The daily digest of Twin Cities culture | Secrets of the City

For the second piece in the Business of Art Series, an ongoing series of articles focusing on local art-types who have turned their craft into a successful business, we'd like to introduce Sevnthsin, a multimedia creative agency located in the Northeast Minneapolis Art District.

Upon walking into Sevnthsin's cheery Northeast Minneapolis office space in the Waterbury Building, it's hard not to notice that this interactive agency plays as hard as it works. A foosball table, a Baywatch pinball machine and a hip crew of young designers and programmers create a laid back atmosphere that speaks volumes about their fun-loving attitude - and also their success.

Owner Jamey Erickson has taken his brand, Sevnthsin, originally the name of his college band, and turned it into a multimedia empire that has grown rapidly over the past couple years. Well-known for creating some of the most stylish websites and interactive media out there, and also for working closely with local artists (often for little to no money), Erickson and his cronies consider their company more than just a business. With close ties, and an obvious affection for the Twin Cities art, music, and fashion scene, Sevnthsin truly embodies the term "creative agency."

I first met the crew a couple years back when I was shopping out a possible web programmer for the l'etoile magazine site, and while we never went through with it, I still maintained contact with the group and have been incredibly impressed with their constant motion and innovation ever since. I was recently surprised and delighted to discover the addition of a full-scale film studio to the Sevnthsin facility - an addition I was lucky enough to experience first-hand while working on a recent project. The studio, which hosts an arsenal of professional lighting, sound equipment, and built-in sweeps is available for rental for film projects of all types - and even comes complete with Sevnthsin's production staff to ensure things run smoothly. Who knows, they might even let you play Baywatch pinball if you ask nicely!

This week I chatted up Owner Jamey Erickson about his business, bad websites, and the future of the internet...


How did Sevnthsin start?

Man, here we go! This story can get a little long, so I'll give you the short version. Sevnthsin was initially a band inspired by a gallery show I was a part of called Vice: The Seven Deadly Sins. It was partnered with another show in the spring called Virtue. The band lasted about a year, we played a few shows, then disbanded. I started doing work for bands under the Sevnthsin pen name for about three years or so, then upon leaving college and heading into the "real world," I discovered many of my colleagues knew of the Sevnthsin work, so I decided to keep the name for the company going forward.

It wasn't until June of 2006 that I struck out on my own. The night job had started to out-weigh the day job, and I had an intern already lined up. So I took a fateful leap into the unknown, and we found just enough work to keep that rent paid. It was definitely a rocky summer, but we soon settled into our own and began expanding.

When we first met, you had a much smaller studio space in Thorpe Building in Northeast. How have you expanded since then?

Yes, when we first met we were over in the Thorpe building in a little 1,000sq ft space trying to squeeze four of us, a conference room and a foosball table all into the mix. By about May of 2007 we decided it was time to move into some real digs, we were adding a fifth person and knew we no longer had the room to stay in our current space. We moved over to the Waterbury Building on the corner of Broadway and Central here in NE Minneapolis (approximately three blocks form our old space) and found a nice little 2,500sq ft place to call home. Shortly after moving we added that fifth, as well as a sixth member to the team. We stayed strong at that size for about three months before growing again. So over that last year we added two more people, putting us at eight, and in the last month we've hired yet another, putting us at nine people on staff. Collectively, though, with all the other freelance resources we utilize on a regular basis, we're easily 18 people on any given day.

Your main business is making cool websites. What are your favorite kinds of sites to make, and which ones are you most proud of?

‘Making Cool Websites,' I think you've just coined our new positioning statement. Yes, we focus exclusively in interactive but over the past year, we've begun to define more precisely what our ‘niche' is in this ever-growing online world. At our core, we provide expertise in building brand loyalty with twenty-somethings by creating engaging and compelling social media and rich interactive solutions for our clients. So we definitely specialize in the edgy, highly interactive engagement experience but also have a very solid grasp on this new social media platform through Facebook, MySpace and mobile devices like the iPhone and the new Google G1 running Android.

As far as my favorites, that's always a hard one to list, but I'll take a stab:

Bella Koshka
Red Shoe Clothing
Bowie by Duffty for Target

Just to name a few!

We are launching a new site, Secrets of the City, soon, but if you got your hands on the current Rake website what would you do with it?

