At Creativebug, art means business

Meet the team behind the crafting class empire

This story was crafted by Job Portraits and commissioned by the San Francisco-based company Creativebug. The interviews below were conducted by Miki Johnson in person with the Creativebug team, starting with Chief Creative Officer and co-founder Jeanne Lewis. Photographs by Peter Prato and Jackson Solway.

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What problem does Creativebug solve?

Jeanne: I think of Creativebug as an outlet for people who have the desire to create, but have little time. It started because I wanted a creative outlet for myself — one that fit within my schedule. When I lived in New York, I used to go to a pottery studio after work to decompress and shake off the day. Years later, I had a corporate job, plus kids, and I wanted to take classes again but didn’t have time. At work I was using an online video tutorial site to hone my technology skills and I loved the accessibility. So I thought, why not have a resource like this for art classes? I figured there were other people like me looking for a place where they could tap into their creative side during stolen moments — and would be willing to pay for high-quality classes they could take on their own time.

Kelly Wilkinson (left), Creativebug’s editorial director, and Fernando Santacruz (right), director of video content, share one end of the office’s largest room. The other end is occupied by the light-filled studio where classes are filmed. In between are the teams that make them happen, along with two large closets. One is packed with a boggling array of crafting supplies—the other with enough cameras, lenses, and lights to put a smile on any videographer’s face.

Diverse backgrounds, strong opinions

Ursula Morgan
CEO

LinkedIn Profile

What past experience has been most helpful to you at Creativebug?

Ursula: About ten years ago, when I was working in publishing, I decided to focus on gathering consumer insight. Instead of just surveying people who were already engaged with our crafting brands, I reached out to people who weren’t yet crafters. I’m always looking for an opportunity to engage the general public as well as hardcore crafters and I continue to do that here.

What are you making right now?

Ursula: I’ve had a set of knitting needles in my handbag for three weeks for the Knit Along with Edie Eckman. I’m jumping on a long-haul flight this evening, so I’m going to download the class to the Creativebug app and get started on the plane.

Jeanne Lewis
Chief Creative Officer, Founder

LinkedIn Profile

What past experience has been most helpful to you at Creativebug?

Jeanne: If you’re going to start a company, you need to be okay with making mistakes. There are people who spend all their time in planning meetings and working on the process, and then never execute. I’m the opposite.

A good example is our live chat software. In an ideal world, we would have built something ourselves that would be the best, most beautiful experience possible. But it simply would have taken too long, so we went with a third-party chat service instead. In the end it was more important to us that our users be able to ask questions in real time than having a customized chat program.

What are you making right now?

Jeanne: The magic braid leather bracelet and the knit necklace by Lynne Barr.

Julie Roehm
COO, Founder

LinkedIn Profile

What past experience has been most helpful to you at Creativebug?

Julie: I’ve always been the person who figures out how to do new things, like how to run a new program or to bring new departments in-house. So even though I was with a mutual fund company for about eight years, and Wells Fargo for ten years, I’ve had lots of different jobs. That gave me a wide range of experiences to pull from as we figured out how to start the business and grow it.

What are you making right now?

Julie: A leather tassel necklace because it looks cool and it’s also not too time consuming—we’ve got a lot going on right now!

Kelly Wilkinson
Editorial Director, Founder

LinkedIn Profile

What past experience has been most helpful to you at Creativebug?

Kelly: I worked in radio as a reporter and anchor, and that ability to juggle different things and meet deadlines and not be flustered is key. Also, the training to go out and learn a lot in a quick amount of time, distill it down into the essential nugget, then relay that to other people. Whether you are reporting at City Hall or telling people how to perform knitting stitches, that’s been enormously valuable.

What are you making right now?

Kelly: A baby quilt for my new nephew.

Fernando Santacruz
Director of Video Content

What past experience has been most helpful to you at Creativebug?

Fernando: I went to school for visual arts and then moved to film, but I never finished studying. I just wanted to get experience in the real world. So I started shooting every day, making skateboarding videos and short films for different companies. I didn’t want to freelance, so I’m glad I met Jeanne. I’m proud of what we’ve built here.

What are you making right now?

Fernando: I’m finishing an acrylic painting on wood for a friend of mine.

The Creativebug team, left to right: Chelsea Sena, Devlin Mannle, Fernando Santacruz, Jeanne Lewis, Kelly Wilkinson, Matt Novak, Erik Wilson, Ken Bousquet, Ursula Morgan, Stephanie Blake, Courtney Cerruti, Brian Emerick, Julie Roehm, Su Li, Liana Allday. Not pictured: Alexi Ueltzen and Zenaida Hernandez.

“I do printmaking and my grandfather was an illustrator, so it’s exciting to be in a creative place where everybody is more or less artistic.”
—Ken Bousquet, Art Director

“Most of the production work I’ve done was nothing as creative as this. Because we work with artists, you just turn around and there’s a project you can play around with.”
—Matt Novak, Videographer/Editor

“My favorite thing about working here is the people. Every single person is so different: our personalities, our backgrounds, where we’ve come from. But we’re like a family. We even fight like brothers and sisters sometimes.”
—Chelsea Sena, Junior Producer

“I wanted people who gave a damn.”

