Working with us

What's it like to work with us?  Some would say we've got our quirks and our process is unique. Well that's because we don't operate like everyone else — we’re kinda different.

It’s these differences which help to make us successful. With almost 30 years of experience banked, we know what we enjoy, what we're good at and how the business works best for us and we like to think that's the sweet spot of biz.

So to help ensure the outcome of our relationship with you works out to fulfil your business goals and brand dreams, it’s helpful to get to know a bit about our approach:

This stuff is real to us.

It’s important to start with an emphasis on this point — we do what we do because we really like it. We like to fill our days along side great people doing rewarding work, helping pleasant interesting people while enjoying a fun lifestyle.

1. Bring us what you make or we won't like you (as much). Kidding. Not kidding.
   Do you believe in what you do or make? Do you think it’s the best or has merit? Then show us by sharing that passion with us. If you make whisky, let us try it. If you make wine or beer or chocolate, let’s taste it together and show us why it’s the best. Simply, show us you love your product so that we can passionately assist in communicating it to others.

   Once again, at the end of the day we do what we do because we love the people, the projects and the products that we get to work with. And we’re gonna be honest; we enjoy the people who are fun, gracious, love their products and want to share it with us. That’s called lifestyle and it’s our goal to have a great relationship and shared lifestyle with good people.
   

2. We're a small family business because we want to be. 
   Many people are surprised that we work from a home studio. But what’s important to note is that it’s not because we have to, but because we want to. 

   The way our business operates and integrates with our life provides us the full life/work balance that people make idyllic movies about. Except we're real and we're spectacular. 
   

3. We are a small but mighty team of creatives, on purpose. 
   We've been running this biz since 1993 and over that time we’ve learned a lot about our business but also the business of our category. And we’ve gotten to be good at it. We’ve found our expertise and we've distilled the process and the team required down to a science. 

   Also a small team is enjoyable. Small is efficient and small let’s us be hands-on with our clients and their brands.

Communication is key.

1. Our communication is not proactive.
   This point can be an adjustment for new clients who are not used to our approach.

   We don’t proactively pursue communication. And, we don’t push clients for next steps (no matter what these are — be it budgets, materials, or needed info on projects etc.). 

   We chased comm for the first 15 years and it proved exhausting, costly and entirely futile. This pursuit creates an imbalance in the relationship and artificially creates a demand for disproportionate staffing in communication — an area of business that is difficult to charge for. So by simply letting clients get back to us with pretty much everything means we only need to do good work and keep our promises when we make them and then you can do the rest. 
   

2. We don't answer the phone. 
   Hard to imagine but we aren't sitting by the phone. Well we are but metaphorically we’re not. We are busy, day in and day out. We like our studio time to count because that’s how we get things done and keeping the world of robocalls and telemarketers at bay while we’re being all creativey makes it more enjoyable. 

   What we ask is that you shoot us an email with your requests, feedback, edits or projects and we’ll get back to you.
   

3. Emails aren’t instant messaging.

   Aside from not answering the phone, we don’t reply to emails instantly. We diligently comb over all emails and process communication in a timely and orderly manner so if you don’t get a reply right away it’s ok, we’ve got it, read it and are organizing to reply.

   We do enjoy a nice conversation however, so when necessary our clients know to email ahead to schedule a friendly call. 

   Emails might not be the type of timeliness you desire, but it suits us in terms of accuracy and accountability and organizational control toward getting your good work done and out. 

Deposits & requirements.

1. We’re a pay for play service.

   We learned a long time ago that receivables don’t make financial sense. That’s why we’ve lasted 30 years. Businesses within our category simply should not attempt to afford to extend terms for work and wait to be paid. Terms are essentially the financing of other businesses which just add costs to our business in terms of the expense of financing clients' payment delays as well as the labour to process and chase it — all of which add costs to your work. 

   So we don’t work that way. Rather, we budget the work to do together, bill ahead of each stage, schedule the work once paid and then get at it. By the end of the process we are paid and clients have great work. Square.

   As part of this philosophy there are important nuances. 

   Firstly, it makes sense for us to prioritize what’s been paid over what hasn’t. This means that from the start we won’t invest in a project until we have received payment for the stage ahead. From the get-go we won’t have a kick-off meeting, talk timing or discuss the project in detail because we have other paid projects to attend to.

   Once paid, the project is pulled in studio and given a focus in order of priority of when it came in (or other influences). As your project moves towards the next stage, we send an invoice for that phase and will only start it once payment is received.
   

2. We prioritize what we can work on and stick to it until we can’t.

   This nuance is important. When we get going at a project, we mesh it into a studio schedule and work at it until the stage is complete, or, until we run into a barrier. 

   A stage completion is quite often a round of creative presented to a client following which we will be looking for feedback or approval to move forward. When we get here we don’t wait for clients. We move on to the next ready project in priority and do the same with that project. 

   What this means is that a project is on hold until the client gets back to us. Remember we don’t chase projects or communication. When we receive feedback, revisions or approval the project gets fed back into the queue to mesh with the other studio work but this often means we can’t get back to it for a few weeks.

   This highlights a couple key things — 1. Get all content to us ahead of the project to avoid waiting in the queue and 2. If time is important to your project, be prepared to not be the delay. Get replies to us right away — approvals, edits, feedback that’s returned to us quickly after a stage increases the likelihood that we just keep moving and won’t prioritize other projects over yours.

   In the end, aside from first prioritizing work that’s paid for, we need to fill all of our time so secondly we always prioritize the projects with which we have all that we need to move forward.

So in summary, the fastest projects are those that are paid and we have all we need to do them.

Scope = important.

1. The scope is what we’ve agreed to do together.

   It’s also the amount of time we say we’ll spend with you in meetings as well as the number of changes we'll include. Once we’re at it, we will stay in scope and so must you to keep to your budget.

   Because we set a clear scope with you at the beginning of a project, we rely on you to understand the parameters and manage your asks within the project. The key takeaway is that we won’t generally announce to you that you are out of scope because we assume you know. If you need to know what the cost might be for the of scope effort then you will need to ask, otherwise we simply invoice it in stride with the project on top of the next stage.
   

2. Out of scope means extra costs.

   If the extra costs can’t be added to the next stage invoice, then we generally aim to quickly invoice a catch-up billing in order to bring the project back into billing order. What this means is that if the invoice isn’t paid right away, then we stop prioritizing the work until it's paid.

In summary, pay attention to the scope so that you are aware of revisions or extras and have a payment system or method that can react and pay quickly so as to not delay work flow. Then everything moves smoothly.