job on it. Like, we're not gonna rush through this part. I'm like, ugh, so there's this funny back and forth where it's like, Kate Denver, we can't like, not that he does this, but like, we can't put that many extra hours into this project because I'm thinking more like, how do we keep the food on the table type of thing? Where he's like, yeah, but we're.

Denver09:58Hehehe

Jesse10:13trying to make good videos here, you know, and so I think having that tension is really helping. Yeah, and they come back totally, totally.

Denver10:16And so they come back.

Kyrill10:21Yeah, I think tensions like that, yeah, like I find like those kinds of tensions, although in the moments they might be a little bit like, ah, it's a little bit annoying. At the end of the day, we're both fighting for a better outcome for not only for the, not only for us, but for the client as well. And I think it's important to have that. If we had, if you guys had say two people who are very laissez faire about the whole process, then, you know.

Dario10:22That sounds so similar.

Kyrill10:49the content will suffer and the product will suffer at the end of the day. But at the same time, you wanna be able to also deliver a good client experience. So you have to keep pushing the boundaries as much as possible on both ends to kind of find good happy mediums because there is no one size fits all solution for every client, right? It always varies. With some clients, a little bit more of the experience and the flow is a little bit more important than with others, the product is just slightly more important, but it's all these little variations and things like that. You know, one thing I kind of wanted to also pick your mind about, Jesse, is that because you were with a partner for so long and then you went solo, it's hard to find a new partner to kind of like bring into the fray. And so a lot of people opt to stick as solo producers within their companies and then just hire out a lot of like the technical aspects or crew up based on the needs of certain projects. Was it just the opportunity of Denver being there? and like looking for a good opportunity and a partnership that just kind of made you jump onto that or was it something that you were actively looking for like before that?

Jesse12:00That's a great question. I don't know if I was particularly like head hunting per se, but I was getting burnt out and I, and I think that probably a lot of freelancers can kind of identify with this where after, um, Caleb, his name, he, he left. I was on my own and it actually worked pretty good because it was really during COVID that I was on my own and I was kind of just working out of my basement and like producing, you know, bunch of random stuff and COVID was actually decent for us with like getting video projects that everyone needed it.

Kyrill12:05Mm-hmm.

Kyrill12:20Right.

Kyrill12:31Mm-hmm.

Jesse12:31But I got really burnt out. And I think the thing I was wanting to point out is just like, there's something about having such a large breadth of things you need to be responsible for, even if it can fit in an eight hour day, it's just like too much bouncing around mentally. And so it's like, I haven't like from books to like color, right? It's just like, everything is just on my plate. And even if it's not that many projects, it's just very overwhelming and it's hard to stay organized. And I think that was getting me really burnt out just being alone, handling everything from start to finish. Um, and so I was definitely looking for something and I ended up getting a little part-time job at a cafe just to kind of ground myself. Um, and that ended up being super beneficial for me just mentally. And also like networking wise was crazy. Like I, I just, you should just work at a cafe part-time because you just, the people you meet, we've gotten so many projects just from me working at this.

Dario13:22Really?

Kyrill13:23Rit. So, so you were over.

Denver13:24We made a joke that Jesse can never leave that job because he just gets us so much work out of it.

Kyrill13:33What? That's so, that's so interesting. I think I would have thought like if someone was burnt out, the last thing they would need is to get a part-time job doing, I mean, something as simple as that. But that.

Dario13:39Yeah, yeah. As soon as you mentioned that, I was like, wait, what? Yeah.

Jesse13:44But that's it. It's like, it's simple, right? And like for me, it's like, I just needed someone to say, you need to be here at this time and do this simple task. Because for me, I had everything, right? Like, it's like, I could just do everything all day. And so there's a certain, like, keeping yourself accountable to that's emotionally exhausting sometimes, right?

Kyrill13:53Yeah

Kyrill14:04That's very interesting. Yeah.

Dario14:04That is the most interesting thing I've ever heard. I would have never thought that the solution to being overworked is to go work for someone else.

Kyrill14:14And ironically that has become like your, what, networking vehicle? Like how do you go about, so you're saying you find clients while you're serving coffee? It's like, here's your latte. By the way, I have a production company.

Dario14:26Kyrill, it's Edmonton. I think it might be a little different here in Toronto if you go do that. This is unique to small towns, basically.

Kyrill14:31I think it's very unique to Edmonton, that's for sure. That's what I mean. I'm just trying to process the conversation. Genius though.

Jesse14:38Yeah. Well, I mean, and I'm not, I'm not there anymore. So I was just there for a year, just, and it was like 15 hours a week. Um, and I think the point of what I was trying to say with the overworked thing was it wasn't even like an overworked commitment to hours. It was more just like, it was more the actual scope of what I was doing was just like the bearing all the responsibility for everything was getting me really tired. And so I needed like, I almost need a routine, if that makes sense.

