Creatives Grab Coffee

Michael Cerdeiros of Cerious Productions in Las Vegas on undercharging and learning to hold your price, running a lean team with a 55-person contractor network, building on repeat trade show clients, and using AI to build the portal, CRM and white balance app that replaced his software subscriptions.

Full episode write-up, chapters, and transcript: https://www.creativesgrabcoffee.com/podcast/124-trade-shows-ai-tools-pricing-ft-cerious-productions/

Chapters:

0:00 Intro

0:25 A 2007 YouTube show with his uncle

2:34 From Staten Island to Las Vegas

3:07 YouTube University and a year and a half in LA

5:23 Starting Cerious Productions in 2015

6:35 Undercharging and learning to hold your price

9:35 A lean team and a 55-person contractor network

11:52 Repeat trade show clients as a steady base

12:55 Quitting the day job in March 2020

14:47 Why Las Vegas is built for event content

15:38 Competition in Las Vegas

17:54 Next: a warehouse studio for brand commercials

19:09 Rebuilding the website with AI

20:26 The portal that replaced Frame.io and HubSpot

22:37 Vimeo, Google Drive, and a branded subdomain

25:55 Cutting subscriptions and the pressure on SaaS

27:25 The security risk of building your own tools

28:31 Kelvy, a white balance app for casino lighting

31:31 Lovable, Rork, Claude, and Codex

33:32 SEO, AEO, and standing out

37:25 Your boss is gonna love us: selling the experience

39:30 When retainers actually make sense

44:06 The story behind the name Cerious

Guest: Cerious Productions https://cerious.com/

Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company.

Doug Thomsen of BT Studio in San Francisco on building a video business that holds up in a crisis: keeping exactly one retainer client, earning referrals by going the extra mile, running a client review campaign instead of paying for SEO, a viral video that still sends links to his site, the limits of AI video, and the self-funded feature film Pride Jewel.

Chapters:

0:00 Intro

0:29 From seventh-grade iMovie to agency life

2:15 Starting BT Studio with Adam Behrmann

3:10 Why the name sounds like a law firm

3:50 When a partner leaves during COVID

6:56 Keeping the business alive through the pandemic

8:56 Pride Jewel, a self-funded feature film

10:30 Two slow years, then three busy ones

10:55 Crisis-proofing: one retainer, many clients, a buffer

13:00 The next crisis and the AI question

14:01 What AI video still can't do: refinement

15:58 AI audio and when good enough is enough

17:43 Referrals come from going the extra mile

19:45 One retainer client, by design

22:13 Why small retainers rarely pencil out

25:48 Where the work comes from

26:25 Skipping the SEO budget for a review campaign

27:43 Getting clients to actually write the review

29:35 Paying for Clutch and ProductionHub listings

31:09 Dario's tip: log how every lead found you

33:05 Mining customer conversations with AI

34:03 The viral desk video that still builds links

37:25 A lean team: one full-timer plus freelancers

37:59 Living with an unpredictable pipeline

38:58 Slow periods as creative fuel

40:46 Living at home vs paying rent

42:19 Going full time at 27: savings, debt, and a reel

44:08 What's next: more commercial directing

46:19 A new feature about a wildfire evacuation

48:45 Finding a producer for the next film

49:41 Film grants in Canada vs the US

51:53 Nonprofit work: Hamilton Families and the SF Symphony

52:57 Internal projects and a relaunched website

55:41 FAQs, llms.txt, and getting found by AI

59:45 Fewer one-day shoots, more start-to-finish projects

1:01:04 What got you here won't get you there

1:02:26 Where to find Doug and BT Studio

1:04:26 Yes, he still does one-day shoots

1:05:14 San Francisco, San Diego, or San Jose?

Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company.

Micah David of STUDiiO on running a Las Vegas video company at 21: learning the business side, a fixed workday over the grind, pricing from an hourly rate, selling social media retainers to restaurants and cafes, losing a Fiverr account, and role-playing cold calls with Claude.

Chapters:

0:00 Intro

0:16 A fifth-grade YouTube bet that started it all

2:57 Running a company at 21

3:55 From hobby videos to paid work

6:38 Learning the business side

9:12 The details of selling yourself

10:49 Does being young cost you clients?

