“Design isn’t what we make; it’s what we make possible.”
I’m Simon Coley. For thirty years I’ve helped build companies that had to be good at something other than marketing — an electricity retailer that told you how to use less power, a banana that paid its growers properly, a cola that funds the villages the nut comes from.
Coley Studio is the practice that came out of that: brand strategy and creative direction for companies building something worth building. I work with a few of them at a time. See what that’s looked like.
Fractional Creative Direction
A senior creative head for companies that need one but don’t need one full time. Enough of my week to hold the standard, set the direction, and be in the room when the decisions actually get made.
Brand Strategy & Positioning
Working out what a business is genuinely for, then finding the words and the shape that make it obvious to everyone else. The hard part is usually the honesty, not the design.
Design & Writing
I still do the work. Identity, packaging, campaigns, copy, the awkward paragraph on the About page. Hands on the tools, not just the whiteboard.
Co-founder of Karma Drinks and All Good Bananas; founding team at Powershop, New Zealand’s first online electricity retailer. Before that, Design Director at Better by Design, Marketing Director at 42 Below, and a creative director in London.
Three of those companies started as arguments about what a category was allowed to be. That’s still the work I’m most useful in.
Working with a few companies at a time. If that sounds like yours —
simon@coley.co.nz