So I spent about five minutes creating a simple card showing my logo and two main web addresses. I uploaded a TIFF to the Squiz site, went through checkout, then entered the gift code Ben gave to waive the cost (usually £11.95 for 50 cards + keyring dispenser with first order).

It took exactly one month from the date of order to receipt of the card set. I’m sure the postal strike had something to do with the delay (should’ve arrived within two weeks).

I like the result, and even though the on-screen card preview looked pixellated, Ben assured me the print would turn out fine. That it did.

The dispenser is spring loaded, and cards go in the same way they come out. I nearly pulled off a nail attaching the silver keyring to the holder, but other than that, nicely packaged and presented. I managed to push 16 cards inside, and you could probably squeeze another one or two on top. I always carry two or three of my standard business cards around with me, but I’ll attach this to my set of car keys for a while, too.

I read the cards are waterproof, so dropped mine in a glass of water, and true enough after a quick dry it was good as new. Never again worry about dancing in the rain, or you could stuff a couple in your swimmers in case you meet a potential client at the pool.

My only grudge (and quite a biggie) is how there’s no option to remove the advertising from the reverse. I’d pay extra for that, or for the option to print your own design on two sides.

Update: 26 October 2009
I’ve just heard from Ben who tells me the option to remove the logo will be live within a couple of weeks.

20 sets of Squiz Cards to give away

Update: 02 November 2009
I’ve drawn the 20 winners and notified them via direct message on Twitter. Thanks very much to everyone who retweeted.

Fancy a set? I’ve got 20 free sets for Twitter users. All you need to do is post any tweet that includes both @DavidAirey and Squiz Cards e.g.

RT @DavidAirey 20 free sets of Squiz Cards: http://bit.ly/3OUyim

Next Monday (02 November) I’ll Twitter Search for anyone mentioning @DavidAirey with Squiz Cards (with or without spaces) picking 20 winners at random. You’ll receive your gift code via direct message (you’ll need to follow me so I can send the DM).

Visit Squiz Cards here.

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This business card for a massage therapist comes in a knot, and you untie it to reveal the contact details. Ever had a knot needing massaged? Via Quipsologies.

Studio on Fire uses these letterpress ninja business cards with card stock “thick enough to kill someone”. But it’s all fun and games until someone puts an eye out.

Great cards for the Glammer Education Institute of Hair Design. Via swissmiss.

Agrie Paint Services, a novel idea. It can only be used once, mind, but if that gets you the client, job’s a good’un.

How about an edible business card for those caught in the wilderness?

For the artists out there, this business card “stroke” easel should suffice. Via Vitaly Friedman.

The mixtape generation card. Very retro. Very cool. And no need to buy a business card holder.

But you know they’ll never top this.

A little more business card design inspiration

• Art of the Business Card
• itevenhasawatermark.com (a bit ad-heavy these days)
• Better than a plain ol’ business card on Smashing Magazine
• Unusual business card designs on Noupe
• The Four Laws of Business Card Design on [Re]Encoded.com
• 50 cards of 50 designers on The Design Cubicle
• Good or bad business cards? on davidairey.com
• Cool business card designs on davidairey.com
• My personal card (couple of years old)

Have any designs caught your eye lately?

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WDE is an engineering firm in Belfast, Northern Ireland. The company specialises in the rental and repair of forklift trucks, and it was my role to create a new brandmark and card design. The design brief stipulated that a simple mark was the target. One that didn’t literally portray the actual shape of a truck, but that bore some resemblance.

“A forklift truck (also called a lift truck, a high/low, a forklift, a stacker-truck or a side-loader) is a powered industrial truck used to lift and transport materials. The modern forklift truck was developed in the 1920s, and has since become an indispensable piece of equipment in manufacturing and warehousing operations.”
— WIKIPEDIA

Sketching is an excellent way to free ideas that simply can’t flow when you’re sat at a computer.

I find it important to eliminate noise from my designs so that no matter what shade of background, the logo still works. The reversed version also offers a high level of contrast.

Green was chosen for the positive “go” emotions conjured.

Example #1 above shows Gotham Black, #2 Gill Sans Ultra Bold, and #3 the favoured Rockwell Extra Bold.

Photo courtesy of Matt at Factor 1.

If you want to chat about an identity design project, do get in touch.

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Shaun Barnes of Jigsaw Internet Solutions approached me to redesign his company logo. He knew he wanted a jigsaw piece shown, and preferably more than one (to symbolise a connection).

It doesn’t matter how professional or artistic your sketches are. What’s important is how the process allows for ideas to flow faster than they do on computer. My thumbnails uncovered the idea of turning the letters into jigsaw pieces.

At first I thought of showing every letter as a piece of the puzzle, but in the end opted for a simpler design. The letter “A” was replaced with a jigsaw piece — I felt the other characters were more important when formulating the actual word “jigsaw.” Also, the piece could be made to look a little like the shape of an uppercase “A.”

