He Designed for Nike & ESPN, Here’s What He Learned About Branding | Matt Lehman Ep. 4

19:56Chris Cruz:very different experience very different experience right the the process is still there where you're like beautiful identities the stores are well curated yeah you have you have a great experience yeah so now if someone if a brand is working with you as a visual identity designer or an agency is working with you what are you what are you first asking to get or what are the questions you're like hey we need to talk about this or here's the stuff we want i really want you to consider yeah we start building out your visual identity the look and feel of your brand That's great. So there is a thorough questionnaire that I give every client, but let me just boil it down to really two main things.

20:31Cause there's a lot of stuff that gets boring, but it's really helpful to kind of get the intake from the client. Think about everything. I really like to ask them, what is your competition doing? Oh, and then how do you want this to feel when we're done?

20:44Chris Cruz:So those are kind of the two. Tell me more about why those stand out to you in your long questionnaire. Sure. What are the reasons those become like, Ooh, these are the ones I really want to think about. Yeah. I mean, again there's tons of sub questions that get more detailed but of course for time and everything let's not get into all that but so how how do you want to be different from your uh competition is you know seemingly fairly obvious but how do you want to be different i think a lot of times people are like oh i love this look that this other person's doing i want to have something like that and i and i totally get that i do that i mean that's that is nothing is really ever completely uh everything's a remix totally unique yeah everything's remakes that ted talk no No, but I've heard it's amazing.

21:27Chris Cruz:Someone just referenced that recently. It's so good. Everything's a remix. You see Bob Dylan songs and you're like, wait a second. And then they show the original version of that song from somebody else. You're like, what the heck? Kind of similar. And that's Bob Dylan. So what are these low-level bands doing? Probably really ripping things off. But if your competition is all red with sans serif logos and the tone of voice is very authoritative and stately, we should probably pivot and do something completely different. You said something there I think is so good that is so common to you. Okay.

21:58Chris Cruz:I don't think many people think about when they think about their identity. I assume everybody thinks like this. You said, what is your tone of voice? Yeah. It's why we're scared to text message people or hard things because you can't discern tone of voice. That's a great way to say that. And so you're like, I can't quite tell how you're saying that. So we use emojis all the time to go like, I want to soften this because I need to communicate my tone somehow. I've never made that connection, but that makes a ton of sense. But you said it so quickly because I think people, but people overlook it, but you're aware of it because you're in communication, so to speak all the time where you're like, I'm regularly thinking about how these brands show up and feel in the world.

22:34Chris Cruz:Yeah. Your tone of voice. What are things people need to be thinking about with tone of voice when you're asking, like, is there other questions you ask to dive into that? Yes. I think people assume that that just means copywriting and I don't think it is. So this kind of dovetails into the, how you, how you want your brand to feel. Okay. Do you want it to feel like, you know, we're fun, we're playful you know all anything um but there's there's lots of dials on that sometimes people are like hey we need to we have some really serious stuff that we're that that we talk about how do we discuss that so it is copywriting but it's also just how you want your employees to greet people when they come in how you want um yes dude uh i mean it it really is like the feeling of um when you're communicating through the visuals, how do you want, it's more than feeling.

23:22I'm trying to explain this. I get where you're digging at. Yeah. It certainly is copy. It's how things are, how things look. It's sort of like when you have a friendship with someone, how do you all hang out? How do you want to be understood? How do you want to be understood is a better way to say it. Thank you. Riffing here, bro.

23:40Chris Cruz:This is so good. I'm grasping a little bit, but that's it. How do you want to be understood? Exactly. And so like that sense of like people say, Hey, you came across super intense. And I was like, I did. Yeah. I didn't know. I didn't know I was so intense. Like, yeah, bro. Your face is constantly furrowed. You're like, you have this energy that when you walk in, you're loud. Yeah. I'm like, in a moment, I either had to reject it as a person to go. I reject that because I don't want to be associated with that. Right. Or I go, I double down. I go, that's me. Yeah. Got it. Thanks for insight into me because sometimes I think we can choose to define our brand, but the, also the other part is the customer actually tells us a little bit about our brand to us going like, Hey, yes, this is what you guys are like.

