i-tees

Yesterday, I was in Hoboken at Trinity Restaurant, having a lovely brunch with a friend. Afterward, I decided to walk back home, getting some fresh air and exercise, since it was a sunny, beautiful Autumn day. As I strolled down Hudson Street and then around, making my way up the main drag, Washington Street, I was about to walk by Carlo’s Bakery (now famous due to the hit tv show, Cake Boss) and I stopped for a minute to watch. There was a line out of the store and down the block toward me.

Before I moved up the “the Heights” of Jersey City, I lived in Hoboken for about 15 years. I had visited Carlo’s on occasion, but there were so many bakeries in town, and some closer to where I lived. I always thought their baked goods were just fine, but I would say I’d never stand on line to get in, and that would be true of any store, I just hate lines. These days, up by me, I frequent an awesome bakery, Goehrig’s on Central Avenue and Congress Street, and his store is busy everyday, they’re not out the door, but the clients are steady, and many are repeat customers. Plus with the new website that we launched in the Fall of 2008 the orders come in around the world. My favorites include, italian pastries, carrot muffins, soft, yet crunchy almond cookies,  chocolate fudge dot cookies and brownies, and the scones, yum!… be warned though, he doesn’t make all of his wonderful items everyday, but each day has a great assortment of fabulous things.

Meanwhile, it got me thinking about the power of tv, advertising and publicity, and just plain having a good idea and the difference between the amount of traffic and the quality of the product.

The success of the tv show, Cake Boss, has drawn attention to the store, more and more first-time customers, and what’s interesting is that for those first timers, it wouldn’t matter whether the cakes were great or just average. Now, of course in order to maintain the expanding business and keep them coming back, the cakes have to be good. The important thing though, is to get them to the store in the first place. It just shows how the concept of the tv show, plus great advertising, and publicity, increases the popularity. And, if you have a great product, you’ll keep them coming back. In Hoboken, in a few locations, they have posters up, and it’s a wonderful photograph of Buddy Valastro covered in cake flour, with the branding logo of Cake Boss, along with information about the tv series.

I feel so strongly about branding and publicity. It’s so important for any business, large or small. When anything regarding advertising the product is created, whether in print or a tv commercial, it’s so important to be consistent, continuity and style, using the same logo, types of graphics and photography, perhaps even the same color palette, so that when the people come across it, they recognize the company, or tv show, immediately.

Whether a bakery or a branding design business. The clients must find you first, (more about that to come) and then stay because of the quality and consistency.

When I have time, I go back and read, in depth, the articles in the stack of National Geographic Magazines that pile up. This past week, I read an article from the June 2009 issue, titled, “The Global Food Crisis, The End of Plenty,” by Joel K. Bourne, Jr. about the over population of our planet, the desire that humans have to eat red meat, combined with global warming, and how more food is being consumed than is being produced.

Highlighting meat production as one of the main causes for this crisis, Mr. Bourne wrote, “It takes up to five times more grain to get the equivalent amount of calories from eating pork as from eating grain itself—ten times if we’re taking about grain-fattened U.S. beef.” Annual worldwide grain consumption has increased from 815 million metric tons to 2.16 billion in the last half century. So, most of the grain is not being fed to people, it’s being grown and fed to the cows and pigs, to fatten them up for human consumption and other industries like biofuels.

Another awful fact is that some of the deforestation, is so that they can make room to plant more crops. In addition, because pesticides have been used in these crops, which gets absorbed into the earth and water, humans as well as other species, are being born with deformities.

Imagine the terrible path we’re on. Over population leading to eating more, which we cannot plant fast enough, combined with global warming, which is going to dry up crops and at the same time poisoning the earth and ourselves. We must do something now, to turn the tide around.

Yet, I see people everyday head into the nearest fast food chain and eat greasy, unhealthy burgers, because they don’t have the time to prepare or sit and eat something healthier. It would wise to think very hard before you eat that next burger, steak or pork loin. Remember, it all starts with ourselves, and one person can make a difference.

The last time I ate red meat was over 30 years ago. I do not miss it at all.

What can “United States Graphic Designers” do, to get back the jobs that are going outside the country?

A few days ago I posted a discussion on one of the groups on LinkedIn and the comments are flying back at me. I’ve heard from designers around the country and some abroad have responded as well, all telling their thoughts on this matter.

The original discussion was about an article I read and blogged about which said there were over a quarter of a million graphic designers in the United States alone.

There are two main topics right now, in this discussion:

1- Are there people out there who are just calling themselves graphic designers and when did the profession get so watered down?

I’ve heard comments such as, “I saw an ad posted looking for a locksmith (2 yrs exp. required) and a graphic designer (1 yr exp. required).” or there have been comments saying that a secretary was working as the company’s graphic designer as well as typing and filing.

When did being a graphic designer lose it’s respect and how can we gain that respect back? Of course, there will always be clients who value good design, if they didn’t, we’d all be out of business. Still, it’s hard to compete with online job sites that post opportunities and we’re competing around the world for these jobs. If someone bids $8-12 an hr, how can I compete with that? If you notice on these websites, a client can be looking around the globe and select that they want a “low price over quality.” (Why would someone choose low quality in the first place? This shouldn’t be an option.)

How about on these sites doing something for the designers? How about posting an area so clients know how many years you’ve been in business, or if you’ve won awards? How can a client tell the difference between someone who’s just graduated, is doing it as their side job or someone who’s been working for 25+ years and it’s their business?

2- Outsourcing from the United States.

There were so many comments about this and understandably. Someone posted that to keep costs down in book publishing, they’re hiring the work to be done in India or the Philippines and paying as low as $2-5 a page. And that’s got to be one of the reasons our economy is down. I don’t know how we’re going to compete on this playing field, because it sure isn’t a fair one. The cost of living in the U.S. commands our hourly wage being higher than $12 an hr. Aside from the costs being ridiculously low, there’s also the time involved. What used to allow for months to be created, now is done in a flash. People post assignments all the time saying for example: “I need an e-commerce website to sell my 150 products and it must launch in 48 hrs.” These people are obviously nuts.

I remember years ago when I was an art director/designer in book publishing, even then we had no time to design the covers for the current season. We’d be given a list of maybe 100-150 titles and roughly 6-7 weeks to produce covers for them all. Not only were there mysteries and novels to be read before we could even assign them to designers or illustrators, but we had cookbooks, gardening and sports books all needing photo shoots. It took a lot of over-time you can be sure.

Today, we also have the crazy situation of templates or themes. Everywhere we look we have web design, blog, brochure, and postcard themes. Anyone can jump onto a browser, call up one of these sites and just start “designing.” UGH! is all I can say about that!

Doesn’t anyone care about having something original anymore? Doesn’t anyone care about branding? Is it only the fortune 500 companies that understand this?

In this terrible economy, I may be outbid from designers outside the country, or people who’re bidding low and think they’re designers, but I’m sticking to my business plan and will make sure my clients know they’re getting my experience and a quality product!