Well, taking on a project like a Rakemag.com redesign would definitely be a fun one. I definitely think there'd be a customization and personalization approach we'd take to the site. Today, the world of online communication has become so much about getting people the content they prefer, in the ways they prefer, in the places they prefer. So taking content and making it available via RSS feed, or creating personalized content feeds, or even creating widgets/apps that can be downloaded or placed on a mobile device that allow the audience to get the content they want without having to go to the website. It's all about instant gratification and providing that content to people as easily and seamlessly as possible.

[Excellent (and wholly un-prompted) answer because those are exactly the kinds of preferences we'd imagined folks would want...and will be seeing soon!]

Where do you think the internet is headed?

Where is the internet headed? Good question. It's headed away from the ‘internet as a website' sort of model for sure. The days of logging onto a web browser to get at your email or news or even your Facebook page is very quickly disappearing. Mobile devices are rapidly taking over and the concept of the ‘internet' is much less one confined to a computer screen. So I think we'll definitely continue to see a shift in the way content gets delivered and how interactive content is experienced by the guest.

What are some of the most annoying trends in websites these days?

I think one of the most annoying trends on the web today is this overly glossy approach to everything. I partly blame Apple for this, but man, if I see another button that looks like a glossy Mike ‘n Ike with a drop shadow I'm gonna lose it.

The film studio is amazing, I know, I've used it! What are your hopes for it, and how did you get all that sweet gear?

Sevnthsin Studios is something we started last year. With all the green screen work we've been doing, it only made sense to get something like that at our disposal. So we took on an additional 1,800sq ft and built out a full studio. The equipment came from an old ShopNBC studio in town that was closing down. We were in one of those "right place, right time" sort of situations and managed to get the entire lot for one price. It was a little hard to believe, but we didn't waste a second hopping on the opportunity. The future of the studio is always changing. It's something we use quite a bit for our own work, but we also have it available for rent to anyone who needs a studio. We've also taken a bit of a different approach to renting the studio. Most spaces charge to rent the space itself, then charge more for lighting and access to different parts of the space; I'm not into doing that much math. Our philosophy is "One price gets you complete access." So, for whatever the day or half day rate, you get into the space and can use anything in there, be it any of the lighting or either/both of the seamless backdrops or even come set up your own set - we've got plenty of room.

What kind of film projects have you worked on, and what would you like to do next?

The film stuff we work on is primarily for interactive. We do some fun little video pieces for parties around the office or as Holiday Greetings e-mailers, but we traditionally do all our film work for interactive. So we use the green screen quite a bit to bring models and actors/actresses to life on screen in these little interactive experiences we've created. I think the best examples of that are the Bella Koshka site or the Red Shoe Clothing site. Going forward I think we'll definitely continue to push the boundaries of what we can do with green screen content in the online space. We're already discovering some new uses and I think there are some really exciting things you'll see coming out our doors in the next year.

You have a real dedication to local artists, and your studio is located in the Northeast Arts District. What is your advice to artists who want to turn their craft into a successful business?

I would have to say two very important things. One, stay true to yourself and the things that motivate you as an artist. There are plenty of things out there that can derail you as an artist; be aware of those things. We all need to eat and we all need to pay our bills, but at the end of the day, it's all about what you're passionate about. And two, as much as we all want to believe this, no one's work will ever speak for itself, so throw that out the window immediately. If you're passionate about what you're doing and you've got something you know people want, you have to get out there and ‘sell' it, no one will just find you and fall in love with your work. You've got to get it out there and in front of people.

You've got nine employees now. What are their unique talents?

Every employee here at Sevnthsin brings something different to the table. We've got three designers, one with a design/photography background, one with a design/illustration background and another with a design/programming background. We also have three developers, one was actually an illustration major, another was a design/animation student and another went to design school before falling in love with the code. Our project manager was a design/design management major and then I come from an interactive/filmmaking/photographic background. So everyone here has some cross history which makes things incredibly collaborative and unique, as everyone brings a different knowledge set to the table that can help streamline our ‘process' around the office.

It looks like it would be a blast to work at Sevnthsin. How do you get any work done is such a laid back environment?

That's a good question. Lets see, we've got three ping pong tables, two pinball machines (Guns ‘n' Roses and Baywatch), a foosball table and a Wii. I think we've created an environment around here where people love coming to work and everyone realizes that although we've got the fun stuff, its a perk, not a priority. So we have a blast, but we work just as hard, if not harder than we play (we play pretty hard, though). I think overall, it lifts the general morale around here and keeps us focused on what we're doing and driving that creative energy.

I once went to a really fun party in your space. When is the next one?!

Soon! Very Soon!

For more information about Sevnthsin, visit www.sevnthsin.com or www.sevnthsinstudios.com