14:59 One thing a day compounds

16:14 Why the always-grinding mindset backfires

21:16 A website built in a trade for video

23:27 Claude, ChatGPT, and using more than one AI

30:12 The Las Vegas video market

32:16 Why social media retainers are hard to sell

34:14 Pricing from an hourly rate behind the scenes

37:47 Selling benefits, not features

39:07 Restaurants and cafes as retainer clients

41:00 Why retainers are harder with corporate clients

45:00 Video company or marketing agency?

48:51 Inbound leads vs cold calling

52:49 Instant verification on Google Business

55:43 The risk of relying on Google

56:57 Losing a Fiverr account and owning your leads

1:01:07 Role-playing sales calls with Claude

1:03:49 AI-built call lists and finding decision makers

1:06:06 Email and LinkedIn outreach is a volume game

1:07:11 Training AI on your books, calls, and emails

1:14:22 Why the next generation is ahead

1:16:06 Ten thousand hours in the age of AI

1:19:41 Where to find Micah and STUDiiO

Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company.

Kyler Beal of Minivan Productions on moving a production company from Virginia to San Diego with a city scoring system, a partner who fired himself from the day-to-day, slicing pie equity, quarterly profit sharing in four buckets, moving owners onto salary, why Minivan avoids retainers, and the grant funding behind its documentary work.

Chapters:

0:00 Intro

0:31 Meet Kyler Beal and Minivan Productions

1:47 Why Minivan moved from Virginia to San Diego

3:20 From a bedroom office to a team of three

5:35 A scoring system for picking a city

6:38 Travel days and documentary work

7:42 Team size and the San Diego studio

8:52 The partner who fired himself

11:48 Replacing a partner's many roles

17:02 From creative to company leader

19:17 Slicing pie equity after a partner steps back

24:16 How Minivan sets its profit sharing

24:56 Four buckets of quarterly profit sharing

27:10 Why quarterly beats annual

30:08 Moving the owners onto salary

33:05 The fear of guaranteed payroll

34:27 Salary and a lower tax bill

37:28 Why Minivan avoids retainers

41:01 The first retainer, by exception

43:54 Retainers at agencies vs production companies

46:50 What is next for Lapse

48:37 Seventy percent commercial, thirty percent docs

50:33 A grant-funded documentary series

52:05 More funding than people think

54:00 Business brain or creative brain?

56:55 Do grant funders check the final film?

59:07 Is most work out there mediocre?

1:01:59 Gambling ads and AI content

1:04:33 Filtering for client fit

1:07:24 Lessons from non-creative industries

1:11:30 The story behind the Minivan name

1:15:20 Where to find Kyler and Minivan

Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company.

Carlos Foster and Stephen Alberts of San Diego's Blue Barn Creative on fourteen years of owner-led production, earning 70 percent repeat business without retainers, using AI to buy back human time, why testimonial clients now want the stumbles left in, and how they kept the company going after losing a founding partner.

Chapters:

0:00 Intro

0:43 Meet Carlos Foster and Stephen Alberts of Blue Barn Creative

2:40 2012 and the birth of the brand film

3:45 First steps: an office and a glorified freelance outfit

6:55 Early clients, cold calls, and wedding films

9:17 Small jobs that grew into big brand relationships

11:40 Be the helper, not the hero

13:04 Moving beyond word of mouth

17:09 Yelp, Google, and ChatGPT referrals

20:41 Seventy percent return clients, no retainers

22:24 Differentiating on relationships

26:01 Owner-led as a brand position

28:17 Why early competitors did not survive

31:10 The Lapse parallel

33:38 Using AI to get hours back

38:26 When a client's AI invented sound bites

39:55 Why people-driven work feels protected

41:40 A reality check on generative AI

45:55 Testimonials that keep the stumbles

50:23 Authenticity, UGC, and coaching interviews

55:25 Why Blue Barn runs the interview

56:53 Leading clients instead of following them

58:25 Losing a founding partner

1:00:13 Partnership paperwork and owning your shares

1:02:19 The week everything changed

1:06:28 Visionaries and integrators

1:11:47 Grief, restructuring, and leveling up

1:14:13 Choosing to keep Blue Barn going

1:17:52 The story behind the Blue Barn name

1:21:40 Where to find Blue Barn Creative

Guest: https://bluebarncreative.com/

Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company.

Vlad Lapich of LV Productions on going from free promo videos to tech launch videos, rebuilding his website with AI, automating proposals, why cold email died, SEO vs Google Ads, scaling post production, and what to do when a client stops paying.

