We’re big believers in the necessity of studios, ad agencies, and even freelance firms to have a definable position that sets them apart from the countless competitors in the “creativity” business.

Frequent SVC workshop leader, Ted Leonhardt, recently turned us on to Blair Enns, a thoughtful, assertive Canadian (didn’t know there was such a thing!), who’s authored the Win Without Pitching web site and training series.

You can learn a tremendous amount on his site without spending a single Loonie. Pay particular attention to his Ten Tests of Your Position white paper.  While we urge you to click on over and take a look, if you don’t, here’s at least one everyone should consider:

5. Are you Charging More? [Read more →]

Peet's Coffee Sign

We keep promising you we’re not going to keep regurgitating things we see on other sites — especially Seth Godin’s.  But we saw this item and it was just too pithy not to pass along.  And so we have.

The Power of Smart Copywriting

Consider this riff from a professionaly printed freestanding sign in front of a Peet’s in San Jose:

“Unlike Any Coffee You’ve Ever Tasted Before.”

Wait. Why the capitals?

“Unlike any coffee you’ve ever tasted before.”

“Before” is redundant.

“Unlike any coffee you’ve ever tasted.”

Too negative. And why is “unlike” a positive trait? I mean, boiled leech guts is also unlike any coffee I’ve ever tasted, that doesn’t mean I want to drink it. How about:

“The best coffee you’ve ever tasted.” [Read more →]

It’s hard to believe — unless you’ve spent hours and hours vainly trying to find the perfect font —  that the ideal font may not exist until you design it. Once the domain of 17th century men with long beards and funny hats, designing fonts is a difficult, but doable task, if you have a serious knowledge of typography and the time to design and create all the variations needed in a typeface. Yes, there are books on the subject, but the best way to get introduced to the process (in our highly biased opinion) is to take a class. SVC offers one from time to time, and you can admire some of the fruits of a recent class’s labor in this Flickr album.

For those of you who missed SVC’s 7th annual Wayzgoose (the one described at length here) take a couple of minutes to see what printing with a steamroller is like. Thanks to all who came, and especially to our design teams from Hornall Anderson Design Works, SVC, AIGA, Girvin, Turnstyle, Fitch, and Beautiful Angle for designing and printing some awesomely large letterpress posters.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ad4cPk3KYJQ]