Client Spotlight: Redbear Films
When Redbear Films' studio deal fell through with a week's notice, TenantBase found them warehouse space in Lake Forest. Nine years later, they're still there, now an Emmy-winning production company.
TenantBase got a chance to chat with PJ Haarsma, founder of Redbear Films, the production house, shortly after a quick, whirlwind move to a new space in Lake Forest, Orange County.
Update, 2026: Redbear Films is confirmed still active at the exact same Lake Forest address TenantBase scrambled to find within a week in 2017. Since then, the company has won an Emmy Award, built a client roster that includes Land Rover, Southwest Airlines, Best Buy, and Shell, brought on actress and producer Felicia Day for commercial representation, and secured a federal GSA Schedule Contract allowing them to work directly with government agencies.
PJ Haarsma started his company Redbear in 1989, pulling the name together by combining the nicknames he and his wife have for each other. Haarsma originally started in fashion photography; his jobs often took him traveling between New York and Miami from his home in Canada. Eventually he made the move to film and TV, which is what brought the couple to the West Coast.
"At Redbear Films, we shoot any media that moves," says Haarsma. From commercials to TV shows and even video games and comics, Redbear truly does it all. At the heart of it, it's clear that PJ Haarsma loves creating content from his passions, and is even a novelist with a four book series published by Random House called "The Softwire." Haarsma was looking to move his creative hub for his multiple ventures out of LA and closer to his home, while cutting his overhead from previously leasing space in downtown LA.
When Haarsma connected with TenantBase, he was already in negotiations for a new studio space when things started to go south quickly. "We started seeing all these hoops we had to jump through, only to be told our lease start date was going to be delayed an extra two weeks," said Haarsma. Zach Porteous reached out to check in on their progress with the negotiations, only to learn that they needed to move within the week and were back at square one, looking for something that accommodated all their studio needs. "We needed a clean warehouse space to shoot our projects in, specifically high ceilings with the width to get bigger shots. Separate rooms were also a necessity for an editing bay and a couple of offices."
"Every problem I threw at him he fixed. We didn't have to worry about getting a temporary storage space and moving all of our equipment twice, which was really what we wanted to avoid."
PJ Haarsma, Founder, Redbear Films
Their first tour and first space Porteous and Haarsma saw together was a hit. Porteous, their advisor, moved quickly to make everything fall into place, from fast tracking the financials to delivering keys over the weekend. Redbear Films was able to move into the 2,000 square foot clean industrial space within a week of touring. "Not only is the space close to home and more affordable, but it's much more efficient to move things on and off set. We went from the 8th floor of a building in downtown LA to an industrial space with a loading dock."
Check out all of Redbear Film's projects here and PJ Haarsma's creative ventures as well.
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