Gimme Shelter

Challenge /

Rock-n-roll real estate. Really. That’s what one of my favorite early clients, Bill Charman, came to me with as his vision for a whole new way of helping cool people find cool digs. His audience: artists, musicians, writers, small-business owners, entrepreneurs. You know, the sort of independent types who rarely believe they can own a home. The sort of people who, like Billy, take a kind of subversive pride in tweaking the American Dream. His challenge to me: find a way of merging a punk rock, DIY spirit with all of the patrician underpinnings implicit in owning property in one of the world’s most expensive markets.

Think: David Bowie in a bespoke Savile Row suit.

Gimme_Shelter_01.jpg
Gimme_Shelter_02.jpg
Gimme_Shelter_03.jpg
Gimme_Shelter_04.jpg
Gimme_Shelter_05.jpg
Gimme_Shelter_06.jpg
Gimme_Shelter_07.jpg
Gimme_Shelter_08.jpg
House_Loft_01.jpg
House_Loft_02.jpg
House_Loft_03.jpg
House_Loft_05.jpg
House_Loft_06.jpg
House_Loft_07.jpg

Solution /

Even amidst the SF boom/bust real estate market, Gimme went gangbusters. In fact, in the first year after launch, the firm’s revenues jumped 2x. And they quickly attracted precisely the band of outsiders, artists and non-conformists that they hoped to. In fact, new buyers flocked to the firm in droves—snatching up killer deals from day one. Further proof that home ownership isn’t just for squares. And continued evidence that nearly anybody with a genius concept, and the right sort of help, can make even the most outlandish idea—like using the MLS to stick it to the man—a reality.

Wicked.

Previous

CleanFish
Next

Brian Joseph