Graphic Design
One look, on everything. Signs, vehicles, print, social tiles and ad artwork for businesses in metro Detroit and across Michigan, designed from one identity, sized for where they will actually be seen, and delivered in the files the sign shop and the printer will ask for.
Talk to usIn short
Everything your Michigan business puts its name on, made from the same identity and sized for the surface: the truck door read from the road, the card read across a counter, the tile read on a phone, and the files that let the trades reproduce all of it.
- Signs and vehicles sized for distance and speed
- Print delivered print-ready, to the printer's spec
- Social and ad artwork that matches the campaign
- Templates your team can edit without breaking the look
Why the look is judged before the words
They decided in a twentieth of a second. Then they read the sign.
Researchers at Carleton University showed people web pages for fifty milliseconds and asked them to rate the appeal. The ratings matched the ones given after half a second, and the ones given with all the time in the world. The look is judged first, and the judgment sticks. At Stanford, when 2,684 people explained why they trusted a site, the look and design came up more than anything it said.
So the job is not a nicer flyer. It is one identity arriving correctly on every surface a customer meets: readable from the road, right on the counter, right on a phone, and delivered in files a sign shop and a printer can reproduce exactly. Then keeping it that way, print run after print run.
Illustrative. The business is invented. The point is one identity arriving correctly on every surface, each sized for where it is seen, and the files that let the trades reproduce it.
- 50 ms
- is enough for a viewer to judge a design's appeal, and the judgment holds when they are given longer
- 46.1%
- of 2,684 people's comments on a site's credibility were about its look and design, ahead of anything it said
Lindgaard, Fernandes, Dudek and Brown, Behaviour and Information Technology, 2006. Fogg, Soohoo, Danielson, Marable, Stanford and Tauber, Stanford University, 2003.
In the work
Signs, print, screens, decks, templates, files
Signs and vehicles
Storefront signs, yard signs, banners, truck doors and full wraps, designed to be read at the distance and the speed they are actually seen from, and delivered to the sign shop's specification so what goes up is what was approved.
Print
Business cards, brochures, door hangers, menus, estimate sheets, invoices, the folder the proposal goes in. Print-ready files with bleed, crop marks and the printer's colour profile, because a file that is nearly right is a reprint.
Social and ad artwork
Templates per platform at the right size, the monthly set of posts and stories, and the ad creative that matches the campaign it runs in. The same identity on a phone screen as on the truck.
Presentations and proposals
The deck, the proposal template, the one-page leave-behind. Built so the person presenting can change the words without breaking the layout.
Templates your team can use
The Tuesday special, the job-site photo post, the price list update. Editable templates in the tools your team already has, locked where the identity must not move and open where the words must.
The files the trades ask for
Vector and print PDF, PNG at every size, the one-colour and reversed versions, the embroidery file, and a one-page guide the sign shop and the printer will actually read. Owned outright, kept in one library.
Getting there
Brief, draft, proof at size, produce, keep
- 01
Brief
Where it will be seen, from how far, by whom, and what one thing they should do next. A truck door and a business card are different briefs for the same identity.
- 02
Draft
Two directions, not ten. Each one already sized for the surface, so the choice is between two things that would work.
- 03
Proof at size
Printed on paper at actual size, or mocked onto a photograph of the truck and the storefront. A design approved on a screen at 20% is approved by nobody.
- 04
Produce
Files to the vendor's specification, the proof checked against them, and the conversation with the printer or the sign shop had by us. The vendor bills you directly and answers to the file.
- 05
Keep
Everything in one library, named so the next piece starts from the last one, and the identity does not drift a little with every print run.
Fitted work
What comes up here, specifically
Read from the road at 45
A sign on Telegraph Road, Woodward or M-59 is read at speed by someone who was not looking for it. Letter height, contrast and the number of words are set from the distance and the speed, not from what fits.
The winter truck
A wrap approved on a white truck in July is seen through grey slush and road salt from November to March. Colours and contrast are chosen to survive the Michigan winter, and the phone number stays readable when the door is dirty.
The Dearborn storefront
A sign in Arabic and English, or Spanish and English, set properly in both scripts by someone who reads them, with the two sharing one hierarchy rather than one being an afterthought under the other.
The fence banner and the booth
The little league outfield banner, the chamber breakfast board, the county fair booth. Small, fast jobs where the vendor's template would have made you look like everyone else on the fence.
Right time when
When this is worth doing
A good fit
- The truck, the card and the website look like three different businesses
- Every print job starts from scratch with whoever is available
- The sign shop keeps asking for a file nobody has
- You have an identity and nothing made with it
Not a fit
- There is no identity yet, in which case the brand page comes first
- You want a logo from a generator, which we will not supply
- Nobody will proof anything before it prints
Scope
What we do not make
Design without an identity
A flyer with no mark, palette or type behind it is a flyer that has to be reinvented next month. If the identity does not exist yet, the brand page comes first, and the graphic design starts from it.
Ship what was not proofed at size
Nothing goes to a printer or a sign shop that has not been seen at the size it will be produced at. The reprint costs more than the proof.
Template logos and clip art
No marks from a generator, no stock icons doing the work of an identity, no filler illustrations. Photographs where a photograph is needed, credited and licensed.
Reasonable to ask
Before you commission it
Do we need a logo before graphic design?
Yes. Everything on this page is made from an identity: the mark, the palette, the type and the rules. If you have one, we start from it. If you do not, the brand identity work comes first, and the first pieces of graphic design ship with it.
Do you handle the printing and the sign shop?
We prepare every file to the vendor's specification, check the proof against it and have the technical conversation with the printer or the sign shop. The vendor bills you directly for the production, so there is no markup hidden in a design fee.
What files do we get?
Vector files, print-ready PDF, PNG at every size, one-colour and reversed versions, the embroidery file where you need one, and a one-page guide for the trades. All of it is yours, kept in one library you can hand to anyone.
Can our team edit the templates?
Yes. Templates are built in the tools your team already has, locked where the identity must not move and open where the words must, so the Tuesday special does not need a designer and does not break the look.
How is this different from brand identity?
Brand identity is the rules: the mark, the palette, the type, how they go together. Graphic design is everything made with them: the sign, the truck, the card, the post, the deck. One is written once; the other is used every week.
Goes with
Where the identity comes from, and where it goes
Send us a photo of the truck and a photo of the card.
And the last flyer, if there is one. We will tell you whether they read as one business, which of the three a customer sees first, and what the first three pieces from one identity would be.
Talk to us