In Your Shoes - Joanna Smyth

Jo is involved in the Account Management and Marketing for Creative Graffix. The role is certainly a varied one and also a lot of fun and gets her out and about meeting lots of local businesses. She is kept pretty busy during the week as she is also a Personal Trainer and takes Fitness and Yoga classes across the city. It is a good way to keep in shape and also meet some wonderful people. She is currently looking forward to the warmer weather and getting more outdoor classes on the local beaches started again - watch this space for more info! She has 2 dogs, Eddie and her daughter Lola and lives in Guardbridge dangerously close to Eden Mill!

From Dundee to Dubai & Denver...

The start of another week that is always filled with the unexpected as we never know what we will see come in. That is the fun of our company - we see into all facets of the business sectors be it Vascular Flow Technologies, to Hoteliers such as Taypark House, to specialist one off projects such as a family tree we designed and set for a very special client. Many of our clients become our friends too as our relationship develops as we do get under the skin of their business to enable the work we produce to be exactly on brief. A number of our clients are based further afield than Scotland in other continents such as UAE, USA, Norway, as well as a few in London. We also get to sample a few of the products we work with too! Thank you Gin Bothy!

SMALL and PERFECTLY FORMED

A small team plus Eddie the sausage dog who have worked together – some of us anyway who are more mature in our years – for over a quarter of a century. Some of us started very young! The nature of the business has obviously developed and changed as technology and demand has moved into the digital age. And although we still do a lot of digital and litho printing it is on a more diverse scale and the large format printing is now something that has taken off. Display posters, architect plans, exhibition stands, pull ups and outdoor street banners. Oh and we can design and create wallpaper too….

THE VAN DE GRAAFF EFFECT

Some of the things we do are rather fiddly and time consuming as not everything can be done by a machine so there is a lot of hand finishing. Binding books, calendars or manuals or laminating menus and business cards – some days there are piles to get through. We recently created a survival book for WEMSI who run extreme rescue courses which was printed on indestructible waterproof stock. But after coming off the printer it has to be rested on our staircase for a day to destatic before binding or our hair would be standing on end not to mention the electric shocks we would be getting which freaks Cat right out!

WE LIKE A CHAT

Social media and marketing are important elements we use to build our reach and awareness to our existing and potential new clients but nothing beats going out and about meeting up with people either and it is just as well I quite like having a chatter! Having moved back from London 19 months ago the first thing that struck me was the openness and positivity of others. People are happy to help here! In terms of popular posts – the most unexpected pictures tend to generate the most interaction…like our Carol being part of her own soup tin.

MADE IN DUNDEE

Our Made in Dundee concept has been a fun new thing we have been doing as part of our support and awareness of the cities status Unesco City of Design / Print City and we are proud to be based here creating amazing work – all Made in Dundee.

THE WEEKEND!! Hurrah!

We are lucky we are a close knit group, and have enjoyed a number of Team Bonding / Fact Finding days together. When you work on the launch of a new bar or restaurant and keep reading and re-reading their menus – you have to go yourself to try it out! We had our own Bake Off recently which resulted in us all being rather surprised as to how well our efforts turned out – in the end the Sausage Dog Cup Cakes, modeled on our 4 legged receptionist, Eddie, won tho – how much Baileys was in those cakes Cat?!! Stay tuned for our next adventure.