Previous Jigsaw Internet logo

Shaun previously displayed this logo on his website:

The first thing I noticed was the stock image. It’s never a good idea to use a stock image for a logo. For one, it’s not an original design, and secondly, you can be fairly sure it’s used elsewhere. It took just a minute of searching before I found this image on the Careerwise website:

Design options

I provided two different options.

One

Two

I was also asked to design a business card, and after a few different variations were presented, the following layout was chosen.

The puzzle piece shape on the front would make an excellent die-cut. In the end, rounded corners were chosen (not shown on the mock-up).

Client testimonial

Shaun had these words to say once the project was complete:

“I hired David because we have a similar design style, and more importantly, similar ethics. As a designer myself I’m aware of how difficult it can be to complete work for other designers. I imagine that David must have been frustrated at times with my constant suggestions and even changing the design myself! To his credit he never let it show, quite the opposite in fact. He was always friendly, polite and more than happy to accept my ideas even though he may well have disagreed with them. It was a pleasure to work with a professional who obviously loves what he does for a living.”

It was a pleasure working with you, Shaun. All the very best with Jigsaw Internet.

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Tammy Lenski LLC is a business that deals with conflict resolution in the workplace, and Dr. Tammy Lenski approached me to re-design the company brand identity, business card and letterhead.

I’ve always found it a pleasure doing business with someone I know, and this time was certainly no exception. Tammy and I have been in touch with each other ever since she first discovered my blog article about the graffiti project on Kelburn Castle.

For a while now, Tammy needed a more cohesive branding job for her print materials and website, but business had been going so well that she allowed herself to repeatedly put it off. “No more.” she told me.

The company was previously called ‘Lenski Strategic LLC’, and I was shown the old logo design before commencing the project. This logo was only available in .jpg and .pdf format, which wasn’t ideal. To enable a logo to be printed at any size, the optimum file type is .eps (encapsulated postscript), and all my clients are provided with this format.

When discussing the identity project, Tammy wanted a design that was:

• Simple and clean
• Inspiring
• Inviting

The corporate colours of purple and green were already set in place, and Tammy went on to tell me of her love for origami cranes. There’s a story about these symbols being associated with peace. I was referred to the touching story of Sadako Sasaki, mentioned on Wikipedia, and I’ll give a brief overview here:

The story of Sadako Sasaki

Sadako Sasaki (January 7, 1943 – October 25, 1955) was a Japanese girl who lived near Misasa Bridge in Hiroshima, Japan. Sadako was a victim of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima and was only two years old on August 6, 1945. At the time of the explosion she was at home, about 1 mile from ground zero. Ten years later she was diagnosed with leukemia, which her mother called “an atom bomb disease.”

In November 1954, lumps developed on her neck and behind her ears. In January 1955, purple spots started to form on her legs. On February 18, 1955 she was diagnosed with leukemia. She was hospitalized on February 21, 1955 and given, at the most, a year to live.

Sadako and the paper cranes

On August 3, 1955, Sadako saw a gift of 1,000 origami paper cranes that were donated to the hospital from the people of Nagoya as a “Get Well” gift. Inspired by the cranes, she started folding them herself, spurred on by the Japanese saying that one who folded 1,000 cranes was granted a wish. A popular version of the story is that she fell short of her goal of folding 1,000 cranes, having folded only 644 before her death, and that her friends completed the 1,000 and buried them all with her. This comes from the book Sadako Sasaki and the Thousand Paper Cranes. An exhibit which appeared in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum stated that by the end of August, 1995, Sadako had achieved her goal and continued to fold.

She had plenty of free time during her days in the hospital to fold the cranes, but lacked paper. She would use medicine wrappings and whatever else she could scrounge up. This included going to other patients’ rooms to ask to use the paper from their get-well presents.

During her time in hospital her condition progressively worsened. Around mid-October her left leg became swollen and turned purple. After her family urged her to eat something, Sadako requested tea on rice and remarked “It’s good.” Those were her last words. With her family around her, Sadako died on the morning of October 25, 1955.

For more details of this sad story, read about Sadako Sasaki on Wikipedia.

It was clear to me that the origami crane would act as an ideal symbol in my client’s line of work (conflict resolution), and Tammy mentioned this in one of her emails:

“Of course I’m already imagining all the things I could do with real origami cranes as handouts at workshops, etc, but am trying to rein in my playful mind until I know whether the crane as part of the logo really works!”

So I set about researching the crane, with the aim of adapting the image into flat artwork that would work effectively across a wide range of media.

