We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful David. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with David below.

David, appreciate you joining us today. Talk to us about building your team? What was it like? What were some of the key challenges and what was your process like?

Chloe (my wife) & I founded Variable back in 2017, and we started it with one other gentleman by the name of Michael Newsome.

Not unlike many people out there, in my previous role, I always felt as if I could contribute more than what was expected of me, and that’s what I always strived to do. Working in the corporate world, I often times felt like a number. I had great ideas, but maybe they weren’t implemented, supported, or executed.

I worked for all types of companies. Smaller companies where I played more significant roles, and larger companies where I worked my way up through the ranks and gained more experience through different responsibilities I was able to take on.

We had a vision for building a full-service marketing agency that took a truly holistic approach, but in those early days, I wore every hat—strategy, creative, client communication, accounting, and the grunt work. It was exciting but also exhausting. There’s something about being at the very beginning of a company’s story where you’re fueled purely by belief and grit.

Starting out, we didn’t know whether we were going to be successful or not. It was very much a side-hustle at the beginning. Both Michael & I had full-time jobs on the side. For almost 2 years, I didn’t get paid at all; I put everything back into the company. The third year, we took $500/mo as income, the 4th year we took $1,000/mo as income, and later that year, I quit my full-time job and jumped into a whopping $36,000 annual salary with a wife, 2 kids, and 1 on the way.

Our first hire was Kacie. She actually started out as a customer, but she was a designer, and we brought her on as a completely remote employee (we didn’t get an office until 2 years ago). As we grew, my primary focus was taking hats off. I was doing everything we needed in one form or another, so I started looking at needs we had, and offloading what we could financially afford.

There was no training process, there was no onboarding process, and I’m kind of embarrassed to admit that we still are a long way off from where I’d like to be in that department.
What we do have that we didn’t have back then, is a more formal application, interview, and review process of our team members and applicants. That took years to develop and hone in (and something we’re always striving to improve).

We hired people we knew that wanted to be a part of what we were trying to build. They were pre-existing relationships that we had in some form or fashion. I don’t know that it’s unusual, but definitely unique for a company that’s larger and more mature; but I’d expect it’s pretty normal for a startup.

If I would have done it all over again, I think I would have kept most of what I did and how we operated the same. One thing that I would change is that I’d have more of a professional boundary with employees. That’s difficult to do when you’re hiring friends or people you already know, but if you don’t have boundaries, the lines are blurred between being a friend, and being in a transactional relationship.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

For starters, my name is David Penna. I’m a Christian, a husband to my beautiful wife Chloe, and a father to our 3 beautiful children (and 1 on the way). I’m the founder of Variable, a full-service marketing agency based in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I started Variable in 2017 with a belief that marketing should be more holistic, trustworthy, strategic, and measurable than what many businesses were experiencing at the time. Too often, I saw companies throwing money into marketing efforts without a clear direction, no real understanding of ROI, and no cohesive strategy tying it all together. I wanted to change that.

My path into this industry wasn’t traditional. I didn’t set out thinking I’d one day run an agency. Instead, I came up through the world of problem-solving for businesses—understanding how they work, what holds them back, and where opportunity really lives. Marketing, to me, isn’t just about ads or creative campaigns—it’s about helping a business grow sustainably. That mindset shaped Variable from day one.

Today, VARIABLE provides a wide range of services: brand strategy, creative development, SEO, digital advertising, video production, social media management, and more. What ties all of it together is the holistic approach—we don’t just run campaigns; we integrate marketing into the bigger picture of the client’s goals. Whether it’s a national franchise scaling across dozens of markets, an energy company defining its mission and culture, or a local business trying to compete online, we design marketing that moves the needle.

What sets us apart is that we operate as a true partner, not just a vendor. We’re not the kind of agency that disappears behind buzzwords or vanity metrics. We’re in the trenches with our clients, helping them make sense of their data, building strategies that last, and producing creative that actually connects. It’s not about “checking the box” on marketing—it’s about creating impact. We live with the mindset that we are “Contagiously Passionate Marketing”. It’s not just a meaningless tagline, it’s a critical part of who we are and it shapes what we do.

If there’s one thing I’d want potential clients to know about Variable, it’s this: we’re builders. We help businesses grow not just through great marketing but by bringing clarity, strategy, and execution together in a way that feels like an extension of their team. We believe in accountability, creativity, and doing the kind of work that people remember—not just because it looks good, but because it works.

At the end of the day, our job is simple: make our clients’ businesses stronger. That’s the standard we measure ourselves against, and that’s what keeps us pushing forward.

As far as what’s unique, we are partners, and our marketing is a collaborative approach where we bring you into the thought process, explain the methods to our madness, educate you in why we do what we do, and empower you to focus on your business and what you do best while letting us take your desire and market it successfully and effectively.

Can you talk to us about how you funded your business?

There was no initial capital, and we’ve never raised or been given a dime. I had a pathetic life-savings of $12,000 that we put into the business initially, and we have cash flowed everything since.

We put everything back into the business, even now. Our greatest growth potential is our people. We pour into them and allow them the freedom to shape the organization and our culture. We have revenue and growth goals just like every other company out there, but my primary driver of that is the individuals that make the world go ’round and bring value to our clients.

I like to say that our revenue and clients are a symptom of our people, and I live by that.

Do you have any stories of times when you almost missed payroll or any other near death experiences for your business?

Ha! There are many, but they’re not in the past. I still deal with them on a regular basis. Numbers keep getting larger and larger. I remember back in the day thinking a $1,000 check was big and exciting, and I always have to remember the humble beginnings of where we came from.

There was one time where I got a call from our bank (shoutout to First Bank Of Owasso) letting me know that our payroll was going to be reversed if they didn’t get it covered by 11a that day. I look at our bank account every day and I’m very aware of our finances, but a charge that was supposed to be pulled out on the 1st was pulled out a day early for some reason, and we didn’t have the funds. We were short $1,200 out of around $9,000 (I wish our payroll was still that size). We had about $2,000 in our personal savings, so I went and got the cash from that bank, and drove to our bank to cover it.

There have been countless times where we haven’t had money to cover payroll, and it’s been the most stressful out of everything else I’ve had to experience.

Another crazy near death moment for the business was a near-death moment for me. In October of 2021, I dealt with this freak Covid scenario where I had a blood clot that was too close for them to operate on. I was out for 6 weeks where I couldn’t do anything. At that time, nobody knew anything about our finances other than me, so my wife grabbed all the company credit cards to the team so we could continue running the business without me. The problem was that we weren’t sending invoices out, so we had about $150,000 of work that almost killed the business. That was a huge learning experience for me, my family, and the company.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://variable.systems/
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• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/variablemktg/