History
Catherine Juon and Linda Girard founded Pure Visibility in April, 2005. Both co-founders were veteran entrepreneurs in the Internet space, drawn to this emerging field and particularly search engine optimization and marketing.
According to Co-Founder and Catalyst Catherine Juon, “In some ways, we are both educators and evangelists as much as anything else.” Pure Visibility had a few homes in Ann Arbor, successively growing out of each into the next.
Linda Girard & Catherine Juon, Pure Visibility Co-Founders
Hatching the Company
There was a “fated” feeling to Linda and Catherine’s first meeting and subsequent planning to start Pure Visibility – according to Catherine,
“We both have the bootstrap angle in common, and definitely the shared background of talking Internet stuff before Google existed, or before half the business world knew what the Internet was. I remember our paths continuing to cross, I remember Jill Wagner introducing us at Ann Arbor Ad Club meeting. And I remember sitting at Ashley’s talking with Linda about her business plan, excitedly scribbling how she could be growing, looking at her already impressive client list, her passion, and the opportunities in front of her… And I remember Linda waiting, pretty insistently and almost patiently, for me to realize that my real dream was to start a search engine marketing company together with her.”
The Incubator Space
Pure Visibility first occupied a space in a business incubator on North Main in Ann Arbor. It was a small space to house the two very active founders and one analyst. Pure Visibility’s first employee, Steve Loszewski, kept accidentally setting off the fire alarm. The old space on North Main was transformed from incubator space to single-company rental pretty quickly, and Pure Visibility decided to move.
The Pineapple Building on Depot Street
The Pineapple Building
The Pineapple Building on Depot Street in Ann Arbor was a larger space than the North Main incubator space, with a lot more natural light. It had two conference rooms and a larger open collaborative space where everyone sat.
Its visible location and the Search Engine Marketing sign above the door occasionally brought in walk-in customers and job applicants — one of whom we hired!
The Pineapple has entered Pure Visibility lore. A traditional welcome symbol, pineapples have become literal gifts and figurative ones. Each week we share figurative pineapples (good things) at our all-hands meeting.
At the end of our time there, we were overflowing a little bit into the park across the street for informal meetings (and even a job interview!).
The First National Building
Postcard announcing Pure Visibility's move to the 5th floor on Main and Washington in downtown Ann Arbor.
By 2007, Pure Visibility had outgrown the Pineapple Building. According to Catherine,
“The need to move became progressively more clear as rooms became more multi-purpose. The most absurd was the combination conference room/printer room/storage room/workspace. A teleconference doesn’t work very well when the printer is spitting out pages in your other ear…!”
So, the company moved on up a few blocks up the hill to the First National Building on Washington and Main Street in August, 2007.
The Next Phase
Pure Visibility occupies the Fifth Floor at our current space downtown. We have a little more room to grow at the First National Building, but we expect to outgrow this space as well. We’re excited to see what the future holds for the company and the team!