Kyrill14:44Okay.

Dario15:05Did you have enough to hire like, did you have enough to like maybe hire a project coordinator or someone part time to come and help out with like all the menial stuff you have to do on a day to day basis?

Kyrill15:05Okay, so it was like too random.

Jesse15:17Yeah, I had an editor and, and he was my kind of the guy that was backing me and he was huge, but he never wanted to like upgrade into that project coordinator space. And so I ended up letting him go. He just was like really content just editing. I was like, Oh man, but I kind of need like help. And he just wasn't wanting that. And so that also was a part of it. That's right. Yeah.

Dario15:32Well, he's an editor. It's not like editor cuts, you know, he doesn't, you know, handle emails and all the other…

Kyrill15:36Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jesse15:39No. But I was like, you don't put your…

Kyrill15:40It's like telling a fish to walk. Hehehehe Well, okay, technically speaking, yes. Hehehehe

Dario15:41Yeah. Well, at some point that did happen.

Denver15:42Hahaha

Denver15:49hahahaha

Jesse15:51Yeah

Kyrill15:53Okay, but I mean, that's still pretty interesting. Look, Denver, this is not to say like, you know, like we're trying to find reasons why he shouldn't have gone with you, right? But we're just kind of curious what that, what that kind of like thinking is like. But I completely understand what you mean, Jesse, in terms of feeling overworked with the amount of like, like the scope of things, because sometimes you'd be doing like one task and then there's an immediate need for something else, which takes time and then that other task gets put further down on the totem pole. Like today, for example,

Denver15:54Yeah.

Denver16:01No? No, no, absolutely.

Dario16:01Yeah.

Kyrill16:22Like one thing we're doing is we're working on some of our own content, right? So I'm like busy editing. And then I have a client call that I have to make a call for and then, oh good, we signed the project. Let me now put together the contracts, send it out, confirm a few things. It's like, oh, before I knew it, another two hours that should have been for editing now already gone, right? It just, like the more thing, different kinds of tasks you have, it really kind of extends like the time it takes to kind of complete some of them. So if you're doing it by yourself, it makes sense why you need to bring someone else on board and to be honest like i feel like dario and i have been spoiled with each other for the last 10 years doing this because you know we've always been able we've always been able to like kind of like lead on each other for help in those says don't get me wrong i want to kill him every now and then but yeah you guys are you guys are young you're like into this what like a year in this relationship

Dario16:57Aww.

Dario17:02Yeah.

Jesse17:06100%.

Dario17:12Look how Jesse's like, look how Jesse was agreeing. It's like, you guys have only been married for like a year. What do you know? Ha ha ha.

Jesse17:17Hahaha!

Kyrill17:19You're talking to a 10 year veterans in this, you know?

Dario17:24You guys should still be in the honeymoon phase by now.

Kyrill17:28Quick and dirty though.

Dario17:30Wait till you get to the point where like they call or like Denver Jesse will call you or Jesse Denver will call you and you just ignore the call. That's when you know it's been a while.

Jesse17:37Oh yeah.

Kyrill17:40Heheheheh Second bits

Denver17:40You know what, I'm not dealing with this. Goodbye.

Kyrill17:43It's like, I'm busy. I'm busy. It's like if it's really important, he'll, he'll send me a text saying, you know, it's important. It's like, okay. Otherwise, yeah. Yeah. He tells me he goes to the library now to work every now and then as an excuse to not answer my calls. I know what he's doing.

Dario17:50Hehe

Denver18:00Yeah.

Dario18:00I go there, but the benefit of going to the library is that I can't answer your call. That's one of the key benefits.

Kyrill18:06That's his excuse. That's his excuse, but…

Jesse18:09Well, I'm looking forward to getting there. We'll keep working on it.

Kyrill18:13Yeah, but it sounds like you guys already have a good dynamic after just such a short amount of time as well What would you guys say is like one of like the first maybe initial challenges that you might have faced? When you guys started like working together

Dario18:29When did you guys start working together? You said 20, 20 what? Oh, it's been like a year and a half, okay.

Kyrill18:322023, last year.

Denver18:322023, last year.

Jesse18:34a year and a half in like yeah

Denver18:36Yeah, biggest challenges.

Kyrill18:38So like what was like an initial challenge or challenges if you guys had?

Denver18:43Yeah. Oh, how do I there? I think the one that we still argue, not argue about, but we still like conflict with to this day. Like, I think coming in, how do we put how do I put this? Not that it's mean, but just how do I how do I put this? I think I think that I had been

Dario19:07Sounds like a relationship show. Like, the way this conversation is going. I feel like I'm a shrink listening to a couple.

