How to Be One of the Cool Kids.

Design > Trade Show Booth

This booth! Hahaha. The Stuf brand was snooty as all get out. It was acting like a spoiled, high-end art studio and its big debut in its own show booth had to be amazing. I love planning out trade show booths. I mean, I hate it and love it. My process is ridiculous, so you’ll see why. I’m sort of a control freak. And, I’m not very spacial. Like, I can’t really tell, just off the top of my head, how to fill a 10’ x 10’ space with displays and furniture and chairs without it being all crowded and shitty. I need to cheat to find that out.

The Stuf booth had to be amazing, sure. But the brand was so clean, and white, and simple that it couldn’t be a circus (even though that was one of the Stuf families). Definitely, the figures needed to stand out. I started with some booth sketches and ended up with an idea of what I wanted to do. Then I moved onto Illustrator to create a floor plan to 1/4 scale. Then I’d do wall plans to scale. Then, yep, I print them out and build a small 1/4 model of the booth, complete with tiny hand-build shelving and furniture. I know what you’re thinking and, yes, I’m a total freak. But wait. There’s more. I populate it with little people to scale and then shoot it, so I can see what it’s like to be IN THE TINY BOOTH.

FINAL: For Stuf’s premier booth at NYIGF, I wanted to build a world a booth that would blow people away while not overshadowing the product. Entering the cloud-world of Stuf, you’re treated to a museum-like experience.

BEFORE: Can you believe this is what our space was when we got there? The design section had wood walls instead of the pipe-and-drape you’d get in less fancy parts of the show. I knew we’d have stable walls before I started designing for it and it’s the only way we could have done what we did.

COMPS: An early sketch that I took to Adobe Illustrator to work out. It didn’t work out. It’d have been cool, but I didn’t think anyone would want to come into the booth through such a narrow entrance. Especially the top part. But the idea of a semi-enclosed space was interesting. So I scaled everything back to end up with the clouds. Because they were all white and the booth was white, I thought they’d be less intimidating. They’d become sort of visible but invisible. To test it out, I’d have to make a scale model because I’m weird like that. Also, I love that tie.

COMPS: Proof positive. My model really helped me understand the space, figure out how I’d attach the clouds to the walls, and managed my expectations. Then I could get down to speccing out the details to give to the guys I hired to make the clouds for me. They had to be light (and on the cheap) so I ended having them cut out of thin sheets of PVC. Then they’d just bend ‘em where I needed a tab to screw them in.

FINAL: A look at our hardcover application to get into the snooty design section of the show. That’s a picture of my model in the book. I hadn’t made the booth yet, but wanted to convince them it was real, it was cool, and it was ready to bring to NY. Kelly’s standing outside the Stuf booth just as we started setting it up. And finally here’s my model shot again along side the real deal. Expectations managed! Hahahaha. It kind of creeps me out how similar they are, but that’s says a lot about thinking shit through. Or about how much I hate surprises.

The best part of this was the clouds. The front of the booth would be framed in clouds, as if they were parting to let you in. Directly behind the clouds, a bright white booth where the only color was the color of the Stuf dolls. It made a HUGE impact. The trick with bringing Stuf to trade shows wasn’t the booth, though. It was getting in at all. Because Stuf belonged in the Design category, and that category is as snooty as the fake art brand we’d created. The design sections of trade shows are juried. You have to submit pictures of your booth and your brand and your products, and then they decide if you’re one of the cool kids or not. And of course Stuf didn’t actually have the booth ready to go yet (I wasn’t going to pay to manufacture it, if I wasn’t going to get in). So that’s where making a scale model maybe wasn’t such a crazy thing to do after all?

We made a hardcover book of the Stuf brand, and we sent that as our application! Yeah, INSTEAD of the actual application. Who does that?! Of course we got in because of it. I’ve written about what a disaster our first shipment of Stuf dolls turned out to be, and this booth was sort of a similar tale. As simple as we designed it, it took FOREVER to set up. We thought it might take a few hours – screw in a bunch of shelves, screw in the clouds, rub down some type, how hard can it be? It took us 7 hours to set up. And when you believe it’ll take 3, but instead it takes 7, it’s mental torment. But the final product was worth it. 

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How a Simple Plan Can Go So Wrong, and So Right.

Design > Product

I know I say this a lot, but making things is hard. There are lots of moving parts to get right, no matter what it is. If you’re a small business, you’re likely struggling to bring it in for a manufacturing cost you can afford, and with a retail price your customer can afford. Not to mention, I’ve had a lot of things come from the factory damaged (it happens) which is a double whammy because you have lost capital plus lost sales opportunity. Because of that, I’m always looking for a way to make things that would eliminate the likelihood of disaster, or to roll with it (like Mysterio did).

I decided on a plush project. It would be one form factor; two different sizes. It would have a flat front, a flat continuous side panel, and a flat back. It’d be made of canvas, filled with fluff and a layer of beans at the bottom so the doll would stand on its own. Easy, right? The fun part would be designing characters on this plush blank canvas. I’ve always been a big fan of art toys. Take Frank Kosik’s Labbit series or the Dunny characters, for example. So smart and simple, and endlessly fun. I’d call my art plush project, Stuf.

FINAL: This is the plush line I created called Stuf. Simple dolls with bean bases (so they stand on their own). Art toys that kids could use as playthings, puppets, or pals. Simple, clean, bright, and fun.

EARLY: I hit on the shape I wanted for all the Stuf dolls to share and here’s a little peek at some of the sketch work. I made paper models (complete with fill) to see if they had the physical presenceI wanted them to have. Yeah, I’m weird that way. I started off thinking I just wanted to make really graphic little characters, but it soon grew to all kinds o possibilities.

EARLY: OMFG. I designed the simplest thing ever so I’d avoid any production disasters. What I got was the exact opposite. Look, I’m good at specing out product for factories (US and overseas).. I was thorough with the instructions for what I wanted (lower right corner). But if it could go wrong it did. The shape, fabric, color, structure…UGH. With my detailed instructions I even included the paper doll shot from above. They assumed I wanted puffy faces sewn on. < sigh >

I didn’t have a lot of money to invest in Stuf. And this plush wasn’t even something that fit with everything else I was designing for Wrybaby. So it was a creative experiment, for sure. I had to begin by getting manufacturing costs, and then from there, work out what I could do. For example, I’d initially wanted to make every doll different. Just create a lot of fun art pieces that would live under a brand story. Once the costs came in, Kelly and I figured we’d be better off creating a handful of Stuf “families” instead. That way each family could be a story, and the likelihood of success was higher overall. Why? Because if I created, say, 20 of one-off Stuf characters, what if people LOVED three and they sold out? I’d be stuck with 17 slow sellers and no way of re-investing in the three that worked. Get it? If you group families, there’s an incentive for people to buy multiple pieces in a family they’re drawn to. I’ll come back to this later.

Anyhoo, it worked out that we’d make 4 Stuf families. Each made up of 4 small dolls and one big Stuf doll. You should see all the preliminary sketches I did (so many!). It was a blast, but I really wanted to make them all. The two deciding factors for the themes we went with were: current trends; and our instinct for what we knew would be attractive to Wrybaby’s wholesale clients. Pirate Stuf, Bird Stuf, and Robot Stuf were an easy leap for stores. We went with Developmental Stuf because it was a link to Wrybaby’s parenting wheelhouse. Think of it as a safety move. If the others didn’t work, at least there was a solid baby offering.

FINAL: A closer look at Pirate Stuf. I gave each pirate his (or her) own little character attributes for kids to build on. A parent once called me to say her son, who’s afraid of the water, found great comfort in his Shaggy Dan. Honestly, that alone made all the Stuf headaches worth it to me. Oh, and Pirate Sue really IS nothin’ but trouble! Hahaha

FINAL: Some Stuf dolls shared pattern on the back, but had extra credit on the side panels, like Circus and Robot Stuf. I especially like how the rosy=cheeked lion sits on a little performance pedestal.

FINAL: We pulled everything along with Stuf’s clean “European art toy” aesthetic through to it’s website and retail packaging. We made plaques for each Stuf family that made them look so special on retail shelving. And later we’d even build wood and canvas backdrops for each Stuf family.

