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CREATING
In most cases, Alphabet Arm’s promotional portfolio pieces are very focused in
that they are designed to fill a specific niche. “While the final aesthetic decisions
remain open, the idea that we want to communicate is often quite well formed
from the beginning,” Belyea says. “Similarly, due to the frequency at which we
produce materials, most of the ideas we have end up being produced in some
form or another.”
Though Alphabet Arm uses them in many situations, several promotional pieces
in particular make up the core of their patented “Sample Pak.” “The Sample
Pak was created soon after the studio’s inception when we quickly realized
that the sooner a potential client could see what we do and how we do it—in
a fun, interesting, physical format—the better,” Belyea says. “From that point, it
was generally an easy leap for them to contract our services for their projects.
Basically, it was our way of taking graphic design—an increasingly more esoteric
field—and making it really clear and accessible to potential clients.”
π
Concise and small in size, Alphabet Arm’s
portfolio components use a fun, whimsical
approach to “getting the word out” about this
multifaceted firm.
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And while the design is different for each promotion, Alphabet Arm has several
overall design principles that they always work around. “First and foremost, the
design needs to be organized and clear,” Belyea says. “We are very aware that
our clients—who are often unfamiliar with the design process—benefit from hav-
ing more information about what we do and how we do it. We also made sure
that the information remains central to the design, and that it is not obscured by
the format.”
IMPLEMENTING
Two factors determine the size and format of Alphabet Arm’s promotional
pieces: envelope size and cost. “Due to the size of the envelope, we are always
aware that the finished piece needs to fit inside,” Belyea says. “Costwise, each
piece needs to remain as economical as possible. Though we know that each
piece’s life span will certainly justify its cost, we try to stretch our self-promotion
budget as far as humanly possible.”
The firm’s promotional portfolio isn’t distributed at any regular interval, but they
do often bring Sample Paks to networking events and client meetings. “We have
found that they are excellent conversation starters and nice leave-behinds,”
Belyea says. “Sample Paks don’t always stay in the hands of their original
recipient, but often get passed around between clients, coworkers, and peers,
so it also becomes an excellent referral tool for us. Finally, we have a form set
up on our website that lets anybody request a Sample Pak. It has gotten to the
point where we’ve had to restrict requests to the U.S., as we were getting too
many people asking for them from abroad.”
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Alphabet Arm has been in the fortunate position to offset the cost of some of
these pieces by partnering with a number of select printers. “We have designed
joint promotional pieces with these partners, and have also been strategic in
working them into press runs for other jobs,” Belyea says. “That said, production
costs vary from $1,000 to $2,500 (£606 to £1,515) per run.” Several thousand
pieces are printed at any given time.
During Alphabet Arm’s eight years of existence, the firm’s promotional Sample
Pak has been very successful, with two or three new pieces being added annu-
ally. “We continually hear from people that it is an excellent resource and it has
helped to convince clients that we are the right studio for the job,” he says. “It
has also helped to get word out about our studio, since we are fairly small in the
grand scheme of things, and don’t have a large budget for our own marketing
and publicity.” And when Belyea and the rest of the Alphabet Arm team is there
to hand out the Sample Paks in person, people are often amazed at all of the
parts and pieces that come in it.
“Once they get a few moments to take everything in, they love the attitude and
humor that we put into each piece,” Belyea says. “From the feedback that we’ve
gotten, it seems that our message is coming across loud and clear.”
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A Passion for Unique Portfolio
Presentations
DESIGN FIRM: GO WELSH (US A)
With dozens of projects featured in a wealth of different publications, Go Welsh
has earned a reputation within the design community for creating innovative,
inspiring branding and design initiatives for clients and for their own firm’s
promotional materials.
PLANNING
Go Welsh’s main goal for their portfolio was to approach the design in a way
that would allow them to cost-effectively create a series of themed promotional
pieces. “We had talked about four-color offset printing but felt we’d be limited by
production costs in terms of the final size (dimensions) and length (number of
pages),” says Go Welsh founder Craig Welsh. “We really liked the idea of being
able to work at a larger scale across many more pages than we’d realistically be
able to afford on an ongoing basis with offset printing. We had also produced
some newsprint-based pieces for a client and found that the tactile, low-grade
quality of the paper and inks was a nice change from the slickened world of
hi-def, screen-based media. It has an authenticity that’s hard to find in other
materials. It’s the medium from which the masses used to get their news.”
CREATI NG
According to Welsh, the most difficult task was to come up with a title for the
publication. “We had many, many concepts we reviewed over the course of
several weeks. However, every title we considered brought its own unique set
of emotional and implicit messaging,” Welsh says. “We didn’t want the first issue
to set a mood that would be challenging to address with future issues. So we
finally started to seriously consider Title as the title with the ability to clearly
theme each issue.”
®
A treasure trove of sorts, Title 01, the
“Thanks” issue, was sent by Go Welsh to
family, friends, clients, and prospects.
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