Kyrill19:10Yeah

Denver19:13Yeah, I'm not…

Denver19:18Oh boy. I think like coming in, Jesse and I had very different tastes. And I remember like at the at the last place, literally watching one of the videos that also had produced before, like obviously, while I was working at the other agency and watching one of the videos and I came in and I and me and my team, we sat down and we watched it and we went like, dang, like, we would never make something that good here. And not to say that

Kyrill19:18Yeah

Kyrill19:26Okay.

Denver19:47it was because of the people we had or you know, even just the agency in general or whatever. But it was like there was something about that video that just really stuck out and was just like next level. Good. And, you know, we produced some fantastic stuff over there. And we had we had a lot of I had a lot of like incredible people on our team. But there was just something about it. that really struck out to me. And then coming into it, I think, you know, my, my brain often goes to, let's just, you know, let's just get it done, move on and get to the next thing. And which is which is kind of opposite to what we were talking about earlier, where we have to you know, I'm usually the one slowing it down and being like, Okay, no, let's make a quality product. Let's make this good, whatever. When it comes to shoot day, and it's like, you know, we're two hours behind, and we're trying to just move through, it's like, I'll basically be the first one to be like, Okay, well, let's just not worry about lighting this shot. Let's just get the shot and move on kind of thing. Or let's not worry about being nitpicky on this. And let's just move on. And I think that was that was really challenged by Jesse. that was challenged in myself coming into it and realizing, Hey, I want to make these things that are just a cut above what I've done in the past. And I think I mean, it's kind of the it's kind of the funny like back and forth of my probably natural tendency is slow and cinematic, whereas Jesse being a little more ADHD is punchy quick, get it done crisp, fast, and edgy and we and a little bit more puts it puts you on edge and makes you feel something right.

Dario21:28Hmm.

Denver21:35It's just a little bit of, it's, I think that was our first like conflict was really just like trying to align our visions and tastes, because ultimately we wanted the same thing to deliver a great product. And trying to align our vision and taste to each other so that when we're on set and when we're shooting these projects and planning these projects, we can actually make something cohesive that stands out.

Dario22:00So how did you guys come to that compromise?

Kyrill22:00Nice.

Denver22:04Lots of arguments.

Jesse22:05Yeah, well, yeah arguments, but honestly, like I think both of us have the ability to just be humble in the right moments. And that to me is key if you're working with someone who is unlike you to actually like stop yourself and listen to what they have to say and then patiently sort of say, well, here's my angle. Now it obviously doesn't always happen that way, but I think we're pretty good at it. And every time we do that, we end up with a really awesome product. I think the key thing we've realized is that's not the same as splitting the difference, right? And so it's not the same as saying, well, let's just do half of what I want and half of what you want. That normally turns out really bad. And we've done that in the past where it's like, we'll kind of meet in the middle. Don't meet in the middle, more just like, okay, who's kind of, whose vibe are we committing to here? You know, and obviously, yeah, it's all, it's super contextual, but it will be times where I'm like, well, let's do this. He's like, I know, but this is like, this, this doesn't fit what we're actually making here. I'm like, okay, that's true.

Denver22:54One.

Jesse23:01And there's times where I'm like, oh, that's like, there's gotta be a more interesting way to do this. And then Denver will stop and think, and he'll agree, right? And then we'll take the risk on that. And oftentimes they pay off.

Denver23:11Yeah.

Kyrill23:11Yeah, I think if you look at it as, I think if you look at it as the other person being like the first filter for your ideas and you being the first filter for their ideas, it's a good way to kind of help each other think a little bit more about like that initial idea, how you can expand on it, how you can change it or something like that. And you'll get the feel of how the other person thinks as you go through that motion over and over and over.

Dario23:11No.

Kyrill23:37Like you guys, like you said, you're only like a year and a half in and it sounds like you've already done quite a bit in that time. Whereas Darren and I, you know, it's 10 years in and we're still we're still we're still growing with that. Right. Things change. And also we don't butt heads.

Denver23:48Absolutely.

Dario23:49So we don't butt heads anymore. Like we used to have the same issues. Yeah, we used to have the same issue back in the early days. And then you just get to a certain point where the thing that helped the most with us was just having a more solid pre-production process. Because then a lot of details were figured out in there. And then come production day, it was just a matter of time, really. We just had to get certain things based on the time constraints that we had. So a lot of the times now.

Kyrill24:11Knowing what to do, yeah.

Dario24:18that we do butt heads is literally just because like we just don't have time to keep getting all this stuff. I'm usually just telling Kyrill to hurry up because we got to move on. That's really the only problem we have now is that Kyrill takes too long or he wants too many takes and it's like, okay, well, we're already behind and we got to move on. That's really it. That's the only issue we have nowadays.

