Most of the time when we’re browsing the web, we’re really just looking for pictures to click on. There’s a reason that single frame memes and Instagram are two of the hottest online trends right now. Brands are catching on and realizing that a few stock photographs aren’t going to cut it. Some are investing in expensive, high quality photo shoots to show off their products, but others are taking a different approach. They’re crowdsourcing images from customers and fans. Olapic is a New York, NY based company that provides the technology that allows brands to “collect, curate and display high quality photos of” products that their “customers are already posting on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and more.” User generated content is not only free, but it also tells a story in a way that the brand itself can’t.
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I’ve taken my fair share of web based courses–all with the intent of gaining skills to improve my business. I’ve learned to code, write copy, do SEO, and a lot more online. I even developed my own course on how to land a job. There are a multitude of companies in the online education space, and most are focusing on these kinds of topics. Sympoz is a Denver, CO based company that is taking a different approach. Yes, they have a few courses on entrepreneurship, but their bread and butter is the craft market. They have a section of their site devoted to woodworking and an entire brand called Craftsy that has the tagline “Learn it. Make it.” Sympoz’s goal is to create “an environment where you can watch, interact, and learn from renowned experts on your own schedule,” and so far it seems like they’re doing a pretty awesome job.
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The only time that I’ve been able to redeem a filled loyalty punchcard has been when I’m buying for a group and I immediately fill the card. There’s no doubt that there’s a better solution, and it’s probably digital. The problem is that nobody wants to have an app for every local business they frequent. They want a single loyalty solution that they can use everywhere. We’re not there yet, but there are a number of companies trying to make that happen. In the past we’ve looked at a few businesses that operate in the space like Belly and Groupon (I love their product because you just have to use your credit card to get rewards from a merchant). FiveStars is a Mountain View, CA company that is keeping the loyalty card, but they’re making it universal. One physical card tied to your phone number (and your Facebook account if you want more points) allows you to get rewards at a variety of participating merchants.
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I used to get excited about Black Friday, but never to the point that I’d actually join the crowds at the retail stores. I’d much rather search for deals online (though I barely do that anymore). While Cyber Monday used to be when e-commerce sites slashed their prices, it now seems that most of them have jumped on the Black Friday bandwagon. The nice thing about shopping online is that it’s really easy to see how good of a deal you’re actually getting. Shopzilla is a Los Angeles, CA based company that helps online shoppers do exactly that. They run a number of destination websites that “help shoppers shop and sellers sell.” Their network of sites reaches more than 40 million shoppers every month and helps them learn about more than 100 million products from thousands of retailers.
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We’re a week away from one of the worst travel periods of the year. If you’re flying between next Wednesday and the following Sunday, good luck. Look forward to long lines, getting groped by the TSA, crying babies, no legroom, and probably a delay or a lost bag. Wouldn’t it be nice to travel without those headaches? That’s why ridiculously rich people buy their own jets. But what if you’re only really rich and can’t afford your own jet? You buy time on one. That’s what Sentient Jet does for its clients. They’re a Cleveland, OH based company that “arranges more air charter flights than any other jet charter procurement business in the country.”
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A lot of people bounce their business or product ideas off of me. It’s fun, but it can also be frustrating because most people can’t see the obvious holes in their thinking. The one thing that I push everybody to do is to validate their ideas. That means talking to customers and getting them to either tell you what they think or, preferably, to actually commit to buying your product. Validation isn’t an easy process whether you’re an aspiring entrepreneur or a billion dollar brand. Finding potential customers and getting them to give honest feedback is almost never easy. Qualvu is a Lakewood, CO based company that solves this problem (I found out about them from a reader who landed a job with them). They connect “you with your truth, anywhere, at any time, through the power of web and mobile video.” In other words, they’ve developed an online platform that makes the focus group way more flexible, powerful, and affordable.