FINAL: Yep! I made Stuf backpacks! The funnest part was the side water bottle pockets. The Owl’s pocket said SEEDS, and the Circus Elephant’s pocket said…wait for it…PEANUTS! Of course. :-)

We’d thought of every little thing except one. That the factory would fuck us. Oh boy, did they ever. We were working with a liason in the states who touted Gap experience and pull with a factory who was rich with Disney experience. As simple as this project was, it was a complete shock when the complete Stuf shipment arrived and only 25% of it could be sold. Yeah. While the samples they sent for approval were great, the final dolls were misprinted, sewn terribly, and…grimy. It looked like they ran the fabric over with a greasy forklift before sewing them. Not to ruin the story, but it’s important to expect the best and plan for the worst. No matter how much you try to avoid trouble, it’s inevitable in one way or another. 

But as they say, the show must go on. We had to really make sure our sellable 25% s-o-l-d. So we kept to our plan and did something you’d think we would have rethought considering the circumstances. I’ve written about how we built a snooty art brand for Stuf to live under. It was like a high-end art gallery that was only open by appointment and never answered the phone or returned calls. Hilarious and, as it turned out, hilariously effective. Stuf would soon be sold in major art museums across the country from SF MOMA to NY MOMA (you can see the complete list here).

Stuf sold through that first terrible shipment and we were able to find a new factory to make a disaster-free second round. Encouraged by Stuf’s success, we designed Stuf backpacks and we added hand-made wood and canvas backdrops for playtime with each Stuf family. OMG, the trade show booth that I designed for Stuf is still one of the best booths I’ve ever done. But that’s a whole other story.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Make a Fan Happy.

Design > Promotional Merchandise

I love music. Always have. I’m a big power pop fan, and I like going to shows. It’s kind of hard living in Mooresville because not a lot of bands get near here (it’s getting better, thank God, but still). So when a band I like DOES find its way to Charlotte, I’m there. And the first place I go when I get there is the merch counter because I’m looking for a t-shirt or something to support the band (even the big acts). It’s always so disappointing. It all just sucks so bad. Same with bars I like (except my favorite in SF). Or breweries. Look, a logo on a shirt is fine (if the logo is half decent), but what about something that captures the spirit of the place? You know, a little extra credit for the fans?

FINAL: I made the first round of Downtown Mooresville t-shirts do more than early adopter fans, but to clothe volunteers at events and hand out to Downtown supporters in Town Hall.

Every time I have to work on promo merch I think about that. The first shirts we designed for Downtown Mooresville were ads. They had to be, because we didn’t have fans yet and most of these shirts were going to be worn by volunteers handing out our Downtownie Passports or directing folks to the bathroom at events. Merchants would get them for free to wear around Lake Norman during their off hours. So we made them in Downtown’s bright-ish orange so that they’d be SUPER visible. Even the sushi place, which still kept pushing their rogue name (DoMo) after the branding began (grrrrr) framed our first T-shirt and hung it in a prominent place. (How could we be mad at them?). I wrote a post about taking advantage of every opportunity and, please, if you ever get a project like this, give it the full force of your thinking. Because this little T-shirt will not only represent your brand, but will also project it to LOTS of people who don’t know it. And just know that a person bothering to wear it LOVES your brand! So why not do them a solid?

FINAL: The second round of Downtown Mooresville shirts featured cooler (not a bright orange!) colors and our nifty logo that was, by this time, pretty well known.

The second go around at the Downtown merch was a little different. We finally had fans! Hahaha. So we finally printed on hipper colors and showcased the logo (it looked sharp). They sold! Then we started making pint glasses and wine glasses. All the best Downtown bars and restaurants had ‘em for sale, and the Downtown Commission raised a tent at every event which was fully stocked with glasses, brochures and the T-shirts. It’d be super easy to just pop a logo on a glass, so of course we didn’t do that. We made them fun little ads. At one point, and I think this idea came from one of our merchants, we made bar coasters for Downtown. Of course we stocked up all the Downtown restaurants, but cunningly, someone got them passed out to bars on the Lake Norman side of town - and they used them! THEY WERE ADVERTISING DOWNTOWN IN THEIR COMPETITIVE BARS AND RESTAURANTS. I can’t believe I don’t remember who did that, because THEY are the true marketing geniuses.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How Packaging Can Set the Stage.

Design > Packaging

Mysterio’s product is super unique. And as I mentioned, things people have never seen before are hard to package. Mysterio tells you your baby’s future on a little t-shirt. There are 12 possible futures (all party safe), and each is sealed up in this bag so that it’s a surprise when you open it. Back in 2006, I didn’t think I had to explain that last part – what with blind box toys getting more and more popular each year. But trust me, the average consumer STILL needs all of this explained to them. Sigh. I’ll share some business and behavioral lessons we learned as I go.

FINAL: Mysterio’s packaging had to do SO MUCH. Tell you what it was, what it did, what the possibilities were, what the guarantee was, where it was made, who made it, and even how to open the goddam thing,

Anyhoo, that’s a lot of work for a little muslin bag! Which is why the whole front of the bag is the product description. The back? All support, no filler. Build up the experience while explaining the experience. We did this for another reason, too – the end user experience. If you haven’t been to a baby shower, here’s how it works. There’s a lot of games and chit chat and cake and such, and then everyone gathers around to watch the mom-to-be open her gifts. When she gets to Mysterio, she’ll likely read the bag out loud before opening it. Therefore, she’ll be explaining to everyone exactly what to expect while building anticipation. Show time!

And this is why, at first, we didn’t list the futures on the bag. We printed the on the wood display so that when Mysterio’s t-shirt was given, nothing would lead the giftee (or her audience) to think their surprise future would be more funny than aspirational. Good idea for the consumer, bad idea for our bottom line. Why? Because on our next reorder from the factory, we decided to freshen up the futures. But we still had a ton of displays. So that meant printing new lids for everyone who already had displays. Woof.

FINAL:And this is Mysterio’s packaging from way back in 2006. Lots of lessons learned along the way! This was when we tried to make the bag easy to open by just pulling the top string (big mistake) and relied on a lot of copy to get the story across (big mistake; no one wants to read).

The first bag was also easier to open. On the first two rounds of production, all you had to do was pull a red string to open it (like a bag of charcoal or dog food). For dramatic effect, we wanted to make the opening act (see what I did there?) was as seamless as possible. We didn’t want to interrupt the mood we’d built up by having someone run off to find scissors, leaving everyone in awkward silence until they returned. This, however was a big mistake – for retail stores. Why? Because their customers were opening all the bags, searching for the future they liked the best. What the fuck is wrong with people? One store watched Puff Daddy’s personal chef do that, but at least he paid for all the ones he opened before he left. Anyway, we got tired of paying to re-sew all the bags closed. So now, you gotta have scissors at the ready to open it.

Speaking of construction, the pinked edges of the bag were designed to give it a roughness. Sort of an economical, controlled fraying. Oh, and while we always offered the wood display, some stores decided the display wasn’t worth the nominal fee and made their own thing (which usually translates to standing them up in a basket where no one will see them). Then they complain the shirts aren’t selling (which never happens), so they finally buy a display, and then they sell through their stock. But still, we wanted to give options. That’s why we eventually added the brass grommet up top. So if stores really didn’t want or have room for the display, they could at least hang it on a peg on a wall slat, and the front of the bag can do it’s job. Options are always good. It costs more to do, but didn’t detract from the product and it enhanced its sellability.

COMPS: Two bad ideas. Megastore Buy Buy Baby wanted to try Mysterio out, but didn’t want the wood display. That’s when we had to start thinking about alternate solutions. This on the left was the quick fix to make it work with inventory we already had. Oh, and we felt like we had to dumb the paper hanger down A LOT for a mass market (which would still be true today). Workable, but I like the grommet we did later better. And on the right is a quick fix for our displays when we changed up the futures. Not a bad solution, but not an ideal long-term one.

