Think tank

Opinions are like assholes, they say: Everyone has one. But fresh ideas—they’re harder to come by. If you’re in a creative industry (a designer, artist, performer), your thoughts could be worth cash.

At least they are to Thoughtly Crew, a local firm that supplies its clients—among them nationwide retailers, giant food manufacturers and cutting-edge electronics companies—with a pool of creative “agents” from Chicago, New York and Los Angeles who pitch ideas from the consumer perspective. The brainchild of Holly Birnbaum, 59, Scott Cheney, 43, and Gabrielle Sutton, 40 (a former freelance writer-editor, fine-art dealer and vintage-store owner, respectively), Thoughtly Crew is the country’s only talent agency for innovators.

“We get tired of the phrase ‘outside the box,’ but people who’ve worked for a company for a long time do get stuck inside that box,” Cheney says. “We’re the people outside that box.” And that’s where ideation, a sort of brainstorming on steroids, comes in.

As opposed to a traditional focus group, which asks participants to react to something they’re familiar with, the goal of ideation sessions—which can last anywhere from a few hours to several days—is to dream up a new product. Thoughtly Crew’s agents have been tasked with imagining the next generation of MP3 player and a new social-networking application for gift giving. Session leaders often make agents sing, dance, wear goofy hats or put on blindfolds to grease the creative wheels.

“Ideation is about taking problems out of traditional problem-solving settings,” Sutton says. “So we’ll do anything that provides inspiration.” For a fast-food restaurant that wanted a new late-night identity, Cheney and his group traveled in a limo to various evening activities, including drinking at hotel bars and getting tattooed. Those experiences, he says, led to an avalanche of ideas the next day.

Birnbaum, Cheney and Sutton started Thoughtly Crew in 2004. They were supplementing their incomes doing creative-consumer work when they realized there wasn’t a source for ideation-session facilitators to readily find qualified people. Though she was unwilling to name drop because of confidentiality agreements (which also preclude her from discussing specific clients or products), Sutton says the company’s agents include many high-profile Chicagoans: “I can tell you one of our agents has been in Jersey Boys for five years,” she says.

Becoming an agent requires passing a rigorous screening process, including a lengthy written test. The very first question challenges applicants to create ten new breakfast cereals, complete with ingredients, a detailed description and a target audience. Sutton says this helps showcase both creativity and, an equally important trait, perseverance. “It can get pretty tough when you have to generate new ideas about toilet paper for eight straight hours,” she says.

Sutton’s favorite question on the test is also the shortest: “What’s in a hot dog?” She looks for people who “really think about what a hot dog makes them think of.” One of the most memorable answers, she says, included two parts latex.

Agents who survive the screening can be paid anywhere from $200 to $1,000 per session. Plus, Cheney says, there is the satisfaction of seeing your ideas come to fruition. “I’ll often see new household-cleaning products in a store and think, We worked on that!”

Aspiring creative consumers can sign up at thoughtlycrew.com.

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