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I was a total wimp when I was a kid. Despite many opportunities to do ropes courses and other similar challenges, I always sat on the sidelines. To be completely honest, it was because I was chubby and figured that I couldn’t actually complete the courses. I’m now more adventurous, but I still prefer adventure with a functional goal (like climbing down into a gorge to go fly fishing). Project Adventure is a Beverly, MA non-profit organization that offers adventure with a goal, but it’s all about personal and group development. They “seek to expand Adventure-based experiential programming, with the goal of developing responsible individuals, productive organizations and sustainable communities.” They’ve been doing it since 1971, and they keep growing their ability to advance active learning.
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I’m going to a wedding this weekend. I’ll wear the same black Bonobos suit that I wear to every wedding. All I have to think about is what tie to wear. I’d never even consider buying a new outfit for a wedding other than my own or one I’m in. But it’s not an uncommon thing for a lot of women to wear a different dress to every wedding they go to. That can get expensive, unless you choose to Rent The Runway. Rent The Runway is a New York, NY based “community designed to fill the needs of women who know and love high fashion, who want to look glamorous for all their nights out, and experiment with new brands without the anxiety of investing in piece after piece.” (Use this link to try it for $20 off.) The company was started by two women (Jenn and Jenny) who met at Harvard Business School, and it’s taken off since as the “Netflix for fashion.”
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Internship searching and e-mail go hand in hand. You’re sending out applications, requesting informational interviews, reaching out to your parents’ friends, asking people to look over your résumé, and doing all kinds of other networking stuff. It can get overwhelming. What if you had a tool that tracked your e-mail, sent it on a schedule, allowed you to use templates, and even told you when people read your message and what links they clicked in it? That’s exactly what ToutApp does, though the product was never really intended for job/internship seekers (if you want to give it a try for your internship search or anything else, be sure to use this link). It’s more tailored to people in sales, PR, marketing, or business development, but ToutApp is amazingly useful for anyone who wants to use e-mail more productively. ToutApp is based in San Francisco, CA, and they allow you to integrate with Gmail, Outlook, and even Salesforce, so you don’t have to completely change your workflow to take advantage of their features.
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I have a lot of shoes for a guy, but nearly every pair has a unique, functional purpose. I may double up in a few key areas, but I only look to buy new shoes when I have a specific need. I’m not one of those people who is constantly looking for an excuse to buy a new pair of shoes, but I know that there are lot of those types out there–and they tend to be female. ShoeDazzle is a Santa Monica, CA based company that was built to feed the addiction without draining your pocketbook. ShoeDazzle’s “Chief Fashion Stylist” is Kim Kardashian, which is great because the kind of person who dots her i’s with hearts is the kind of person you want helping you pick out shoes.
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I’ll fess up to it… I watch Storage Wars. How can you not enjoy a show where people make exorbitant bids for other people’s junk and then find out whether they won big or overpaid? Isn’t part of the American Dream finding treasure in someone else’s trash? I don’t know where they get the valuations on some of this stuff, but who cares if the “value” of all of the world’s antiques and collectibles is greater than the total amount of money in the world? (I’m making this up, but I’m convinced it’s true.) If you really want to make money from storage units, you’re better off owning them–or helping their owners market them. That’s what SpareFoot. They’re an Austin, TX based company that “has the largest inventory of storage units on the web” and allows you to “search by location, price, unit size and amenities.”
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I had exercise induced asthma as kid, but I really enjoyed playing sports. That probably explains why I loved baseball, tolerated basketball, and avoided soccer and lacrosse as much as possible. Despite the fact that more and more kids are as out of shape as I was, soccer and lacrosse have both seen a ton of growth over the past two decades. The Moylan family has been well ahead of the the trend. In 1984 one of the family’s six kids (Mike) was assigned a high school business project, so he decided to start a small soccer catalog called Eurosport. The family embraced the business, and it became Sports Endeavors. They spent a decade doing the mail order thing, and then they made an amazingly smart move in 1994. The Hillsborough, NC based company bought Soccer.com and Lacrosse.com. Combining an already existing business with those domain names made for a killer combination, and that’s why Sports Endeavors has continued to grow–though they still only focus on soccer, lacrosse, and rugby.
