Winning a Gold Aster Award for TV/Video Advertising, The Orthopedic Hospital of Lutheran Health Network TV spot features Julie Pope, a hip replacement patient, who shared the story of her surgery and quick recovery. The second Aster Award earned was a Silver for the Billboard Design of the LED QuickER boards, which feature the current, average ER wait times for three local network hospitals: Dupont Hospital, Lutheran Hospital and St. Joseph Hospital.

“We’re thrilled to have been working with the Lutheran Health Network marketing team for over five years,” says Matt Kelley, One Lucky Guitar’s owner. “We continue to relish the opportunity to work with an organization whole-heartedly committed to delivering the best possible patient care and we’re honored to be supporting them in telling these life-changing stories.”

The Aster Awards, hosted by Marketing Healthcare Today magazine and Creative Images, Inc., is a medical marketing awards program that allows healthcare organizations and advertising agencies to compete against similarly sized competitors from across the nation and world. Awards were issued for entries that received top marks from judges placing them in the top 16 percent of the nation for advertising excellence.

BRAND SPIRIT
Do you recognize your favorite products—without their logo? Could you pick it out from the competition? Well, Brand Spirit—a blog started by brand strategist Andrew Miller—is exploring the idea in a Tumblr project where he post one item per day for 100 days. The item, doused in white paint, will be stripped of its brand essence leaving us to ask the question… is money spent on visual identity and packaging really working? Take a look at Brand Spirit, and let us know what you think.

LESSONS FROM SPRINGSTEEN 
It’s no surprise that Springsteen’s energy level, powerful voice and unbelievable songwriting abilities have inspired the core of OLG. No one explains that better than Matt, and for that story, see “Rosie, come out tonight.” For now, here are eight lessons from Springsteen that companies and brands should lend an ear to. From being innovative, to being meaningful, to letting your values define you to the core, this man knows branding.

SOCIAL BEER
This gentleman, Helder Pimentel, launched a beer (called Backlash) using only (yes — only) social media. Through his blog and social media tools, like Twitter, he keeps his fan in the loop about the recipes he’s working on and promotes the beer on Twitter. He’s even polled his social audience to help decide on a name for brews! He says he can’t believe companies still exist that don’t see any real value in Social Media, and here’s why… 

HASGHTAG CREATIVITY
From taking advantage of unused Twitter characters, to discounted Pizza, to vibrating phones falling off tables — these companies got really creative with their Twitter accounts and made a splash in Social Media resulting in loads of tweets and mentions, not to mention accolades for their awesome social media activity.

DIY FOR THE YOUNGSTERS
This site creates an online community for kids who MAKE. Instead of putting the work they’re so dang proud of on the fridge, they can now put it here too — on DIY.org. The best thing about this new network is that it is made for the kids, protecting their identity in a safe environment online, while promoting and inspiring their creativity. Check out how it works, then consider signing your child up!

The addiction spread into my adulthood. I collect as many maps as I can when I travel. In fact, a highlight of any trip is examining the airport map kiosk and taking photos of all the wayfinding. (Seriously, ask my wife.) Ever been to IKEA? The furniture is fine, but they have a really nice map to help you make your way through the store's maze of product displays. I decorate with maps, too. I just bought a huge 48" map of the world for the den and am about to splurge on a map of the moon's craters.

This cartographoria (real word?) has served me well as a professional. Over the years, I've had the privilege to design maps for Indiana Tech, Fort Wayne Children's Zoo, Downtown Fort Wayne and Arts United's Campus for the Arts. And this week, I just completed perhaps the largest and most complex map I've ever designed—Fort Wayne Trails' (FWT) regional trail map.

A Little History

Fort Wayne's modern multi-modal trail system dates back to the 70s, when a bunch of passionate volunteers got the original Rivergreenway started near downtown Fort Wayne. Over the years, the city and other advocates helped expand the trails to span east to New Haven along the Maumee River, a few miles north along the St. Joseph River, and south along the St. Marys River.

Trails cost money (about $500k per mile, on average), and as public interest in safe, non-motorized pathways grew, several independent trail fundraising organizations emerged to raise money and advocate for more trail construction. Namely, Aboite New Trails, Northwest Allen County Trails, and The Greenway Consortium. As you know, as these groups raised money and expanded the trails in their boroughs of the city, their paths eventually crossed — in a good way! Trails were connecting! People could ride a bike on a trail all the way from New Haven to Aboite, or from Tillman Park to IPFW. Not only did the trails connect, but these organizations merged into Fort Wayne Trails, Inc.

Add up all the trails in the Fort Wayne area and you get about 68 miles (that doesn't include our bike lanes, sharrows, sidewalks and all the trails within private neighborhoods). 68! And 50 of those miles are completely connected. That's an impressive network. Impressive enough that it attracts visitors and business investments to the region. We don't have beaches or mountains here, but our trails provide a natural outdoor activity that people crave. A way to exercise, spend time with family, or even commute to work, school or shopping. People want to live near the trails. Trails add value to the community.

And yet, exploring 68 miles of trail can be a little daunting. Questions arise: where do I park? Where does this trail go? What if I have to use the bathroom? Need water? What businesses and attractions can I see along this trail? All of these questions can be answered with a good map.

New Milestones, New Maps

Several good maps have been produced over the years to help users understand the trail network. Most recently was the fantastic Rivergreenway map distributed for free by The City of Fort Wayne. Its only drawback was that it wasn't big enough. With so many trails added in recent years, its central focus didn't capture the entire network.