Let’s talk about extra credit. I say, it’s for chumps. Here’s a good example. When we switched to scissor-open-bags, I wanted to add something to add some stability. It always sort of bothered me that the bag was so floppy and light. I know, it only held a tiny folded t-shirt, but still. I also didn’t want people cutting through the t-shirt while opening the bag (see, I was learning!), so I added a thick cardboard card with an outrageous guarantee. If Mysterio’s future wasn’t correct by the time the child was 70, you could return it for a full refund. Funny, but not to our lawyer. At least until I showed him the legalese attached to the guarantee:

*Claims must be submitted with original receipt and the allegedly inaccurate garment upon which Mysterio’s prediction must be legible. Substituted garments will void this offer (besides, Mysterio will know you were trying to trick him). Claims shall also include a facsimile of child’s birth certificate, complete grade school transcripts and college transcripts (if applicable). Please also include an essay by the child, in his or her own words explaining the circumstance of his or her failure to achieve the destiny predicted by Mysterio detailing any conflict of personal hopes and/or dreams. As all claims will occur in the distant future, before submitting your claim, please consult a psychic or other such mystic for information regarding Mysterio’s whereabouts. Reimbursement will consist solely of the garment’s original purchase price minus sales tax and minus any delivery fees Mysterio shall incur. If said fees exceed the refund amount, you will receive an invoice from Mysterio of the balance owed to him by you. Invoice will be payable immediately. Failure to remit payment will result in dream-state visitations to the claimant by Mysterio until the balance is settled. By reading this agreement you promise to see the futility in filing a claim and to realize that it’s perhaps easier to go ahead and just fulfill Mysterio’s prediction by doing what he said you’d do.

Fun little extra spice to add, right? Nah. It added a new vendor to production, drove up the manufacturing cost, and in the end I don’t think anyone really cares. Maybe it was just too much. Like a smart friend of mine is fond of saying, “It’s a joke on a joke”. Unnecessary. We’re heading into our 10th reorder of Mysterio shirts, so if you want one with a guarantee, you’d best order one now before they’re gone. Hahaha.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Expand a Magical World.

Design > Product

I’ve said before that your packaging is as much the product as the product is. This is another example of how true that is. If you don’t know, Mysterio makes a baby t-shirt that can predict your child’s future. Kelly and I had just published a children’s picture book about Mysterio and we were looking to expand his product line. Mysterio was always more of a gift for parents than a gift for baby. Sure, the baby got a shirt. But the parents, the baby shower guests and the gift-giver, all got a fun, memorable experience. So why not develop more experiences for them

FINAL: BEHOLD! Mysterio’s Deluxe Keepsake Chest! An expansion of the Mysterio infant t-shirts that predict your baby’s future. It was so fun to play in this sandbox from a design and illustration standpoint. Almost too fun. In the end I made way too much stuff for it. Made it a little hard to explain all the contents!

That’s where Mysterio’s Keepsake Chest came from. It was a deluxe collection of Mysterio’s baby shirt, his book, two fun games, a wooden top, and a paper craft. Over the years, customer feedback told us that people really did keep Mysterio’s shirts once their baby’s grew out of them. How fun to see if the future would eventually come true! So one of the games we developed predicted more specific events – Milestones. At the bottom of the box lies the game board and a heavy card filled with milestones. Spin the top and name a milestone. When it stops, it will point to the age at which the child will reach that milestone. Write it down on the card. Easy! The fun part is discovering that your child’s first haircut will happen at 58 years of age. Yes, all silly, good fun at a baby shower. Flip the game board over, and you’ll find that Mysterio will answer any YES or NO questions you have. Again, ask the question, spin the top, get Mysterio’s answer.

FINAL: SEE?! TOO MUCH STUFF! The tag on the outside had a list of contents (as brief as I could make it), but it still read like a novella. The game board that’s flipping up? That’s two games on one board. Of course it comes with a one of Mysterio’s signature baby t-shirts and his new picture book.

FINAL: A close up look at the Ask-O-Meter! Think of it as a flat, paper, much sassier Magic 8-Ball. I’ve got one of these in our living room and we use it all the time to make YES or NO decisions for us. I like how a lot of the answers end up being sort of confusingly ambiguous/

FINAL: The flip side to the Ask-O-Meter is a fun way to record when your baby will meet their major development milestones. What’s so funny is how horribly wrong Mysterio’s predictions get. First Tooth could be at 51 years, for example. Hilarious.

FINAL: There’s even a little papercraft Mysterio that you can pop on a shelf to keep a mystical eye out for baby. I like the extra credit (which I always say is for chumps) of printing a back to the paper Mysterio complete with all the instructions reversed as well. And here’s a shot of me tying up a box to ship out. I’d do 100 of these at a go and it KILLED my fingers. The things you do for art.

I think my favorite part of the whole thing was the clever packaging. We stuffed the box with wood excelsior so it looked all wild and exotic. We even slid the lid closed to leave some of the curly fill sticking out because it looked so cool. And just like we did on his baby shirt packaging, we let the lid be pretty simple and straightforward. We used a paper tag to really detail all the info. But even the tag was cool because, as the gift-giver, you could clip off the contents part and be left with a nice gift tag to fill out. Then, the giftee could discover the contents on their own. Also, it looked WAY not-commercial that way, too. Oh, and to keep people from getting into the box in stores (I already learned they would try), I wrapped each one with heavy rope and fastened it tight with heavy black wire. It killed my hands (yes, I wrapped them all myself), but it was totally worth it.

When baby was too big for Mysterio things, the whole kit and kaboodle could be stored away in Mysterio’s handsome wooden chest. Someday, far in the future, the child would find it, and have a good chuckle.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to See If People Like What You Make, Then Be OK If They Don’t.

Design > Product

This is really weird. But it was supposed to be, so I achieved what I set out to do. I’d been working on a lot of really fun but intense projects that all sort of ended at the same time, so I felt I needed to stretch my legs a little and do something for me. So I decided that thing was to make some fun stickers. The thought was that I’d make sheets of bizarrely themed stickers and then turn the best ones into postcard sets, and then canvas bags, and then...you get the idea. I’d take everything I knew about what gift stores are buying today and illustrate my own odd little brand to offer folks.

FINAL: The idea behind Mr. Dave’s Best Stickers in three photos. A sheet of weirdly themed stickers. Which you could peel off and put to equally weird uses to delight your family, friends and co-workers. A genius product that was way before it’s time.

FINAL: I was especially pleased with how the back turned out. Yes. I wrote the copy all by myself.

FINAL: Oh, there were all kinds of topics. I could go on forever. But fate had different plans!

Kids! Hahaha...I love kids. My friends’ kids all call me Mr. Dave (I live in the South, you know) and I think it’s hilarious so that’s what I called my line. I went for a retro look to offset the not-retro-at-all themes. Sort of a brand subterfuge to make people think they’re about to see something really sweet and wholesome and then it turns out to be stickers of cats pooping.

I put a challenge to myself to do, like, 30 full sheets to prove that the idea had legs. I wanted to make sure that I didn’t get bored halfway or feel like I was running out of ideas. That ended up being over 150 individual drawings! So I took 5 sheets that best represented the line and them printed in China on the cheap. I thought I’d test out the concept on Etsy while running them past a bunch of gift boutiques. I quickly found that, um, people don’t come to Etsy to buy stickers, much less stickers of run-over animals (see Roadkill). Great for the unique, bad for strange. Gift stores didn’t know what to think. Hahaha. It was a mess. I don’t know what I was expecting, but no one wanted any part of that shit. They didn’t get the topics or anything. And these are people who’ve known my sense of humor for years. One store asked why it was so old fashioned. What? So I got my stickers into a big box store. Well, one big box store. Cost Plus World Market. The one closest to my house.

FINAL: Actually, there was a sort of categorical plan. Knowing what I know about the gift and greeting card industry, I was able to focus on weird themes in distinct categories: Animals, Fashion & Culture, Food & Drink, Home & Garden, and Health & Fitness.

FINAL: Oh, I also made postcards and posters. You can see more high-brow designs in the illustration category.

Here’s what I did. I went in one day, found some items that were $6.95 (Mr. Dave’s MSRP) and took pictures of their price tags. I went home and printed out the tags and stuck them on the backs of 5 Unicorn Poop sticker sheets and 5 Dead and Dying Succulents sticker sheets. It was just days before Christmas, and World Market had a special little section for unicorn stuff (plush, notebooks, junk like that) and a special little collection nearby of potted succulents. Perfect places to surreptitiously drop my sticker packs and make a hasty retreat.

I returned the next day and found they were not only still hanging there, undiscovered by World Market Employees, but one of the Dead and Dying Succulent sticker sheets had sold! So I kept going back whenever I was in the neighborhood or needing more Hoi Son Sauce, and the selling proved to be slow going. After a few months they took down those special little displays. I thought that was the end of my experiment, but I found my stickers had simply been moved to another part of the store. I kept checking back periodically and was sorry to see that the savvy World Market shopper was really not interested in Unicorn Poop stickers. I hadn’t sold any. But there were only 2 left of the succulents. Yay? What’s weird is the stickers never made it to the Clearance shelves. I’d have been so sad if they had, but they just continued to be repositioned around the store. At month seven, I couldn’t find them anywhere and thought, “Oh, well, it was fun while it lasted.” But the next day my wife sent me a picture showing they’d been moved up to the checkout impulse racks – just three Unicorn Poop sheets hanging below the gluten-free gum and salted licorice from Norway.

