Let us paint you a picture of where we were seven years ago…
Design Bug was nine years old, Kristy was two months pregnant with her second child and Bec was doing the heavy lifting while she suffered from fairly severe morning sickness. The business was thriving but something was missing. We both felt stuck. We’d become designers to unleash our creativity onto the world all while helping people thrive in their own businesses. Idealistic – maybe? We found that we were creating more and more work for corporate clients and although we were getting great results for them, we felt like we were getting lost in their work.
Kristy was lying on a bean bag in the sun reading a business book to make herself feel like she was being somewhat productive while feeling ill. She was clearly searching for something, although unsure of what it was at that point. She read the line – “if making money wasn’t an issue – what would you be doing?”
The business was thriving but something was missing. We both felt stuck. We’d become designers to unleash our creativity onto the world all while helping people thrive in their own businesses. Idealistic – maybe?
Kristy decided Bec also needed a break from the screen, so we took a walk around the corner to a local coffee shop. She posed this same question to Bec – “if money wasn’t an issue – what would you be doing?” We both said in unison (as sisters often do) – “making a magazine”.
The to-do list was huge, overwhelm was high and we would be stepping away from our core-knowledge of design to become publishers. With a hard deadline (baby due date) and an upswing in motivation – we knew that we needed to act now or this would just be another one of those great ideas that went nowhere.
So… how did we do it?
- We strategised. We got clear on our mission, our vision and WHO we were going to be talking to. Was anyone already doing the same thing? If so, what could we do differently?
- We registered our name, purchased domain names and social media handles (and let our accountant in on our new endeavor).
- We created a moodboard to visualise how we wanted the brand to look (we are designers after all).
- We created our logo (knowing this needed to be suitable for a magazine masthead and talk to OUR people).
- We set up guidelines including all our font styles, colours and photographic style so that our internal team and contractors were in alignment from the start.
And we did all that in less than a week. Yep!
Swell Magazine has now been in business for seven years (with 23 Issues under our belt). Design Bug is in its 15th year and we have helped hundreds of businesses take action and create a polished, custom logo and visual brand identity using the same process that we used on ourselves with Swell Magazine.
As graphic designers, we’re never been the type to lock ourselves away in a creative cave. We pride ourselves on building strong client relationships – talking to others inspires us way more than any design book. By that logic, starting a magazine has been the perfect creative outlet, and it’s also given us new perspectives to draw on for our client work.
We’d love to be able to help your business nail your authentic branding in the same way that we did it for Swell (plus, we’ll let you take more than a week, if you wish!) Check out our online courses to use our experience to become the master of your own brand!
