Nov. 14, 2022

This paid piece is sponsored by Click Rain Inc.

Lemonly and Click Rain have a new shared headquarters. The two agencies moved in September into their new building at Seventh Street and Nesmith Avenue in the East Bank neighborhood.

Click Rain Inc., the agencies’ parent company, purchased the building in fall 2021 and began a yearlong renovation process to turn the historic building into a modern, open-concept office for Lemonly and Click Rain to call home.

Renovating a century-old building

The agencies’ new headquarters, nicknamed the Sawtooth Building, was originally constructed in 1919 as a spark plug factory owned by Symms-Brownell Manufacturing Co. Its iconic sawtooth-shaped roof, which features three triangular vaulted sections, would have allowed the factory ample airflow and natural light in those days.

The renovated space features a modern industrial aesthetic with lots of glass, metal, polished concrete floors and an open-concept layout with a central bullpen where team members are stationed. The ceiling has been restored to its original wood, and large skylights have been installed in the vaulted roof.

Nods to the building’s unique history are incorporated throughout the new space. Room names call back to the building’s days as a factory, like two rooms named after Wesplug and Radio brand spark plugs that were manufactured here a century ago. A unique conference room now occupies the factory’s old freight elevator shaft, with parts of the lift mechanism still in place.

Co-op Architecture and Reynolds Construction Management completed the project, with the renovation of the 20,000-square-foot space lasting nearly a year. Furniture was provided by Canfield Business Interiors. An internal design team collaborated with vendors to select furnishings, materials, colors and the layout of the space, while keeping the agencies’ culture and flexible work approach at the forefront of the design process.

Some finishing touches, including room decor, wall art and a basement lounge, are coming together as the teams settle in. Lemonly fans needn’t worry — the company’s famous neon signs of its lemon logo and its “Better Every Day” mantra made the move, too, along with a new matching sign featuring Click Rain’s raindrop logo.

Eric Ellefson, managing partner at Click Rain Inc., said the new headquarters is a testament to the organization’s people-centered approach to business. “Not only is the final product the result of a ton of team collaboration, but the location is our investment in those we now have the privilege to call neighbors. We’re excited to expand the downtown presence and welcome the opportunity to bring attention and future investment with us.”

A ribbon-cutting event with the Greater Sioux Falls Chamber of Commerce for the companies’ new headquarters is planned for Jan. 17.

Planning for flexible work in a new space

Lemonly and Click Rain are champions of flexible work for their teams — allowing employees to work wherever and whenever they work best, whether that’s in the office, from home or anywhere with an internet connection.

For Click Rain, this is the first time the team has had an office to call home in a year since moving out of the former space in the Rock Island Building in October 2021. Most of the company worked from home for a year, and some team members set up shop in the loft at Lemonly’s former office on Main Avenue during that time.

“I personally love being back in the office,” said Megan Jensen, a media strategist at Click Rain. “I find I’m more productive when I’m outside my home environment. While remote, I’ve missed the side conversations by the coffee maker or just being able to pop over to someone’s desk to ask a question.”

Carly Schultz, a senior visual designer at Lemonly, has no trouble working remotely from her home in Sioux Falls. But lately, she has enjoyed working in the office more frequently: “I’ve found myself coming into the new office a lot more often since we’ve moved,” she said.

“I know there will always be a spot for me to plug in for the day — I don’t have to worry about taking someone’s desk or having the equipment I need. With that being said, I still feel so supported for choosing to have my primary setup at home. There’s no pressure to come in, but when I do, there’s a place for me to have a productive, fun working experience.”

Embracing flexible work means not only equipping team members with the hardware and software they need to work effectively from anywhere but also designing an office space conducive to frequent video calls and virtual collaboration — with lots of tech-equipped meeting rooms, drop-in stations for mostly remote team members to work from when they’re in the office, speedy broadband and so on.

Chris Castellanos, a Click Rain senior copywriter based in Los Angeles, has noticed how the office setup promotes inclusion among the team: “The new office setup makes it easier for remote employees to chime in during meetings. It helps people sitting behind a camera — whether you’re across the country or across town — feel included.”

An essential ingredient for flexible work is asynchronous communication — communication that doesn’t depend on people being together whether virtually or in person at the same time. For Lemonly, video messages — Loom is a favorite tool — have been key to enabling asynchronous work over the past few years. Recording a quick video is faster than typing, and team members can watch or refer back to videos whenever they need to.

Synchronous meetings definitely still have their place, especially for group brainstorming, problem-solving discussions or decision-making, but asynchronous video works great for information-sharing, process documentation, tech tutorials and even design presentations when clients aren’t able to hop on a conference call.

With the right mix of hardware, software, office space and organizational culture, Lemonly and Click Rain are empowering their teams to work however and wherever they work best — and they hope to encourage other companies to do the same.

“We’re committed to being leaders in flexible work and employee experience, and our new office plays a key role in that,” Click Rain Inc. CEO Natalie Eisenberg said.

“We designed it as a space where people would enjoy spending time in person and one that would serve remote team members well. Since moving in, we’ve noticed a buzzing atmosphere, activity in all our breakout spaces and lots of great conversation and laughs amongst the team. It’s been beyond our expectations.”

About Click Rain Inc.

Click Rain Inc. is the parent company of Click Rain and Lemonly, two marketing agencies headquartered in downtown Sioux Falls. Click Rain is a people-centered digital agency that builds the region’s best high-performance web solutions and digital marketing strategies. Lemonly is home of the world’s best infographics, a graphic design agency specialized in infographics, animated explainer videos and other visual content.