Studioblog (n): a blog by Studiobanks about design, marketing, internet, business, Charlotte and more. 

The New AAF Charlotte

Robbie 1 Comments

We recently launched the new AAF Charlotte website to coincide with the beginning of their new season and mark the name change from Charlotte Ad Club to AAF Charlotte. The new site better organizes the group's content as well as adds some new features, including member profiles, company pages and a vendor search. Despite the addition of profiles, this isn't an attempt to create yet another social network. Try to think of it more as an advertising resource for the Charlotte region, as well as a way to keep up with AAF Charlotte happenings. Basically, if you work in an industry that deals directly or indirectly with advertising, you might want to look into joining AAF Charlotte.

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No More Soup For You!

Banks 0 Comments

This week's issue of the Charlotte Business Journal reports that local entrepreneurs John and Victorian Kirby will be opening an Original Soupman restaurant in downtown Charlotte. The Original Soupman was created by Al Yeganeh, better know as the inspiration of the "Soup Nazi" from the TV series Seinfeld. With most Original Soupman franchises in the northeast the Kirby's restaurant will be Charlotte's first taste of the 50 soup varieties.

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(Project Update) Southern Comfort Logo

Christy 0 Comments

Here's the final logo picked by Southern Comfort Development Group. It was our favorite. We've just wrapped up the collateral design and are on to the website design. The client is working hard to gather up content, including photos of their properties and deciding what information they want to provide for each of their site's pages. This is always one of the hardest parts of the process. You would think it would be easy to just sit down and compose a paragraph or two about your company and its processes, but in fact, it's not so easy. This is why we have many great copywriters at our disposal to help our clients along while they gather content.

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(New Project) Varji & Varji Salon and Spa

Christy 0 Comments

This is our third client in the Morrison, located in South Park. First Winestore, then Asana Activewear and now Varji & Varji Salon.

We had our kick-off meeting yesterday and are very excited about the vision Max and Susan Varji have for their website. If you've seen the interior of their store, you'll have some sense of their incredible taste.

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(Project Update) Asana's New Logo

Christy 1 Comments

As we promised, here's the logo Asana chose from the six or so options we presented them—and it was our favorite one of the bunch, too. Clay designed this font by hand, so Asana will have their very own personal typeface. We chose the four colors from swatches they gave us from one of the clothing brands they'll be carrying. Now, the architect designing the store, which will be located at the new development Morrison in South Park, will be incorporating the color palette we've chosen into the store design. The next phase for Studiobanks is to create all of the Asana collateral: business cards, letterhead, envelopes, in-store hang tags and product signage.

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We Love The Avett Brothers

Robbie 0 Comments

The Avett Brothers, hailing from Charlotte (rather Concord/Mt. Pleasant), just released their new album Emotionalism on May 15th. A few of us made it down to their in-store at Manifest this past Tuesday. According to their management, around 700 people passed through the store during the event and 300 copies of the album were sold. All in all, they played 13 songs and mingled with double the attendance of their last in-store there in 2004.

If that wasn't enough, the guys recently performed "Paranoia in Bb Major" on Late Night with Conan O'Brien. Videos of the performance have mostly been deleted from YouTube by NBC, but we found one!

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(New Project) Asana Activewear

Christy 0 Comments

We are very excited to announce yet another great project from a client located at the new development Morrison in South Park! First the Winestore, now Asana Activewear.

Asana Activewear is a newly formed company that operates boutique, specialty-apparel retail stores, focused exclusively on yoga-inspired activewear and accessories for men and women.

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(New Project) Southern Comfort - Custom Home Builder

Christy 0 Comments

Studiobanks has become known for creating strong brands. With our latest project, Southern Comfort, a local custom home builder new to the market, we will have the opportunity to create their entire brand - including logo, marketing materials and, of course, the website.

With so many builders in the market, our challenge will be to create a memorable brand that sets them apart from the rest.

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Design Un-Plugged: A Panel Discussion with Charlotte Studio Owners

Banks 1 Comments

Recently I had the opportunity to represent Studiobanks and speak on a discussion panel of Charlotte based studio owners held by AIGA. All of the selected studios employed between 5 and 10 people. It was an honor to be included in such an esteemed group of local firms. The discussion covered various subjects like running a design studio, working in Charlotte and hiring the right people. Here is a snippet of some of my responses on the various topics:

What do you prefer to spend more time doing, design or business?

While I do enjoy business side of things, I prefer to spend more time on design and the creative direction of our various projects. There was a time about a year ago that the studio had grown to a point where I was doing business about 90% of the time. It was quite draining, so I hired a project manager to help with client relations and the day-to-day business operations of Studiobanks.

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(Press Release) Carolina Nightlife Recognized as a 2006 Charlotte Magazine "Best of the Best" Recipient

Studiobanks 0 Comments

CarolinaNightLife.com designed and developed by STUDIOBANKS, was recognized as a 2006 Charlotte Magazine Best of the Best Award recipient for "Best Guide to the Night Scene."

Charlotte Magazine’s panel of editorial staff members, contributing editors

and regular contributors handpick Charlotte’s Best of The Best after being

assigned specific categories to research.

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