24:22Chris Cruz:And you could either go, no, we're not like that at all. Or you go, actually, that is exactly what we are like, but we have never articulated it. Yeah. Thank you. We're going to start doing that intentionally now. And so, cause you can do everything you can't. I hadn't even fully thought about that, but as you're saying it, I'm thinking about the way people interact, with even the brands that I've designed on social media. Like this one is where the influencers go to take the pictures and to do the, it's very, this one is maybe more casual families. You know, it's a funny thing where someone does something goofy.

24:54It's yeah, it's just, it's so interesting how those things are understood.

24:58Chris Cruz:I looked at your work with Dude Perfect and you're like, it feels like Dude Perfect, but it doesn't feel like everything else I've seen of Dude Perfect. Okay, that's great. But it felt, but when I looked at it, I was like, I actually wanted to ask you about it Because it felt like it had a tinge of modern, like, oh, it was like these lines were put in it in ways that I'm like, that doesn't feel like the, my kids watch Dude Perfect for a long time. They still watch it occasionally. Yeah, same. But Dude Perfect is loud. It's very loud. When it's on, it is insane. In all the best ways. Yes, in all the best ways.

25:30Chris Cruz:It is so loud. Like, my son screams, let's go because of Dude Perfect. Yes. Like, and I'm sure all the kids in his school because of Dude Perfect. Yes. But there's a kind of like you can go down that route and it could feel almost childish, but yours didn't. Oh, thanks. And I was like, okay. I love that. When you were working with Dude Perfect, was there any intentionality behind how you thought through how that was going to show up? Because I don't even know what the finished product was outside of seeing it on your portfolio. Like, oh, that worked for Dude Perfect. Almost all of it became finished product.

26:04So let me also explain to you. This was through Invisible Creature. If you know those guys, they're incredible. So they hired me for this gig. So I don't work. People ask me all the time, like, can you get the Dude Perfect guys to send a cameo to my son for his 11th birthday? I'm like, I can't. I don't know them. Yeah. I love it. Yeah. So the idea on that was like, yeah, one, channeling like a, you know, 8 to 12-year-old kid. But also, like, everything is very boy-skewed, which is cool. But my daughter loves it, too. Yeah. So maybe some of the more elevated pieces. And I told her my daughter does, too.

26:39dedicated pieces were because of that. We're a little more female. I think the boys just went, let's go. And like really frenetic stuff, which a lot of it is, it is pretty loud. The stuff that I designed as well, but some of it had a little more of a, um, what did they become? Like what were they put on? They were, they were put on t-shirts and then, um, they ended up being used at their headquarters now. Um, so they're like, it's on the basketball court and on the walls. And then they made koozies and I mean, I, well, actually maybe not koozies but like all anything that could be yeah like every drip was squeezed

27:12Chris Cruz:out of it you're like this design is so good we're gonna fully know that was happening yeah that's a whole other conversation yeah with contracts um but yeah it was uh yeah that's a that's a needed but boring part of the conversation yes it's true but they were great it was super easy they um the invisible creature guys and their partners with dude perfect basically approved all of it. They do a ton of merch all the time. But yeah, the idea, I mean, my thought is I want everything I do to feel smart. Not that I'm the smartest guy by any means, but just sort of really well thought through elevated.

27:46So a little more of, um, maybe a little more special than the average thing you would get. And then hopefully a little bit of like a wink or a smile in there too. Um, and that's, and that's what a lot of the do perfect stuff became.

27:58Chris Cruz:Okay. So I'm going to swing us back to your, your questions. Cause I took us off on a tangent. when you talked about tone of voice and you said that. You said, what are your competitors doing? What is the tone of voice? And what was the other thing? How you want this to feel when it's over. Yeah. So both how you want to feel about it, I think, to some degree, but also how you want the users, the customers, your fans to feel about it. And just really, I think a lot of times people, when people fill out these questionnaires, I ask about brands that they love. And people always say all the usual suspects.

28:33Would you like to guess?

