Yesterday Finland had it’s official “entrepreneurs’ day” and to celebrate it (one day late though) we want to share some details from Blockbusters Gang Oy’s founders, Iiris and Emma.
The gang has never been about us two so we wish to make this just a nice sneak peek inside the entrepreneurial side of the network. Neither the gang nor the company would ever stand out just with us on board, so the biggest thanks must always go to our amazing members who make it this special.
How did it all start though? In the beginning there literally were just us Emma and Iiris.
Before founding Blockbusters Gang Emma had lived in Paris, almost completed her business studies and been running web stores and sales in couple of different companies. After becoming part of the Iron Sky team and meeting Iiris in 2013, she has been focusing on marketing and sales in the media business. Emma always knew she wanted to run her own company one day – and when Iiris told her about her idea of having many freelancers under the same umbrella Emma immediately saw a business opportunity in it.
Iiris on the other hand has been working on film for the most of her life. She completed her first job as an assistant director in the age of 14 and her first feature film as the 1st AD had it’s theatrical premiere before she turned 18. She’s worked in multiple different positions in film, TV and media production which made her a perfect match to Emma’s knowledge of marketing and finance. Blockbusters Gang started forming up.
Since it was clear from the start that it needed to be bigger, we grabbed Minna and Meri-Tuuli with us to brainstorm the best possible way to form the gang. Year later more people came along, and then more again. The gang is still expanding and finding new ways to work in a larger scale than ever.
Above the fact that we wish to work in inspiring productions, both us founders have our own visions. As cliché it might sound Emma wants to be a successful entrepreneur and Iiris a role model for the future filmmakers. These goals drive us to do our absolute best in every project we are involved in. Emma is always trying to challenge the traditional film marketing and distribution by adapting the best practices learnt from other industries to it, and she is continuously searching for new ways and point of views to keep up with the changing environment. Iiris is working on taking the culture of working in film and TV to the next level. She has a passion for both teaching and learning and she pays a lot of attention in helping out industry newcomers to fulfil their dreams – BBG Coaching is mainly her little baby.
How are the company related work then shared? Emma is in charge of finances and marketing and is constantly looking for new ways to make BBG bigger, better and more powerful. She takes care of all the paper works, invoicing, payments and salaries. Iiris handles the HR and member issues as well as plans new schedules and projects. So far it’s been working great – perhaps since it’s a very logical and natural way to divide the workload for us.
And what comes to the actual entrepreneurship it’s been one scary and mind blowing adventure so far – we didn’t see this happening any other way, and would not see now either. It’s absolutely been one of the best decisions we’ve ever made. Congratulations and all the best to every other entrepreneur out there! You are supermen and -women all of you!
Ps. Finnish government, you could make it much nicer though. Thank you in advance.
Emma & Iiris
CEO & COO
emma(a)blockbustersgang.com iiris(a)blockbustersgang.com