Liquid Assets
By Keith Lawrence
Messenger-Inquirer
August 27, 2006
Like a lot of office workers, Robin Lancaster and Ginger Burns used to spend a lot of time talking and dreaming about starting their own business.
Unlike most, they actually did it.
Today, they’re partners in Liquid Concepts, a small Owensboro-based advertising agency with a Lexington office.
And they say they couldn’t be happier.
“We’re very happy,” Lancaster said recently, in her office on the fourth floor of Midtown Plaza, 920 Frederica St. “We don’t want a corporate environment. We have a lot of fun. We laugh a lot. But I’m not saying we don’t put in a lot of hours — a lot more than I would like some weeks.”
The women met in 1990, when Burns joined the sales team at Owensboro’s WaxWorks/VideoWorks Inc. where Lancaster was advertising director of the video division.
Burns later became video sales manager. And the women became friends.
“We were always kicking around the idea of going into business for ourselves,” Lancaster said. “Then Ginger left and went to WBKR in sales. Her clients became dependent on her advertising ideas. And one of them — E & L Pets — called her and asked if she had considered starting an advertising agency.”
“I had always offered my clients free advice,” Burns said.
But starting an advertising agency was a big step.
“It’s feast or famine in advertising,” she said.
Burns said she discussed the idea with Gary Exline, who was WBKR’s station manager at the time.
When Exline gave his blessing to the project, Lancaster said, “Ginger called me and asked, “Do you want to start an advertising agency?” We started the business on my dining room table.”
That was 1998.
Starting business is scary.
“It’s really scary to step out of a secure job where you’re making a good salary and have benefits and go into business for yourself,” Lancaster said.
“It was easier for me then it was for Robin, because I had been used to working on a 100 percent commission,” Burns said. “There’s not that much difference.”
Lancaster quit her job at WaxWorks and picked up a part-time job at Owensboro Community & Technical College. And Burns continued to work at the radio station during the business’ early years.
Finally, in 2001, they opened their office in Midtown Plaza.
“Malcolm (Bryant, the building owner) offered us an incredible deal,” Lancaster said. “This is the only place we could have afforded.”
Burns moved to Lexington and works out of her home. But the company plans to open an office there as well.
Burns and Lancaster couldn’t afford a staff. But changes in technology made it possible to tap into a freelance base of retirees and stay-at-home moms.
“We absolutely could not do this without the Internet,” Lancaster said. “With the Internet, everybody has the opportunity now to find their niche.”
The business has grown to the point that it was too much work for two people.
“We were going to have to expand or quit,” Lancaster said. “So, we reached out to freelancers. With computers and high-speed Internet, it doesn’t matter if the person is in Bowling Green, Florida or the next room. Them working from home is no different than them being in the office. We have instant messaging on our screens. It’s the same as conversation.”
“Even when I’m in the Owensboro office, we usually talk through instant messaging,” Burns said. “We’re so used to it.”
They also added a couple of part-time employees in the office.
Looking for talent
“We’re always looking for talent (freelancers),” Lancaster said. “Anyone who’s interested should send us their portfolios. A lot of freelancers don’t want to have to go out looking for work. We do that for them.”
“The Internet has revolutionized our business,” Burns said. “I can use voice talent and television production from anywhere as long as they have the equipment to send it to me on the Internet. Even eight years ago, there weren’t that many voice artists who had their own studios and could work for companies like ours.”
Liquid Concepts recently added a client in Las Vegas. But most are in Kentucky and Indiana, Lancaster said.
“We don’t do a lot of marketing for ourselves,” she said. “People find us on the Internet, and we get a lot of business through word-of-mouth and relationships.”
Lancaster said: “We specialize in outside-the-box innovative stuff. We help develop jingles, find actors for commercials, write scripts, and create characters. We created “Super Cell Phone Man” for In Touch on Kentucky 54. That’s even the name of their Web site.”
The company began life as Lancaster/Mauzy Marketing. Then, Ginger Mauzy became Ginger Burns.
“The old name was a mouthful to say,” Lancaster said. “We always had to spell it. And we’re more than marketing. We’re a full-service advertising agency.”
The name “Liquid Concepts,” she said, means that “like water, we flow through everything, all phases of our clients businesses. Our slogan is ‘Where fresh ideas flow.’”
Add a .com, and it’s also the name of the company’s Web site.
“We interview clients just like they interview us,” Burns said. “It has to be a good match if the relationship is to succeed. We consider ourselves partners with our clients.
