A friend of mine, Rachael Donnelly, expressed interest in starting her own business as a personal trainer. She’s been working in body building and competing for quite some time now, so it was only a matter of time before she started her own company. She sent me a text with some ideas she had about a logo, which would then translate into a business card.
What she had forwarded to me was an idea of someone else’s she really liked. She asked if there was a way we could capture the simple essence of the logo, while adjusting it to fit her needs. She was excited at the prospect of using her initials as her logo, so we started in. After asking a few questions, I was able to ascertain what, exactly, she liked about the logo she sent me, and I was able to sketch up a few ideas for her.
While they don’t entirely look too impressive, getting an idea of the flow of how Rachael wanted her logo to look was important. I told her I enjoyed the first one a lot, and she said she liked the last one a lot, so I refined the looks a little more.
After the second round, a funny thing happened — Rachael agreed with me! So off we went with the first design, and we started on the business card. The front was simple — just her logo and her catch phrase “reach your own destination”. Some specifics she wanted on the back of the business card were:
- Her name
- Her title
- Her email
- Her phone number
- Her facebook and instagram addresses
- Her photo
- Lastly, a spot where she could offer a free 5th training session to any of her customers. Much like a stamp card, she would initial until the card was full, then give the customer a new card.
Everything else was basic when it came to working on the business card. The only potential for error came in the stamp area. We had to devise a way that she could initial off. There are a few issues you have to keep in mind when designing for a spot like this. For one, the background needs to be light enough for a blue or black pen to be seen on it. Secondly, making sure the card stock being ordered isn’t too glossy (ever tried to write on a glossy business card with a ballpoint pen?).
Since Rachael decided she wanted to utilize spot UV on this card, luckily it was easy as removing the spot UV from the initialing spots.
Overall, she was excited and thrilled to become “official” — ready to start her business with the essentials. I’ve sent her on her way with a logo package including a logo that she can watermark images with in the future. Thanks Rachael! Best of luck for your promising new business!