Thinkbox Rebrands to TBX: The Why
Brian Dokter • January 19
When the pain of staying the same is greater than the pain of changing, we will change.
The midwest agency world is full of talent and creative marketers. It’s also littered with stories of quick-to-rise, quicker-to-fall companies. At Thinkbox, we had a dream to build an agency we were proud of, to do work we loved, and to bring great people along for the ride. But we knew we had more work to do. A lot of work to do.
Five years ago, we noticed a shifting wind. It was subtle, and came through small, seemingly insignificant moments. But we could sense it. Our agency had been growing year after year, and we were continuing to build projects and relationships we were proud of. We had our first office. We loved the people who worked with us. And we loved what we were doing.
The shift was happening—slowly but surely.
At the time, Thinkbox had four owners: Ben, who founded the company; Travis, our creative “jack of all trades”; Michael, our coding genius; and Brian, our sales and accounts guy. We were a hardworking group of owners and operators that sold the work, did the work, managed the work, and hustled for every project we could get. It was enough to survive, but surviving wasn’t the goal: we wanted to thrive.
It was enough to survive, but surviving wasn’t the goal: we wanted to thrive.
So the pain of staying the same started to show up. But thankfully, that was also when Nathan Messelink and Bruce Pobocik showed up.
In 2012, Bruce Pobocik came on as our first Operations Director. He took over project management, put new systems in place, and started working to better our team. He did this with amazing humility, a strong work-ethic, and true passion. With his help, our agency improved and changed.
That same year, Nathan Messelink started designing with us. His eye for progressive design and his relentless attitude to push our team to create our best was almost exhausting. He challenged us in every way, in terms of the quality of our work and the meaning behind it. He did this with unrelenting enthusiasm and incredible hustle. Once again, our agency improved and changed.
As we’ve continued to grow over these last five years, we now hardly resemble the Thinkbox of old. While we have the same personal character, values, and work ethic, our agency looks different. It feels different. So we’ve made moves that reflect these differences.
On October 12, 2017, Travis, Michael, and Brian bought out Ben Eggers, the founder of Thinkbox. The process could not have gone better and we are forever grateful to Ben for his wisdom, for the risks that he took to grow our agency, and for the hard work that he and his wife put in for over 15 years. Ben is a class act, and who he is as a person will forever be in the fabric of who we are as an agency. But as we look forward, we’re even more excited for what’s to come.
A vision that pushes us to do bigger and better things, yet still for the right reasons.
On January 1, 2018, Nathan Messelink and Bruce Pobocik also became equal owners of our agency. These two have been genuine catalysts of growth for us and we could not be more proud of them. No one deserves this honor more than they do and our vision and our future is shaped on their shoulders.
We realized the vision is what the shifting wind was subtly hinting to us all along. We’ve been building something different than what has always been there. It’s a vision that’s more progressive. A vision that drives our team to do better work. A vision that allows us to have more fun. A vision that pushes us to do bigger and better things, yet still for the right reasons.
This vision closes the door on some of the things we’ve been, and swings the door wide open on what we are capable of becoming.
The door of Thinkbox is closed.
The door of TBX just swung open. (read more)
Here we come.
We are TBX.