FINAL: The great World Market experiment. On the left is where I left my Dead and Dying Succulents stickers and on the right the sad aftermath months and months later. Just a couple Unicorn Poop stickers left!

I’m so sorry, I don’t think I have a point here. Hahaha. I guess it’s that when something doesn’t work, try and learn what you can from it and move on. Or make a quasi-illegal game out of it to keep yourself amused while you go on to the next adventure.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Make an Efficient, Effective First Impression.

Design > Website

Web design is a discipline that I can’t say is a focus of mine. BUT! And this is, as the kids say, a big but – I can do it, and do it pretty well. Case in point, the project I did to rebrand American Greeting Properties (AGP). They had confidence problems and we “re-skinned” them to fix it. The backbone of that effort was their website. Look, a website is all about organization and the hierarchy of information. For AGP they needed their homepage to be a gateway to a world of creativity. Their objective wasn’t to collect leads, sell product, or even a service. It just had to inform and make a desired impression. Not to downplay this, there was a LOT of impression to change, in the process. The website also had to tie together a lot of disparate assets and present them under a unified umbrella. So, not easy.

FINAL: The home page for American Greetings Properties.

FINAL: Clicking an area of the map (or in the legend) would bring a pop-up of everything you needed to know about each property.

FINAL: I’d designed and illustrated all the infographics for each properties detail page. This was a ton of work, but also a ton of fun.

FINAL: Here’s what clicking ABOUT US would bring you.

FINAL: How mobile would work along with a little secondary navigation idea that didn’t make it. Once the island drawing was finalized, I made a topographical rendering of it complete with a handy chart of who lived at what elevations. Hahaha.

I worked with an internal team who included a developer, so whatever I designed was sure to be actually possible to create. I’m a realist and won’t work under any other circumstances. Who wants to do a bunch of work and have it be impossible to implement? So we all decided on a simple structure. A home page base would present the entire site map (see what I did there?). Clicking a character would bring up a light box panel of information that would deliver everything (plus infographics) they needed to know. We created a format where a LOT of information could be conveyed in the most condensed form possible, without making anyone want to kill themselves. Easy.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Make a Package a Salesperson.

Design > Packaging

If you’re an entrepreneur reading this, let me tell you – packaging is as much the product as the product is the product. VersaMe’s founders had the Starling itself designed to perfection. A powerful wearable in a sleek, cute little device. Even the Starling’s dock was extra-credit handsome. But the product packaging was made before any of the messaging was solidified. So it went the Apple route – sparse and simple. Thing is, the Starling’s tech wasn’t as simple as printing “iPhone” on the lid. It was actually really hard to even explain what the Starling was. In fact, we’d struggle for two years with what to even call it. After all, VersaMe didn’t have the luxury of making their product and being able to say it was finished. Far from it. There were still bugs being fixed like crazy, software updates being slammed through, overseas suppliers to keep on top of, investors to update, and all kinds of other important things going on. I noted this issue with the packaging when I started working on the Starling’s Kickstarter launch, but it wasn’t high on my priorities for practical reasons (it was only sold online initially). Remaking the packaging is expensive and time-consuming and really wasn’t what anyone wanted to hear just weeks before the big launch.

FINAL: Packed full of useful info about both the product and the problem it’s meant to solve for you’re little one. Oh, and the asterisk in the headline? We were always extremely careful to not overpromise the product benefit and instead of walking back such a statement (which was scientifically true and proven anyway), we turned it to our advantage by referencing the study and pointing people to learn more at the VersaMe online research center I had built.

Eventually we’d get feedback on the current packaging that would push it up to the top of my list. The buyer at Barnes and Noble looked at the box and said flatly, “It’s not ready yet.” And she wasn’t all wrong. The product was good to go but the packaging would never sell it without someone standing there explaining it to you. I went to our local B&N and took a ton of photos of where the box would live. I even even snapped a few existing Starling boxes which I placed on the shelves to show the gang back at VersaMe how they really got swallowed up. These are important steps that should A) be implemented before you even start sketching ideas for a package, and B) demonstrate to a client why their current packaging isn’t working.  We all agreed it was missing a lot of curb appeal so how could we compete there?

BEFORE: The Starling product was beautifully designed. But no matter how beautiful a product is, if it comes in a box, the box is also the product. And it needs to sell the product. The Starling box was simple and clean, but really didn’t communicate the importance and benefits of the product inside.

COMPS: Look, no one wants to redesign their packaging, no matter how much they know they have to. I started from the ascetic they wanted to achieve to begin with – clean and simple, only with a lot more info about what this special wearable is and can do. Even still, the best description we had for the thing that’s never existed was the confusing, “Wearable Word Counting System”. Because, still, what the Hell is that?

COMPS: The Starling’s value proposition was more compelling (at first glance) than “Wearable Word Counting System”. I added a lifestyle shot of an existing older-than-newborn baby to define the category and the big shocker of a proposition to attract any shelf-browser’s attention. Shown here are color and side panel variances.

COMPS: Yep, the back of the box. Everything had to work so hard and this was working the hardest. So many points of value for this product. Too much? Well, I don’t see how you could leave anything out with a product so full of important benefits.

It wasn’t just a matter of being louder or bigger, or more obnoxious and loud. The new package had to be true to our product, be informative, and be compelling to our audience. It also had to be inexpensive to produce and easy to switch out. Telling our story took a long time and was necessarily layered. So I went unconventional. I didn’t lead with an illustrative lifestyle photo of the Starling in action. If a picture says a thousand words, it still wasn’t enough to explain the Starling. Besides, they had already done that. I didn’t lead with a giant product shot (Pretty but what is it?), or our logo (no one knew who we were). Instead, I screamed our proposition – Loud and proud. If it took time to get people to understand the Starling, then I needed to get their attention first. Then I’d use bullet points, diagrams, eye candy, and short captions to educate them quickly.

In the end it worked. Kind of. For the Starling, typical rules of packaging just didn’t work, so I got to break them all – which was fun. Think of this the next time your project isn’t working the way it’s supposed to. Maybe you need to tackle it from a different angle.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Make the Complicated Simple.

Design > Brochures

Every client is different, and every marketing problem is different. But sometimes (although rarely) you don’t have to reinvent the wheel all over again. If something works, heck, keep it! I already had a brochure-making system that worked and I already made a bookshure (I really need a better name) for VersaMe’s Starling Partners program. It was a cool idea that worked great, so we kept all the physical formatting (same size, dimensions, heavy cover and nice page weight) for the next project. Besides, if you have to do multiple brochures for a company, you might as well build a library that looks uniform and tight when they’re all together.

FINAL: The name and logo I created for VersaMe’s platform came directly from how it worked. Also, Spoke’s not a bad name for a company that’s all about verbal communication, right?

The Starling was VersaMe’s early-education wearable. You can read all the deets here, but in short, The Starling was based on a super advanced platform that VersaMe created called Spoke ( I named it that based on the eventual infographics). The Starling logged data about an infant’s early-developmental progress and sent it to Spoke. Spoke would process that data and send it (along with recommended action items) to the parent and any parent-approved care givers. For consumers, the data usually just went to parents, grandparents or a nanny. But if parents wanted, they might also include their pediatrician. If an infant is a little short on direct verbal communication, their parents and the pediatrician would recognize that and, at the regular visit, they could figure out ways to improve that outcome together. Think of it like an educational thermometer that parents could share with their pediatrician.

Anyway, that’s it’s simplest version of how VersaMe’s Spoke platform works. Spoke was developed to sustain the maximum amount of early development team building. Unlike so many of today’s algorithms, this one wasn’t built to exploit user data to deliver relevant advertising. Spoke was built to deliver relevant, actionable educational opportunities to a team of caregivers in the development network the parents created, in order to meet their child’s specific needs. Cool, right? And that’s what this brochure had to explain to an audience that wouldn’t want to get into the coding weeds about exactly how that was even possible. Investors, partners, etc. just wanted to know the basics of how Spoke worked and what its potential was. 