28:34Chris Cruz:Oh gosh, dude. And we're going to put the Apple. Apple, Nike. People say Google. I'm like, what is that? Okay, sure. I mean, it's a great point. Yeah, like, okay. Sometimes people say Amazon just because they use it. I'm like, okay, fine. They'll say, they might say like a luxury brand, like a Mercedes or whatever. But I'm like, what do you like about those things? Like the Nike swoosh in and of itself is fine. I mean, it's fine. but it's really all the brand associations you have with this all the history of yeah advertising i love the shoes look cool michael jordan andre agassi bo jackson going way back you know so associations you have with that and you're going i love that you said this brand i love that you said whole foods what's your what's your association what do you love about it yeah exactly It's, it's, um, and sometimes, you know, when, when a, when a client says Apple, I'm like, well, they love things that are easy to use, simple, clean, but I'm like, you don't, you know, I don't know if your brand needs to feel like Apple, but then, but there might be component of your brand that needs to feel really user friendly, very easy.

29:40Something that's very complicated, like an iPhone. I don't know how it all works, but it's very easy to use. Um, my kids can use it. My two

29:48Chris Cruz:your daughter can figure out like knows that there's some kind of touch reality now in the world. It's crazy. I know it's ridiculous. So it's, it's, it's, it's really having to interpret. There's a lot of psychology and you have to almost play like a counselor, like a therapist. Okay. What do you really mean by that? What do you, let's like go a level deeper. What do you love about that? Um, and so when, when you can get them to say, I really want my brand to feel super luxurious. Okay, great. I really want my brand to feel, can you just deal it to a couple really, and they might even have things that don't go together.

30:21I want it to feel really playful, but really high end. Okay. Got it. It's going to be in this neighborhood that's really high end, but it's also a more playful brain. Okay, great. We want to be the authority on fill in the blank.

30:32Chris Cruz:Yeah. Automobiles, I don't know, whatever. Yeah. Love that. So then, so my question for you now is as we, as we look at, people are doing so many products right away. They're the creating X, Y, you're seeing so many supplement brands or so many different stuff coming out so fast. I wanted to ask you a question about visuals and what are people missing? Like when you're like, what is frustrating you? Like when you're as a visual designer who's constantly working on brand logos, word marks, the way packaging is, what are you when you look at you like, oh, I'm so mad that brands aren't thinking about this?

31:11Oh boy, that's really hard. I think you're really good at that, by the way. even just those like faux case studies you're doing those are so smart i love those and i don't

31:20Chris Cruz:dude i'm reaching for the stars trying to see if they make sense yeah it totally makes sense i think if i could tell and i'm not sure every brand is missing this but i would say a lot of brands if you go to whole foods or you know even just from commercials or whatever i think a lot of people want to tell you more than one thing and you can tell people one thing in my mind like here's the one thing like this product is one thing um if you start saying you know it's like again not to use nike's the end all be all but they're really just selling you that um you have potential that you are an athlete basically uh but if but if they start selling you hey our shoes are great for cutting on the basketball court yeah if you want to jump no no no one no one like all people want to know is like how's this going to make me feel really.

32:11Chris Cruz:And so I think Seth Godin says we all kind of marketers are all liars because we all kind of are telling the story that is going to get you to the story you want to tell yourself. So it's not technically a lie. It's kind of just you going like, or you want to tell yourself, this is the story I just want to tell myself about me. And the brands are going like, that's okay. We get that you want to tell that story. So what we're going to do is help you tell that story to yourself and go, you actually want to feel that way. so let's get you to feel that way yeah right so there's that element of like okay that's pretty genius yeah it's a great book all marketers are i think you put it i think i rebranded it was originally all marketers are liars and then i think it was all marketers are liars crossed out storytellers or something now yeah that's so great i mean he's uh seth godin is untouchable he's that's the dream genius interview oh yeah yeah let me uh send some text messages.

33:03Yeah. Thanks. Yeah. So I, I mean, I don't know if there is just one thing, but to me, it's overcomplicating things is, is, is typically what happens.

33:12Chris Cruz:So, okay. And this happens to me when I'm going into restaurants or when I'm in, uh, in whole foods, or I'm looking at a company on Instagram and they're creating something new and an ad pops up. How often, like, is there also for you something you're just like, oh man, I wish people were doing more of this. Like, and it's not necessarily like, oh, you're doing that. Like it's, this is wrong. You're like, I wish brands were doing more of this kind of work that you're like, I loved this. Is there anything that stands out to you? We are seeing this more and more right now. This is kind of a trend, but I think, and this is hard for me, this is something that I would like to improve upon as well.

