Got a nice surprise in the mail today: The Super-Incredible Activity Book For Creatives from Veer. If you’re not familar with Veer, they are a website that sells fonts, stock photos and other resources for creatives. First off, it’s not everyday you get a nice, unsolicited direct mail piece like this. Secondly, it’s a pretty sweet little book filled with random puzzle and mind games with a lot of good design and great typography. My favorite game has to be “bah bah black sheep” which is a list of random phrases you try to get your relatives to say out loud at a family gathering. Anything from “How was the drive?” to “Have you seen my teeth?” Classic! read more
DISH Network has been in what seems like a never-ending battle, playing third fiddle to DirectTV and big cable providers like Comcast (Xfinity), Cox and Time Warner. Their growth over the last few years has been somewhat impressive and they’ve seen marginal success playing the pricing game in their past campaigns. However, for the most part they have played the same game as DirectTV and Comcast rather plan plowing their own road, attempting to boast number of HD channels or sports packages. Although they have offered cheaper service and a progressive HD service, DISH’s brand hasn’t outgrown their underdog status. read more
So after being reminded a dozen times, I finally got around to installing Firefox 3.6. They seem to have made some nice improvements to the browser, although honestly I really don’t take enough advantage of all the add-ons and plug-ins available for Firefox. Anyway, one of the more noticeable changes is the new Personas, that allow you to choose skins for your browser window and even allows designers to create their own. Not really a deal breaker, but a nice fun surprise that distracted me for a few minutes. Here’s a screenshot, which you’ll also notice the new b.todd Twitter page, so follow us!
Brands can be funny things sometimes. Companies will spend hours upon hours along with a small fortune to develop, strategize and promote their ideal vision, yet when it comes down to the true brand perception, it is the consumer who gets the final say. As a company, you have the power to lay the groundwork for you brand and guide the consumer down the path that you see as ideal. Companies can preach certain values, choose who they market to, dictate store environments and determine product usage, yet they are always at the mercy of the consumer and whether or not they buy into that brand that is presented to them. When the company and consumer on the same page, it can be bliss. When they are not, it can be fatal. read more
Every so often, a designer accidentally (or vengefully) designs a logo that is maybe a little too phallic, and the client doesn’t pay enough attention or care to notice that their brand new logo depicts a man’s naughty bits. Unfortunately for these companies, their customers notice, ohdotheynotice.
The London Sperm Bank happened to end up with a brand new phallic logo themselves, however, this one was on purpose….for obvious reasons. Seems like quite a clever branding strategy to attract younger male clients, we’ll see how the plan pans out for them.
Getting new business cards is always exciting, especially for a designer…especially when they’re your own. Take a look, and if you ask nicely, maybe I’ll send you one. read more
B.Todd wishes you all a Happy New Year and a prosperous 2010. As you all are celebrating a new year, a new decade and maybe…probably thinking: “2009, don’t let the door hit you on the way out!”, please be safe tonight.
As a way to celebrate the new year (and prove that we actually do work around here) here is a sneak peak at a couple projects we’re working on for our clients and good friends LaxGear. First is an new print ad going in the February issue of Lacrosse Magazine. Second is a preview of the soon to come new website for LaxGear. read more
So Ikea recently opened a new store, and to celebrate the occasion as well as promote it, they launched a viral marketing campaign utilizing the already free features of Facebook. They created a profile for the store manager, and posted pictures of their products in the profile. Whoever tagged themselves on a certain product first got it for free. Check out the video. Unsurprisingly, the campaign worked like a charm and snowballed due to Facebook’s ever-reaching exposure across the world. read more
I have not yet delved into the wacky world of Twitter as a user, but I, as the rest of humanity, have been involuntarily subjected to it in the form of thousands of Twitter off-shoot websites, celebrity tweeting and limitless Twitter jokes. My personal favorite twitter-esque comedy has to be Conan O’Brien’s TwitterTracker:
Well, actually we’ve been in business for a couple of months, but I’ve tried to keep things on the down-low to give myself adequate time and room to get this company started and get all of the little, mundane things that come with starting your own company out of the way while I still had the time. Things like opening checking accounts, writing contracts and registering for tax identification numbers which is horribly boring but all too necessary.
The most time consuming part of it all was probably getting this website up. I’ve done quite a few websites writing content and working with designers and programmers, but this was my first shot at doing it all on my own. So after a lot of research on how to get it done on a start-up’s budget as well as learning some on-the-fly HTML and CSS coding, I finally feel that the site is ready to unleash onto the public, which is why you’re most likely reading this right now. read more
