Holiday Reading List
Summer 2020 saw me return to two favourites before skimming a rush job.
I hand out copies of this book like toffee.
Read it because it’s inspirational common sense stuff. The cover is beautiful which helps.
Read this before starting a business—any business.
I haven’t read this yet as it’s only now out. Read at your peril.
What is a?
The last time I was employed was on July 22nd 2015. On the 23rd I left Aberdeen for Edinburgh and for the five years following I’ve worked for myself.
In that time I’ve tried my hand at a few things, the common link being design.
NotFrom_
Between 2015-2019 I traveled the British Isles meeting with all sorts of creative types for a chat. At the start all but one were from London.
The big smoke is rightly regarded as a global hotpot of design talent. Back then, our design press were so focused on London that you might have thought the entire creative output of the UK came out of Shoreditch.
I didn’t believe that and I wanted to prove it to myself. The purpose of NotFrom_ was to shine a light on the incredible talent working beyond the M25.
I learned a lot from interviewing my heroes. In no particular order—
people working in creative industries are incredibly open
talking is much easier than writing about talking
there are an overwhelming number of white men in senior creative roles
approaching your heroes isn’t scary and unsolicited emails almost always get a response
always finish an interview before opening the bubbles (I’m looking at you Steve)
Don’t Walk
In March 2018 I established Don’t Walk LLP with Mark McAulay. We had spent a year daydreaming about setting up shop together and it took us another year to settle on the right shade of yellow for our brand identity.
Between 2018-2020 we worked for national charities, visitor centres and a handful of friends. During that time Mark realised that Het Sass was where it was at. Nowadays his time is spent punishing his punters palettes. He’s stocked by bars, kitchens and retail outlets between Aberdeen and London. Importantly, he’s looks like he’s loving it!
Running a small business taught me a few things—
it’s as hard as people say but the results are absolutely worth it
remote working really works
treat people well and they become your greatest spokespeople
you don’t need a logo on day one
everyone else would seem to have more of everything than you do
everyone else is making it up as they go along. And that’s ok
get an accountant
the more people are involved in a project the further you can push the work
the more people are involved in a project the longer it will take
setting up a company need not be difficult or scary
I’ll miss working with Mark but I’ll always look back on that partnership with fond memories. And I’m greatful to him for taking a punt on me.
[a] design agency
As a sole trader I’ve gone by the moniker of [a] and described myself as a few things.
[a] is a—
sole trader
designer
brand consultant
design agent
graphic designer
brand designer
middleman
Whilst all these descriptions are accurate none of them are quite right. The only thing that hasn’t changed about the way I communicate my business is an unhealthy obsession with yellow.
People who work as Sole Traders are often described as being a ‘one-man band’. I’ve occasionally described myself as a one-man army*. Whichever metaphor floats your boat, I’ve learned that I’ll never perform music, or go to war, alone.
I don’t know what [a] will be in five years time but I know what it is now.
I can’t wait to share that with you.
I started out with a yellow phone, a set of ‘anti-business’ cards and a really nice pencil.
*I likely won’t be starting a career in music
Freelance Design Rates (2019)
We’re rethinking the way we pay our [a] team. That starts with questioning a few things.
Here's how we operate today—
Rates
We'll propose on a project-by-project base. The same way we do with our other design pals. Each project is different and we therefore don't have a fixed hourly rate.
You are your own business. When you take a brief it's up to you to ensure that it's profitable for you. That said we would like to think that you earn a fair amount for your skills.
We assume* that our budgets allow you to earn approximately—
- Artworking £25-35 hourly
- Design/layout £45-65 hourly
- Brand design - £55-75 hourly
*These are fuzzy numbers because we all know that it never works quite like that. In practise we would propose a brief and a budget. If you can turn work around in an hour but the budget is £300 then you would get a £300 hour rate**.
**course that'll be less once you've generated an invoice, taken a coffee break etc
Our concern is that designers are prone to overdeliver. We're the same. So if you ever think you need more time or money we would rather hear that sooner rather than later. We can often revisit our budget or negotiate with the client and work around something.
We can pay freelancers deposits upfront but don't have a flat percentage for this. Happy to discuss stage invoicing etc on a case-by-case basis too.
Transparency
We're proud of the freelancers who choose to work with us. What that means is that we don't hide who you are, and in many cases will introduce you directly to our clients. There's a perceived risk there, in that a freelancer might poach a client...
We've been lucky so far. But sooner or later we might well lose a client to one of the freelancers we work with. It goes without saying that we would not continue to work with that freelancer if they 'poached' the client.
Collaborative pitching and BD
Clearly you're not afraid of putting yourself out there. We would be happy to discuss joint pitches if that's still something you're keen on.
Hire us!
Collaboration is a two way street. If you ever wanted to bring us in on one of your projects we would be happy to support you with strategy and project management or a joint pitch.
The real deal
Hourly rates are useless. But they can be good tools to judge your profitability.
Day rates are bullshit. Who works a 7.5 hour day every day right?
To accurately price you must cost on value. There are whole books on that.