The new financial order

Alright this is the last thing I will write about the financial crisis. So pay attention.
I do not wan't to be a jerk towards everybody who really felt the financial crisis in the states. People who had to leave their homes and all those thousands of jobs that where lost. But I have to say that it is not a financial crisis per say. It's the changed state of the world. It is not going to change in six month. It is here to stay. So what we have to do now is learn to adapt. And adapt fast. 10 years ago or should I say, before the internet, the world changed in soft waves along a curve of years. People and markets had time to adapt and get used to financial or cultural change. But then came the internet. And now we have a time where things change by the week and we have to learn to adapt so very quickly. We get information and news almost as it happens. The financial market is not able to forsee anything anymore, because things change to fast. Now the waves of change is like spikes on a cardiogram. This is first of very stressfull untill we figure out a way to fast-adapt, and secondly the business models that our big companies are, and have been, using is outdated and do not work in these times. There is no such thing as a 5 year plan anymore. And what is one of the most difficult thing for people to do? Change...right? You always say you have to love your lover for what they are and not for what you can make them to be. Change is not easy. But it is necessary. So what I am saying is that it is not a financial crisis per say, but a time for adaption and change.
I just saw on the news that in Denmark we have saved many many millions of kroner more than last year on our bankaccounts - this is money we don't put out there in the consumer market and that is fear. Fear will keep things from not getting better. We need to get rid of the fear and adapt to this new world. And don't get me started about the millions of people who are starving and don't have anything around the world. They have had their financial crisis since long before anyone ever dared thinking "Internet".

But what has all this done to The Mark? Well, first of, we obviously lost a big client to that crisis, late last year and has be struggeling for a while to get new clients. This is not the easy part of a designers work. We will not get close to the money earned in 2007 or 2008, but we will survive and keep designing for our clients. We are in it for better or for worse.
But it also have an effect on the quality of work - not that we don't do our best everytime, cause we do - but this year I have been met with demands for price cuts more then ever before in our 11 years. We have to do the same quality work as before but are not making the kind of money that we need to be able to do our very very best. The facts are these: Design is popular like never before, products needs to stand out and attract consumers, from my point of view, it isn't taken seriously enough. Design is a professional process that involves a lot of new thinking, research and feelings, not only the production part and it is very frustrating to want to help your client to help themselves but are not given the amount of time to make the perfect solution. You can't do a serious packaging design in two days...but that is what I am met with. Unfortunately, I could, so now it's what I'm surposed to. Should I say thank you but no thanks? I think not. I love working with design. I'ts my passion and money have never been a reason for me. But if you want a professional solution that works, you should take your designer seriously and give them the time and money the need to make it work for you. Otherwise...if you don't care about the end-result - why use a professional?

All this is pure frustration on my account because I wish to dig deep into every design project I do, because that is what I love. I know this is not a luxury I can depend on, but boy do I long for it. And companies need to take the design way of thinking into their businesses and learn how to design their way out of the old business models and create something new.

Dare be different and try new things

This is not the end of this... I'm sure :o)

Welcome to new clients

First of I would like to welcome The Royal Danish Academy of Music to The Mark. I was recommended by the chief of design in famous TIVOLI Garden in Copenhagen, so thank you Mikkel for that one.
The Royal Danish Academy of Music is Denmark's largest and oldest Academy of Music – a dynamic and lively artistic educational institution which measures itself against the best academies in Europe, and which views it as its key task to continually develop classical music and enhance its topicality, in close interplay with today's artistic and cultural world. I met up with the folks from RDAM or DKMK (danish) and I felt a sudden connection with them and is has been a pleasure working on the first project for them. They needed a concert calender for the rest of 2009 and that is in the hands of one of my printer collaborators as I write. I am very excited to see the final result. Oh and what a pleasure it is to work with the beautiful indentity from danish design studio Bysted. You can see the case here:
http://www.bysted.dk/Menu/Cases/Det+Kgl.+Danske+Musikkonservatorium+-+identitet
I will upload a picture as soon as I get it from the printer.

Stimulate that thing between my ears

And I, who didn't think anyone read my blog. Yesterday a total stranger told me to keep writing on my blog and then shortly after, my totally cousin gave me a hint about that non-moving car, that is my blog. Anyway thanks for support guys. I promise to write more from now on. I do...I really do.

