RingoFire: West Greenville’s Success Story 

By Finn Meyer

RingoFire is a digital advertising agency that provides a large variety of marketing services. These services include social media, website development, graphic design, and many forms of content creation. Even though RingoFire is still a fairly new company, opening their doors roughly six years ago, they’ve already gained a large following not just in the Greenville area.  Their popularity has skyrocketed nationwide, gaining many high-end clients such as Elmer’s Glue, The Home Depot, Lowe’s, Crescent Tools, and more. However, becoming “West Greenville’s very own success story” was no easy task. 

Brian J. Stearns is the founder and CEO of RingoFire. Stearns grew up in Concord, North Carolina. From there he attended Appalachian State University for undergrad where he studied public relations and communication. He then moved toward the corporate field of power tools in Atlanta. After about ten years Stearns moved to Greenville, South Carolina to advance his career by enrolling in the Clemson MBA program, which allows students to enrich their education by collaborating with companies on real-world projects. 

Brian J. Stearns sitting in his office at RingoFire on Monday, February 20th. 

“It was a class project to come up with a side business or a side hustle, and mine was RingoFire. So that’s kind of what spawned what we have here today.” Stearns said while on the topic of the MBA program. He also discussed his early fascination with businesses advertising on social media, which at the time was still a new idea. Later on social media advertising became the basis of RingoFire. 

“It is a little bit daunting but exciting at the same time. There’s no downtime, you can go at your own pace as an entrepreneur but if you don’t go full throttle you won’t make it.” Said Stearns about the topic of starting his own business. So much goes into starting a company but in RingoFire’s case it paid off in the end. But that process wasn’t without obstacles along the way. 

“I was always kind of a little intimidated by certain things about being an entrepreneur, one of which was business operations which I knew wasn’t my strong suit. Then finances, I’m like the anti-CEO when it comes to being more of a CFO mindset…” A CFO mindset is typically more direct and goal oriented, which tends to leave less room for the creative mind to blossom. However, both of these mindsets are important pillars to a successful business. Some other important pillars of a starting business are creating a good image toward the public and of course, a great company name. 

“I knew that most agencies were people’s last names or initials and I’ve always thought that that’s so boring.” Stearns spent ten years DJing at Appalachian State University. There his DJ name was Johnny Ringo, who is the villain from a 90s western drama called “Tombstone.”  When Stearns started this company he wanted to include some kind of homage to that point in his life. He also stated he is a big fan of Johnny Cash who was an American country singer and songwriter. One of Cash’s most popular songs is titled “Ring of Fire.” So Stearns love for Cash’s music and his former years as a DJ inspired the now iconic name, RingoFire. 

RingoFire also takes extreme measures to make sure their employees stay happy. 

“I knew what it was like to get up in the morning and drive to a job I hated. I don’t want that for anybody here.” Stearns said. Many measures are taken to ensure positive mental health among his employees. Some of those measures include leaving early on Fridays, bringing in petting zoos, climbing rock walls, and showcasing musicians. Many of these events are kept unannounced to keep people “...motivated, inspired, and passionate.” On top of all that on Thursday, February 23rd a wellness retreat session was held on campus. At this retreat, a mental health professional was brought in to discuss some ways to handle stress and anxiety with the RingoFire crew. Things like this have become regular occurrences at the office. “It’s important to take a break and take a pause for a cause, which is mental health and wellness,” said Stearns. 

RingoFire takes everything about their business to heart. They care so much about customer service and making sure every client gets the digital advertising they deserve. Many things are done to ensure that employees enjoy waking up and going to work every morning. It is no surprise that RingoFire took the title of "The 5th Fastest Growing Ad Agency in the World,” according to AdWeek’s recent global rankings. Thanks to Stearns burning passion for advertising, RingoFire will continue to reinvent everything we know about this digital market.