Also, with the newly formed Fort Wayne Trails, Inc. advocating, educating and fundraising for trails for the entire city, not just specific neighborhoods, it made sense that Fort Wayne Trails, Inc. would take on the responsibility for creating a new map for the Greater Fort Wayne area. As a board member of Fort Wayne Trails, and a map lover, I naturally accepted the challenge.

Exploration and Challenges

I began the mapping process simply by working with the assets that were already available. Employees at the City of Fort Wayne, who are passionate trail supporters, helped me access technical map data. Their immense knowledge of the trail network, city streets and landmarks was invaluable. So using all this data, I started working on color palettes for the map. In an interest to convey vibrancy and natural beauty, I gravitated toward a nice rich green for the background color of the maps. This lead to issues with legibility, though.

You see, maps contain many layers of data. There are the streets and waterways, landmarks and parks, and facilities and services. All of the above then needs to be labeled in an orderly way. Strong background colors — whether very dark or very light — limit the ability to give visual emphasis to items on the map. There will likely be more color clashes, too. So a neutral background color is preferred. Grey would have done the trick, but I chose a tan color to warm things up a bit.

With that decision made, there was still the challenge of determining the right colors for other map elements. To decide that, a map maker needs to determine the map's primary focus — what key information are you conveying to the user? Once you know the answer to that question, other elements on the map should be designed to serve the core purpose. The focus of the FWT map is relatively simple: to identify where the trails are, where they go, and how they can be accessed.

With that focus clearly in mind, determining the right palette was relatively easy. The trails needed to be the boldest element of the map — the visual anchor. Streets and roads are crucial reference points, but they had to visually play a tertiary role and not compete with the trails for visual prominence. To that end, the trails are a chunky dark brown, while the streets are all reversed out in white. This approach keeps both pieces of information separate, gives the trails the emphasis, and retains legibility for both. Identifying parks was pretty straightforward — green. And landmarks are in a salmon color, similar tone to the background with enough hue added to stand out on the map without overpowering any other elements.

The next challenge was adding icons for facilities on the trails. Since most of the map up to this point used natural and neutral colors, I could use more primary colors for the small icons. Bright blues, oranges, purples and yellows are judiciously used to call attention to parking areas, bathrooms and water fountains.

Good map making requires a little cheating, too. The trails appear to be very wide — wider than the roads! The rivers are also much wider on this map than they would actually be. These nuances are what makes map designing so fun. If this were a technical map for surveying, we'd have to be more judicious. But pushing the scale of landmarks and key features helps the end-users make mental connections between what they see from a trail and what they see on the map.

You'll also notice that not all streets are drawn on the map, only major arteries and key neighborhood streets. Since the focus of the map is on the trails, it made sense to reduce the clutter by removing some streets.

Branding the Map

Fort Wayne Trails, Inc. is working hard to develop a brand that is modern and hip, while still appearing approachable and established. These maps will be available to travelers in the Visitors Center, convention centers, hotels, maybe even at the airport. The distribution of these maps will be in the tens of thousands each year. So, it's important that we conveyed the right image for our city and its awesome trails. This map is more than just technical data and user information, it's a flagship for the City of Fort Wayne, and a component of the overall brand that our city is building.

Importantly, Fort Wayne Trails, Inc. is kicking off a massive fundraising campaign. We have $5 million committed to new trail projects, but we'll only be able to access those funds if we can raise $1 million of our own. What an awesome opportunity! Every dollar given to the trails effectively becomes $6! In an effort to get the word out, we devoted a great portion of the extra space on the maps to our campaign. Check out what projects are in the works near you and consider supporting this awesome organization.

Continuous Improvement 

Any project this big, done almost entirely in free time, has a decent margin of error. So we've already identified a few areas where things could be improved. We're also eager to find what kind of information can be added to the map that makes it even more user-friendly. But it's a progressive project, and each season as we revise and reprint, it'll keep getting better.

The word "we" has crept into this point, and for good reason. I couldn't have designed this map without the incredible support of some awesome folks. Amy Hartzog, Dawn Ritchie, Alec Johnson, Paul Spoelhof, Bert Migues, Matt Peters, Kienan O’Rourke and many other awesome dudes and dudettes — my hats off to your giant brains. Thanks to Lori Keys and Josh Smith at FWT for your knowledge and patience as I finished this up. Also thanks to the team here at OLG for helping me hone the graphics, especially the boss who let me use some work time to get this done. Excell Color Graphics did the awesome printing work. And NIRCC — big thanks for helping us make the printing and distribution of these possible.

Well, thanks for reading all this. As a map lover and a map designer, this is one of my proudest accomplishments. I truly hope that residents and visitors use these maps to explore parts of their city they've never been to before. Or, at least see these parts of town for the first time from the vantage point of a bike saddle or a good pair of walking shoes rather than through the windshield of their car. I hope more and more people start using their bikes (or feet) to get to work and school, or the store — imagine a bike friendly community where people prefer riding a bike to taking car to most places. That'd be nice.

Want to get a map of your own? Drop by Fort Wayne Trails HQ at the Auer Center for Arts & Culture in downtown Fort Wayne. In the coming weeks, you'll be able to pick up maps downtown at the Visitors Center and many other establishments around the city. Stay tuned. 