And I made up everything you just read. Sort of. Mostly. Look, although Spoke’s functionality was clear for the founders and developers (so they could build it), no one ever really defined it in a way regular people would understand. Even though I’d made a name for myself making complex stuff simple, I was lucky to have the capable help of VersaMe’s Product Manager, Susan Tahir. Together we defined, named, branded, iconically mapped, invented creative uses for, and I can safely say, improved the complicated process that made this Spoke so valuable.

So for the brochure (and this didn’t have to be a brochook): same company; different audience; different product; slightly different look. This had to convey all the existing brand attributes, but send a different message – we were confident, smart, sophisticated, and had created a (truly) amazing platform.

INFOGRAPHICS: I really enjoyed designing the graphics showing how Spoke worked for different users. It’s was crazy complicated and I got it boiled down to an easy-to-follow, step by step guide.

I kept with my favorite system of solving one problem per spread, but this was so targeted, that I didn’t need to go overboard on the eye-candy and repetition. Here’s how this one broke down:

Cover: Sexy and High-Tech.

Spread 1: What we’re doing is a big fucking deal

Spread 2: Look, here’s why it’s amazing for everyone...

Spread 3: ...and here’s how it changes everything

Spread 4: Here’s exactly how it could be used to do this...

Spread 5: ...and this

Spread 6: You’re already behind in this emerging, proven technology

And we’re out. If you’ve seen the other VersaMe stuffs I did (the Partner Brochure, or the videos, or even the packaging) this a similar example of taking existing materials and jerking the message into new territory without having to recreate everything.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Not Make a Brochure a Brochure.

Design > Brochures

I was recently in a meeting with a CEO who was newly hired by a long time client (not VersaMe). He didn’t have the history on what lousy shape the marketing had been in before I started helping to pull it together. He mentioned his desire to increase B2B sales and I told him we’d recently finished a brochure for just that purpose. The CMO handed it over to him, and he leaned back and flipped through the brochure for nearly 2 seconds before he tossed it on his desk and said, “Well, this is table stakes.”

FINAL: The cover of the brochure that wasn’t really a brochure. Or was it? < Insert evil laugh here >

FINAL: Probably the most important spread in the brochook. Publishing information! So important-looking! :-)

I bring this up, not because it was kind of a shitty thing to do and say, but because it says a lot about what a brochure has to do. First, let me say that about a month before his arrival at the company, an old brochure (from before my time) existed. It was missing the logo on the cover. Actually it wasn’t missing, but the logo was the printed in the same color as its background color. So the tag line was visible in white and you could juuuussst barely see the logo if the light was shining on it just right. That CEO was actually lucky to even have table stakes to look at. Hahaha. But to my point – even though he didn’t look at the thing from the perspective of the reader it was designed for, which you should ALWAYS do no matter what C-level you are, he DID give just about the right amount of attention to it.

No one wants to read your brochure. Sorry, they don’t and they won’t. Not all of it, at least. That’s why you’d actually laugh out loud if you read all of a brochure I’ve designed and written. Look, every spread has got to solve one problem. Not page, SPREAD. But you can’t do it all at once, like in one big piece of copy. You’ve gotta boil down the point you want to make to its shortest, most effective form, and then repeat it on the same spread in different forms - pull quotes, diagrams, testimonials, icons, photos, captions. So that no matter what catches their eye as they flip through like that CEO did, something important will stick with them whether they like it or not (or even know it, or not).

FINAL: The first real spread is all about authority. This book is factual and the information comes from big places and important professionals.

All this being said, at VersaMe, we created a really quality piece as a leave-behind/mailer for our new Starling Partners Program. Our audience was libraries, pediatricians, speech language pathologists, pre-schools (public and private), teachers, and non-profit organizations. These people, who already knew the importance of early-education, were seeking out emerging technology that could: help their missions; keep them relevant; and in some cases, keep them well funded. This brochure assignment turned out to be my favorite ever because I decided I wasn’t going to make a brochure at all. Instead, I wrote a BOOK about the problems the reader faced. And midway (SPOILER ALERT), the Starling would appear as a fantastic example of what was available to solve those problems.

Because VersaMe were experts on early-education (true), and what we had to say in here was important (also true), we had to make this brochure (bookchure? brochook?) look important. That’s why I wrote it in a sort of third-persony way and even added publishing info to the title page (sometimes it’s the littlest things that do the most work for you).

FINAL: Second spread is empathetic. We know your struggle is real.

FINAL: AH! Third spread and we final get to the Starling. But still talking about it as if we had nothing to do with it until the second sentence of the copy.

As a side-note, VersaMe had always wrestled with a minor identity crisis. They had only one SKU, the Starling, so did they really need the VersaMe name? Was it confusing? Should they just call the company Starling? It didn’t make since to have an umbrella company until you’ve got more kids to put under the umbrella. Still, always plan for success. Who knows when those new products would come (turns out not very long, after all). So in this case, using VersaMe as the author and publisher of this book, and Starling as the example solution late in the story, actually helped define the company/product name hierarchy for us. And it was just good theater.

Anyway, here’s how I broke down the spreads before designing it:

Cover: Looks like a book from a research company. I see someone who looks like me and what’s that cool star thing?

Spread 1: This information we’re giving you is as legit as these researchers, respected people, and institutions.

Spread 2: Your job is super hard, we get it.

Spread 3: There’s a thing called the Starling that will seem like a miracle to you.

Spread 4: The data you could get from something like the Starling could finally prove what you do is effective.

Spread 5: Organizations are already using this Starling thing.

Spread 6: Something as helpful as the Starling is easy to set up.

Spread 7: Look at these smart smarties who are helping your peers.

Spread 8: This is all it takes to solve your problem. Not scary or complicated at all.

FINAL: Reading left to right, spreads 4-8

And there you go. I mentioned above that no one wants to read a brochure. But people like reading books. Even thin-ish, square paperback books that give the right reader true, helpful information that they’re interested in, delivered in a way that welcomes them to learn about a very real solution to the problems they have while trying to help their communities to raise their children right.

Remember that dismissive CEO from before? It wasn’t two minutes after he tossed my brochure on the table before he snapped it back up and flipped straight to the spread touting  friendly, knowledgeable professionals. Pointing to the feature photo of his IT Manager, he asked, “How’d you get him to smile? I’ve never seen a head of IT look that happy.”

Boom.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Say Everything in a Small Space.

Design > Street Banners

Every piece I do has got to work its ass off, and the street banners for Downtown Mooresville were no exception. With street banners, you don’t have a lot of room. And it’s outdoor, so your copy’s gotta be super brief. Which made this an excellent challenge to support our Downtown message: It’s Happening Downtown. I’ve told you about all the events the Downtown Commission created to pull in traffic, but we also had to prove this wasn’t all about events. Downtown looked empty when I started working on it. There were BIG gaps between open businesses. Lot’s of newspaper covered windows, know what I mean? We really needed to promote the events, but also the business that were already there. And there were quite a few of them (you just couldn’t really tell). And that’s why I did what I did on these banners. I listed all the types of shops and services that were ready and available right this second. It didn’t hurt that Main Street is also Highway 152. So a lot of traffic is coming from somewhere else, going somewhere else. But what a great message for passers by, either on foot or in cars. Downtown actually has a lot to offer.

FINAL: The first round of street banner I did for Downtown Mooresville told a story up and down the street – Downtown is full of business!

COMPS: This is an idea we presented for the second round of banners, when occupancy was WAY up and people knew there was fan to be had in Downtown Mooresville. In fact, we even had a joke campaign that mostly complained how there wasn’t any parking available Downtown.

FINAL: In the end we went with more festive, shorter messaging to reinforce the things you could do (and probably are already doing) while you’re Downtown.

After a while it was time for a refresher. Downtown had blossomed. In fact, things were booming everywhere in Mooresville. And that meant competition. Now, I’ve told you about the situation with Lake Norman. Well all those Mooresville shopping mall / apartment complex combos butting up against all those Best Buys and Applebees were vying to become the lake-side’s version of Downtown Mooresville. And, I kid you not, one giant development, just one exit down the I77, had plans to rename their micro-city from Langtree at the Lake to...wait for it...Downtown Mooresville. Ehem, but fuck them. Needless to say, that didn’t go far. But we did see the need to claim our rightful ownership of being the Heart of Downtown Mooresville. And so we did. :-)

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Make Everything Come from One Place.

