“We had Kevin’s bed sitting on top of cinder blocks so that we could store all of our camera equipment underneath it,” Jake Jorgavan recalls. It’s not an uncommon scenario for college startups. But Jake and Kevin’s dorm room startup, Rabbit Hole Creative soon took a turn when one industry connection changed everything for the college entrepreneurs.

Both Jake and Kevin eventually transitioned from paid college projects to projects for celebrity clientele. The young twenty-something entrepreneurs quickly learned the ropes of running a successful company and landing celebrity clients including Cee Lo Green — singer-songwriter, rapper, and record producer — all while balancing college life and graduation.

Today, their startup has come a long way – and the co-founders are producing tours and events for clients ranging from Dolly Parton to Charity Water. Learn how Jake and Kevin built a successful business from their college dorm room and why one connection changed their business forever.

How We Got Started

Kevin and I started Rabbit Hole Creative out of our dorm rooms at Belmont University. We started off filming senior recitals of Music Majors for a few hundred dollars each to get some money flowing in our business. At that point in time, we had Kevin’s bed sitting on top of cinder blocks so that we could store all of our camera equipment underneath it.

Slowly we transitioned from campus work, to video work for real clients. We built things up while we were in school and eventually got the opportunity to start working with tour designs. One connection to the touring industry led us to dive into a completely different market and changing the entire focus of our business.

Our company now consists of a creative team of directors, producers, designers, video artists and audio engineers. We specialize in tour & event design, projection mapping, and production & post-production services.

Best Success Story

We have had several success stories over the past several years. The first big success was the opportunity to design Paramore’s 2010 Honda Civic Tour. Shortly following that, we got the opportunity to design Cee Lo Green’s Saturday Night Live Performance. That eventually led to designing Cee Lo’s entire 2011 tour.

Just after working with Cee Lo we ended up designing Dolly Parton’s 2012 Better Day World Tour, and we also worked on a project with Cirque du Soleil’s KA show. Recently we have also worked with clients such as MUTEMATH, Charity Water, Five Finger Death Punch and several others.

Biggest Startup Challenge

Our biggest challenge to date has been trying to handle graduating from college while running a successful business. In our last semester at Belmont we had to hire two employees just so that we had time to finish up our class work. Since graduating, we have seen the business grow and develop at a much quicker pace.

#1 Tip for Entrepreneurs

Commit yourself to constant growth and improvement, both as a company and as individuals. Embody that culture into your company and you will see your organization reach levels you never initially dreamed of reaching.

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