With the spring launch of The Good Ones brand, not only did OLG get to influence and design the clothing itself, but we also made it a point to enhance all touchpoints of the purchasing process.

First in line was developing hangtags that would be put on each item. Anyone who pays attention to these little elements knows that the world is open for different opportunities—sizing, textures, colors and attachments are all considerations. In the end we landed on a piece that was inspired by VIP badges you might see at a concert, and this played well with our character's role as a young band. The top portion was printed and die-cut and then a screenprinted piece of fabric was run through a slot to be sewn at each end. It's finished off with a black string and a Good Ones button is affixed.

Our attention next turned to how things arrived to the customer. Each item needed to be placed in custom bags and we found an oversized 1-color logo would do the job. Then there was the issue of how to attach the packing slip. You could just place it with the clothes, or you could make a custom-printed zip bag and stuff it with stickers of the characters and our very own Good Ones guitar picks. Hopefully the lil' ones wearing the clothes also have their favorite character stuck on a notebook or lunchbox!

Eventually we started itchin' to do some posters, y'know, because we like that kind of thing. We created four posters, each representing the different characters, Stuart, Adrian, Franklin and Bullfrog. Since their fictitious tour was all across America, all four posters could also individually pay homage to a section of the country; this was done by creating icons of landmarks and popular themes. We printed on a mushroom-colored stock and used a process where digital white ink was put on top—giving the appearance of a screen print. Initially, you'd get a free poster for a certain dollar amount spent on the site.

Get your own goodies at TheGoodOnes.com.

But first:

The only place to start is with an epiphany. And I had a stunner in 2006, and here's how it went. I had spent years and years traveling distances great and small to see my heroes in concert. Blur at the Metro. Marah at the Pike Room. Eitzel at the Majestic. Adams at Exit/In. Clem Snide at the Annex. Reilly at Birdys. Pulp at St. Andrews. Wilco at The Vogue. You Am I at Beachland. Westerberg at the Guthrie. Pernice at Spaceland. Avetts at Mercy. Snider at Station Inn. Dylan at Newport (easy, easy, I'm talking 2002).

At some of these shows, I'd catch my mind wandering a bit—I was imagining these artists doing the same show, only in Fort Wayne. With a bigger, more appreciative, better crowd. One that took nothing for granted. I was thinking, Fort Wayne would love you, baby. But artists like these—the relevant, the buzzy, the up-n-comers—rarely came our way. They drove by, went around, pushed through, flew over.

My mind would wander…how could you get your heroes to play your hometown? Well, I was just perplexed. For years. And then, one day, the answer became clear:

You ask them. 

(Funnily enough, they tend to say yes.)

So in May of 2006, The Avett Brothers played on Calhoun Street, as part of the DID's block party series that summer. It was a cathartic show, in about a hundred different ways. This was a couple years before those guys were on Columbia Records and playing with Dylan at the Grammys.

The following August, Tim Rogers (of You Am I) came to town and played at Columbia Street West. It's rare enough for Sydney's You Am I to make it over for a US tour, so a Rogers solo jaunt is to be savored—especially since his What Rhymes with Cars and Girls is one of my all-time top five records, and the tour is just five shows long (LA, Seattle, Austin, Fort Wayne, NYC, duh). Rogers loved Fort Wayne, and Fort Wayne loved Rogers. The legendary Joel Faurote photographed his first concert that night. Tim played a song called "Any Old Time" at this gig, a song which opens with the line, "Any old time you want to come 'round, try some Speckled Hen, or just put me in my place again…" I'd never had Old Speckled Hen, but I had been put in my place, and it became a goal of mine to track down this brew. And soon enough we'd convinced Kim Jacobs of the nascent J K O'Donnell's to put it on draft as their house English Ale.

I was fortunate that my old band, The Trainhoppers, opened both of these shows.

2007 saw the Ike Reilly Assassination at the Botanical Conservatory, for Lucky Seven. We served Speckled Hen, Rolling Rock, and nothing else.

(I'm only mentioning shows OLG had something to do with—like these. Meanwhile, these same sorts of things were happening all over the city, on most nights of the week, in new and re-emerging clubs and non-traditional venues and with wildly creative bands (like my compatriot Nate Utesch's Metavari) leading the charge. It was like a movement.)

In 2008, Rogers was due to return to the States, and requested a Fort Wayne date. We booked him for—yes—J K O'Donnell's and I got to design what was probably my favorite non-RMike poster of my career. And then…his work visa got held up, and the tour was off, at the last minute. The thing was, we had an email list full of hungry punters, aaaaand…no gig. So we hopped over to the roster of Tim's booking agent (Kevin French) to see who else might be around, and noticed that Eef Barzelay of Clem Snide—OMG, Clem Snide!!!—was playing the last show of his Lose Big tour in Columbus on Friday night. Our show was sposed to be Saturday. So I asked if Eef and his band would add a show, and play Fort Wayne, with almost zero notice, the following night. And he said yes, even though we'd lost J K's by that point and the only venue we could find was the front room of Calhoun Street Soups, Salads & Spirits (CS3). (The yet-to-be-dubbed "Tiger Room" in back was booked for a drag show, which only added to the evening.) Turns out, the front room actually works for bands, especially when people are hanging from the rafters.