Chapters:

0:00 Intro

0:38 From Belarus to San Francisco: photographer turned videographer

2:06 Free promo videos and the Instagram DM that changed everything

4:46 Wearing five hats at a startup, then going solo

7:21 GPT-3 cold emails and the first big clients

8:13 The team: freelance editors, animators, and DPs

8:52 The bottleneck: scaling post without losing quality

12:12 Junior prep, senior storytelling: the editing pipeline

14:44 Paying editors: hourly vs per project, and picky clients

17:30 Rebuilding the website in a week with Cursor

22:03 AI for lead intake, proposals, and Video Galaxy

27:41 Pricing on the website and the proposal tool

30:04 Cold email is dead: 80 percent SEO, 20 percent referrals

32:22 SEO takes years, and one Google update can undo it

34:00 Why Google Ads did not work in San Francisco

38:37 Weddings vs corporate at Lapse

41:28 Networking for introverts

42:11 Premiere vs DaVinci Resolve

44:44 Animation: from 10K videos to offshore competition

47:43 Goals for the rest of the year

50:53 Claude as bookkeeper: margins, salary, and a missed invoice

54:08 LLC vs corporation

59:02 Clients who do not pay

1:03:46 Invoicing: 50/50 deposits and net terms

1:06:38 The story behind the name LV Productions

Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company.

Rob Arevalo of 17 Projects on launching a video company two months before COVID, marketing with no budget and then with real money, cold calling in New York, government RFPs, toning proposals down for corporate buyers, and why client retention drives growth.

Chapters:

0:00 Intro

1:46 Meet Rob Arevalo and 17 Projects

3:13 From the Air Force to launching during COVID

6:35 Why keep going when the industry stopped

8:13 Corporate clients and the easiest path in

10:31 Client retention beats chasing new clients

12:59 Systems that keep clients happy as you grow

14:38 A two-person core with a deep freelance roster

15:57 A thousand cold emails: marketing with no budget

18:56 The marketing bets that took 17 Projects full time

20:18 How Lapse grew: SEO over paid ads

22:40 Evolving the marketing mix year to year

24:03 Do mass cold emails still work?

27:32 Cold calling in New York

29:07 Timing, brand awareness, and staying on the radar

32:08 Government contracts and RFPs

38:38 What RFPs teach you about proposals

39:32 Corporate proposals: make them boring

44:24 Expanding to LA, Chicago, and Miami

48:54 Competing in NYC: do your recon

51:01 Why the name 17 Projects

Creatives Grab Coffee is produced by Lapse Productions, a Toronto video production company. (https://www.lapseproductions.com/).

To learn more about the show, visit: https://www.creativesgrabcoffee.com/

Gabe Nazario, founder of Offbeat Creative in Jersey City, joins Dario and Kyrill for a candid, tactical conversation about the business of video in the New York metro. He built Offbeat on the side of producer and editor roles at Fox, Disney, and JP Morgan, then went full time once the profit matched his salary. In this episode: growing slowly and hiring deliberately, why a lean 1099 crew sometimes scares clients, treating AI consulting as an SEO play, the tools that speed up the work, chasing simple-deliverable retainers, and why in a market where everyone makes good videos, you win on trust and follow-up.

Guest: Gabe Nazario, Offbeat Creative (https://www.offbeatcreative.co/)

Chapters:

0:00 Intro

1:19 Meet Gabe Nazario and Offbeat Creative

2:07 From Fox, Disney, and JP Morgan to going solo

5:09 Making the leap from a corporate job

8:51 A lean core team plus 1099 crew

10:26 Why a small team spooks some clients

12:29 AI consulting as an SEO play

16:39 The AI tools Offbeat actually uses

28:32 Social media: phone-tier content and volume

33:08 Corporate and commercial: the bread and butter

35:00 Chasing retainers for a monthly pillow

42:30 Google reviews, SEO, and the 70/30 split

45:31 Take the one-off

46:59 Jersey City vs New York

49:41 Competition and winning on trust

53:14 The sale is closed on the hello again

1:01:42 The story behind the name Offbeat

Creatives Grab Coffee is a podcast on the business of video production, hosted by Dario Nouri and Kyrill Lazarov and produced by Lapse Productions (https://www.lapseproductions.com/).

What happens when a sales guy, not a camera guy, builds a video production company?

Rob Weiss started MultiVision Digital 15 years ago in New York City with no portfolio and no editing skills, and has since produced more than 1,700 videos. In this episode he sits down with Dario Nouri and Kyrill Lazarov to break down the system behind that run: batch producing so one shoot day becomes ten deliverables, selling clients on a video-first strategy instead of one-off projects, a trade show sales machine built on business cards and a script he has used for years, niching so hard into manufacturing that he launched a second website, and going chest-deep into AI without burning through the budget.

