The "R" word?

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  • kelpie0

    I think there's a valid point here though, it would be the way to try to fend off the badness; digital is cheap and quick and potentially can reach a lot more people so I'd expect it to be where whatever's left is going to go in the next year - it would be the way to pitch yourself in any attempt to get new work anyhow. One of our bigger clients already had to cut its cross agency marketing budget even last year and it was all cut from above the line, so I can conceivably see this being how it goes.

    It won't be a desire for high quality from companies that saves anyone though, it'll be a willingness to get stuck in for less cash on agencies part, to be frank. And being clever and resilient, that'll help.

  • kelpie0

    also I'd imagine it'll be better for smart freelancers when it comes to any of the smaller jobs that tick an agency over outside the big contracts as they can undercut more easily. Spooky may be bullishly looking forward to a lot more book cover commissions too as people decide to spend £7.99 on a good book and stay in rather than going out to gigs/cinema/etc etc ;)

    • mmm, not sure about that. Newsnight last week showed a surge in library membership, because its free OLD books..Khurram
    • Daily Show/Colbert Report also had a piece on growing library membership.Khurram
    • ah! of course! soory spooks, nae luck.kelpie
    • i'm sure he has more strings to his bow than just book covers... spooky? spooky???Khurram
  • kelpie0

    actually, you're right. Maybe open a cobblers instead

    • or a fucking library! I have, like, over a hundred books!kelpie
  • designbot0

    Let's look at the tangible effects if you want to call it that. How has everyone in here been affected so far? This recession has been going on for some time already....so how has everyone in here been actually been affected? So far for me personally there have been no dramatic changes. Just curious to see what others in here have to say. I get the impression that some people in here think that some apocalypse is going to occur overnight.

    • hasn't been going for some time. Uk to ENTER recession in 2009 according to Bank of England head...Khurram
    • I clearly remember over a year ago a co-worker (here in US) freaking out about a recession and being all paranoid about it.designbot
    • you clearly don't think for yourself.Khurram
    • your clearly a sensationalist.designbot
    • clearly...Khurram
    • hahadesignbot
  • kelpie0

    well as one example, a friend of mine books gigs for a living, she told me that everyone in here industry is getting nervous to the extent that ever new venue request by tour management is being downgraded to the next largest venue by promoters. Everyone knows that sooner or later people are going to stop going out as much and places wont fill. This is a pretty good eg of what may happen generally and "we" service those kind of companies requirements in large part.

    • interesting how it seems to be all speculation.
      I think that could hurt everyone more then anything else.
      designbot
  • Khurram0

    I'm almost finished a book called "A Mind of Its Own - How Your Brain Distorts and Deceives"

    There's a chapter in it called "The Vain Brain", which is about how our egos shield us from the truth, painting specifically rosey picture in the face of contrary evidence.

    "We think it will be so, simply because we would prefer it to be so."

    As in people who smoke and think "well, i'll never get lung cancer, i'll be in the small percent who escape."

    But really, it is quite natural. According to psychologists, there is only one category of people whose perceptions are more balanced and closer to reality. - who assign success and failure more even-handedly, and their predictions for the future are more realistic. They are the clinically depressed.

    So yeah...

    • I think for other people it boils down to an issue of Faith. Not to sugarcoat or be delusional about anything. But to accept that it is completely out of your control.designbot
    • completely out of your control.designbot
    • Dude you read far too many "How The Brain" books.SkyPoo
    • You don't read enuogh...Khurram
    • I've read more about that than you might realise. Enough to know that 'know thyself' is the moral of the story.SkyPoo
    • it's not a competition.Khurram
  • Khurram0

    http://www.economist.com/opinion…

    On October 21st Yahoo! said it would cut its staff of around 15,000 by at least a tenth. Given the internet firm’s woes—its third-quarter profit fell by 64%, to $54m, as online advertising withered—the cuts were perhaps inevitable. Equally striking has been a wave of lay-offs at much smaller start-up companies, which are bracing themselves for a coming recession.

  • Khurram0

    third quarter unemployment figures the worst in 17 years? come on...?

  • SkyPoo0

    My thing is I have no niche. I'm not book covers any more than I'm record sleeves, and I'm neither of those any more than I'm a press ad for an FMCG product. I am also neither traditional nor online, what I produce can be digital or print.

    The thing is this: Big wheels keep on turning. Every single year a new set of consumers hits the street, along with a new set of speculators, and entrepreneurs, and it comes good again, and in the meantime... if it goes bad it goes bad across the board for all, and though some might squeezed more than others, at the end of the day we're all on the same big dipper so what's the point in sitting there fretting about it. What are going to do... get off the ride, go and subscribe to a different economy?

    I'm sure that things will go more digital as the years roll by, but I'm equally sure that would have happened even if there was no recession... its the future.

    I'm going to have the sticky toffee pudding. I'm feeling a bit cheeky. Who's with me?

    • I'll have the strawberry sorbet cheers pal, we should get an other bottle of wine as well yo!.chossy
  • Bluejam0

    • I would love to see you write a full sentence on here. One that contains a subject, predicate and polysyllabic words.Khurram
    • noBluejam
    • At least some punctuation then?TheBlueOne
    • Don't do it!Peter
  • SkyPoo0

    Personally, as long as its a recession now, not a depression or a financial crisis I'm fine with that. In a bog standard common-or-garden recession business has to market the crap out of itself, services have to promote the bejeezus out of themselves and retailers have to advertise their nuts off.

    Work for thee and me.

    BWING IT ON!