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Google is an absolutely amazing company. They’re working on everything from information organization to e-mail to self-driving cars, but from a financial standpoint they’re kind of a one trick pony. 96% of their revenue comes from advertising, and the majority of that comes from search advertising. It’s not really a problem–it just shows what an amazingly dominant business model search advertising is. Unfortunately for the rest of the market, Google owns most of the world’s search advertising inventory. Yahoo! comes in at a distant second. And then there’s adMarketplace, a New York, NY based company that “delivers data-driven performance to the Internet’s leading marketers through the only search syndication platform that adjusts bids by both keyword and traffic source.”
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This Gangnam Style craze is kind of ridiculous, right? I originally saw the video in July and found it pretty amusing, but didn’t think much more of it. A couple months later it has over a quarter billion views on YouTube. I’m not sure if the interest will carry over into other Korean entertainment acts, but if it does, DramaFever is extremely well positioned. They are a New York, NY based company that gives “you a better way to find and watch the best TV and movies from around the world.” Their original focus was on Korean dramas, but they are rapidly expanding their offerings of tv shows and movies from Taiwan, China, Singapore and the Philippines. Bollywood films and latin telenovelas will come next. What’s interesting about DramaFever is that they target their content toward English speaking audiences, so it’s not just about giving expats the content that they miss from home.
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When I was a kid I was jealous of the kids who went to one of the other elementary schools in town because they had an awesome carnival. I was kind of a wimp about carnival rides, so the most intense ride that I would go on was called the Himalaya. All it did was spin you around kind of fast. While the painting on the ride was certainly accurate to the name, I’m not sure that it was a very good representation of Himalayan culture. The Rubin Museum of Art in New York, NY is. It’s “a dynamic environment that stimulates learning, promotes understanding, and inspires personal connections to the ideas, cultures, and art of Himalayan Asia.” It also won’t make you nauseous like the ride might.
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It’s a great time to be a sports fan. The pennant races have already heated up in baseball, and football is here. If there’s ever a time to go to a live, outdoor sporting event, it has to be now while the weather is still beautiful. I usually go to StubHub for tickets, but I’ve been tempted to use a new site called Vivid Seats. They’re a Chicago, IL based company that aims to “to reinvent the ticket purchasing experience.” Beyond sports, they also offer tickets for concerts, theater, and more. While I’ve generally been happy with the StubHub experience in that I can get the tickets that I want for a good price, but the user interface is terrible and the add-on fees seem exorbitant. I haven’t had the chance to try Vivid Seats, but from what it sounds like, the offer a superior ticket buying experience and a total cost that “is almost always the lowest on the web.”
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I remember when people used to be shocked that I would buy stuff online. They thought I was crazy to put my credit card number into a web form, and I though they were crazy for not thinking twice before giving their credit cards to random people who worked at stores and restaurants. While buying stuff over the Internet is now commonplace, you’d be shocked to know how painful and expensive it still is for businesses to collect payments online. It seems silly to spend a lot of time and money to make sure that your customers can pay you, but it’s kind of essential. Braintree is a Chicago, IL based company that is simplifying payments for online businesses. They solve many of the headaches, and they offer transparent pricing that makes it easy for merchants to estimate costs. The best indication that Braintree is offering a great solution for payment processing is their own growth–they ended up at #415 on this year’s Inc. 500 with 895% three-year growth and $9.9 million in revenue.
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On Friday I visited one my Dad’s college friends at his workshop. He makes sails for traditional boats, and he’s been doing it for a long time. He doesn’t get a lot of incoming calls from potential clients (it’s a pretty niche business), but when he does, he almost always makes the sale (no pun intended). It’s because he has developed a process that shows potential customers that he’s undoubtedly the best guy for the job. He does it all by hand (even to the point of writing a personal letter), but it’s essentially automated. He spends about 15 minutes on it every morning, and that’s it. While that approach won’t work in a lot of business, nearly every company can benefit from automating parts of their marketing. Pardot is a company that provides software to do exactly that. They’re based in Atlanta, GA, and they came in at #172 on the Inc. 500 with 2,001% three-year growth and $7.4 million in revenue.