In this episode:

- Batch producing, and why you never make just one cookie

- How to sell clients on a video-first strategy

- Where clients really are on video adoption (a 1 to 10 scale)

- The 14-FAQ-video story: aligning budget to goals

- A trade show playbook built on "I just want to say hi"

- Niching down until you need a second website

- The YouTube Shorts epiphany and repurposing to TikTok

- Using AI in real client workflows, and pricing it with contingency days

Chapters:

00:00 Intro: A Sales Guy Who Built a Video Company

03:29 Batch Producing: Why You Never Make Just One Cookie

05:23 Stop "Just Carving Out Snippets," Plan Your Reels

08:41 Selling Clients on a Video-First Strategy

11:19 Where Clients Really Are on Video (a 1 to 10 Scale)

14:21 Aligning Budget to Goals + the 14-FAQ-Video Story

17:34 A Softening Market and Smarter Client Questions

20:38 Trade Shows, Business Cards & Planting Seeds

24:05 The "I Just Want to Say Hi" Sales Approach

29:01 Postcards, QR Codes & Email Sequencing

33:57 Running Sales While Running a 5-Person Team

40:09 Coming From Sales, Not the Camera

43:25 Long-Term Freelancers and a Team Mentality

47:21 Why Manufacturing Became the Niche

49:55 A Separate "Video For Manufacturing" Website

53:46 The YouTube Shorts Epiphany

57:40 Going Chest-Deep Into AI Video

1:04:07 Pricing AI Work With "Contingency Days"

1:08:29 Where AI Video Editing Goes Next

Guest: Rob Weiss, MultiVision Digital — https://multivisiondigital.com

Hosts: Dario Nouri and Kyrill Lazarov of Lapse Productions — https://www.lapseproductions.com

Creatives Grab Coffee is a weekly podcast about the business of video production. If you are enjoying the show, follow and leave a review, it genuinely helps. Watch the full video episodes on YouTube and find every episode at https://www.creativesgrabcoffee.com

In this episode of Creatives Grab Coffee, we sit down with JD Gonzalez, founder of LivaLittle, a boutique production company based in Brooklyn, New York. JD is a cinematographer, producer, and director who's built his business around a unique philosophy: experience-based hiring — rotating crews and giving people the opportunities they need to grow their careers.

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 – Intro: Meet JD Gonzalez of LivaLittle

01:50 – Experience-based hiring & a DEI-focused production company

03:58 – Building a network by rotating crews

10:23 – Getting remembered in a new market: consistency over time

12:17 – JD's backstory: film school & teaching high school film

17:00 – Crafting the Image: running free filmmaking workshops

23:46 – Virtual production & partnering with rental houses

25:09 – Why film education should be free

27:19 – No one can steal your perspective

30:10 – Could Creatives Grab Coffee go live & in person?

31:21 – Why JD moved from Denver to New York City

34:30 – Breaking into the NYC market

36:38 – Does owning a camera still win you work?

39:11 – Consigning gear with a rental house

40:41 – The logistics of filming in NYC: trucks, insurance & freight elevators

48:22 – Branding, SEO & landing direct-to-client work

51:23 – Running a lean, direct-to-client production model

53:05 – Building PrepViz: a scene design & previz app made with Claude Code

56:31 – Pre-Checklist: simplifying gear lists & prep

58:49 – Teaching yourself to build apps with AI

1:02:41 – Building a custom CRM

1:03:54 – Are you locked into one AI platform?

1:09:44 – The ups and downs of the AI train

1:11:41 – Standing out when everyone uses AI: you get out what you put in

1:16:04 – Wrap-up & where to find JD

Connect with JD Gonzalez:

Website: https://www.livalittle.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jdgonzalesdp

🎧 Hosts:

Dario Nouri & Kyrill Lazarov — Lapse Productions, Toronto

https://www.lapseproductions.com

🎙️ About Creatives Grab Coffee:

Creatives Grab Coffee explores the business of video production, featuring candid conversations with studio owners and filmmakers around the world on scaling, creativity, and industry evolution.

👇 Follow & Subscribe:

Website – https://creativesgrabcoffee.com

Instagram – https://instagram.com/creativesgrabcoffee

LinkedIn – https://linkedin.com/company/lapseproductions

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