There were a few layout options we both discussed, and I’ve shown a couple below:

With these ideas, it was felt the symbol could all too easily be interpreted as more of a ‘crown’ than an ‘origami crane’, especially with the mark placed above the company name. Having the ‘LLC’ characters on their own line also added more complication than was necessary. Simplicity was key.

I also experimented with the tracking between the Futura Thin characters. Changing the spacing between letters can alter the impression dramatically, as shown in the image below:

The 5th option appears very constricted, and doesn’t lend itself to offering a fresh, peaceful appearance. Number 5 is the standard typeface tracking, so each previous option was a manual adjustment in Adobe Illustrator.

Business card design

As well as the logo design, Tammy wanted me to create a business card and letterhead.

If you click on the image below, you’ll see a larger version of the first three design options.

“I prefer the portrait orientation and like your idea of business name only on one side and contact on the purple reverse.”

Tammy proposed making her card more unique by adding a die-cut, an idea that would allow for the crane symbol to be ‘stamped’ out of the card. This adds expense to the printing, but I believe it’s a great idea to set yourself apart with these little touches, particularly with print, which is a tangible promotional tool that once given, cannot be changed (unlike online promotions).

Design number 5 was considered the most suitable for use:

“The card looks perfect! I love it. Go ahead and send me the files and I’ll pursue the die-cut questions with my printer. Thanks so much for your work on this, David. Best business card I’ve ever had…and one I’m finally satisfied with.”

The die-cut questions that needed answering revolved around the following image:

Whether Tammy’s chosen business card printer could work with the segmented die-cut, at the size shown in the card design above, would need clarified. It’s possible that the size is too small. Regardless, I went ahead and created a mock-up, using Adobe Photoshop, of what the business card will look like when printed.

The following link downloads the Tammy Lenski letterhead design (opens a PDF file). I showed Tammy a few layout options, and this is the preferred design.

Client testimonial

“David Airey’s work impressed me on multiple levels. He had an uncanny sense for what I was pondering but hadn’t yet said aloud, really listened effectively to what I was seeking, brought forward beautiful design ideas for my consideration, and did it all in a timely manner and with excellent communication skills. How could so many terrific characteristics and abilities find their way into one graphic designer? I recommend David unequivocally and would hire him again in a heartbeat.”

Dr Tammy Lenski
Tammy Lenski LLC

My thanks to Tammy. It was a pleasure working on this project, and I’m delighted she received the result she was looking for.

I value your opinion, so by all means leave a comment.

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I was approached by the California-based Fidelity Hearing Center, and asked to design a brand identity that was easily differentiated from their competition. First and foremost, the design’s primary purpose was to act as an identifier for the organisation.

The name, Fidelity Hearing Center, was originally chosen because my client associates the word with ‘Hi-Fidelity’ and good sound quality. The word ‘Fidelity’ also means faithful or true. Some of the services they provide include audiological examinations, hearing aid supply and repair, earmolds, swimplugs and ear protection against noise.

The research and sketch process had me thinking around two main design routes, shown through my rough sketches below.

The first row of sketches signifies the transition from an ear into a simplified speaker / ear shape, using two circles.

The second row of sketches shows the transition from an ear trumpet into a graphic equalizer. The progression of larger bars correlates with the progression of sound getting louder (and easier to hear).

Colour was kept to a minimum for cost-effectiveness, and the blue / gray combination was the client’s preferred choice. A modern, easy-to-read typeface was needed, so I chose Gotham — a personal favourite.

Photo courtesy of Factor 1 Studios

The brand identity was the last piece in the puzzle before a new website was to be launched, so time was of the essence. Because of which, the time frame for completion was just short of three weeks.

Dr. DeKriek had these kind words to say once the project was finished:

“Thank you for doing such a great job designing my corporate identity. As you know, I required an identity that was easily differentiated from my many competitors. I also required that my logo be reproducible in colour or black & white, as well as large or small so that it can be incorporated into any print media. The unique two-circle logo you designed for me is both attractive and highly adaptable. I appreciate your attention to detail. I am equally pleased with how quickly you completed this project. Thank you.”

Dr. David J. DeKriek
Fidelity Hearing Center

Thank you, David, for choosing to work with me, and I’m delighted that you’re happy with the final outcome.

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“Wow! I’ve never seen anything like it!”

Well, where business cards are concerned, there’s normally a very good reason for that.

One idea might, on the surface, seem to be innovative and unique, but sometimes the designer forgets about functionality, and where the card is going to end up.

The image above, showing a design for Eduard Cehovin, is a wooden clothes peg with the contact details printed on. Yes, it’s a novel idea, and some people would think it great if used for a dry cleaner, or laundry service etc., although there’s no functionality. No-one will carry a clothes peg around, nor can they file it or keep it in a business card holder.

Here’s a business card that sprouts vegetation when watered, by Jamie Wieck. It was designed to be kept on your table, but I’m curious, would you really leave a bunch of cress growing on your desktop? Besides, where do you think the card will go when the cress dies?