    • how can you be so sure?Khurram
    • i'd have thought advertising is hit hardest during a "down-turn"...Khurram
    • Because I'm like a god amongst men.SkyPoo
    • it's the opposite, actually.paraselene
    • not to spooky, although you might in fact be a man amongst gods...paraselene
    • +1
      we've never been so busy ! had to take on extra help !
      23kon
    • if you do's a good job that is WORTH the money then that word will spread and people will come to you!23kon
    • rather than spending money with overpriced bullshit mongerers23kon
    • spooky, advertising is running back. i saw this confirmed in a newsstory recently..janne76
    • could you link that janne?Khurram
    • dutch. sorry.janne76
    • don't think i have the link anymore either..janne76
    • I have been flat out too with work, I just hope it lasts!slappy
  • johnnnnyh0

    I'd like to share the SkyPoo optimism but I'm way too much the realist for that. Having experienced the R word before I'd say that things don't go quite as SP thinks. No additional spending, no aggressive marketing, instead everyone just shuts down and makes do. Without money/funds/budgets no one spends on anything they don't feel they need. Also, if you have money you don't spend because you have the "just in case" mentality, where you don't want to risk your money just in case you need it later. That's because the end is rarely "in sight" and until it is, you don't play risk.

  • maximillion_0

    its a news reader - probably the same one who told us about Weapons of Mass Destruction

  • Doorman0

    You all heard about the Icelandic Bank? Mainly Councils and Huge Business have invested into it. In France 600 Millions Euros have disappeared from La Caisse d'Epargne.....but you know the risk when you have shares or Bonds.....It is terrible....but the world is still spinning and as long as you can buy food - pay the rent and surf the web...it is okay. As long as you survive....no worries.

    As SkyPoo says Bwing it on

  • SkyPoo0

    "i'd have thought advertising is hit hardest during a down-turn"

    That's exactly it Khurram... we've had the downturn. We've been turning down for six months now. By the time they say "okay, recession time is here" do you think businesses go "Oh no, we've got no chance" and just curl up and dessicate?

    NO MAN. OF COURSE THEY DON'T. The get all Dog-Eat-Dog, and they think about their families, and their mortgages, and their pride, and how their potency is tied up in their economic succes and they say I AINT GOIN' OUT LIKE THAT and they get right on the phone to the head of marketing and say "GET ME SOME SELLIN' AIDS BOY", and the great economic cycle begins another slow predicatble revolution.

    • I've just doubled my fees.
      Wait, I'm halving them again. Someone tell Mervyn King.
      SkyPoo
    • youre so convincing, I jumped on the table and gave you a 'hell yeah!' after that little soliliqythebottlerocket
    • Mission statement!killthefish
  • Doorman0

    Money talks...people want it all and over spend....a recession as they say and people realise that they spend on stuff they actually dont need but want.

    I work part time and I survive easily coz i choose want I need rather than what i want.

  • Khurram0

    "I for one will spend the next few months learning as much about the financial system as possible. The investment opportunity of a lifetime is just around the corner.... Glory times!

    "

    Always see the positive, and save my money, and buy a bomb-shelter. Preperation is exasperation. Revolution in innovation... to the station.

    • also take out an income protection policy like chossy... wise man..Khurram
    • There has already been a few times where I was contemplating doing this but didn't. Too bad cause I would have made some money :)designbot
    • money :)designbot
    • DO IT NOW!!!Khurram
  • maximillion_0

    a recession is only the equivalent to a detox for the design industry - it gets the rubbish out of the system

  • Khurram0

    I think that's a little naive. Wishful thinking perhaps. Makes some sort of sense based on THAT logic.

    But a contraction in the economy affects the entire economy. Marketing and advertising is the last thing on a companies list of things to do to become rich...

    But regardless... with all these bankruptcies, with Starbucks closing 600 stores across America - who are you gonna be creating fancy logos/websites for?

    If inflation is allowed to get out of hand, like the Bank of England seems to be considering, whose gonna spend the little cash he/she has on creating a stick web-experience???

    If fewer people go out, which club is gonna be running a poster campaign with Spooky exclusive artwork i ask you????

    • Thjere's more than 600 Starbucks on Oxford Street, that's nothing. They deliberately over did it to kill off the competition. Competition will remerge now.SkyPoo
    • competition. How does 600 Starbucks bring you fancy logo commissions anyway?SkyPoo
    • its just an example. There's fewer businesses. Less "design" work available.Khurram
    • There's newer businesses. Small commissions, but growth to follow. EXCITING TIMES±!!SkyPoo
  • SkyPoo0

    Its exactly the same as nature's growth cycle. Out of the rotting vegetation of this downturn, exciting new shoots of vibrant business will emerge, it will be cheap and easy for entrepreneurs to usher in the next phase of growth. We have a brand new global communications network infrastructure in place that is just waiting to be exploited for business, commerce and eventually domestic use. It will make Broadband internet seem like morse code, it will require a tidal wave of totally new software development to furnish it. We have an immense incentive now that we are acting upon globally to address our oil dependency. New smaller boutique vehicles using new small boutique fuels and locomotion methods will all need to be invested in, developed, branded, marketed, sold, supported... from that our life styles will change hugely and the knock-on effects will usher in new opportunities for new ideas to be invested in, needing new branding, promoting, marketing, packaging...

    These are very very exciting times. I for one am, I for, am...

    oh I can't be arsed.

    • THIS ALL NEEDS CREDIT!! THERE IS NO LIQUIDITY! NO MONEY IN THE SYSTEMKhurram
    • rand new global communications network infrastructure

      What that then?
      roundabout