Eef loved it, too, and called back six months later to kick off Clem Snide's Hungry Bird tour in one of his new favorite venues—The Tiger Room at CS3—with one of his new favorite hostesses, Donna with her brilliant laugh and excellent menu. So we did it again for Meat of Life in 2010. After that show, I grabbed Eef and told him that we had a sliver's sliver of a chance of setting up a show where the Fort Wayne Philharmonic would back him for a few songs, much as they had done with his buddy Ben Folds in a much more formal engagement. And 17 months later, Fortissimo actually happened, in IPFW's beautiful Auer Performance Hall (setlist included "Denver" solo on uke…"Denver"!!!!), with an encore at The Tiger Room the following night.

Tim Rogers' cancellation in 2008 sucked, but the Clem Snide / Fort Wayne love affair is the kind of outcome that sorta explains why we think the guitar is lucky.

Which brings us full circle.

A couple of months ago, Eef wrote in asking about doing a show in Fort Wayne to preview Clem Snide's new album, Songs for Mary. Only this time, he wanted to do something a little more inventive. Solo acoustic, no PA—"all naked"—and perhaps at the OLG HQ. Tickets would be a tad more expensive, but we'd have a drawing for a just-for-you MP3 from Eef, some free downloads and "maybe have some cupcakes on hand or some such." Amazing. And after hosting Mark Hutchins' Sleepy Furnace, Pedro the Lion's David Bazan, and of course Ike Reilly for unbelievably memorable shows within OLG's walls, we thought—yes.

Next thing you know, Tim Rogers writes in. "Miss yer drawled vowels Matt." OMG *swoon*!!! Tim's gonna be in the States for a couple of weeks and his short US tour is pretty much being planned around making sure a Fort Wayne show can happen—and it's just a week after Eef's performance. But where to put it? It could go anywhere, and would fit perfectly at The Brass Rail, or The Tiger Room, or the Arts United Center, but, well, we simply can't resist the idea of hosting two of the finest songwriters in the world in our walls within a week of each other, so…it'll be here.

(And realistically "here" is not the OLG offices, so much as 1301 Lafayette—in the Lotus Gallery on the first floor of the building we call home.)

I couldn't more confidently believe that both of these shows are going to be once-in-a-lifetime, miss-it-and-regret-it-forever evenings. We'd love to see you there, and by there, I mean here.

Here's your OLG Late-May 2012 schedule:

Eef Barzelay (w/s/g Chris Otepka of Heligoats), Wednesday, May 23rd, 8PM, 1301 Lafayette Street, 46802. (tickets)

Bike-It art show at Lotus Gallery, Saturday, May 26th, 7PM, 1301 Lafayette Street, 46802. (free)

Tim Rogers (w/s/g TBA), Wednesday, May 30th, 8PM, 1301 Lafayette Street, 46802. (tickets)

And remember: 

How do you get your heroes to play your hometown? It's pretty simple: you ask them.

Someday they might ask you the same thing.

There will be no more flying over.

It's all happening in conjunction with Fort-4-Fitness Spring Cycling event and the Cultural District's Last Saturdays.

You can join the event on Facebook.

Like past logos, we started creating an icon for the new school based on the heritage of the current school. DeKalb High School is known by "The Barons" moniker and so I moved forward thinking of how to tie a medieval theme into a progressive-looking element. I liked how the shield had worked for Huntington's Viking program and I thought the same feeling, with a twist, could work well for DeKalb. The result is a shield that references the top of a castle with a red (their school color) flag waving above. The "D" inside is a custom letterform who's slab is more "knightly" and collegiate. The logo is finished off with the same typeface we've used on all New Tech logos, for consistency.

In addition to branding the New Tech side of the school, we were also asked to refresh the traditional high school's mascot image. It was quite fun taking the old Baron head and giving it the proper love. I can't wait to see it on a football helmet.

With all of the mobile and smartphone apps out there, how do you decide which ones to install? Well, that's a good question. All of us here at OLG have our personal faves. We thought we'd share our personally curated list of apps with you. Each of us have picked our three all-time favorite apps—the ones that we just can't live without—accompanied by a screenshot of our home screens. Without further ado, I would like to present to you: The Apps @ OLG™. We'd love to hear what your favorites are in the comments below. Enjoy!

Taylor

Instagram
Instagram is a free application that has reinvented photo sharing. It's fast, smooth and super user-friendly. Snap a photo. Choose a filter to transform the look. Send photos to Facebook, Twitter or Flickr and share with friends you've connected with through the application's social network. It's simple, and the available filters create beautiful photographs. My camera is now gathering dust...

Diptic
Taking mobile photography to the next level, this application allows you to easily combine multiple photos and apply artistic effects to create awesome photo collages. Rounded boarders, color options, 52 customizable layouts and other effects create tons of opportunity for what seems like unlimited options.

Path
The logo may look similar to Pinterest, but the app is very different. Path is a smart journal that allows you to share your life—including your thoughts, music you're listening to, location, who you're with, sleeping schedule, and high-quality photos and video—with your closest friends. I say closest because the app actually limits your friends to 150 to deter mass-sharing, individualizing the app from networks like Facebook or Twitter which encourage quantity of connections, not always quality.

Nate

LogMeIn
Game changer. Create an account, set up all your devices and machines on LogMeIn, and it's done. I can now make a quick edit in Photoshop, virtually from my office machine, while physically on my iPhone, all while waiting for an oil change. Or hop on my home machine from my office machine, throw a file in my dropbox, and watch it pop up at work. Insanity. Total control. And totally free.