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Cornell University students! I’ll be on campus tomorrow (Friday). E-mail me at willy@onedayonejob.com if you’d like to meet up.
I usually try to eat a high protein, low carb breakfast. Eggs are the perfect answer, but I find eggs completely unpalatable. Instead I’ll usually cobble together a breakfast of bacon or sausage and some fruit, but that isn’t quite enough. Lately I’ve been having Greek yogurt, and I really like it. I haven’t tried Chobani, but they seem to have become the big name in yogurt these days. In fact, they came in at #117 on the Inc. 500 with some really impressive numbers. Their 2,662% three-year growth rate is far more impressive than higher growth rates because the Norwich, NY based company started with $23 million in revenue and grew to $633.9 million in revenue. They could sell a billion dollars in yogurt this year. That’s absolutely ridiculous when you consider that Chobani’s Founder Hamdi Ulukaya started the company because he “stumbled upon a classified ad for a yogurt plant recently closed down by Kraft.”
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I spend a lot of time meeting and talking with budding entrepreneurs. One thing that I’ve noticed is that people who are starting their first businesses often get too caught up in the administrative details. They want to incorporate, set up contracts, design a logo, get business cards, etc. It’s not that these things aren’t important–it’s just that there are far more important things (like validating your business idea or doing customer research). Still, there’s some legal stuff that absolutely needs to be done. Hiring a lawyer is too expensive, and using a boilerplate won’t quite do the job. What do you do? Go to Rocket Lawyer. They’re a San Francisco, CA based company that is “making legal work easier and more convenient for everyone.” Their online model has helped them reach #72 on the Inc. 500 with 3,672% three-year growth to $14.2 million in revenue. Rocket Lawyer uses automated technology to create custom legal documents for business and personal use. But they don’t just leave you there. Rocket Lawyer members (they charge a monthly fee for access) get “free document reviews” and “questions answered by local attorneys.” Additionally, Rocket Lawyer has “pre-negotiated lower rates with local attorneys” so that customers can save money when they do need more than a document.
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This is a good week for me as a transplanted Chicagoan. Over the weekend I had the Air & Water Show to watch, which is free as long as you’re willing to deal with some crowds. And today the Yankees come into town for a three-game set with the White Sox. I’m going to go to at least one of the games, and that means I’ll try to get a deal on tickets through StubHub at the last minute. I’ve found that no matter how you try to buy tickets for a major event, it’s always kind of a headache. The interfaces to pick seats are terrible, you get slapped with all kinds of fees, and sometimes the tickets disappear before you can buy them. ShowClix is a Pittsburgh, PA based company that provides “simply (fair) ticketing.” They’re aiming to make the ticketing experience better for both the people putting on the events and the people attending them. They may not be an option for this week’s Yankees games, but they are “the preferred ticketing solution for thousands of performing arts theatres, live music venues, and festivals — as well as museums, non-profit fundraisers, nightclubs, even circuses and rodeos.”
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I need someone to help with a small PAID project/mini-internship. If you have WordPress experience, basic HTML skills, and excellent writing/editing ability, e-mail me today at willy@onedayonejob.com.
For some people planning a vacation is better than going on a vacation. I wouldn’t go quite that far–especially because not having a plan can lead you to some pretty awesome things–but I like having control over what I do when I go on a trip. Others have a completely different approach. They want everything planned for them. They’re the kind of people who go on a trip with Collette Vacations, which is a Pawtucket, RI based company that offers “more than 150 expertly designed, escorted tours spanning 50-plus countries on all seven continents.” Collette Vacations was founded in 1918 and is still family owned and committed to creating “extraordinary travel experiences that fulfill the vacation dreams” of their clients.