The core video production team, Matt, Brian, Devlin, and Erik (from left) grab an early-morning coffee from a cart around the corner. Topics of conversation include: skater art, a new food startup, and the coffee culture in San Francisco. Matt and our photographer round out the discussion with a review of Errol Morris documentaries and the failures of TV history re-enactments.

Jeanne started working on Creativebug in the spring of 2011. In January 2012, with five employees and seed funding in the bank, they started filming classes, and the site launched in May of 2012. Now the company is up to 17 employees and growing.

Tell me about how you built the company and the team. Everyone talks about how it’s such a family. Were there conscious things you did to make that happen?

Jeanne: I looked for creative people who were passionate about the maker space, but I also just wanted people who gave a damn. It’s really hard to find people who are like, “Yeah! I’m totally into this!” versus people who just need a job and want to say they work at a startup.

The first thing I did was find a director to shoot the pilot video. Then I was like, “Ok, I have a director, she knows my style; she’s going to help me hire a lead camera.” And Fernando showed up. Then it was, “Now we need a sound guy.” That’s how we did it. We set up at a cafe in the Mission and just started interviewing people. And one person at a time we built the team.

I don’t want to sound too spiritual, but whenever we needed someone to fill a gap as we grew, the ideal person would turn up — through friends or friends of friends — and we would just connect the dots. If you try to think about everything you need to get to where you’re going, you’ll never do it. You just have to tackle one piece at a time.

Stephanie (far right) often seeks outside perspectives from other team members, like this day when she was deiciding on classes to promote through the site. “Everyone’s voice is heard and disagreements are welcomed,” she says. “I think they foster that here. It’s really about moving the product forward, not the ego.”

Erik, Liana, Chelsea, and Devlin (left to right) admire a 10-page feature story on Creativebug in the latest issue of Where Women Create BUSINESS magazine. This leads into a conversation about Liana’s first day at work. “No one knew what I was doing—I didn’t even know. And then someone came up and hugged me and I was like, ‘whoa.’ I’d never been hugged at work before.”

“Everyone here is really creative. That’s one of the main things I ask when hiring someone. What do you do besides being a shooter?”
—Fernando Santacruz, Director of Video Content

The individual taste and style of each team member is apparent in the objects that collect around their workspace. Clockwise from top left: Cricut flowers and ideas for projects outside the production studio; office rock art; a fabric patchwork near Chelsea’s desk; bits of inspiration from Matt’s desk, including an embroidered photo from a Creativebug class.

What doesn’t work for people here?

Jeanne: Because what we do is so collaborative, it’s important that everyone is working together for the good of the whole team and product. I talk a lot about how we are sort of pushing this boulder up the hill of success. We need everyone shoulder-to-shoulder, pushing in the same direction. If there’s one person just sitting on top of the boulder, we’re that much less likely to make it to the top.

Tell us about what you do in the office to keep everyone having fun and feeling creative.

Jeanne: We do “crafternoons,” which is when we choose a class from the site and all gather around to make the project together. I love that everyone participates. It’s a popular activity since it’s gives us a break from work and a chance to get creative with the product we work so diligently on.

We also do free-lunch Fridays, and the fridge is always full of beer, soda, and snacks so anyone working long hours feels taken care of. And when we release a new trailer or video, we huddle around the editor’s computer for an impromptu premier.

Julie, Ken, Matt, Brian, and Liana (left to right) work on Magic Braid Bracelets, a project on Creativebug. These “crafternoons” help the team stay connected with the product and each other.

“The thing that drew me to Creativebug was the authenticity of the videos. It’s not about the lenses or angles they use—it’s a mindset. The team sees what they do as ‘artists shooting artists.’ That’s the Creativebug essence.”
—Ursula Morgan, CEO

After wrapping up a class on knitting dog sweaters, Brian and Erik take Fernando’s pup, Wes (as in, Anderson), for a quick fashion shoot.

Do you have a philosophy you live by at Creativebug?

Jeanne: We always say: “Remember the artist is the talent. It’s our job to help them share their gift with the world.” They are putting themselves out there and we’re here to represent them in the best light and make them feel supported. We are showcasing their skills and trying to find a bigger audience for their talents.

Left: Jeanne and the dev team discuss changes to the site. Right: During the meeting, Urusula and Julie check in through a window that opens into Jeanne and Ursula’s office.

Ken and Arlen continue the conversation about site changes in front of a hand-painted wall that lines the office’s entrance.

“I’m really excited to see where we go as a company. I think we are in a position to realize what we want to become.” — Devlin Mannle, Photographer/Videographer

Since Courtney adopted Charlie, many people have been eager to pitch in as pet parents. Here, Matt helps with potty training on a patch of grass on the roof.

With its many open doors and windows, the Creativebug office seems to embody the team’s spirit of collaboration. Here, French doors connect the original office (left), which includes a waiting area, Jeanne and Ursula’s office, and the ops team, with the newer space (right), which houses the video and editorial teams and the glass-windowed production studio.

It sounds like there’s a lot of trust here. What have you done to build that?

Jeanne: I think that trust comes from the work being so collaborative. Everyone here touches some part of the process in a significant way, so everyone is invested.

Interested in working with the Creativebug team? They are hiring two frontend engineers and a dev-ops engineer. Contact jobs@creativebug.com for more information.