Jesse24:25Yeah.

Kyrill24:37Yeah, yeah. Like that's probably the biggest one. Yeah. It's not even really an issue. It's just kind of like, it's kind of like, you know, you're in the moment, like for example, if you're the one shooting, you're in the moment, you kind of want to get certain angles or certain takes. And then you sometimes need someone to tell you, it's like, Hey, like we've already gotten a few, we're running. That's like basically the AD role kind of like kicking in at that moment. It's like, we got, we got to kind of move on to the next one. All right. It's like, okay, cool. Which you need to have on set, right?

Jesse24:41That's funny, like…

Denver24:57Yep.

Jesse25:04Are you, am I coming through, still here?

Kyrill25:07Oh, did Jesse freeze? Because for a moment, I thought that was a very odd frame to freeze on. He's really thinking intent. He's really listening intently right then and there.

Denver25:11Yeah, so did I. He's really just looking.

Dario25:13I think he did freeze. Oh, he's been kicked out. Oh my god, he better be able to join in.

Jesse25:16Yeah.

Denver25:24He should be pretty quick.

Kyrill25:24Well, let's see. Oh, yeah, do you think he'll be able to join in if we're still rolling?

Dario25:29I wonder because, well yeah, he should be able to join in. I just. I just don't know how the edit's gonna work now, because we have Riverside use AI to edit the episode, so I wonder how this is gonna work out.

Kyrill25:34Oh yeah, he should be able to.

Kyrill25:44Yeah, just gonna start off with Jesse like this. That look is just like fully like… It's like, I'm listening to you.

Dario25:52That's how we should start an episode one day, it's just all frozen and we're like, oh, we're just joking. You thought we were frozen, did you?

Denver25:53That's it.

Denver26:00That's a classic Jesse. It's a classic Jesse look to it. All of our meetings like he just like kind of goes down and looks up and it's like, well, what's going on? It's funny too, because his webcam on his computer usually like cuts off half of his face. So it's just like down here. And so he's like, it's like,

Kyrill26:00Yeah, exactly.

Kyrill26:05Hahaha!

Dario26:07Hehehe

Kyrill26:14Pfft

Dario26:17Ha ha

Kyrill26:18Just like slowly coming up like this, like…

Denver26:20Exactly. It's like, we need to fix that. That's sometimes because he likes it when he thinks he kind of goes like this and, and like, he's, he'll, he'll just have a toon on and you'll just see his toon popping up in the frame and you're like, it's, I mean, I don't know if it's still recording or whatever. But I mean, I kind of wanted to, I can say this now, I wanted to say this about the, the coffee shop thing of like networking and whatever, like, Jesse's a very

Kyrill26:31I just did too. Clients are like, who are we talking to right now?

Denver26:49unique, personable guy, like he makes those first impressions, he asks the tough questions right away. And so like, for us to network and get work from a coffee shop was purely just like, because people were curious of like, who the heck this guy was, one, asking them these deep questions or whatever off the bat, and two, just like, he's a he's a quirky guy, like, they just wanted to get to know him, right? So That was really like it was a testament to him of just being a good networker. Being in that being in that role and being a good being a good people person. So very quirky. That's what makes him and it's been it's very it's very fun to be a part of that and get to know him more. Right at the end as I'm saying.

Dario27:38I love how he joins in right now. He got back into the room and all he hears is like, he's a very quirky guy and that's just him. Ha ha ha.

Jesse27:40Yeah. Yeah, I am a quirky guy.

Denver27:44Hahaha

Kyrill27:46He just joins in and is like, what up?

Jesse27:48Yeah, what'd you say? Um, sorry boys, the internet's weird today, which is really annoying, but…

Kyrill27:55It's funny because I basically finished talking and then I looked over and I'm like, no thoughts. And you were just in this frame where you're like, like very intently listening. Ha ha ha.

Dario28:01Yeah, you're frozen like…

Denver28:03It was your classic thinking face.

Jesse28:06I do, I do think that way.

Dario28:08I was just thinking about how funny it must have been. It's like these guys just want to get a coffee and Jesse is over there asking them questions about their business and this and that and the other thing. Yeah.

Jesse28:17No, but dude, like, it's, like, people, the people loved me there, and it's, and that was never my MO. Like, I was never like, I'm gonna market my, just like, what else do you do? Oh, I do video, right? Like, people, you just get talking, you're just getting through the line, and so.

Kyrill28:18Their life goals. Ha ha ha.

Dario28:32I used to do that at the bank too when I was a teller, so I relate to that. Yeah.

Kyrill28:35Yeah, yeah, I get it. I get it.

