This week, we had the pleasure of sitting down with Kevin Rapp, the Co-Founder and Chief Creative Officer of Ultra Friends. His agency is known for turning bold ideas into scalable content systems for tech-forward brands. With nearly 20 years in the creative trenches, Kevin has worked his way up from small studios to tech startups, eventually creating a space where creative value and business impact truly meet. One of his standout projects was the socially charged "Progress Owed, No Apology" campaign with NASCAR driver Bubba Wallace. That work earned national attention and multiple Cleo awards. It proved how storytelling led by heart can still move both people and metrics.

• Why creatives are chronically undervalued in business and what we can do to start changing that

• The fine line between exposure opportunities and outright exploitation

• How to build leverage in your creative career and when to stop working for free

• The ongoing disconnect between creative ambition and business outcomes

• Why value-based pricing is not only ethical but necessary

• How the "good-fast-cheap" triangle fails both creatives and clients

• The generational cycle of creative gatekeeping and how we can break it

• How to educate clients to value effectiveness instead of just visuals

• The difference between needing art and actually valuing art in business

• Why the creative world needs more unions, guilds, and collaborative pricing ecosystems

"Despite the fact that we are the arbiters of telling Porsche, Gucci, Vuitton why they have this conceptual value... we're terrible at doing it for ourselves."
— Kevin Rapp

This quote hit me hard. It probably will for many of you, too. We, as creatives, are the people behind the stories that turn brands into status symbols, help billion-dollar campaigns succeed, and shape the very culture we live in. Yet when it comes to recognizing and articulating our own value, we often fall short. Kevin puts a spotlight on that contradiction and challenges us to take that same brand-building power and apply it inward. Not just for our own good, but for the health of the entire creative industry.

Talking with Kevin Rapp was one of the most honest and enlightening deep dives we’ve had on the show. It is rare to find someone who speaks fluently in both creative and business languages, and Kevin brings both insight and empathy to the table. We unpacked the pain points around pricing, advocacy, client relationships, and the systems that undervalue creative labor. We even managed to cover all that without diving into AI (a first). Honestly, this felt like the kind of conversation that reminds you why we do what we do and why it is worth fighting for fair value in our field. If you're a creative trying to make a living doing what you love, this episode is for you.

If you'd like a visual quote card or audiogram from this episode, let me know. We have a ton of great material to work with.

— Carl Cleanthes, Founder of Epic Made and Co-Host of Pixel Retentive