This rubber business card, created by Chris Hirsch for personal trainer Poul Nielsen, is another unique idea, but without very much functionality. Poul only had 10 of the items made, but last I heard was planning for a reprint, with his tagline on the reverse. Notice how you have to use both hands to read the telephone number? That makes it a two person job to give Poul a call.

In saying all this, these designs prompt people to talk about them. They generate interest. If they were more subtle in appearance I wouldn’t have written this blog post. So are there different functions to a business card? Is a business card used for more than just conveying information?

Have your say

What is the purpose of these designs? Are they supposed to be discarded soon after you receive them or has the designer missed the point? Should conventions be challenged where business cards are concerned? I’d love to know your thoughts.

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Fancy some business card design inspiration? There’s a nice business card Flickr set from dailypoetics that features (at the time of writing) 584 different designs.

Here I show some of the designs I enjoy most.

As you’ve probably noticed, the last image (above) shows my personal business card design. I’ve published a short blog post with details of the print finish and printers. Click this link to read it: David Airey’s personal business card design.

Other sites featuring business cards

• 18 smokin’ hot business cards
• 35 inspirational business card designs
• Lifeclever’s choice picks from the Flickr set
• Creative Bits choice picks from Flickr
• 36 cool business cards you should’ve seen
• Cooler business cards
• 70 amazing business cards

What makes good business card design for you?

From the examples above, I particularly enjoy the card design with the burnt corner, and also the ticket idea for The Dave And Alex Show. How about you?

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Look at that subtle off-white colouring.
The tasteful thickness of it.
Oh my God, it even has a watermark.

Here’s an oldie, but a goodie, from Mary Harron’s movie, American Psycho. It’s the scene where Bateman and his shallow co-workers are pitting their business cards against eachother, debating the merits of bone, eggshell, and off-white. I take pride in my own business card, but these guys?

Does the business card scene only appeal to graphic designers?

I was reminded of this footage when browsing through some cool business card designs (worth a look for inspiration).

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What makes a business card effective?

Is it originality? Legibility? Simplicity?

Perhaps it’s how your card prompts the recipient into contacting you. A clean, uncluttered design shows that you care about appearance and immediately sends out a professional vibe.

First and foremost, your card must clearly show your contact details. That’s the number one priority. Even if your card is poorly designed, it must allow people to contact you. Kind of a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how many cards hide the contact info away behind some over-indulged colour scheme or illegible typeface.

Size deserves a mention. If your card doesn’t fit into a holder or wallet it’s not likely to be kept close-at-hand.

Should your promotional piece have a gimmick? Here’s an original idea that doesn’t use card stock.

It belongs to Poul Nielsen, a certified personal trainer and fitness consultant in Toronto, Canada. Just reading his name is a light workout in itself! Poul seems like a top bloke, so it’s a shame his personal trainer website isn’t quite as unique.

You want your contact details to be obvious without any catch, so I’m split about Poul’s card. Sure, it’s original, and works excellently for the industry, but it doesn’t make the information apparent at first glance. What happens if the prospective client is missing a thumb, or arm? Of course he could always hand this card out personally and have a back-up for such occurences.

How much should conventions be challenged, and does it depend on the industry?

Take a funeral director for instance. I tried to think of a profession where you want to be subtle in your sales pitch. Being subtle doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice good design for a ‘plain Jane’ finish.

A funeral director wants to sell his / her most expensive headstone or coffin. Why not print the card with a subtle marble or oak-effect behind the text? Gloss laminate the substrate for a smooth finish perhaps?

Mark Boulton was recently asked, “What makes a good business card?” and he wasn’t so sure about his response. His readers make some interesting points in the comment section of that post.

One commenter, Zach Inglis, thinks your business card should be, “Clean, crisp, readable, rememberable.” He makes a good summary, even though I’m sure he meant ‘memorable’.

I came across a post about cartoons on business cards. For me, this one depends on the message of the cartoon and the industry being designed for. There were some nice examples, and I’ve shown a few below.

I’ve also written a little about the process behind my personal business card.

Terry Tolleson believes that a business card should (at the very least) contain three elements (in order of importance):

1. Contact information
2. Company name
3. Visual identifier for the company (a logo for instance)

“Regardless how flashy or clever your card is, if contact information is not readily available, or quickly processed, the card failed. What does it matter if someone remembered some neat trick the card does or how nice it looked if they find a hint of difficulty acquiring your information from it.”
— TERRY TOLLESON

I agree, which is why I have reservations about Poul Nielsen’s card.

Your business cards

I’d love to see examples of your business cards. Are they online? Feel free to send me some links or photos and I’ll add them to an upcoming showcase.

For more business card inspiration, have a look at my blog category on business cards.

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