Jesse28:36Yeah. It's funny. I wanted to bring this up. Like when you said like the pre-production thing is what solved a lot of those sort of tensions, I feel like we're speed running what you guys did in the 10 years. Cause that's exactly where we are now too. And like where it started for us, I kid you not was your guys podcast. So we listened to one. Yes, man. I listened to one where you guys were talking about like your proposal process. And I was like talking to Denver about like, this is like.

Dario28:54Nice.

Kyrill28:55Oh really?

Denver28:57Yeah.

Jesse29:05this is so, this makes so much sense. Like we need to do this. And it's like funny, cause you think it's just the simplest thing, but like sometimes you just need it spelled out for you. And I felt like you guys would do that on those, like some of those episodes, especially the salesy ones. Those are all the ones I'd listened to. But yeah, that's like, that's what got it roll, the ball rolling for us, like a few months ago, maybe a closer year, but.

Kyrill29:20Ha ha.

Dario29:21Hahaha

Kyrill29:26Yeah, that's how it was for us too. Like when we started understanding how much of a step-by-step process there needs to be for just the initial stages of the whole project. Like before we were just creating, we were trying to basically create a document that just had everything from like the details to the creative, to the mood board, storyboard, examples. Like it was basically doing the entire project in one document. And we kept like taking things out, putting things in and then realizing Okay, this is all important, but we don't need to do it all at once. Let's first start splitting it up. And honestly, like from the last episodes you've probably listened to, it's probably went through a few different changes even up until now. Yeah.

Denver29:59Hahaha

Dario30:06It changes, it changes like on a weekly basis. I remember when we were first doing them, Kyrill was like, oh you know like don't do it so that they have it because they might share it with other people. I was like Kyrill like even if they do it like it changes so often just look at the one from like the month before like it's completely different and sure if they want to share outdated stuff like go for it.

Jesse30:09Oh, 100%, 100%.

Kyrill30:11Yeah.

Kyrill30:25Makes no difference at this point.

Jesse30:29And like nothing's new under the sun with that stuff really either. Like you don't have the proprietary proposal process. Like you just have a process. And I think like that's the thing is like, I always say to Denver, let's just make something and then you have it written down and then you can be like, this is wrong, but at least you can say why it's wrong versus just not being able to say anything at all. Right. And so like just having something is like, you're already like ahead of like 80% of businesses who just.

Kyrill30:39Yeah.

Dario30:49Yeah.

Kyrill30:52Yep.

Jesse30:57just are dogging it like I was for years where you're just like, yeah, we'll just make it happen. Right. Whereas like now it's like, okay, perfect. We have our discovery call. That's where we gather this info. It's more about listening. And then if you're interested, we kind of give a price range. And then from there we sit down to a brainstorming meeting.

Dario31:11Oh. He's gone.

Kyrill31:12And he's gone. It's all good.

Denver31:17What a nightmarish day to have internet problems, eh?

Dario31:20Oh he's back, he's back. Yeah. Oh he's frozen again. He's frozen again. Now he's frozen. It looks like a profile picture.

Kyrill31:20Oh, he's good. There, he's still here. He's still here. No, no, no. Oh yeah, he is.

Kyrill31:31Oh man, poor Jesse.

Denver31:33Poor guy and usually like our office internet is 10 out of 10. It's super reliable never had any problems But today we were in a call earlier before this and he got booted out twice, too. So

Kyrill31:44So he's just one of those days where the internet is just having some issues for him in Europe

Denver31:46one of those days. Yeah.

Dario31:49So you guys are in your office right now, right?

Denver31:51So Jesse's in our office. I'm at my home office.

Dario31:55Oh, okay. Yeah, we kind of killed the whole office thing early on. Like, we've gone back and forth on it, but we never really committed to it. Actually, we were about to commit to it.

Kyrill31:56Okay.

Kyrill32:05I mean, we want to do it, but it's, we want to do it, but it just doesn't make sense yet. That's just where we're at.

Dario32:10You know, you know what? We were thinking about it. We were almost about to do it. We were about to pull the trigger at the beginning of 20. I don't know. Mid. Was it 2023 or 2022? 2022.

Denver32:11Right.

Kyrill32:16Like a year ago, I think. 2023 beginning. I think we were close to doing it. It was either like we were looking into it a little bit more in depth in 2022 because we just came off a project that was.

Dario32:30We were about to, no, we were about to, we were about to start looking, go looking with our agent friend and everything in 2022. I think it was like around like April to May-ish. And thank God for that. Thank God for that. Cause then, you know, what happened with the economy and everything, we would have been in a very bad spot right now. Cause that would have been a three year commitment.

Kyrill32:38Yeah.

Kyrill32:41Yeah, but it's just.

Denver32:44Hehehe

Denver32:53Right, yeah. Minimum.

Dario32:55That would have been bad.