Square
Square app links to your PayPal account and allows you to take credit/debit card transactions via your phone. You can either punch in the digits manually or request a card reader from Square and they'll mail it to you for free. But if you're antsy, Target sells the reader for $9.99. Square takes a nominal fee for each swipe (although the app itself is free) but it's well worth it. The behind-the-scenes reports are wonderful—even geographically specific, which is amazing for taking orders on the road. Strangely enough, PayPal just announced they have released their own version of this technology. I'm sure it's tremendous but for now I'm staying loyal to Square.

Barclays Football
All my Premier League needs. Namely, quick access to news and stats, plus live text from the games I can't watch on my American telly. The number of times I've read half a game while pricing drywall and doorknobs at Lowe's is insurmountable.

Tommy

Spotify
I use Spotify daily to stream music while driving in the car. I can't remember the last time I synced music to my phone!

RunKeeper
RunKeeper helps me keep track of my runs. You can use the GPS on your phone to track your route. If you're a pro member you get live routing, which allows others to see your progress in real-time.

Word with Friends
If you're not familiar with this one, it's basically Scrabble for your phone. The nice thing about it is that you can make your next move at your own leisure, unlike the real version where I tend to space out half-way through. If you want to challenge me to a game, my username is tommycutter.

Michelle

Facebook
Not sure much needs to be said here—who does not know the world of Facebook. I use this app to chat and message with friends, post status updates and stalk people's timelines. You still need the website version for full Facebook overload, but the app is very useful.

CraigsPro+
This app features an easy interface and essential set of features to browse, bookmark and post to Craigslist. If you love to buy used goods, this app is a huge step up from visiting your local Craigslist site.

ABC Video Player
Out of all the free video players, I really love the ABC Player. Not only does it house all my favorite shows, but it is easy to use and has great quality on my iPad. My one complaint is that they often play the same spots and promos at each commercial break. At least these breaks are less than watching TV live!

Paige

Pinterest
Pinterest is a content sharing app that allows members to "pin" images, videos and other objects to their pinboard. I love to surf through the hundreds of images that have been pinned by others. It is a great way to gather ideas for delicious recipes, how-to's for DIY projects, photos of architecture, clothing, color schemes etc... It has just about everything and is forever changing as others post things they like so you never know what you are going to find.

Shazam 
I am the queen of asking "who sings this?" So I love Shazam. At the click of a button the app listens to the music and tells you the name/artist of a song. If hear a song I like I Shazam it and it saves it to a list of tagged songs that I can easily buy on iTunes. Also I will link through to the lyrics which will scroll along while the song is playing. This helps with the unanswered questions like, "is he saying Rock the Casbah...the cash bar...what?"

Fandango
For me, going to the movies is usually a spur of the moment thing. Trying to figure out what movie is playing at what theater at what time can be a challenge. Fandango pulls all of that together in an app that is super easy to use and has different filters. For example, if you are looking to go to a specific theater it will then show you what is playing and at what time. If you are looking for a specific movie it will tell you when it is playing and where. Sometimes I don't even know what I want to see so I can skim the list of movies that are out, read reviews, watch trailers then see where it is playing.

Jake

Google News
Yeah, on days that I feel like I haven't kept up on national news, I at least like to go through the Google-supplied headlines of the hour.

Great Clips
This app is a great example of a (free) phone product that not only works well, but truly affects some part of my life—namely time spent waiting to just shave my head. Log into the app and a version of Google Maps comes up with every nearby 'Clips location and the wait time. Click "check in" on the location you want and then arrive at the given time. I guess I miss reading ESPN mag in the waiting area though.

Redbox
Redbox's DVD dispensors are a nice, quick way to see a handful of pretty new releases. This app allows you to see what movies are in any particular Box, and reserve them if you like.

Matt

Cyclemeter
For a brief time, I tried to have a bike computer. But it was difficult to use, clunky, and—get this—wired! This app is a bit pricey (pricey? It's $8.99!), but entirely worth it. It offers the functionality and features of a device that would be a couple hundred bucks on its own. Too many stats to mention, mapping, reports, charts, graphs, all that kinda stuff. You like stats? This is like fantasy football for the rest of us.

NPRMusic
Incredibly designed app that archives a million and one NPR performances. Did you miss Marah on World Café in 2006? Joe Henry on Fresh Air earlier this year? Tiny Desk Concerts? They're all here. Those, and Bruce's SXSW 2012 keynote. It's a free app, and it's totally priceless.

LoseIt
OK, I'll tell you a secret: I'm trying to drop a couple of pounds. Who isn't? LoseIt is a killer free app that will track all that junk you're over-eating and over-drinking. You can set up goals, reports, any old thing. It's super easy to use and a real motivator. Especially if you discover that about 1/3 of your weekly caloric intake comes from…well, never mind. A guy has to have SOME secrets.

Drew

Google Wallet
This app uses the built-in NFC (Near Field Communication) functions of my phone to pay for stuff wirelessly. Good bye regular wallet — just wave my phone over PayWave registers and cha-ching. Nice. 

Spotify
Changed the way I consume music. Access to everything all the time, and it's surprisingly fast.

Nap App
Kinda silly, right? It's not even designed well. It's ugly. But with the flick of a finger, I'm down for a 15 or 20 minute cat nap. I use it almost daily.

Mint
Mint.com and its apps for Anroid/iOS have done more to help me manage my money than other tools I've ever used. Pure amazingness. 