33:48Going for things that are really unexpected and that's really hard to do. And sometimes that That can be a bad move. That can be alienating. But I think we're in a season where if you go to the grocery, a lot of the consumer goods products are taking big swings. Kind of like the really more minimal clean stuff is kind of moving away. Although that will always be there. That will always come back as well. But I think these like really unexpected adventurous things are what I'm really excited about right

34:15Chris Cruz:now. And I would love for more people to do that. Is there an idea or a thing you've seen or something you have inside of you that you're like, I wish a brand would do this. Like if you had to do like a, uh, uh, idea that you're like, it's in the barrel. You're like, I'm just waiting for, is there anything that comes up to your mind in your mind in that part? That's a great question. You mean something, something that I would like to do for a brand? Yeah. You're like, Oh man, I would love to do this. If we could do this, this would be fun. Yeah. There's, there's an, I've done a little bit of this.

34:41I mean, but it's, it's, you know, it's, it's really hard to answer this question because I think is this self-serving or this be serving the brand? So I think from a self-serving standpoint. Let's just be selfish right now. Whatever I would want to do would be, I think a company, this sounds terrible, but it can work. A company that has like, everything changes all the time. Sort of like this, you can get away with no logo is your logo. No brand is your brand. Kind of like, it's sort of like everything is evolving. So whether it's like, maybe everything is like collage artwork and you can really kind of mix it up.

35:18Those are really fun. It's pretty hard to do. I think another place, so maybe there's a better answer. Another place is like sports teams branding is really, I mean, a lot of it is the same. There's so many ugly jerseys that are going to come out right now that I'm like, especially in Major League Baseball, I've been looking at.

35:38Chris Cruz:They're so bad. The city stuff is pretty bad usually. I'm like, why are we, what is going on, guys? Like, get somebody in there. Hire Matt. Like, somebody, please. I would love to. If you work in Major League Baseball and you're trying to figure out, get somebody. I'm like, get Matt to do something because these are so bad. I think you have, so this is an offshoot of what you asked me. This is not exactly it. I think if you were designing a jersey or for any professional sports team and like a sports logo package, it's either got to be super classic and perfect and pristine and incredible, like honors the heritage, or like the University of Oregon.

36:12Just like go for it. Like you have no history until recently. yeah like you can do whatever you want yeah so go for it yeah but it's when it's when teams kind of straddle the middle like this is a weird example this is super niche you got to be a sports fan but like the the university of maryland it's like some kind of weird stuff but also it's kind of boring and um so i think you just have to like really own one of those worlds because

36:37Chris Cruz:you're seeing it in the nba you're seeing it in major league baseball you're seeing these kind of alternative jerseys and they're like some of them trying to be retro there's just this article i watched and they went through all the new ones for major league baseball going through some of these alt jerseys they're like this is the the the other home jersey and you're like oh my gosh who was in the room i don't know like who was in the room guys this is so bad yeah but the the other question i wanted to ask you is if you had somebody in front of you who has no visual identity no sense of like what their brand wants to look and feel like but you're they wanted to know about kind of as a business owner, they, they, they are great at operating their business, but they don't have value for the visuals, but they're like, I can operate the crap out of this business.

37:24Chris Cruz:I can make this thing work and be successful. But then you're like, but you really don't care about any of the visuals, not in a way that you're in a conflict or a battle. They're just like, it's just not on their radar. They're not really thinking about how do you communicate to them like, Hey, this is something important. Like here's, and here's why. Yes. So, um, there's a couple of things here. One of the things I failed to mention when I'm talking with new client is who is their, who is their customer. So that's the third component to, um, what did I say? How do you want this to make you feel?

37:56What are your competitors doing? Yeah. What are your competitors doing? And who's your customer? Um, so I think if it's somebody who doesn't have a frame of reference for visuals and they don't understand the value of it, I will often put together a PDF of like, Hey, here are maybe brands I've designed, maybe even some I haven't designed where there's like numbers attached to it. Like here is like, here is the ROI attached to like when this brand did a rebrand, this is what it got them. So people can think with dollars.