Kyrill32:56Yeah. Here the rents are insane for anything in Toronto. I don't know how it is in Edmonton.

Denver32:59Yes.

Dario33:01No, no, they weren't bad. No, Carol, they weren't bad. Like the option we were. Yeah, but the space is big. If we wanted to, we could have got something smaller for half of that. We wanted something that was spacious. That was the issue.

Kyrill33:043K a month is still pretty, pretty pricey.

Kyrill33:11Yeah, well yeah, because like if you're gonna do a studio where you can actually shoot in it, like that's the whole point, right? Where you can actually create content. If you don't have that, then what's the point of even getting a space, right? How big is your office?

Denver33:14Yeah.

Denver33:18Yeah, you need space. Yeah.

Denver33:24Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, that's the Oh, it's a closet. It's actually an old, like, like our office that Jesse's in right now is literally an old, so the building used to be owned by a church. And then they kind of like sectioned it off. And so now it's kind of like a shared co working space. But we are literally in the church's old coat closet. So it's just

Kyrill33:31Oh, okay.

Kyrill33:50Hahaha

Denver33:54have two desks in there. That's it.

Kyrill33:57I mean, that's not bad.

Dario33:59The whole point of the office for us was like, oh, okay, we weren't being too productive at home or we were having issues with that. So we're like, at least we can go there and then, excuse me, it'll force us to work and whatnot. So I'm glad we didn't go that route because it would have been a very expensive way to work. But now luckily for me, at least I have a library right next to my building. So I just walk over there in the mornings and I just spend like several hours there. The YMCA is right next door. So I finished there.

Kyrill34:15Yep. Well, it would have…

Denver34:27Oh nice.

Dario34:27Go do a little bit of cardio, workout a bit, go back to the library, finish off, go home, eat. Like, it's much cheaper that way.

Denver34:35Yeah, no kidding.

Kyrill34:35Yeah, I mean the benefit like of having the space was more so also like, okay, if we could actually use the space to shoot some of our own content, even have some client content done in there, you know, like that is gonna pay for it a little bit as well. And there's gonna be a lot of value that comes from it. But again, if we were to sign on for a contract, it's like three grand a month, that's 36K a year. And I'm not even including probably the 10K upfront that you probably have to put into it, just to make it.

Dario35:02utilities we'd have to pay into as well like

Kyrill35:05That too, like it'll just add up to, yeah. And that was the thing that we realized, that's why we realized like, okay, you know what? If we absolutely need to use the space for anything, then we'll rent it out at that point, if we absolutely need it. So up until now, we've been able to make it work with staying remote and honestly, like with just two people, you really don't need something permanent as of yet, right? Once you start growing a little bit more,

Dario35:07Shared expenses they don't mention.

Denver35:10Yeah, the op cost, yeah.

Kyrill35:36then maybe you might have to start thinking about it. But I know there are a few companies that we've had on the show that I think are remote and are like five, six people even, and they're still.

Dario35:44Honestly, Kyrill, even if we do get to that point and I would rather just get a shared work or rent out a shared workspace for like a day or two if we need to do big group meetings. Like I'd rather do that than commit to having a big office space like the overhead cost alone. Like, I don't know, man. Stuff like that worries me because like with our jobs, like it's usually the first thing that will get cut in a marketing budget. So it's always like, you know, like.

Kyrill35:53Yeah, exactly.

Denver35:54Yeah.

Kyrill36:02There are a lot of those like…

Denver36:08Right. Yep.

Dario36:12If something happens like it's happening now in our economy, like ours is the first one to get cut out of that budget. Why take the risk? At least now, like unless…

Kyrill36:21Yeah, during the pandemic, I knew this one marketing agency owner, pretty small, but had like a few big contracts like before the pandemic. And then they had an office downtown team of like maybe five to 10 people. And this office was costing her about, I think it was like eight grand a month at the time, which was fine because she had a lot of great work coming in. She had a team that she had to manage. It made sense before pandemic. pandemic hit, she had just signed like a three year lease two months before the pandemic and was, or I don't know if it was three years, maybe two years, but yeah, imagine that eight grand a month for two years locked in and there was no way to get out of it. And that just like scared me.

Denver37:01Yeah.

Denver37:06And you can't even use the space. Like you can't go into it, right? Cause you just have to stay home.

Kyrill37:10No. Yeah. So like, that's like one of those like harsh examples of like how when you get locked into something that I could really decimate you if you don't have a plan B or anything like that. I mean, granted COVID was just like a whole separate thing and we've beaten that topic to death at this point but it just goes to show that anything can happen and you have to really make proper business decisions based on current and potential situations that come down the road. And even though Dario and I knew we were in a good space at the time. We knew that the next few months was gonna be lucrative. Who knows what's gonna happen next year? And lo and behold, the economy tanked for a little while. And I'm just really glad that we didn't have, I think we would be like 70, 80 grand down in rent alone. And that's just being conservative at this point.

