Building A Business In A Pandemic

Not going to lie. When Sam and I decided to open Roundtable Studios in the middle of the Covid-19 pandemic and Movement Control Order in Malaysia, we didn’t have any certainty that the studio will take off. You may call it the naivety of youth or millennial confidence, but we knew that we needed to do this sooner or later.

So it’s been a few months since we made ourselves official, and I wish that I can report that business is booming, but let’s face it, we’re just happy to be making some money at the current state of the world. Our studio is still more a storeroom than a creative space, our clients are still uncertain of the future but we take confidence that we have pivoted our business enough during the pandemic to make it through alive.

For Fame Or For Fortune

The state of the creative industry is rather sad at the moment. We know the jokes of creatives being paid with exposure instead of money. We laugh at it, but at the same time, we know that we do have to suck it up sometimes. So in this seriously interesting times, Roundtable Studios will be taking a serious look at our incoming jobs and ask whether this will bring us fame or fortune (because it’s rarely ever both).

The latter is pretty straightforward. They are the ones that may be slightly mundane, repetitive or troublesome, but they provide enough monetary reward to make it worth the effort.

The former is harder to pin down. Jobs that bring us fame may not bring us dough. But it’ll be balancing between what future opportunities they may bring.

Pivoting In A Pandemic: Livestream

We’re also happy to announce our livestream solution. Built around the idea of bringing onground events online, our livestream capabilities lie in our flexibility and portability. We’ve already streamed a wedding and a product launch and we’re hoping that this will be a strong addition to our already growing list of products.

Turning to livestreaming was a no-brainer as our event coverage jobs disappeared due to the need for social distancing. Even if the situation miraculously gets better, it’ll be a while before people will become comfortable traveling or meeting in large groups again.

We foresee doing more livestreaming for other unorthodox events like Annual General Meetings or Press Release launches in the future. There’s space for this side of the creative space to grow.

Where Do We Go From Here?

To be totally frank, we’re still on survival mode. The focus of the remainder of the year is to keep the studio alive and hold for the end of this weird 2020. We had so many plans such as an official launch of the studio, some tutorials and trainings and even a LinkedIn headshot day, but all these have to be on the backburner for now.

It’s not all doom and gloom. With all said and done, we are still fortunate enough to be growing in a pandemic. We hope that the rest of our creative family can too.

We won’t be back stronger next year, because we’re not going anywhere in the first place.

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Stay safe. Stay home. Stay sane.

Godspeed,
Reuben