38:23Chris Cruz:Yeah, that is, I don't know how many designers are actual visual identity designers. If you're listening to our podcast and our show and you are a visual identity designer, you do lots of visual identity work and you're branding people in that part of the brand and you can create that document you become powerful oh thanks like so you're taking this and going hey you're sliding it in front of them and they're seeing numbers attached to it continue yes i just want to call that out because i don't think it's common oh thanks we i i did this with uh a bakery a dozen bakery they're in nashville oh yeah you did dozen as well yeah yeah it does bro so are you kidding me yeah i love this we had done a logo a number of years ago and it had really kind of become dated to some degree.

39:04It was really focused on sweets and they have a whole savory menu. So we went through this huge PDF. They didn't ask me to do this. I didn't really get paid for this, but I was like, I just want to help you. And I was like, here is what all your competitors are doing. Here's all the logos. Just put them all in like a document. Here's where your current logo is, which I made, but I was like, I think it's time to update this. And then I was like, here are other restaurants who maybe have rebranded. And then you can kind of Google some of the facts about the financials. Now, I don't know all of it, but I can be like, hey, this was enough of a turn.

39:36They got new packaging for their to-go bread. They did this, and here's where that kind of led the business. And so that really helps business owners because maybe they don't love talking about fonts or colors, but they like making money and they like having a successful business. So it's like, hey, here is a weak spot in your successful business where it's not as successful. You can really see a huge leap if you go here, knowing that your consumer values design. Like you have people who are moving - You may not, but your consumer does. So doesn't have a clientele who, there's a large clientele of pretty artsy people, a lot of people who are transplants from Brooklyn, from wherever, who are like, I love really, really great bakeries, but their visual identity or lack thereof is just kind of like whatever.

40:23But the product, so back to your original thought, the product was so good, but it kind of didn't matter. But I was like, but you can capture so many more people to have this really lovely experience if you dial in the vision. Why limit yourself? Yeah, why limit yourself? And the owner who is the best, she's so kind, she's so gracious. She didn't really care about it. She's like, I like food. I don't really care that much about it. I mean, she was never rude about it, but she was like, help me know what I don't know here. And so she was open to it, which was great.

40:56Chris Cruz:So then what was that process like after that? you started to just kind of take everything with dozen and look at it all? Or were you just taking a portion of it? Like, how did you, we looked at it all. They have someone on staff who's a great illustrator who, and so, and so she kind of does all that stuff. I just kind of gave him a kickstart. Like, Hey, what if we changed, what if we updated your color palette to kind of use what you've been using, but I'm going to own some new colors. Let's have some new illustrations. I kind of created a style for them. And this girl kind of follows that style.

41:22And then she does a little bit of her own stuff changed some fonts created a greater consistency um not you know not everything is perfect that they're doing but it's just it's yeah it's way better than like kind of nothing besides like a logo that i did and they kind of did everything else in like google sheets which

41:38Chris Cruz:is okay but you're like real it's real okay yeah implementation matters here yeah right can we get tied up and i think what i didn't know you did dozen because what i when they just recently moved to a bigger facility but they were in wedgwood houston another neighborhood here in Nashville that kind of has a little bit of that like it has a little bit of that artsy feel to it in that neighborhood there's a lot of like some of these smaller restaurants and they made sense there like when you were like okay like this is really cool I'm really intrigued to see how it goes when they've moved to more of an industrial park area right where they're now in this part where they're like they've got lots of more industrial buildings they're not the vibe of a really cool Italian restaurant up the road an art gallery next to you yeah soho house around the corner a really cool dicey dicey's pizza around that spot there it's a completely different neighborhood though they have a massive wholesale now that they're trying to do so the brand is expanding beyond what that little store was capable of so i get the transition but i'm on a brand level i'm also going like how is this going to impact the clientele i know we're going out to we'll see i think they had a i think so far they have a loyal of enough customer base that it's worked out okay because the project is so good yeah but then they've done they've done some nice upgrades and yeah yeah but it's my kids we did the other day and they literally it was so funny i was getting all their sweets i was in their new location and my daughter just knocked something off the shelf and i'm like okay i felt so bad but i was like okay i broke this i was like i'm buying this what is this you have to know what happens there all the time because it's like i know what am i buying oh a sea a seaweed seasoning i'm like great i'll just turn it up sure i'm sure I'm not going to throw it away.