(Fort Wayne, Ind.) The Good Ones, a brand new, whimsical boys clothing company born in Fort Wayne, has launched their website and online shop. The company, a brainchild of the creative minds behind Matilda Jane Clothing (MJC) and One Lucky Guitar (OLG), offers soulful boys clothing from 12-months to 10-years old.Founder of MJC, Denise DeMarchis, and OLG founder, Matt Kelley, have collaborated and inspired each other’s business growth since 2003. With nine years of successful partnership behind them they teamed up in late 2011 to build a boys’ clothing company that would embrace the wonder and make-believe of boyhood—The Good Ones.

"We wanted to celebrate the boys who light fireworks in our souls," says DeMarchis. "This clothing line is for their imagination, joy, giggles and eyes that twinkle. For creativity and adventure, for catching snakes and carrying frogs in pockets, carving names on a tree, for their home runs…and strikeouts."

The Good Ones’ designs surround a band of characters: Stuart, Adrian, Franklin and Bullfrog, four neighborhood friends from Bricktown, USA who meet at the skatepark trading MP3s and form a rock band. The intention of the clothing company is that boys everywhere will see themselves in the band, or in the band’s biggest fan, Paulie and find a connection with the characters. The creativity behind the clothing line is extensive, including a back story, music videos, original songs, ringtones, wallpaper, trading cards and coloring pages, all of which customers can find on the website's "Goodies" section.

"The Good Ones site isn't just a place to buy a t-shirt and move on,” adds Kelley. “Adventures await everywhere you turn, just like in boyhood. The clothing is designed to celebrate the stories boys will never forget.”

The other image here is a commemorative poster for last week's show of London's The Business. They're a punk rock "Oi" band that sort of has that working-class feeling so I thought an image looking like a patch or organizational logo would work well.

We recently wrapped up The Winning Equation, the 2011 annual report for the Northeast Indiana Regional Partnership—designing this report did not disappoint. The RP had a successful 2011, and they wanted an annual report that really captured the excitement and energy behind the year’s initiatives.

At the core of the content was an equation for regional success: leads + product development + regional team effectiveness = business investment. As mere words, that equation could seem a little dry, but we used illustrations and info graphics to illustrate the different components of this equation throughout the report. Also, a significant portion of the content was devoted to the regional priorities, for which we developed a family of icons.

Here are a few photos of the finished piece. We're pleased with the outcome, and proud to have the OLG name on it.

You know, thinking about annual reports in general, what I love most about these publications is their ability to set the pace for an organization. Years ago, these kinds of books used to be viewed as a wrap-up for the year—celebrating the good, explaining why the bad happened and how it won’t happen again. That kind of content can get dry and routine. But a well-crafted annual report can be a key component to engage and educate your investors and stakeholders. It’s a chance to reinforce your mission. It builds steam and arms your stakeholders with the knowledge to tell your brand story.

The NEIRP’s goals to help our region prosper economically are noble, and it was a pleasure to help tell their story. We’re looking forward to an exciting 2012 for their team and for all of Northeast Indiana.

When the name The Good Ones was chosen, the concept to have characters was born. Why have 'em? Well, think of any products you enjoyed as a kid. There's a good chance some of those memories revolve around a world of something imagined. Although we think the clothes themselves stand out, we wanted to develop a storyline that could enhance the brand and give it some longevity–if done properly. 

Like everything OLG, the made-up band came from our love of music and the opportunity to create something unique down the road. Concepting started with figuring out not only how many characters to have, but what they were—goofy monsters, aliens, animals, inanimate objects, kids? The answers ultimately came from late-night sketching. After all the decent drawings were looked through, it became pretty clear that The Good Ones represented a more down-to-earth group of dudes—dogs, actually.  Dogs that each had their own personality, played their own instruments and went to school. Oh, and they had a friend that showed up once in a while too. Not long after, they had names; Stuart, Adrian, Franklin, Bullfrog and Paulie. They would create original music and live in a place called Bricktown (that's the name of the borough OLG and Matilda Jane reside, ha).

As far a art direction, there's a lot of ways we could've went with the guys. We could've done the Gorillaz thing and "went all 3-D" or illustrated them up in a Disney fashion. Instead I took the honest approach that I always appreciated in Bill Watterson's Calvin and Hobbes. Black and white can still emphasize character traits more than you think and I've always loved the line effects done with an inked nib. Also, I figured the black and white would look good next to the brightly colored clothing. The contrast between characters was important to me as well. I tried to have Frankin (the bassist), tall and large, as a difference to Bullfrog (the drummer) that was small and hyper. 

Once everyone was happy with the character development, we started coming up with more personality traits. You can read about them (and hear their sweet theme songs) on the Meet The Good Ones section of the site. We also started developing the characters for use on other touch points like album covers and swag. The best part was printing off "life size" versions of the band to be incorporated into the music videos and photo shoots.

We think the friends will be playin' music long into the future.

Last month, the show was finally picked up. Airing at 8PM on Wednesday nights (89.1FM on the local dial, nipr.fm on the international one), the show is always entertaining and highly recommended listening. I was tickled as can be to be asked to participate—truly, the "pick ten songs" thing is just a fantastic way to spend a couple dozen hours—and it was especially fun to play some songs that might otherwise be considered a bit left of the dial for radio airplay. (Special thanks to @TommyCutter for the assist on the Tim Rogers / You Am I mashup.) 