Design > Posters

Before we started working on the branding, Downtown Mooresville had just scheduled an exhausting number of events to draw traffic. Cruise-ins, Art Walks, Food Trucks, Farmer’s Markets, so many events. At some point the Executive Director of the Downtown Commission and I likened the Downtown Commission to a corporation that runs a mall. All the vendors can be themselves in the mall, with their own advertising and signage and what not. But if they did any advertising, they’d do well to include the Downtown logo. Because that’s where people could find their shop. Look, tell me the actual address of your local mall. Right? Or neighborhood even!? The same thing goes for the events. They were all wildly different, but at least now, they could identify as being held in this “mall”.

Anyhoo, I’ll shut up and throw a bunch of Downtown posters at you now. Enjoy!

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How and When to Use Restraint.

Design > Logos

Sometimes the solution to a problem is right in front of your face. Downtown Mooresville is the birthplace of Mooresville, NC. You can honestly say the train delivered it. Incorporated in 1891, the town began with a railroad depot where farmers would load their cotton. Many of the buildings that sprang up soon after are still here in a little 2 x 3 block area that straddles the rails which still see a freight engine once a day. Only now, it loads grain from the mill on North Main Street. One block down from the depot (not the original, due to a fire, but still charming) are the ruins of Mill #1 where cotton was spun. Further south is the massive mill complex that would replace it - Burlington Mill. I’m telling you all this because that’s the kind of charm Downtown has. It’s not fancy, but it’s not dull. It’s historic as gangbusters, but not famous. It seeps potential. Heck, it’s why I moved from SF to live a couple of blocks from it.

FINAL: Here’s where Mooresville started – at the train depot. It was a simple farming town and Downtown Mooresville still reflects it’s historic railroad heritage.

While Downtown had been here for over a century, about 85% of new residents (those living among all the Super Targets, Red Robin’s, and Chipotle’s near the lake) had no idea Downtown existed. Seriously. They just never thought about turning right when they got off the freeway on their way home from Charlotte. On the Downtown side, people knew it was there, but there was an identity vacuum. Downtown was at about 40% business occupancy where we started. The merchants who were slugging it out were desperate to increase traffic as they saw a boom beginning to happen down in Charlotte. NoDa (for North Davidson), Dillworth, Plaza Midwood – these were old neighborhoods that were becoming hipster hot spots. A smattering of coffee shops and breakfast dives moved into the 50’s and 60’s era gas stations and whatnot in these mainly residential neighborhoods – and they were getting buzz. It was where the cool people hung out. Mooresville merchants thought...“Downtown needs cool people. So we need a cool name.”

“The Dirty Mo’” and “DoMo” (see what they did with that one?) were big favorites among them. In fact, the sushi place made shirts and stickers and was running full steam with their “DoMo” idea, whether anyone agreed with it or not. Look, having a cool name is great. I’m a big fan. But when people don’t even know you exist, it can work against you. Take DoMo. What the fuck is that? Run with that and you’ll 100% have to explain it in the tag line. “DoMo. In Downtown Mooresville!” Two wasted opportunities to identify yourself. No, if you have to start from chapter 0, then do the work and call yourself what you are – Downtown Mooresville. Oh, and no one had ever used a capital D when writing the word Downtown in copy before. We told them to start. It’s a destination, so treat it like one. Always. Anyway, even though we’d name Downtown what it already was, we’d do something important with the logo – we’d lead with the tagline and use the name as support.

FINAL: See? Same hardware store as 100 years ago, but now we have people who run for fun. I think they call it “exercise”. The logo still suits the atmosphere, no?

The logo itself was inspired by old railroad signage from historic photos of Downtown. If you’re thinking, “oooh, big idea using railroad graphics for a railroad town”, think again. The big money Lake Norman side has a freeway, a lake and Five Guys Burgers and Fries. We’ve got the railroad and the 104 year old hardware store. Work with what works best for your message. This is how you build an historic rail district. And if you’re still miffed about the railroad imagery, get ready to be more miffed. The font I used was called Railroad Gothic. You know, sometimes the best idea is the obvious one.

FINAL: I used these images when I presented the final logo to the Downtown Commission. Even though it’s simple and historic, the logo had to be able to live in a variety of modern situations that’ll likely come Downtown. Clothing stores, restaurants, nightlife, events of all kinds…the logo had to be able to support all that and keep it’s sense of place.

I used black and white for the logo, and as an accent, the red-orange that was predominant in the bricks of our historic buildings (it stood out like gangbusters in advertising). Then I locked it all up nice and neat with the tag line, and tweaked the perspective on the whole thing to give it a little motion. Sort of like you’re passing through town and seeing it from the train window, painted on a brick building (yep, Downtown’s got a lot of old advertising murals, too).

Oh, I almost forgot. The tag line itself is the best part. It was one of the biggest lies I’ve ever told (professionally). There was certainly nothing going on Downtown. But there’s would be. The Downtown Commission was gearing up for their first big flight of non-stop events and we were cranking out supporting materials like crazy to get people to go to them. We had no idea that it would take less than a year for our big lie to become the absolute truth.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Make a Brochure About Something That Doesn't Exist Yet.

Design > Brochures

Downtown had a brochure before I started working with them. In fact, they had too many brochures! Hahaha. There was one they had made, the Mooresville Historic Preservation Commission (HPC) made one also (without asking, even), and I think the local newspaper made their own for some reason. So when we finished all the strategy and identity stuff, I sat down to straighten all that out. Gotta say, it wasn’t like the HPC didn’t have any business in promoting Downtown. There was plenty of history to talk about Downtown. In fact, I even ended up using some of their stuff (I’d later become the Chairman of the HPC). It’s just that everyone (and everything) had to work together.

FINAL: The first brochure I did was so simple in the end. But it took a lot of work to define and visualize a Downtown Mooresville that didn’t quite exist in the way we were describing it.

BEFORE: A look at the existing situation before I got started on rebranding Downtown Mooresville. Clockwise from top left: 1. The many co-existing brochures of Downtown Mooresville. 2.-4. This is literally 90% of photography that existed of Downtown. People’s backs and empty streets. 5.-10. The real Downtown Mooresville. Lots of empty storefronts.

I mentioned before that “It’s Happening Downtown” was a big fat fib-a-roo. At least in the short term. Lots of events were planned for Downtown, but for the brochure, I couldn’t wait for them to roll into existence. I had to prove the lie immediately, while occupancy in Downtown Mooresville was at an major low. Also there were no photos in their photo bank to use. Just a few random shots of people’s backs. Man, thinking back on it, I was pretty screwed. Hahaha.

First I found myself a local photographer (the talented Jeremy Deal) via the frame shop owner on Main Street and off we went to try and hustle up some visual happenings. It was hilarious. Downtown was so D-E-A-D. And it’s not like we could go hire a bunch of models or crowds. The little girl on the cover is Jeremy’s daughter. The guy walking by the hardware store is my neighbor and eventual Mayor of Mooresville and his daughter. They happened to be passing by so we pressed them into service. The couple walking by the train depot? Friends of mine. In the end we did a pretty decent job of faking a lively (or at least sparsely populated Downtown). Take a look at that list of events. SO MANY! We really tried to segment the information as much as possible so at a skim, you got what we were gettin’ at.

FINAL: We pulled our new street banners through to the inside of the brochure, proving there were plenty of interesting businesses open for business in Downtown Mooresville. I was glad when we finally dropped the individual listings in favor of supporting Downtown as a richer, more engaging destination.

One cool thing we did was a simple map insert for the brochure. We’d heard this story from the old hardware store: when people were done shopping there, they’d ask, “Is there someplace I can grab a bite?”. They’d tell ‘em where to go, but who knows if they ever found the place. Turned out this was a common occurrence at most all the businesses. So we gave these maps to every shop Downtown and they’d circle where they were on the map, and the location of what the customer was looking for. Just like at a resort. And then those folks would leave with a helpful list of everything they could see and do and buy Downtown. Cool, right?

FINAL: We cobbled together enough for the first brochure, and eventually built our photobank up enough for a major revise. This time featuring way more images of what makes Downtown so amazing. Pictured above is the inside of the second brochure and below are some festival snaps we were able to get throughout the year.

FINAL: When I designed Downtown’s logo I designed it to live in a lot of different situations. But I hadn’t planned on it promoting weddings. I was happy that Downtown’s aggressive bold brand didn’t drown out the sweetness of this brochure’s messaging.

