I love business and art equally.

I respect the nuts and bolts of business, but I love the creative side most of all. I thrill at the creative “Aha” moments — when I can look at a client’s problem with fresh eyes and see a new opportunity or solution they had overlooked before.

The same dichotomy is true on the art side. I love the creative aspects of my world. Design and copywriting are my life-blood and I’ll probably never stop doing them, but I am extremely pragmatic. I require all my concepts to work hard for my clients. Beautiful for beauty’s sake is just not in me. To be beautiful, something has to be effective as well.

How did I get this way?

I don’t know, but I was the kid who was always making a poster for the school play, or painting the backdrop for our neighborhood “circus” show, or creating a brochure with the cheer lyrics so the East High School football fans could chant along with us. (Yep, I really did that. I was crushed when I found the majority of them under the bleachers after the game.)

I enrolled in college to be a set designer. I didn’t know the field of Graphic Design existed. It was my advisor’s idea that I take general graphic design classes before I consider specializing. It was perfect. I fell in love.

I learned the “old school” methods of the field in college, and as a professional picked up the technologies the desktop computer introduced. Now, as the internet has grown to be an integral part of our lives, it has brought new communication opportunities. There are always new design media to embrace, new techniques to learn, and new ways to touch people.

In my business I’ve worked with hundreds of clients to help them use those technologies and develop deeper connections with customers and stakeholders. I’ve helped them define and express their brand and grow their businesses through creative marketing and intelligent communications.

In addition, I’m doing more and more business consulting, using my marketing and messaging insight to help direct clients through the process of vetting and implementing a business concept. I love working closely with my entrepreneur clients.

As I look forward to our 25th anniversary this summer, I feel truly blessed. I have a profession I love that is the synthesis of “smart” and “art”.