Is branding for an electrician folly?
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- moth0
He asked for a website, and tried to sell him a rebrand. You're overlooking a) what he asked for, and b) how much money he has to spend.
Nice try, but you should have at least expected a knock back.
- kushman0
I think what Glitterati_Duane says is spot on in his case.
That's why I want to rant at my client! I guess I just needed to feel confident that my design is better than the original and I wasn't just blinded by ego.
He thinks his current card stands out more form a distance and the black and yellow text is easy for dyslexic people to read (and therefore easier for customers to read)
aagh!
- Gucci0
That's pants, Kushman.
Maybe the client is just frustrated with how things went down and is acting on principle? It can't be the design. yours is far better now and sticks out more.
- I don't think that's necessarily true. Some clients just can't recognize "better design".Glitterati_Duane
- sad but true.Gucci
- kushman0
I feel like ranting at my client now and telling why he's wrong.
I think it's because I angry at myself for putting so much time and effort into this and then to be told. "No, I don't like it."
It's been a while since that's happened but I guess he did come to me for a webiste, not branding (even if he does need branding more that a site.)
- Welcome to the wonderful world of Graphic DesignGlitterati_Duane
- to be fair you didn't really do any branding, you just spent an inordinate amount of time making a business card.max_prophet
- to be fair, yeah yore right! But you have to start somewhere?kushman
- moth0
Nevermind kushman.
I do like that last one you posted though.
- kushman0
The thing is I've just got a message back of him saying he likes his current business card better than my new design!
Bloody electricians!
- typist0
there is no grid
- I thought there waskushman
- you make no sense theremax_prophet
- moamoa0
you forgot to kern the number 1.
- phatlee0
Be good if it was glow in the dark ink!
- ftravieso0
It seems to me your problem is that you don't stick to what your client is asking you to do. Get his website done and cash the check.
Wether you can provide branding services in the future, well, that is another issue which I advice you to do is that's something you think you can do.
I'm sure that if he sees good design in the website, the re-branding will follow.
But that's just my opinion.
- stem0
- tparsons0
Has branding worked for GE?
Not saying this is the next GE but your client should get the idea.
- matblack0
I'm not saying that the business cards should be designed to look like anything but electricians. I recently designed some business stationery for an electrical systems company, white foil on black card. They generate interest and dialogue.
All I'm saying is they deserve good design.
- Bluejam0
"Often the best design, the most important design, takes place outside the profession,where this is still a true vernacular. A non-corporate, non-designed vernacular. Vernacular is slang, a language invented rather than taught. Vernacular design is visual slang. More than that, it’s design that’s so familiar that we don’t really see it. Seeing the vernacular is seeing the invisible. It is looking at something commonplace— a yellow pencil, a metal folding chair— and falling in love. Vernacular design is so clear and simple that it seems to be from another time. Often it is. Vernacular design happens when a small business hires the local sign painter, print shop, or commercial artist to take care of its design needs. Vernacular design happens when a business takes care of its own design needs. Appreciation of this sort of design shouldn’t be confused with nostalgia, because the vernacular isn’t a bygone era or a style that can be celebrated or revived. Rather it’s a process, a straightforward one, that creates work which has an unfiltered, emotional quality. These designs are some person’s, some regular human being’s, idea of how to communicate— how to say,
“This is a company that sells shipping supples.”
“This is a store that sells sausages.”It is the unscientific but clear way to say,
“This is a beauty salon,” or
“This is a bottle of soda.”The vernacular is designed as if design were a regular thing to do, and not the sacred mission of an elite professional class. It’s design that hasn’t been ordered and purified by the methods of trained practitioners. It’s communication without the strategy, marketing, or the proprietary quantitative research. And that’s what’s good about it."
Tibor Kalman
- _niko0
I'll have to agree that they are a different creature. I'm currently designing a website for a local electrician and no matter what I present, they keep telling me that they want something exactly like this:
http://www.mistersparky.com/
It looks like what an electrical website should look like so they refuse to deviate from this norm.- so they are an electrical company... that is scared to look like anything else but an electric company... hmmm... interestingESPtype
- scarabin_net0
i like how the numbers in the photo are blurred but you can clearly see them
- ESPtype0
i think both cards need work...
if your going to rebrand... make it worth it
- matblack0
Why should it work differently?
After all, they both need name, contact details, brand/insight and to convey professionalism. It's all a form of self advertising.
I would want to trust an electrician just as much as a high powered solicitor.
- they are different because their clients are differentESPtype
- johndiggity0
letterpress