Red Star Creative was founded in 1990 as a full service advertising agency. It was the worst of times, it was the best of times. While the nation was slipping deeper and deeper into economic recession, desktop publishing was wreaking havoc on the advertising industry. Typesetters and keyliners were out; two day deadlines were in.

But, while the Madison Avenue oceanliners were slowly making their U-turns, Red Star was making progress like a school of fish. Turn to the left. Turn to the right. (Stand up, sit down, fight fight fight.) Whatever roadblock we hit, we just turned and went the other direction. It worked, and we grew. Then the internet came along. Dot-coms sprouted up like quack grass, and the non-dot-coms were clamoring for an online presence. Now what.

(Turn to the left. Turn to the right. Stand up, sit down, fight fight fight.)

We regrouped. Rebranded. Developed an interactive department. Phew. Things clipped along until 1999. Then, we finally had time to catch up on some reading. We picked up Futurize Your Enterprise by David Siegel and Creative Company by Andy Law. They both advocated change. One said to become client-led, the other said to become employee-led. Sounded like a good idea, so we decided to give it a try.

(Turn to the left. Turn to the right. Stand up, sit down, fight fight fight.)

In August of 1999, we shut our doors for two months in order to re-engineer the company. When we re-opened, we became everything our clients had ever wanted from us and more.

We became Club Red.