noises from dog n’ moon.

Normally, we wouldn’t quote a Bon Jovi song from 1987 but- well… yes. Yes we would.

The last update to the Dog n’ Moon World Headquarters blog was in June. It’s now December and we’re fresh off a Fall Tour to 19 US states over 8 weeks. As you can imagine, it’s difficult to keep the home fires burning. Ironically enough- a flight from DC landed just in time to get home, swap out clothes in the suitcase with fresh ones, and get evacuated from the SoCal Wildfares that were dangerously close to DnM World HQ. 

Initially when we started Dog n’ Moon, it was a small graphic design outfit mainly doing personal websites and business items like cards and letterhead. But over the last decade or so, we’ve been fortunate enough to meet some amazing clients and colleagues that resulted in positive growth for the company. Now, not only do we continue to do visual design, but we have become quite adept at exercising the creative muscles for product launches, worldwide ad campaigns, and local environmental design. We still call ourselves a “boutique agency” and nobody here drives a fancy car or wears fancy suits, but we have had the blessing of being able to manage and drive a number of campaigns that span the globe and extend scope of what creatives do for a living.

Case in point, next month marks the 2-year anniversary of our relationship with Taylor Guitars, based in El Cajon, CA. Our duties with them involve some print work and tradeshow assistance, but mainly doing in-person point-of-sale advertising. It’s one thing to build an ad and pay to have it run in a publication for six months. That kind of advertising takes strategy and skill and a healthy dose of creativity. However, grassroots advertising to support an established brand is a unique way to do advertising on the fly. The good news is that it’s not sales. We are not responsible for turning a conversation into a transaction. That removes the listeners’ fears of agenda-based cordiality and opens up the opportunity to creatively discuss a product’s benefits and feature set. In addition to giving us opportunity to travel, it also teaches us to be better communicators. In advertising, it’s possible to see the viewer as the last link in the chain- and to put too much weight on the brilliance of the message or medium. One-on-one conversations remind us that advertising is simply a conversation in print, but no less needy of clarity, patience, goodwill, and brevity.