Eventually some of the merchants got together to form a sort of wedding conglomerate. It was such a neat idea. Each merchant had their own offerings for the newly betrothed (hair, makeup, fashion, tailoring, tuxedos, flowers, etc.) and they needed a brochure they could hand out at events they’d host. I mentioned this somewhere else, but getting merchants to work together is next to impossible, so I was super excited for them. I was also excited that they thought to even ask the Executive Director for help! Which was what anyone could do at any time (that’s why the Commission exists), but in the past everyone just went rouge and did whatever. So this was a sign they were not only listening, they were learning. Whew! It was interesting to try and soften our pretty hard-edged, railroad inspired brand to live in such a delicate wedding environment, but I think it turned out pretty well.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Design Way More Than a Loyalty Program.

Design > Logos

This little program we developed solved a whole bunch of problems for Downtown Mooresville. If you want to know the strategic nitty gritty, you can get it here, but I wanted to run though some detail on the actual pieces real quick. Downtown never had any money to spend. So aside from being strategically versatile, the production of the materials had to be super cheap.

FINAL: Logos designed for the Downtownie program. One for each of the three stages of participation.

I knew all this going into Downtown’s logo design and that’s part of why I kept it black and white to begin with. But that came in super handy for the Passport part of this program. I developed a special little passport stamp with a mark featuring the Downtown logo socked into it, and we were off. The Passport had to be cheap to print and durable enough to be carried around in someone’s purse or pocket for a while (while the user collected stickers) and to eventually survive being mailed. So, heavy chip board and one-color printing fit perfectly with the brand and gave it a throw-weight that made it hipster high-design. The stickers?  Avery label sheets (no special die cutting) and an identifying icon for each type of business you’d visit Downtown {event, shopping, food, drink, services}. Oh, and every Passport came with a half-page flyer (economical!) which explained the program to each target audience – Live It (people who lived within walking distance), and Love It (people who loved driving across town to visit).

FINAL: Our award-winning Downtownie program starts here, with a special passport that you’d fill with stickers from businesses and events in Downtown Mooresville.

FINAL: Collect all the stickers and mail your Passport in. You’ll get this fun little package from Mooresville’s Downtown Commission making you an official, card-carrying Downtownie! Complete with a nifty decal for your car.

FINAL: Teamwork makes the dream work. Literally. The back of the Downtownie card told members to look for participating shops via window signs Downtown. Getting a HUGE chunk of Downtown businesses to participate was instrumental to the Downtownie program’s success. The icing on the cake was winning an innovation award from the North Carolina Main Street Center.

The card itself was a very simple thing and I used the Downtown photo collage I built for the website to try and make it look exciting. The back was a hoot to write though. I developed separate logos for both the Downtownie car decal (which you’d receive when you got your card in the mail), and for the merchant window stickers. I wanted the systems logos to look like the kind of logos you’d see attached to a City or State welcome sign. You know what I mean, all the Kiwanis shields and stuff. Sort of official looking. The merchant window clings we did were big, too. As in LARGE. You couldn’t miss ‘em, even from the street. Hahaha. We also made some little register signs in case store employees forgot to tell customers about the program. I really do think we thought of everything.

Downtown Mooresville’s Executive Director still has every Passport that was ever mailed in to her. They’re in a big box in her terrible office (she’ll laugh when she reads that) and she always loved looking through them. There was so much to learn by how people placed their stickers and what they wrote in their passports. Even how they mailed them in was fascinating. One Passport was all but laminated with layered strips of Scotch tape. It was so personal. People really invested time in becoming Downtownies.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Tell a Big Story in a Small Brochure.

Design > Brochures

Brochures are fun. I go on and on about how I like to solve multiple problems with one solution, and this kind of project really gives me the legroom to do that. We had just rebranded Continuum, and they wanted to go after more of their lucrative B2B business. So the first thing I did was get some one-on-one time with the sales team. Look, if you’re creating sales collateral, you have to get the reps involved no matter what. Number one, they’re the ones out there trying to make it work. And if they’re worth their salt, they’ll give you some great insights on how to help them. Number two, if you go off and make something in a vacuum, they’ll have no ownership of the final product and your beautiful work will never leave the box the printer shipped it in.

FINAL: The cover of Continuum’s business brochure. The purpose? Convince businesses that Continuum is a not just a local option, but an unexpectedly capable partner.

Robin and Tyler were great/super helpful. The net of the net was that none of the out-of-town competitors had to do anything to prove their worth. An endless churn of sales people dropped off rate cards and the business just made itself happen. Robin and Tyler had more work to do. A lot more. They had to tell them who Continuum was, and then convince them they were up to the task of handling their business critical services. They had to make a case that having a local provider was actually a really big advantage over going with any of those out-of-town providers. So this was the task. There were two tiers we had to communicate to – small businesses (nail salons, bars, restaurants), and big enterprise accounts (manufacturing, medical offices, business parks). We were budgeted for one collateral piece, for both.

FINAL: The first spread of Continuum’s business brochure introduces them (problem number 1 – who are you people?) as a local provider doing a lot to help local businesses. Lots of eye candy tell essentially this same story over and over (and over and over).

When I do a collateral project, every spread has to solve a problem. So, the number of problems determines the length of your brochure. Every brochure project is different but I tend to tackle each one in the same way – knowing nobody wants to read your brochure. So why do ‘em? Because it’s an excellent, super versatile tool. I’ll get to that in a minute. But really, no one wants to read these things. That’s why in each spread I try to focus on the main problem briefly, then pepper each spread with lots of pullouts, tidbits, graphics, photos and captions. Sometimes all these bits are unabashedly saying the same thing – the point I want you to take away from this spread. In other words, even if you just skim this thing you’ll pick up what I’m putting down. And all of it combines to reinforce the brand as reliable and strong, local and friendly, and more than capable of handling any size job.

FINAL: Second spread, second problem – Continuum may be local, but we’ve got incredibly talented, experienced people running this place. Remember, the logo assignment for this rebrand had to shout RELIABILITY. This spread had to back it up.

FINAL: Ah, this spread is for the big boys. The enterprise business that’s going to have a LOT on the line with any provider. We had to prove we could speak their language. You want to talk about Dark Fiber, Colocation, and Ethernet Transport? Brother, we can talk about that and more all day long.

FINAL: This spread is about not just supporting all kinds of business, but also being involved in the community. Because we’re real, local people.

The fun thing about this too is that when you give it to a small business owner, they see what you’re saying to way bigger customers. It’s sort of comforting to know that, 1) this company can more than handle my business, and 2) should I realize my dreams and expand, this is a provider worth sticking with.

So back to why, if no one’s going to read this, it’s still worth doing. Well, this one piece can be used in a LOT of different ways. The printed version of this piece became a great little book on what and who this rebranded company was. For example:

• The CEO, Board of Directors, commissioners, mayors, town managers and PR folks who had to promote and defend this business could now be on the same page and speak the party line for everyone in the company and all the interested stakeholders

• The sales team could use it as a walk-through of their pitch (which it really was, thanks to their involvement)

• It’s a great quality leave behind, and as a mailing, it’s harder to throw away than, say, a giant rate card postcard. The piece says, “this is a quality piece and you’re worth having it.”

As a PDF it could be used as:

• a sales email attachment

• a free download on our website. Give us your email and we’ll tell you why your local choice is your best choice.

• a free download in a social media campaign

• a free download in a B2B html email campaign

Also, you could enlarge and print each spread to decorate the customer care office. Or hang ‘em up in the conference room. In the end, Continuum didn’t get the brochure they thought they needed. They got a lot more.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Plan for Every Little Thing.

Design > Identity

Here’s how long I’ve been in the business: rebranding projects would start with the logo and follow with the stationery. Hahahahaha! Remember stationery? No? Ahem. Well, it’s still useful. It is! Ok, what’s most useful now is your email signature, and the way your company’s bill looks, and the envelope that carries it. That’s right, the junk drawer of identity. But it’s super important! Because any of those things can be the loose thread in the sweater. Someone in billing gets the idea to pull on a thread and everything unravels. I’m not being dramatic. I’ve seen it happen. Lots.

FINAL: This whole project had to be done as economically as possible for a lot of reasons. So a clean look worked well in more ways than I thought then we got to the fleet graphics. I worked with the wrap company to design these things for maximum gangability in printing.

That’s why we were sure to have plans for the junk drawer stuff when we rebranded Continuum. We wrapped all our rules up in a detailed book of design guidelines so that any other vendor or employee could refer to it if they got the hankering (and preferably, permission) to make some Continuum materials on their own.