Denver37:45Totally.

Dario37:55Bro, don't even like, I can't even imagine. It would have been, I did the calculations and I was like, Kyrill, this is gonna be about a hundred Gs in three years. I was like, do you wanna, I was like, if you really want to, I suggest we just set 3K aside every month, put it in a savings account. And then maybe in two years, if you want, we either use it as a down payment for a condo and then, you know, or something else. And then just, at least we can build equity with like a place, you know.

Kyrill38:03in three years. Didn't make sense.

Jesse38:05Yeah.

Dario38:25Instead of paying someone else's like mortgage on a property, I'd rather like we get something out of it through the business.

Kyrill38:25Yeah.

Jesse38:30Did you, Denver, did you tell them about our space?

Kyrill38:30So that's, that's our plan.

Denver38:30Yeah. Yeah, yeah, we were just talking about that. Yeah.

Dario38:32Yeah, the church. Church closet.

Jesse38:34Yeah, church closet, $500 a month.

Kyrill38:37I mean for 500 that's not that's not bad. That's not bad. Okay, like I we have a

Dario38:37That's really cheap. That's really cheap, okay. That's really good actually.

Denver38:40Yeah.

Jesse38:42We got it. You got to run lean, dude. Like you got her. And I mean, that's what I love what you guys are saying. Like I think that's so crucial as the cashflow piece where you're just not getting smoked.

Denver38:51W-well, and-

Kyrill38:52Keep in mind, we have a storage locker as well for all of our equipment, like a 10 by 10 foot storage unit, which costs now, I think we got a good deal on it, like something like 150, once, okay. So like 180 roughly a month, which is not bad even just to store all your equipment, because that's also part of the need, you know, like for during the pandemic, Dario and I, we were just basically storing half at my place, half at his place, complete nightmare to kind of get it out there. And the biggest issue I had back in the day was needing to…

Denver38:56Yeah.

Dario39:00177.

Dario39:16Yeah.

Kyrill39:21assemble everything on a cart in my condo, bring it down to the parking lot, load it into my car, then go to the location, then back, and then bring it back up. And it was just such a crazy nightmare at the time that we ended up getting our own storage locker, especially since the equipment list kind of like got bigger. It just became easier to store like that. And that makes sense. So basically our only overhead technically is, yeah, like 180. in terms of storage or physical space, right? And for you guys, 500 bucks storing all your equipment and having a space to do work, that's not too bad. Yeah.

Dario39:58Yeah, that's pretty good.

Denver39:58not bad. Yeah, we're in a similar situation again, too, with like, like even bringing on a part time person or hire or something right where it's like, okay, well, you know, back in September, we were pretty swamped. And we're like, Oh, we got to hire an editor, we got to get a part time editor. But then it's like, well, look, if we look three months down the road, we can't afford that editor, like, you know, and I'm glad we didn't do it. But now we're now we're in another mind, another spot where it's like, okay, is this the time and, and we've got now we've got like contractors and

Kyrill40:18Yeah.

Denver40:29subcontractors helping us out and everything. But it's kind of that, yeah, like, when do you make that commitment to a space or a person or, you know, that's it's a jump in costs, like, when can you justify that, right?

Kyrill40:42I think it also depends on the person that you find because I found that a lot of the people that we're working with are freelancers, which yeah, we would love to bring them on full time, but it's gonna be very difficult to bring them on full time because they also wanna be working on different kinds of projects with different companies. Finding full-time people, you're gonna have to completely redefine what the role is almost to find those people because people who want a full-time versus sticking to freelance, they're completely different mindsets that they might have. So you have to… see if you could even find that as a possibility, right? But I don't know, it's something that we're also not there yet. Like we have a bunch of different subcontractors that we bring on for post, for production as well. Dario and I strictly handle the pre-production for all projects on our own, just to kind of keep everything streamlined. And yeah, full-time editor would definitely be the next hire, but. Who knows, right? Like, I mean, projects are like, can come in an influx at once. Like for example, in 2022, we had a project where we were shooting for three weeks straight, every single day, for this one client. And we had to produce 80 explainer videos in one month. So that was, that was like one of those times where it's like we ramped up and we basically brought in one of our freelance editors, air quote full time, you know, just to help us.

Jesse41:56Oh

Denver41:57Hehehe

Kyrill42:08tackle that project from start to finish, but then we might have like a month where it's like one small video project here and there, or if it's something minor enough that we can do it in house. Like if there are some projects that are simple and quick to do, I would do it in house for the team because then, you know, it helps kind of streamline some things and we don't, like when you work with an editor, there's a lot of back and forth sometimes that happens, right, which can delay the process sometimes. And if it's something very quick that

Jesse42:33Yeah.