Broadcast regulations prevent NIPR from archiving the shows, but some super-awesome folks bootlegged the episode I was on…for your next road trip's soundtrack, click here. 

“When Denise called OLG—I was a young man still in my pajamas at 11AM, trying my hardest not to sound like my office was in the kitchen of a small apartment—especially because there was a clothing company on the line. Little did I know, Denise was calling from her utility room, where she was starting a clothing company between life,” says Matt Kelley, owner of One Lucky Guitar, in his Damn Good interview. “Seven years later, Matilda Jane is a worldwide success with 26 employees and 175 sales reps, and OLG is a booming 10-person design and marketing boutique.”

In addition to the selection of Matilda Jane look-books, identity system and clothing tags created by OLG, Damn Good features the work of countless proud designers from all over the world which the authors deemed to be the best-looking, highest profile and smartest strategically. The design work highlighted includes print, packaging, identity and mixed media, and needed to meet only two imperative criteria to be included in the publication—passion and inspiration. Other agencies featured in Damn Good include Ogilvy, Deutsch Design Works, and Facebook.

“We really wanted to provide a wide view of the fantastic design that’s happening all over the world,” authors Tim Lapetino and Jason Adam say in the introduction. “The work between these covers spans 35 countries, and we dug deep to find not only great projects by well-known, successful firms, but also to ferret out the creative juices flowing in undiscovered corners, away from the spotlight.”

About One Lucky Guitar, Inc

One Lucky Guitar, a Fort Wayne-based design & marketing boutique, was founded in November, 2000 and specializes in high-concept design, advertising and marketing, providing clients with top-shelf creative work and full service through strategic partnerships. Advertising clients include 3Rivers Federal Credit Union, Arts United, AWS, Carson Boxberger, Grand Wayne Center, MKM Design, J K O’Donnell’s, Northeast Indiana Regional Partnership, STAR, the Talent Initiative, United Way of Allen County and Matilda Jane Clothing Company. With Indianapolis’ Lodge Design, OLG is the agency of record for the Lutheran Health Network.

OLG’s community involvement is highly regarded, with work for organizations including the Downtown Improvement District, Embassy Theatre, Fort Wayne Philharmonic, Fort Wayne Women’s Bureau, Fort Wayne Trails and Vision 2020.

The company made its early reputation on work in the music industry, for labels and artists including Robert Plant, Alison Krauss, Willie Nelson, John Prine, and Smithsonian Folkways Recordings (Washington, D.C.), among others.

To learn more about OLG, visit oneluckyguitar.com or contact hello@oneluckyguitar.com.

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Social media is uncharted waters for a lot of us. With new opportunities and communication channels, come new challenges. You may have read our post on integration, which helps us to understand how social media can be a support to our existing marketing efforts. Another stumbling block for businesses is how we can begin to track our efforts when it comes to social media. And unfortunately, because there is not yet a standard for social media measurement, many assume it isn’t possible. This may come from a lack of understanding of how to effectively use social media to support business goals. While there may not be one trusted method of measurement, there are definitely several different approaches that can work—and work well—to help a company determine the success of their social media activity.

Before you attempt measurement though, there are a few important things about social media to consider:

Social media is the vehicle, not the purpose.
Being active in social media is not enough; it’s what you do once you create that account that is important. Your company’s Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and Pinterest accounts are just the avenues you are using to relate to your customers and publics. You have to look more specifically at the social activities that you are engaged in; your engagement with audiences, your content sharing, or your customer service response.

What other ROI do you measure?
Stop and think for a minute, do you measure the ROI of handouts, or business cards? A Facebook fan or Twitter follower represents potential, the same as handing out a business card. You can’t exactly measure the value of that potential. Email marketing measurement also works by these rules. You usually don’t ask about the ROI for your e-newsletter, you ask for the conversion rate, the click-through or the visibility.

What are your objectives?
You can’t measure the ROI for social media without first knowing what your objectives are. What are you shooting for? Is it brand awareness, engaging existing customers, short-term sales? Or are you trying to complement a promotional campaign, encourage word of mouth, or spread news and important info about your business? Perhaps you’re just trying to increase your searchability.

Now that you’ve thought through some of these essentials, you can move on. With your goals and activities crystal clear—you can figure out what form of measurement makes the most sense to track your efforts.

Measurement Method.
Find your form of measurement, something that you can track. Will your social media efforts increase your foot traffic or your sales? Do you hope to see an increase in web traffic? Use your own language, and base your measurements on your own specific goals. Depending on your goals, the truth is there are plenty of trackables…

• Website traffic
• Foot traffic
• Increased sales
• Conversion rate
• Fans or members
• Positive customer mentions
• Page views
• Referrals
• New cliental/relationships
• Revenue
• Contributors
• Posts or comments
• Company mentions
• Reduced returns
• Reduced volume call (if you’re using social media as a customer service channel)

And, as you are evaluating the success your social media campaign or efforts, Forrester Research offers up four main factors to guide you:

1. Financial.
   Did your marketing cost decrease or sales increase?
2. Brand.
   Have perceptions and/or brand awareness improved?
3. Risk Management.
   Are you better prepared to handle crisis or issues that affect brand reputation because you now have a direct outlet to your customers?
4. Digital.
   Has your brand enhanced its digital assets?

It doesn’t stop there!
When it comes to your business, there is so much more that social media can help with. It might be closing business, forming new partnerships and relationships, reducing marketing costs, improving your ranking in search engines, or helping your company to recruit new talent. An overwhelming amount of companies have said social media has been a successful recruiting method for them.