Fleet and building signage are far from junk drawer material because they’re so visible, but it’s a specialized use of the new identity. Do you know what it costs to wrap a van? It’s crazy expensive! And Continuum had 60+ various vehicles that needed to be rebranded. So I teamed with the signage company they picked so I could design graphics in a way that would let the printer gang up the job, maximizing the wrap material to its fullest. It helped a LOT to have a clean, white identity, letmetellyou . It was a bear to figure out, but fun at the same time. And guess what? The less wrap material you have on a vehicle, the longer it’ll last. The vans were all stripped and detailed (to get rid of ghosting from the old brand), and redressed in their fancy new graphics. Two years on they still look as good as new.

FINAL: While the building now looks WAY better than it did, I wish the graphic service bands weren’t so boring and straight on the building. I had comps of the bands organically swirling and looping their way across the building, but everyone wanted to play it safe. It also made it cheaper to have it painted. Those blue marks on my mock-up up top are to show stupid town planning that we were complying with a signage code that said we could only use 20% of the buildings surface.

Continuum’s HQ (formerly MI-Connection) was always kind of a dump. Situated in a virtual hole next to a tall railroad berm, you couldn’t really see it from the main road. They’d had a tall pole with a tiny lit rectangular sign atop.  We had to ask Mooresville’s planning department to replace it with something a little taller. They said no. So we tore the sign pole down completely and turned the whole building into a sign. Fuck you, planning! We painted the whole building a bright, clean white which made it WAY more visible to traffic. And the existing architectural lighting made the thing glow like a shiny new Apple store at night. 

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Rebrand a Company and Make Your Trademark Lawyer Happy.

Design > Logos

MI-Connection, our small, local cable, Internet, and voice client, needed to rebrand with a new name and logo that projected authority and reliability. Our competition were all well-known, out-of-town players: Time Warner, Dish, and Windstream – big and personality-less, it was still a no-brainer they could handle your personal and/or professional digital life. Plus, everyone already knew them.

Discovering a name that is appropriate for a business AND sounds super cool is, well, hard. What’s harder is clearing your super-cool-sounding, appropriate name with legal. Obviously, you can’t start with legal, so you have to have fun thinking of a lot of names, knowing that most of them will go straight into your trademark lawyer’s trash can. To help us spread our thinking out, I made a little graph to work to. 

FINAL: Here’s where we finally ended up! I love the branding process because when the thinking is right, and the work is both responsible and good, you can’t lose no matter what logo the client chooses in the end. I had no idea we’d end up here until we suddenly did. Everyone’s input really put a lot of confidence behind the final final because everyone had ownership.

IMPORTANT GRAPH: So simple, yet pretty useful! On the far left you’ll find names like COMNET or TELEWEB. Stuff that you’ll never get legal clearance for. On the far right you’ll have names like NIMBL or ZING. Crazy names that no one would pick for a communications company. What we wanted (and where we’d end up) is to be just to the left of the “Legal Gold” line in the middle.

On the far left are names you’d expect a cable company to be called. On the far right are crazy ass names that don’t mean anything. Now, the further you get to the left, the more legal trouble you’re going to get into. Same as trying to buy a domain nowadays, it’s next to impossible because all the cool stuff is already taken by similar businesses. The more you go to the right, the more you’re clear with legal because at the far end, these words are silly or completely made-up. Tech-startups thrive in this area with all their misspellings and chicanery. We needed to be in the middle-left. We weren’t a crazy little startup. We needed weight, authority, and familiarity. We started with 300 contenders and it was (painfully) narrowed to 10 before we flung them to our amazing attorney. Three survived and after a few rounds of visual concept boards, we had a winner we felt did the job – Continuum. As we saw it, that’s where your digital life thrived – in the Continuum. We were invisibly working to keep you connected to all the extremes in your life – Work and Play, Family and Friends, Sports and News...and everything in between. The only question was, and this is terrible but true, would people be able to read it and say it? It has two “U”’s after all. So we went out and filmed local folks from the three towns reading the word off a card. They did great, the board was convinced, off we went.

COMP: Once a winning name popped out of legal (Continuum), I could get to work designing marks for it. These are from the first round of black and white ideas. Early on we thought we’d need the name to be Continuum Network, so that’s why you see the “N” in some of these. In the end we decided against it. I still like all of these except the pixelated C on the bottom row. The head of tech at Continuum said it looked like bad reception and we said, “Damn. Good point!”

COMPS: A look at some of the logotype ideas we presented. In the end we nixed this direction altogether because I was nervous about ending up with a problem we had with the old MI-Connection logo – it was so long and skinny that it needed to be really big all the time to be legible. Even thought the one on the bottom right is not as long as the rest, it’s complicated with the dots, so same problem.

Continuum’s logo had to do the same thing the name did: project strength and more than a little corporate backbone. It had to look reliable like it’s got big money behind it, but somehow a be a little, I don’t know...quirky? We presented a LOT of logo / logotype options. All in black and white at first so we could concentrate on how their form alone made us feel. Narrow it down to three and add some color for each.Then the favorite color pallet on all three logos. The three go off to legal, and one came out a winner. The C with the radiating, Wi-Fi-like bands wasn’t the most out-of-the-box idea, but man, it worked so hard doing what we needed done. Especially the familiarity part. It doesn’t take a genius to see that phone service isn’t very important to folks, cable is tanking fast, and Internet is still the future. So if you take away anything from this logo, it should be that we supply Internet. But the bands are different colors, and each color represents a service we provide. And those service icons are locked up with our logo. And eventually, after enough exposure, we’d be able to use just the C at times to communicate our brand, which will be kind of cool. 

COMP: Once we decided on a short list of logos, in come the colors, along with some idea of how it would all live in the wild. A word about color – it had a job to do as well. Because the name and logo was corporate and reliable.and the messaging would push “we’re local”, we needed our color palette to be the bridge between those two things. The colors had to say, we’re respectable, but uniquely different.

BEFORE AND AFTER: On the left is the old logo and to the right is the new brand we created, name and all. I’d had to work with the old logo for years and it was such a pain. There were no variations of it. Not even an all-white knocked out version! So everywhere we used it had to be on a super light color and it had to have LOTS of horizontal room if it was going to be big enough to be read. I was sure to design some flexibility in the new brand I created.

COMP: This is how what we now call the “service bands” could work in the future – playfully weaving in out of our ordinary lives. Quietly busy in the background keeping us connected to the things that are important to us.

I mentioned above that in the Continuum was where our digital lives flow. Through this, and the color-coded services, we got a fun little bonus idea: Why not illustrate the services we provide as bands flowing through the air around us? We explored all kinds of fun ways to use this graphic in the ads (you can see those here) and it gave us an extra bit of brand imagery that we could either pull forward or drop back in the future.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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How to Redesign a Logo Without Redesigning a Logo.

Design > Logos

The objective was to “restage” a department of American Greetings (AG). American Greetings Properties wanted a new image, a new website, a fun tagline – the whole shebang. They also wanted a new logo, with one caveat: we couldn’t change the logo. The AG logo had to stay locked up, rose and all, with a very-light-if-not-white background. The good thing about the map/island concept they chose, is that it gave me a lot of visual cues to work with – the most important being the masthead for the maps legend. We’d already had a simple design for the legend bar that would be on the website, so I worked up a bunch of solutions to top it off properly. Locking it up in a structure let me off the hook for having to always keep the background white (or close to it). The logos had to be really simple to match the illustration style I used, so it was sort of painful going through old map books for inspiration and seeing how beautifully designed they could be. I did all of this in 2013, so if it looks a little hipster-familiar today, rest assured it didn’t in 2013. :-)

OPTIONS: So many options! I really rubbed my brain all over how to deal with getting the AGP logo to work as is in the map legend concept. These are just a small sample of what I tried (the row along the bottom) along with what they approved in the end (up top in the final image). I’m pretty happy with the final I think. Less all about being piratey. and a more restrained.

INCIDENTALS: I’m known to proclaim that “extra credit is for chumps”. Because even adding the slightest bit of delight will likely go unnoticed by all. The tiniest bit of extra work will go unrewarded. And no matter how passionately I believe this to be (sadly) the truth today, I can never stop doing extra credit. I guess it’s the Walt Disney fan in me. Here are some bonus lockups I did for AGP, so that when I was off the biz their designers would have some goodies to work with. I also left a bunch of illustration extra credit and you can see all that stuff here.

DAVE SOPP – Creative

Yep, that’s me. I’ve got over 20 years of marketing strategy, graphic design, advertising art direction, and illustration experience. Want to use some of it? Email me at dave@davesopp.com

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