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I’m really tempted to start with a lawyer joke today, but I’m not looking for a lawsuit. I know that it can be hard to feel bad for lawyers, but they actually have it tough these days–especially the young ones. The job market has gotten so bad that elite law schools are hiring their own graduates on a large scale with the intent of fudging their after graduation employment rate. While the new grads are getting hit the hardest, the glut of lawyers on the market has an effect on the entire profession. Any lawyer who wants to stay employable needs to continue learning and improving. That’s where Lawline.com comes in. They’re a New York, NY based “provider of Online Continuing Legal Education courses for attorneys across the country.” Their subscriptions are many orders of magnitude cheaper than law school, so getting a positive ROI on education from Lawline.com seems like a sure thing.
Keep on Learning
Lawline.com has thousands of faculty members who have developed courses on a very wide range of topics. Their online CLE (Continuing Legal Education) programs not only allow lawyers to keep learning and get better at their jobs, but they also are sometimes required for lawyers who want to keep their licenses. What’s most interesting is that Lawline.com is that they give away their content for free. Lawyers only have to pay if they want to get credit for the courses they take. I love it when business see reality and don’t try to hold on to a dying business model (too bad lawyers often are the ones obstructing this kind of innovation). Even though Lawline.com is all about the law, you don’t have to be a lawyer to work for them. Their Internships page shows that they have opportunities in:
- Customer Support
- Accreditation
- Web Development
Lawline.com has done a nice job with their Careers site, and they really push their company culture (they even have a blog about it). It’s paying off as they were ranked 21st in Crain’s Best Places to Work in New York City. They don’t mention anything about whether the internships are paid, but if they follow the law…
Links to Help You Begin Your Research
What’s your favorite lawyer joke?
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There’s no time that sports apparel gets more attention than during the Olympics. There are the crazy “barracuda skin” racing suits for the swimmers, the bejeweled leotards for the gymnasts, and the ever controversial bikinis (or pants and long sleeved shirts if it’s under 60 degrees) for the women’s beach volleyball players. One might think that every uniform is chosen to maximize physical performance, but there’s research to show that what you wear/how you look affects your mental performance (See: Red is a winning color – GO BIG RED!). While they might not be outfitting our Olympians, GTM Sportswear is a Manhattan, KS based company that helps athletes perform better by looking better. They specialize “in providing custom-embellished uniforms, warm-ups, and practice apparel for college, school, and club sports teams nationwide.”
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This is going to blow your mind. I’ve never had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Peanut butter sandwich, yes. Peanut butter and jelly, no. I don’t have an explanation except that there was this kid at my elementary school who always had jelly on his face and it kind of grossed me out. I’m sure this is a travesty in the eyes of the people at The J.M. Smucker Company. Luckily for the Orrville, OH based company, not having me as a customer has not kept them out of the Fortune 500 (though their grasp on that title is tenuous at #495). While they’re best known for their fruit spreads, they also manufacture and market “peanut butter, shortening and oils, ice cream toppings, sweetened condensed milk, and health and natural foods beverages.” Though publicly traded, The J.M. Smucker Company is still a family company–their CEO is still a Smucker.
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When people unsubscribe from these e-mails, the biggest complaint that I hear is that the jobs aren’t relevant (have you tried our search engine?). I understand that a single company every day isn’t enough for some people, but if you think our posts are just about the company that we’re covering that day, you’re missing a big part of ODOI’s value. Each day’s profile should be a jumping off point for your job search. So let’s say you really liked Totsy, but you want to be on the West Coast. Did you immediately start looking for competitors closer to where you want to be? If you had, you would have found Zulily, a Seattle, WA based company that offers “daily deals for moms, babies and kids.” It’s a pretty similar business, but it’s a completely different company. Even if you have no interest in either of these companies, you can use them as inspiration to find other interesting companies. For instance you could look up their investors, and see which other companies they’re investing in, or you could look at the products each site sells and research the companies that make them.