Kyrill42:37you can get to a client out instantly, then you will make the judgment call based on how much work is going on at the time, right?

Jesse42:41You

Jesse42:44Do you guys use, what do you use for like, do you use DaVinci Cloud at all or how do you guys do your editing?

Dario42:50Oh, we use, uh, yeah, we use frame.io.

Kyrill42:51Frame.io.

Jesse42:52Oh man, you guys, dude, you guys edit DaVinci or you're premier? Okay, okay.

Dario42:55Premier.

Kyrill42:55Premier, we're not Da Vinci. We're not part of the Black Magic family, all right? Like, I know. No.

Jesse43:00Okay. Well we man, we've been using DaVinci cloud. It's disgusting. It works so good. It's just like open up the project on any computer full speed. It's crazy. Yeah.

Denver43:00Hehehehehehe

Kyrill43:11Interesting.

Denver43:14It's it's for like, it's been out a couple years now. And I when I mean, we just learned about it a month ago. And I was like, this should have been a bigger deal than it was like my job was on the floor for like three days figuring out like, really, because I was always a Final Cut guy. And that was what finally switched me was cloud. And it's pretty, it's pretty nuts. It's a lot of fun.

Kyrill43:31D'oh.

Dario43:37Hasn't Apple abandoned Final Cut? Not yet? Oh, they're still supporting it, okay.

Denver43:40Not yet, but yes, they're still supporting it. It's still getting updated. It's still, yeah, I mean, I edited on Final Cut for like 15 years, so it's like, it's a tough one to let go. I was editing a wedding yesterday or like doing some edits on a wedding yesterday that I had done in Final Cut previous before switching, and I'm like, man, I just, I miss how snappy and quick and fast this is. But I mean, it's…

Kyrill43:40The final cuts. I don't like final cut.

Denver44:10I said five years ago or 10 years ago, I was like, this program is not going to exist in five years. And I'm shocked it's still around because I mean, Apple's pretty much putting all their chips behind DaVinci at this point to

Kyrill44:22Yeah, the final cut was never a favorite of mine because of like the whole transcoding process. That's what I learned early on. And then I found that most people that we've ever interacted with know the Adobe Suite. So it's just been pretty straightforward to stick to it. Like, yeah, maybe DaVinci could be better, but that means not only do you have to learn it, you have to find editors that edit in it and work it because what happens if you have to take over something on a project? from an editor that isn't familiar with it, right? Then it's like, oops. But anyways, I think we're kind of like heading close to like the two o'clock mark that we, and we've already lost one of our patrons on the episode. So for the third time in this episode, Jesse is MIA. You think we'll be able, ah, there we go. He's.

Denver44:53for sure.

Dario45:03Yeah.

Denver45:10Oh dear.

Dario45:11Hold on, he's coming back in.

Jesse45:13Alright well, we gotta, I should wrap up here. I should. Yeah, I'm sorry guys, I feel like I'm ruining your guys' podcast here with my stupid internet, but.

Denver45:16That's literally what we were just saying.

Kyrill45:16Yeah. We were just talking about

Dario45:17Yeah, that's what we were saying.

Kyrill45:25You know, it's funny, the audio, the people listening to this on the go with audio is not going to know the difference. You know, just, you know, the rest of us just took over the conversation at that point. But no, everything's staying, everything's staying in the way it is. This is awesome.

Dario45:33Hehe

Jesse45:33Yeah, yeah, well, hopefully there's.

Dario45:39Hehehehe

Jesse45:39Okay.

Denver45:40Yeah.

Jesse45:42Hopefully there's enough usable stuff there for you.

Kyrill45:42But guys, thank you for… Oh, for sure, for sure. But anyways, thanks guys for jumping on. Like I know this was a little bit more of a quick episode than compared to our usual like hour, hour and a half long ones that we typically do, but let's keep in touch and let's chat again a little bit more in depth, you know, it doesn't have to be in a podcast format either, but great to finally meet you guys. And also thanks for supporting the show for so many years as well. We appreciate that.

Dario46:06Yeah.

Denver46:07Hehehe

Denver46:10Yeah. No, great. Thanks for having us on. And I mean, thanks for all the valuable information that you've provided us with your podcasts over the years. So it's been, yeah, it's, it's cool to finally meet you guys and get to talk to you guys.

Dario46:22Likewise. Yeah.

Kyrill46:22Hopefully we can keep it going.

Denver46:24for sure.

Jesse46:24Yeah, we'll keep it going. Thanks so much, boys.

Kyrill46:27Thank you guys, all right, take care, bye bye.

Dario46:27Alright, thanks guys.

Denver46:30Take care.

Jesse46:30Peace out.