After you’re done thinking through how you will track your efforts, and in what ways social media can help grow your business, try to think out of the box as well. Use your social media activity and results to learn abut your audiences and then apply those findings to the way you do business. There is an opportunity here to learn about your company.

Some of us are better with examples… Let’s say a Certified Financial Planner who runs his own Facebook page shares various financial tips ranging from retirement planning, to savings growth, to investment advice, to paying off debt responsibility. Now, that is a lot of very useful information. If this CFP is posting these tips on his Facebook page, he may see that he has a much greater interest (more comments and likes) on his investment advice than anything else. When he goes to publish his own book in two years, he’ll know to include more chapters on investing than on debt-payment, or retirement planning. He now has audience buy-in and a gauge on their preferences because he gathered it from his Facebook activity.

Don’t underestimate the opportunity to learn from your social media audience.

All of the above make for a great SNL spoof, but at the end of the day, they discredit what this noble character was all about. You see, Leonard McCoy, portrayed by DeForest Kelley (January 20, 1920 – June 11, 1999), uttered some of the most profound, and in this writer's opinion, most unappreciated words in the Star Trek canon:

"I choose the danger."

He spoke those words in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock when, at the risk of his own life, he was asked if he would attempt to save the life of Spock, the very Vulcan who was at the source of years of consternation. Saving Spock would be risky. Life threatening. Dangerous.

"I choose the danger."

Sometimes we need to choose to do what's right, even if it's a little uncomfortable. Without guarantee of success. When it's dangerous. Life is much more fun that way. Or, at least, more worthwhile.

Choose the danger.

Have a great weekend, and may Spring come early. 

The relationship between Sauer and OLG dates back to 2004 when they worked together on marketing initiatives for the Red Cross, where Sauer sits as a board member. When Sauer launched his independent consulting firm in 2011, it was OLG that branded and developed the identity for Sauer Consulting LLC. Shortly after, Sauer Consulting assisted the downtown marketing boutique in strategic planning efforts.

“The process was so energizing and valuable for both of us, we wondered if there might be more to it; if there wasn’t a potential product to be developed,” said Joel Sauer, of Sauer Consulting LLC. “Fate answered quickly when a current OLG client asked for similar services, which were provided by the fledging partnership.”

The strategic partnership will allow the two organizations to take their double-team technique to a greater audience, helping business in northeast Indiana thrive and prosper by equipping them with the needed tools to become a fully engaged organization. Their combined services include business strategy, future mapping, SWOT analysis, market analysis, rallying cry development, brand identity and overall marketing strategies.

“Our partnership with Sauer Consulting was born from a mutual desire to dig deeper and go bigger for our clients—offering a robust experience that marries business development and planning with brand storytelling, marketing and creative strategies” said One Lucky Guitar’s Matt Kelley. “We relish the opportunity of working together to shape an organization with a strong pulse. Plus, I really like Joel.”

About Sauer Consulting LLC.

Sauer Consulting, LLC, offers a full range of business consulting services, specializing in simple yet effective strategic planning facilitation. The results of this planning are clear and concise action initiatives, not pretty spiral bound dust collectors.

Joel Sauer brings more than two decades of business leadership and experience to every engagement. With niches in strategic planning and business development, Joel offers special talents in helping companies identify strengths and map out specific courses toward a growth-oriented future. In a world rapidly consolidating, Joel also has a unique ability to bring parties together, both culturally and operationally, to maximize efficiencies. These are extremely valuable—but often overlooked—aspects of merging entities.

To learn more about Sauer Consulting, visit sauerconsultingllc.com or contact joel.sauer@sauerconsultingllc.com.

About One Lucky Guitar, Inc.

One Lucky Guitar, a Fort Wayne-based design & marketing boutique, was founded in November, 2000 and specializes in high-concept design, advertising and marketing, providing clients with top-shelf creative work and full service through strategic partnerships. Advertising clients include 3Rivers Federal Credit Union, Arts United, AWS, Carson Boxberger, Grand Wayne Center, MKM Design, J K O’Donnell’s, Northeast Indiana Regional Partnership, STAR, the Talent Initiative, United Way of Allen County and Matilda Jane Clothing Company. With Indianapolis’ Lodge Design, OLG is the agency of record for the Lutheran Health Network.

OLG’s community involvement is highly regarded, with work for organizations including the Downtown Improvement District, Embassy Theatre, Fort Wayne Philharmonic, Fort Wayne Women’s Bureau, Fort Wayne Trails and Vision 2020.

The company made its early reputation on work in the music industry, for labels and artists including Robert Plant, Alison Krauss, Willie Nelson, John Prine, and Smithsonian Folkways Recordings (Washington, D.C.), among others.

To learn more about OLG, visit oneluckyguitar.com or contact hello@oneluckyguitar.com.

These mailers are to advertise five upcoming lectures in major cities talking about the 2012 presidential race and the politics that surrounds it. As GW is well known for being experts at this stuff, it's neat to get to be a part of what they do best.

The request was to develop an image that represented the two major parties fighting it out. The first task was pairing the donkey and elephant in the same space which is challenging because they contrast significantly in size, shape, etc. I think we managed to get a consistant look between them. To wrap it up, I placed the illos on an interstate-looking sign, trying to signify that these lectures were on the road for a series of dates.