Have You Heard?

WICHITA — Ryan Gates is just the sort of young talent that Wichita civic leaders are always talking about trying to keep here.

Now, after being gone 15 years, the film and television producer is returning home.

He’s bringing Creative Rhino, a video and film production company that also offers online and new media viral marketing, with him.

“I never had the whole, ‘I’m never coming back!’ ” Gates says.

He did, though, have “that young, idyllic dream of New York City.”

Creative Rhino originally was based in San Francisco, then New York state.

For the last two years, Gates and his wife, Kathryn Van Steenhuyse, have taken their work on the road.

“We’re what you call digital nomads,” Gates says. “As long as we have an Internet connection, good cell phone reception and a major airport, we can operate from anywhere.”

The international Easyhome rent-to-own company has been a major client, as has the Easygates franchise, which Gates’ father, Bud Gates, owns.

Ryan Gates is returning to Wichita to be the new marketing manager and director of viral marketing for Easygates.

He’ll take a back seat at Creative Rhino (named for his “Rhino” nickname) and Van Steenhuyse, an abstract painter and designer, will take the lead at the company.

“We have some current clients that we’ll certainly stick with, but I’m excited to expand out and see what else we can do,” Van Steenhuyse says. “We hope to form some new partnerships.”

The company doesn’t officially move here until May, but Van Steenhuyse says she’s already been working with Start-Thinking and Trish Higgins Fine Art locally.

Ryan Gates says Creative Rhino will make a shift toward more experimental art and design and offer event planning as well.

Van Steenhuyse is a former designer for Martha Stewart.

Ryan Gates says there are a lot of great things about moving to Wichita.

For instance, though Wichita State University isn’t his alma mater, he’s a diehard Shocker fan.

Also, where they’ve been living — Bolton Landing, the small New York town that Bud Gates named his former B.G. Bolton’s Sports Grill for — is so tiny that their dining options have been severely limited.

So one of the biggest things Ryan Gates says he’s looking forward to?

“The fact that we can actually go out to dinner after 8 o’clock at night.”