Who’s behind The Brand Dossier.

Just me.

How is this different from FordVisuals?

FordVisuals is my primary business, the mother of it all. The one that sort of sits back and handles everything, can take on any size client, loves a big project she can sink her teeth into. Think big brands with big budgets, high profile projects, timelines that often stretch off into the distance.

The Brand Dossier is specifically for small businesses that have urgent puzzles to solve and a defined budget. Just like a larger corporate clients, they need consistent coherent branding to move the needle. We’ll look at the entire scope of your brand and its ecosystem, from website to social, email to collateral.

Why are you doing this and why is it needed?

I’ve been working with brands of all sizes for over 25 years. Small businesses and organizations are my favorites to work with because the clients are passionate and need work done quickly. I’ve found over the years that there aren’t many reliable, cost-effective, and aesthetically on point solutions for brands that don’t need a full studio experience.

Why do you move so fast?

It’s fun. I like to move quickly. Blame it on a 90s ADD diagnosis, an air sign mind or just my nature, but I move fast. It’s fun and satisfying and rewarding for everyone to see solutions come to light so quickly.

There aren’t many design and branding studios that hit the sweet spot for small often one-person businesses. They end up with band-aid fixes and using multiple people to help with their needs (logo, website, ecommerce, social, email, event prep, collateral) which results in scattershot branding and a less-than-polished presentation to your clients and customers.

Any loftier reasons behidn all of this?

Yep. I believe in small businesses. I’m the granddaughter of a solo mom with just a high school education who built a business up from scratch in a small midwestern town while raising my Dad. She often had many jobs at a time, including selling encyclopedias door to door, working in a dress shop and renting out rooms in their tiny house to boarders and sleeping in the kitchen to give up her room. When she was in her 50s she started selling real estate in her tiny town and grew her own business so she was able to support herself through retirement and beyond. More importantly, I’ve never heard a bad word spoken about her. Everyone in town knew her not only because she could chat for hours and remembered all the details about your life, but because she was fair and kind. She was always there to help, and in turn was treated with kindness by her community. As a widowed single mom myself, I’m honored that my life has paralelled hers in so many ways, and so grateful that I can look to her life as guidance and inspiration.

I also believe that great design and branding can dramatically change the outcome for brands, and I want to make that as accessible as possible to as many people as possible, especially women, the queer community and people of color. There’s no reason for gatekeeping in design. Everyone benefits from great design.

Oftentimes

  1. We learn about your immediate needs, longer term goals, and current state of your brand.

  2. We make a recommendation within your budget in order to address these goals, but also make suggestions and recommendations on what else you can do. That doesn’t mean you have to do it with us - but we’ll give you recommendations

Do you do anything behind just giving me design files?

  • Various web platforms. There are a lot and they’re changing and growing rapidly. I’ve used them all. We’ll talk it through and recommend the one that’s best for you.

  • Non-mainstream resources for images, typography and graphic elements. We use the big houses, too, but focus on supporting smaller, boutique businesses that are POC, queer and women-owned.

  • Organization of all your stuff. Where’s the favicon? The transparent logo? Which one am I using on IG?

IF YOU’RE HERE THEN…

COMMON COMPALINS FROM OTHERS ABOUT FINDING A WEB/DESIGN EPRSON 

— TJEY ONLY DO ONE THING SO I HAVE TO FILL IN GAPS WITH OTHER PEOPLE AND IT FEELS LIKE A PATCHWORK OF IDEAS 

— IT’S ALL CONFUSING

— THE PRICING IS VAGUE 

— I FEEL LIKE I HAVE TO MANAGE IT 

— THEY HAVE NO VISION 

— THIS LEAVES ME WITH MORE TO DO, A LESS COHERENT, CLEAR, CONSISTENT MESSAGE AND A BRAND THAT I’M NOT 100% BEHIND. 

— THIS LEAVES ME SPENDING TOO MUCH MENTAL TIME ON THINGS THAT I DON’T SPECALIZE IN AND I LITERALLY DON’T HAVE TIME. SO IT JUST REMIAINS UNDONE AND DRIVES ME CRAZY BC IT SITS PARKED ONMY TO DO LIST. ESP WHEN I KNOW IT’LL ADD INSANE VALUE ONCE IT’S DONE .