Imagination Movers: Four Dads Who Built a Children's Empire After the Storm

Four Dads Who Built a Children's Empire After the Storm

The Imagination Movers are not the band you'd expect to come out of New Orleans. No brass instruments. No funk. No second line rhythms. Instead, four dads from the city created a children's entertainment franchise that landed on the Disney Channel, sold out concert tours, and proved that New Orleans creativity doesn't always have to sound like New Orleans to be authentically from the city.

Rich Collins, Scott Durbin, Dave Poche, and Scott "Smitty" Smith founded the group in 2002 with a straightforward idea: create positive male role models for kids while encouraging creativity. They were childhood friends, all living in New Orleans, all dads, and all convinced that children's entertainment could be smarter and more engaging than what was available. They worked on the project in the evenings, from nine to midnight, fitting it around their day jobs and family responsibilities.

The concept caught on locally first. Louisiana Public Broadcasting gave them airtime, and the Movers built a regional following of kids and parents who appreciated their approach—songs that were catchy without being annoying, content that respected children's intelligence, and an energy that was genuinely fun rather than manufactured.

Disney came calling in 2005, but the Movers turned them down. Twice. They preferred the PBS route, wanting to maintain creative control. Then Hurricane Katrina hit.

The storm destroyed the band's office and the homes of three of the four members. Everything they'd built was underwater. In the aftermath, trying to rebuild their lives and their city, the Movers reconsidered the Disney offer. In spring 2006, they signed the deal, and by September 2008, their show premiered on Playhouse Disney. It ran for seventy-six episodes through 2013, reaching millions of kids around the world.

The Katrina connection adds a layer to the Imagination Movers story that makes it quintessentially New Orleans. The storm destroyed what they had, and they rebuilt something bigger. That's the New Orleans narrative in miniature—loss followed by reinvention, disaster followed by something you never could have predicted.

The Movers continued touring and performing long after the show ended, building a live concert business that fills theaters with families. They're not the kind of New Orleans act that makes the music magazines or the festival retrospectives, but they represent something real about the city: the entrepreneurial creativity, the emphasis on community, and the stubborn refusal to let even a catastrophic hurricane keep you from doing what you set out to do.