43:21Chris Cruz:I'll just pay for it. Um, that's amazing. Okay. We're going to end this episode with NASA. Okay. Sure. Tell me about you creating something, branding something that went to outer space. Yeah. Right. And I got it. You had a line. You told me the story, so I'm not acting like I didn't know it. Do you, I want to make sure you hit the line about when you asked about budget. Sure. Yeah. I'll, I will definitely discuss that. So, uh, this was in, this was a, a mission patch for an international space station. I got connected with an astronaut. This is, this is wild. But one of my friends is friends with an astronaut.

43:56There are not that many of them.

43:57Chris Cruz:The way you could say that, my friend is a friend of an astronaut. Yeah. And so the astronaut who is, I guess the captain of the mission, um, gets to determine who works on a patch. So they have people who design for NASA, but he can, he or she can also determine if they want to do it. but if they want to spearhead the charge and have someone else make the patch. So it was for the 43rd mission of the International Space Station. And I worked with an astronaut named Terry Vertz. He was great. But again, a guy who's not super concerned about design. And even like - And what was that process like?

44:32It was, he was great. He was open to a bunch of stuff. We ran into some limitations on, some of his ideas were like, I want this gradient and whatever. And it's like, this is an embroidered patch. technical limitations here this is thread we can't do all that um so we kind of worked on i had asked him some questions about where they were going as if i knew outer space that well i'm like i know some of the planets i'm not super well versed on the other galaxies yeah exactly i'm a huge star wars fan um yeah i'm a tattooing or what what's happening exactly so he kind of told me sort of what they were doing um and we had to reduce everything to really simple forms for the patch.

45:14So I ended up showing them probably three to five options. But before the process started, when I got connected with him, I was like, great. You know, if you want to put me in touch with the accounting department, what is the budget in general? Should I give you an estimate? And he was like, oh, well, I need to tell you, there is no budget for the patches. This is an honor to be chosen. So it's either you do it for nothing or you just don't do it at all. And I was like, great, I will do it for nothing. This is NASA. You should have the money to pay me. But also, if NASA calls, you just do whatever.

45:48It's fine. So I wouldn't say for most clients, I wouldn't work for free. But when it's NASA, you're like, sure, whatever. So it was a pretty easy process. We ended up doing about, yeah, three to five patches. And then probably on the one that they selected, probably three or four iterations off that. And then we landed on something. We had to use, um, uh, Russian names and American names. That was a bit of a challenge. Okay. Uh, but it was, it was, it was, it was. What did you land with?

46:14Chris Cruz:What, like, we're going to throw it on the screen too. You're going to send it to me a second. Yeah. It was like a hexagon shape. Um, we sort of united the, the 43 that kind of became the logo. And then in like the, what's called like the bowl of the three, uh, the bottom part we put earth and then had like a flare of like the sun coming from this one side, like new horizons. And it's like, you know, new that, that whole idea. And then had the little space station. There was a little bit of just slightly on like, Hey, this doesn't look exactly like whatever, but I'm like, again, this is, this has to be so tiny and stitched.

46:46Chris Cruz:So we can't get, you know, he's an, he wants to geek out on like, Hey, this, this module of the space station isn't exactly that. And I'm like, I can make like a 45 degree angle and like tie it to the other part, but that's really it. We don't have a lot of, a lot of flexibility. And once he kind of realized, he was like, oh, yeah, this is like we're sending this off to be stitched. That was it. Yeah, it's not going to work. So I'll still see it places. Every now and then I saw it on television. I was going to say, did you see it on TV in any way? I saw it on TV. They were interviewing. They were showing footage from one of the astronauts being interviewed from that space station.

47:23He was talking about something else, but he was wearing like a polo with it on it. And I'm like, oh, yes. So I'll see it every now and then. You can go online and buy the patches from old missions. And so you can purchase it, which is cool. um yeah it was it was a total blast and something i never thought i would ever get to do love it uh blast no pun intended um but yeah things really taking off for me

47:43Chris Cruz:i like it let's keep going yeah yeah yeah the joke's going all right but bro thanks for talking with me man thank you for having me so fun appreciate it