Today we’d like to introduce you to Bolen High.
Bolen, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
in 2004, I moved from New York City to West Hollywood and, after returning to school and being certified in graphic and web design, opened High Arte in 2007.
High Arte’s business model — an integrated marketing, graphic, media and e-commerce Web design firm — grew out my knowledge and love of art and design; my recognition of the Internet’s significance as the world’s new business platform and three decades working in New York’s entertainment industry.
There, the creative and marketing talent is hired — based on the project’s requirements — on an as-needed basis. And, so it is with High Arte, where staffing is tailored — project-by-project — to meet the needs of each client.
Melding the imaginative, intuitive and conceptual with the logical, practical and strategic — aspects honed over years of creating a wide variety of projects — I use my knowledge, experience and creativity to guide High Arte’s clients in transforming their projects into viable — marketable — realities.
High Arte’s motto is, ” Communicating who you are and what you do to the people who need to know.” And after 10 years in business, I’m happy to say that we have done and continue to do exactly that to a diverse portfolio of professionals and companies throughout the Southland.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Starting a new business is difficult enough in itself, particularly when you’re starting from scratch, but to do so and then find yourself facing the worst financial collapse since the Great Depression was almost more than I could take.
Fortunately, because of High Arte’s structure, I had very little overhead to worry about and through my memberships in the West Hollywood Chamber of Commerce and BNI’s (Business Network International) Professionals Chapter I discovered that there were a lot of people who needed my services.
When business was good, many professionals and owners of small companies didn’t focus on marketing (they didn’t have to) or they never bothered to either create a web presence or had a website that did not communicate who they were and what they did effectively.
These individuals and companies were the client base that I discovered and developed.
The success of one client led to being referred to another and, as the saying goes, “When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade.”
Please tell us about High Arte.
High Arte is a Los Angeles Web Design, Graphic Design and Internet Marketing firm that recognizes all businesses – regardless of their size – deserve a holistic, custom-tailored approach that effectively communicates who they are and what they do to the people who need to know.
I feel that this holistic approach to each client, sets us apart from most of the firms that provide comparable services. I also don’t have to support a large staff of designers, developers and marketing personnel and therefore can offer a custom-tailored approach to each client based on their individual needs at an extremely competitive price point.
We work with start-ups, professionals, established companies, nonprofits and companies in turn around. Our approach is to help them develop a responsive, 21st Century brand and ecommerce presence with a results-oriented, on-line marketing and communication strategy that focuses on the long-term success of their business in this ever-evolving mobile environment.
Our goal is to make our client’s business visible, creditable and most of all … profitable.
Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
I was fortunate to grow up in Oak Park, Illinois (a Chicago suburb) and lived in the home that Ernest Hemming was born in (now a museum). I attended Oak Park River Forest High School and was extremely active in the theatre department.
I loved the theatre so much that I worked summers to save up enough money to take the bus to New York City during Christmas break of my Junior year. My parents let me go by myself and I spent a week in New York, staying at the old Commodore Hotel at $12.50/night and saw eight Broadway shows including Funny Girl with Barbra Streisand and Hello Dolly with Carol Channing. Alone in New York City at Christmas was probably the most amazing experience of my youth. And I was never bothered or ran into any problems that I couldn’t handle.
Contact Info:
- Address: 1341 N. Crescent Heights Blvd.,
#203, West Hollywood, CA 90046 - Website: www.higharte.com
- Phone: 323-656-6517
- Email: studio@higharte.com
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HighArte/
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/high-arte-west-hollywood-3
- Other: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bolenhigh
https://plus.google.com/+Higharte
https://www.youtube.com/higharte
Image Credit:
Luke Gibson
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