St. Thomas alumni Jeff Sevaldson and Joey Nesbitt’s company Drumlite received national exposure when the Red Hot Chili Peppers used one of its light-up drum sets in this year’s Super Bowl halftime show.

Drumlite, formerly called iW Drums, manufactures LED lights for use in drum sets. The Red Hot Chili Peppers’ drummer Chad Smith used an outfitted kit during last Sunday’s halftime show. Sevaldson said the project was exciting, but the company has seen other big successes during its three-year life.

“From a financial standpoint, we’ve certainly had bigger projects, but from a branding standpoint, this is by far the most lucrative,” Sevaldson said.

Sevaldson said he has seen large spikes in the number of hits on the company’s website since the Super Bowl show.

“Our website has gone nuts over the past few days. There’s like seven times as much traffic on it than usual, and our social media leads have risen to well above 600,” Sevaldson said.

St. Thomas entrepreneurship professor Mark Spriggs said having Drumlite’s products displayed prominently during the Super Bowl was likely a great promotion for the company.

“They weren’t able to shape the message like a traditional ad, but they got exposure and benefitted greatly from social media buzz,” Spriggs said.

Freshman Samuel Vilone said although it was his first time watching the Super Bowl, Drumlite’s unique drum set stood out to him.

“There was a lot of lights on stage, but the lights from the drums just sort of popped out,” Vilone said.

Sevaldson said he and Nesbitt did not get to work with the Red Hot Chili Peppers directly. Instead, one of the largest drum manufacturers in the world, Pearl Drums, acted as the middle man.

“We had heard rumors saying that Chad Smith was working with Pearl Drums on something big for the Super Bowl, but nobody knew what it was,” Sevaldson said. “When the call came from Pearl in October, all they told me was that they had a big thing going on, and it’s going to be in front of a huge audience.”

Confirmation that the Red Hot Chili Peppers would use the Drumlite set didn’t arrive until early December, and Drumlite couldn’t do promotions until January; however, Sevaldson said there was plenty of time to spread the news.

“We attended the annual National Association of Music Merchants show in Anaheim (Calif.) this January, and we were running all over the place telling as many people as possible,” Sevaldson said.

Spriggs likened the exposure that Drumlite received during the halftime show to the publicity a company would receive on the popular ABC show “Shark Tank.”

“Basically, getting on the show is a business win in itself. The buzz generated from being on television is worth just as much as a product placement ad, and the social media effect is incredibly enduring,” Spriggs said.

Junior Caitlin Woodard agreed being featured at the Super Bowl would help businesses gain national exposure.

“It’s the Super Bowl; it’s kind of a big deal,” Woodard said.

Financial gains and national exposure remain two sources of excitement for the Drumlite duo; however, the company also makes a point to give back. An auction for the halftime show drum kit was set up on the National Football League website, and all of the proceeds from the auction will be donated to the Make-A-Wish Foundation.

“Doing a kit for the Super Bowl was a big seller, but the kicker was that the proceeds from the whole thing would go to a good cause,” Sevaldson said.

As far as future projects or ambitions for the company, Sevaldson said the next logical step would be to work on lighting up other instruments, such as guitars or basses.

Tom Pitzen can be reached at pitz2014@stthomas.edu.