‘I Am So Board’ aims to connect St. Louis with creative jobs—and more

Atomicdust co-founder Mike Spakowski’s side project is becoming an essential for people pursuing creative and marketing jobs.

by Sarah Fenske | St. Louis Magazine | April 2, 2026 at 5:45 AM

It was around a year ago that Mike Spakowski started a job board for creative and marketing roles based in St. Louis. He called it I Am So Board, because, as the creative director at a branding agency, he knows the power of a catchy name. 

And over the past 12 months, what started as a simple Excel sheet that Spakowski manually updated twice a month has become a stylish website that refreshes listings in real time, automatically pulling any relevant jobs posted by the 177 creative firms in St. Louis, as well as postings on LinkedIn.

That’s just the start. Spakowski has been adding new features as he continues to play around with the site (it’s become one of his “Sunday morning projects,” something to noodle around whenever he has a little time). I Am So Board just released a survey of 50 people in the area’s creative scene, which Spakowski hopes will be the first in a series of quarterly reports. “I’m a dabbler in this, and I’m learning a lot, too,” he says.

A partner and creative director at Atomicdust, Spakowski set out to make the job board with two goals: To keep his skills sharp and to help show that St. Louis has a vibrant ecosystem for creative work. The former, perhaps, is a bit easier than the latter. 

“All the time I meet students and they’re like, ‘I really want to get a job here, but there’s no place,’ or, ‘There’s no scene’ or ‘There’s no community.’ And so for years, I’ve been trying to share that story of how vibrant it is, because we do have a huge marketing and creative scene.” Spakowski acknowledges that it’s felt less vibrant lately, thanks to COVID-19 and remote work. “But I’m stubborn,” he says, “and I want to see it thrive.”

Go Deeper: I Am So Board’s inaugural survey found that 43 percent of respondents felt the creative job market in St. Louis is “thin” right now. Just 28 percent responded that it was “decent.” (Alarmingly, the others “didn’t want to talk about it.”)

On a more positive note, 27 percent of respondents said they were “slammed”; another 35 percent were “comfortably busy.” And Spakowski notes that after relevant job listings dropped in the winter, they are now climbing back up.

The elephant in the room may well be fears about artificial intelligence. Only 15 percent said they aren’t worried about AI at all. Another 42 percent reported being “a little nervous”; 37 percent were “moderately terrified.” Spakowski, for one, is feeling some nerves. Of the 15 percent who aren’t worried, he says, “It’s either like they don’t realize the impact, or maybe they know something I don’t know.”

He concedes that the latter is possible. He remembers starting Atomicdust as a 24-year-old in 2001. Looking back, he’s amused by his own chutzpah, but adds, “the thing was the Internet was new. And we were kids that understood the internet, and all these traditional agencies or businesses didn’t. It was a big advantage making websites and digital assets for clients.” 

What’s Next: AI may present a similar opportunity that the Internet did when Atomicdust started over 25 years ago. 

The agency has since grown; it now has 25 employees, headquartered on Locust Street in Midtown (and Spakowski, for his part, is now the father of three). The firm has added services like brand strategy and identity. But Spakowski still remembers when the Internet felt like the Wild West and people in board rooms were mystified by the idea of clicking links. 

“You carve out your own niche,” he says. “And I think history repeats itself. With AI, it’s the same cycle. Everyone’s going to have the same questions around AI: How do I do this? And what’s the best way? And what are other people doing? So there’s always these secular opportunities.”