That Tweet in my eyes
I got on the tweet-train. I was a little tired with the whole facebook thing even though I realize the power of networking which have given me work and connections. So finally I tried Twitter. As a graphic designer working with communication design I need to stay on track with what is new and fresh. But I found Twitter to be much more than I thought it would be. When following the right people I get a huge amount of inspirational links that I don't have time to search for myself. This is a great help. I do get the logo of the day, beautiful package design from I love packaging and other cool stuff from designers all over the world.
But Twitter is even more. I can do a quick market research. I searched the word "Bose" that is the name of one of my clients and a large amount of tweets about my client came up. It's was amazing to see all these people around the globe so happy about my clients products that they felt like sharing it.
You can also network with twitter. That stranger is no longer a total stranger anymore and it's also a good way to stay updated on your friends and make new connections on a global scale. The other day I connected with a upcoming UK freelance magazine and website and it sounded really interesting.
So whatever your passion is – whatever stimulate that thing between your ears - it's out there. Movies, fashion, design, electronics, travels and gardening - there is tweets about everything.... go find yours - and start with mine: http://twitter.com/enterthemark

Welcome 2009 and goodbye 2008

Hello there 2009 and hello blog. I'ts been a while...and I really need to get better at my blogging. May 2008 was the last time and how lousy was that? But that was 2008 and this is 2009. But before I get ahead of myself I should fasttrack you from may 2008 to 2009 with a few notes about last year.

The whole summer was a blur for me and I really can't remember much so I will fast forward to october where I went to New York to attend the AIGA's Design & Business conference together with a danish delegation from DDA (Danish Design Association). DDA is the danish "AIGA". The trip was pretty amazing. It's fantastic to talk to people from around the world about their approach on design and business. I should and could write a lot about this trip but I already did in my newsletter in danish and I'm not going to here :o) OH but we did visit AKQA and Mother Design. YUMMI!

November was the anticlimax of the year and the trip to NYC. Our biggest client, the magazine "Film Guide" has closed due to not being able to make any money. It's getting hard to sell magazine-ads and that was the whole foundation for the magazine so there was no way back for them. This of-course hurt us bad. and we will miss it. We used to make this mag 10 times a year and the magazine was our bread and butter. But as it was, Daniel and I talked about Daniels wishes to try something fresh after 3 years with The Mark, so together we decided that he should look for other work. The timing was perfect and this week Daniel found a job, regardless of the crisis. This is something Daniel totally ignored. Well done and we wish him the very best as he departs at the end of January. We hope he will visit often. We do still have a classic soccertable!

So what now?
Our client have all been a little quiet for a while so I went back to my roots in advertisement but this time working with graphic design instead of final artwork...or at least a combination. I've have had some really fantastic projects to work on and love the time I usually have on projects when working for ad-agencies... We have also been invited to pitch on a super cool design project but it's secret for now so come back later for more on that.

We recently moved our offices to the center of Copenhagen. It's a really cool space that we share with other creatives. We moved in together with Imagework who is working with advanced photo retouch for the fashion-, art-, and advertising-industry. This is our new headquarters and from here we will continue to fight for new clients and ofcourse the clients that are still with us. The year is just beginning and everything feels new and fresh. We will try to apply that to our designs.

Come back soon. The bloggin has just begun...again

Mark! The Mark!

The Mark rocks RockZoo

RockZoo is one of our smallest clients, but as we love them all and always takes our work seriously, small is not a problem! We have created the new logo for RockZoo, a hard rock music management agency. We have also helped them out with a few posters and are currently working on a website design for RockZoo. Stay tuned!

For the love of movies

We never write much about the movie-magazine we do almost every month but the truth is we love to work with movie-related projects. Film Guide is out every month in the cinemas and cafés around the country and this year we have already made 5 issues. The thing is, when you work on the same type of work over and over again you have to constantly think about how to improve your work and get new ideas, but all within the design guidelines we have made for the magazine and that is actually the great part about it. Always stay on our toes and stay sharp! Here's this years covers!

Bose is back...in black

This winter (january/february) we helped Bose with an in-store campaign followed by newspaper ads. This is all about making this Bose product the hero of the campaign. Speaking earliere about going international with our clients, working for Bose has showed us that this is a task, we can manage.