The Story

Nobody plans
a universe.

Weldwood was one marketing agency in a town of 20,000 people. Every other company here exists because a client asked for something we couldn't outsource in good conscience.

How it actually happened

One request at a time.

It started with websites. Then clients wanted the site to actually rank, so SEO came in. Then they wanted ads that didn’t set money on fire. That became Weldwood Marketing, and it grew into a full agency serving businesses across Oregon and the rest of the country.

Then a client wanted to launch a podcast. We sent them to a studio two hours away and the audio came back unusable. So we built Weldwood Studios in Lebanon, with a full creative team attached instead of a rental room and a shrug.

Then an expert wanted to write a book. The publishing world is full of people happy to take twelve thousand dollars and hand back a PDF. So we built Weldwood Publishing and put an actual launch strategy behind it.

Then everybody needed photos and video that weren’t shot on a phone in a parking lot. That’s Weldwood Media.

And somewhere in the middle of all of it, we got tired of business conferences that felt like a sales floor with a lanyard. So we started the Oregon Business Conference.

That’s the whole origin story. No venture round. No five year plan. Just refusing to hand people off to work we wouldn’t put our name on.

The through line

Marketing for humans. Not for algorithms, not for awards, not for a case study nobody reads. For the person who has to make payroll on Friday.

Not yet, but coming

Weldwood Foundation and Weldwood Developments are on the board. Neither one is open for business yet, and we’re not going to pretend otherwise on a website.

What we won't budge on

Five rules.

Say the real thing

If your idea is bad, you’ll hear it from us before you hear it from the market. Politeness that costs you money isn’t kindness.

No hostages

You own your domain, your accounts, your files, and your book rights. Leaving should be easy. Staying should be obvious.

Small town standards

We run into our clients at the grocery store. That is a better accountability system than any SLA ever written.

Funny is not unserious

There are monsters on our logos. There is also twenty five years of work behind them. Both things are true.

Send them elsewhere when it's right

That is a lot of doors, and none of them is the right one for everybody. We would rather point you somewhere good than sell you something adjacent.

The people

Who you'll actually talk to.

Founder

Jake Zufelt

Marketing consultant, StoryBrand certified practitioner, and author of the international bestseller Digital Marketing Sucks. Hosts the Irreverent Business Podcast. Speaks to rooms that were expecting something more boring.

His work
Operations

Kendal Fitchett

Operations specialist. The reason projects have dates instead of vibes, and the reason those dates hold. Keeps every company in the lineup running on one set of systems.

Mockup note: confirm Kendal's current role and title before this goes live.

Where we work

Oregon first. Everywhere after that.

Lebanon is home. We work regularly with businesses in Albany, Corvallis, Salem, Eugene, Springfield, Sweet Home, Bend, and Portland, and with clients across the country who found us and stayed. The studio, the conference, and the camera crew are Oregon. Everything else travels.

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