Final Take Productions
a digital storyteller

Snohomish County Business Journal/KIMBERLY HILDEN At his Mill Creek office, Final Take Productions President John Holmes edits video from clients’ events as well as commercials and infomercials the company shoots. Final Take also can transfer clients’ home videos to a digital format as well as duplicate DVDs.

By Kimberly Hilden
SCBJ Assistant Editor

Whether it’s shooting video of a wedding or producing a corporate training video, Final Take Productions is in the business of capturing memories and telling stories.

“I would say that we really can do video to fit everybody’s needs. We’re the Swiss Army Knife of video production,” said John Holmes, owner and president of the Mill Creek-based enterprise.

Final Take Productions Address: 15720 Mill Creek Blvd., Suite F3, Mill Creek, WA 98012 Phone: 425-338-7500 or 206-799-6735 Web site: www.finaltakeproductions.com

The family-run business — wife Kathleen is vice president and sons Dan, Bryan and Kevin are active on the production side — offers a range of services, from producing event videos, commercials and infomercials to transferring clients’ home videos to a digital format and duplicating DVDs.

“We can turn out 250 to 500 DVDs with color printing and packaging in 48 hours if we need to,” said Holmes, who founded Final Take Productions 13 years ago after spending 15 years as a public school teacher, educating students on technology and video production.

While the summer wedding season is the busiest time of the year for the company, Holmes, with the aid of a half-dozen contract videographers and editors, has built a corporate client base that provides projects year-round. Along with video work for the Boeing Co., Holmes’ business has worked with:

n Oki Golf, producing a wedding demonstration for its Newcastle golf course that was highlighted at the Seattle Wedding Show. “Echo Falls is next,” Holmes said of Oki Golf’s course in Snohomish. “We’re also talking with their human resources folks to do a training video for the company.”

n Bellevue Mutual Mortgage/ Strategic Equity, creating video projects aimed at increasing clientele.

Final Take also recently produced a public-service commercial for the Boys & Girls Clubs of Snohomish County, with organizations such as the Everett Hawks and Seattle Sonics spotlighting the importance and need for mentors, Holmes said.

And one of the “down-home, meaningful projects” the company is working on is for the South Snohomish County Chamber of Commerce, enabling every chamber member to have a two-minute Web clip on the chamber’s online business directory, Holmes said.

“The business owners are ecstatic that for (much less) than $1,000 they can promote their business,” he said, noting that through Final Take, chamber businesses can have that video clip duplicated for their own individual marketing efforts.

The majority — as much as 70 percent — of Final Take’s customer base comes from word-of-mouth referrals in an industry whose competitive edge is defined by customer service and technological know-how.

But keeping current with technology is almost a job unto itself, Holmes said. “It’s a constant learning curve. I like to keep my own young adult and teen children (in the business) — they have grown up with technology since infancy.”

The new industry technology is high definition, he noted. “With HD-DVD burners and Blu-ray (disc) burners, you can take HD all the way through the video production process to create a DVD with HD quality for home or commercial use.”

After years of growing its regional consumer- and corporate-oriented market, Final Take is in the process of expanding its reach and offering its expertise hundreds of miles away in Southern California, where Holmes’ son Dan is currently attending film school and will run the branch office.

“I’ll oversee it until he gets on his feet,” Holmes said. “... I’ll give it a year to get it off the ground. It’s going to take some time.”

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