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I have a good friend who has been subscribed to these e-mails from the start. He’s not looking for a job, but he helps me out by giving me feedback, pointing out typos, and recommending companies (you’re always welcome to do the same by hitting reply). He has an 18-month old daughter, so he knows how crazy the market is for products targeted to new parents. Even though most college students and recent grads don’t have babies on their mind, he thinks it’s a great market to start a career in (it’s growing big time), and I agree. One company that I found that is attacking the new parents market is Totsy. They’re based in New York, NY, and they’re combining a hot market with a hot business model (flash sales). As they put it, they offer “moms on-the-go and moms-to-be access to brand-specific sales, up to 90% off retail, just for them and the kids, ages 0-8.” Babies and flash sales, how can you go wrong?
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quality engineer,
software development
I was never big on locking doors, until my college apartment was broken into over Winter break. Having something stolen from you sucks, but the loss of feeling secure is far worse. Living in Chicago has only made me more wary, though I’m far more worried about walking the streets downtown (the situation is completely out of hand these days) than I am about anything happening to me while I’m at home. I’ve never really considered a security system, but the other day I came across a company called Urban Alarm that takes home security to a new level. They’re based in Washington, DC, and that’s the only market that they operate in. They offer the same type of security alarm systems that other vendors offer, but they do it with no long-term contracts, same day service, and a high level of customer service. Moreover, they have additional services like Urban Vacation Watch (they watch your house, water your plants, etc. while you’re gone) and secure airport transfer (so the cab driver doesn’t call his buddy to tell him that your house is now unoccupied). Urban Alarm also has a lot of high-tech offerings (complete system control over the Internet), but it’s the personal touch that really makes their business stand out.
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Tagged as:
account management,
customer service,
Internships,
sales,
security,
unpaid,
Washington DC
A lot of companies that we feature are doing something innovative–they’re changing the way things work, and that can provide an amazing learning opportunity for a college student. But sometimes you can learn more from companies that do it the old fashioned way. I hate to say negative things about a company, but when I see the stuff that AmeriMark sells, I think thrift store. They position themselves as offering “a vast selection of quality, value-priced, brand-name merchandise,” so it’s really not far off. They sell “women’s apparel, shoes, jewelry, cosmetics, fragrances and health-related merchandise” along with a lot of As Seen on TV products. Maybe I’m wrong, but this stuff doesn’t sell itself (though they do seem to put a really strong emphasis on quality). And that’s why I think Middleburg Heights, OH (Cleveland) based AmeriMark is so interesting. They know how to sell this stuff. They’ve been doing it since 1969, and they’ve used the same approach across both new and old mediums.
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Tagged as:
apparel,
bilingual,
copywriting,
creative,
customer service,
design,
e-commerce,
e-mail,
fashion,
Internships,
inventory control,
marketing,
merchandising,
Ohio,
online marketing,
planner,
retail,
sales,
web development,
writing
Sometimes a sign is the best marketing. It all started with paintings in caves and piles of rocks placed on trails, and we really haven’t moved too far beyond that. Yes, there has been some innovation in signs (video for instance), but many of the signs that are the most effective at grabbing people’s attention are pretty simple–just look at Burma-Shave or South of the Border. One of the most memorable signs that I’ve driven by is hand painted on rotting wood by some near Syracuse, NY. It ain’t pretty, but it gets its message across. Still, I don’t recommend that you follow that guy’s style guide. Instead you may want to check out BuildASign. They’re an Austin, TX based company that “has reinvented the way people buy signs” by offering an easy online interface for designing a sign and the ability to produce and ship finished products in days or even overnight.
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Tagged as:
advertising,
analyst,
arts,
customer service,
design,
e-commerce,
graphic design,
Internships,
marketing,
online marketing,
paid,
public relations,
sales,
seo,
software development,
strategy,
Texas,
web development
