Hey thanks, Garret! To repeat: My task is to share seven things about me that not many people know, and then choose 7 people to go and do the same. Here we go!

1. My career in design started early. My first award-winning design piece (above, left) was created when I was in 3rd Grade (ha-ha). There was a school-wide contest to design the cover for the band concert. I guess the judges didn’t notice that I spelled “spring” wrong, because they picked mine and printed about 500 of them. It’s inevitable that when you draw bubble letters, you’re going to spell something wrong (Aaron, EJ, am I right?). Due to embarrassment, I abandoned my design career for a while (see #6).

2. I’m allergic to raw bananas and nickel. Nickel is in most jewelry, which is torture for me, because I really like earrings and rings, but they just kill me. So I don’t usually wear much bling. The raw banana allergy kicked in when I was 17. It makes my throat annoyingly itchy, but at least I can still eat banana bread.

3. I have eight grandparents. Lovely, lovely grandparents. Mom’s mom, mom’s dad, stepdad’s mom, dad’s mom (she blogs!), dad’s dad, dad’s stepmom, stepmom’s mom, stepmom’s dad. At one point I had 16. I’m a lucky girl!

4. I get anxious about filling out forms, especially if they are confusing and I don’t know if the directions are specifying for the line above or the line below. I get so anxious—especially if there is a line of people behind me or if someone is watching my hand write—that the letters sometimes get blurry, and I often have to scratch things out or ask for a new form. I’m also like that about simple tests (like taking the vision test at the mva when there is a line behind me). I didn’t admit this to anyone until about a year ago, and since I can admit it, it’s gotten a little better!

5. I was an actress in junior high science videos. If you could call it acting. I was really bad. But I learned a lot about biomes. What’s it like where you live?

6. I chose my undergraduate major through an odd mix-up. I went to a pre-college open house, prepared to go to the Communications/Journalism interest meeting. I received Erin Rosenthal’s itinerary by mistake, and I didn’t notice because my name is Sarah Erin Rosenthal. So I headed to Erin’s meeting, about Visual Communications. By the time I realized what happened, it was too late to back out. And frankly, Visual Communications sounded more interesting than what I thought I wanted to do, anyway. I just never knew you could major in such a fun thing!

7. I’m particular about desserts. I love dark chocolate so much that even as a kid, when I got a foil-wrapped milk chocolate Santa in my stocking, I would give it away to my brothers. Now Santa knows better. I’m also particular about pies. My mom always made her own pie crust, and she taught me to do so. I’ll only make a pie if I have time to make the crust. (Homemade strawberry-rhubarb pie pictured above).

I’d love to read about these fine friends:

EJ Hall
Ande Campbell
Anna Forbes
Brody Letson
Grandma Peggy
Sam Merrick
Haley Smith

I’m going a little bit off-topic today. Darryl Ohrt just tagged me in a meme called 7 Things. My task is to share 7 things about me that I feel you should know, and then choose 7 people to go and do the same. This should be interesting:

1. At the top of my bucket list is “learn to fly.” I’ve always been fascinated with flight, and had this feeling like it was my destiny to learn how to make it happen. I want to start in one of THESE.

2. People say I have serial killer handwriting. I promise I’m not dangerous, though. I blame it on being lef-handed. You have to do weird things with your writing when you’re a lefty, otherwise, you’ll smear the ink or graphite. It’s pretty frustrating.

3. I have a lot of tools, but don’t use them much. I don’t know where I picked it up, but I guess I have this crazy ideal in my head that to be a real man, you must have a sweet tool collection. I’m pretty good with them, but there are many tools that haven’t been touched since the purchase. But hey, there’s nothing worse than needing a tool and not having it, right?

4. I have a 29″ inseam. (Ok, you can stop with the short jokes, I’m not that short) Seems pretty irrelevant and random, but it’s a really frustrating size to be. Have you ever tried to find pants that have a 29″ inseam? Yeah, it’s pretty much impossible. As a result, most of my pants are too long for me. I’ll be all set when I’m 80 and can just wear boys’ pants.

5. I was a member of my high school’s Power Club, which recognized the strongest people by how much they could weightlift. I’m not a huge guy, but pound-for-pound I was one of the top 5 strongest people in my high school. But then I got old. Aaah, those were the days – when I could eat anything I wanted, and had time to work out every day.

6. I am a two-time NCAA America East Conference Scholar Athlete Award recipient. I was recruited on a full academic/athletic scholarship to play golf at Towson University. It was fun, but a bit monotonous. Turns out, there CAN be too much of a good thing.

7. My mind is constantly flooded with new ideas. Some are total duds, but others are great…like the time I came up with the idea for a tackle football league for regular working people. I always thought it would be great to get home from work and suit up in full protective gear and go out and make some hits. Normal people just don’t have that kind of outlet. It would be kind of like Fight Club. Only, instead of fighting, we’d be playing football. Seriously…it is going to catch on.

Ok, that’s about it. And here are 7 folks I’d love to read about:

Sarah Rosenthal
Wendy Willard
Rusty Walters
Ryan Deal
Rachel Stuart
Darryl Siry
Tracey Halvorsen

Go!

Garret Ohm
http://www.orange-element.com

I heard recently that we’re in a recession.

No kidding. And while at first I was in denial, as our firm was as busy as we could stand, things have indeed started to slow down a tad for us. As marketing director, I’m probably just as sensitive as anyone to this because it’s my job to maintain a steady stream of business. As a result, I often find myself caught up in the so called experts’ assessment of the situation, and tend to start to think with a glass half empty mentality (i.e. with fear).

Aaron sent me an article last night that gave me a little bit of perspective on the whole situation. It got me thinking that while it’s a difficult time for everyone right now, there ARE in fact some good opportunities out there, provided you don’t find yourself crippled with fear. Instead it’s key to take a step back and move forward with strategic clarity.

For us, this means understanding that while marketing spending is down, it’s still there. We need to focus on making ourselves as visible as possible to our prospects, while all the while making sure our value proposition is crystal clear. I’m excited about doing just that in 2009.

For our clients and prospective clients, moving forward with clarity and without fear means resisting the temptation to cut bait by freezing their marketing programs. The companies that make this mistake are acknowledging that they believe marketing is an expense rather than an investment and putting themselves in peril by lengthening the gap between their product/service and their customer. The companies that are going to be successful in 2009 are going to continue marketing just as hard as they always have, and they will be rewarded for it.

You can read the TechCrunch article Aaron passed along HERE. And try to remember to operate without fear in 2009.

Happy Holidays,

Garret Ohm
http://www.orange-element.com

I want this.

But I don’t want this one. I want a clock that chronicles MY OWN brand interactions. It would be amazing if someone could put an ecommerce site together that allowed you to upload the timeline of your brand interactions and have your own clock produced and delivered. Who is with me? 

Found via @wwillard on Twitter. Thanks, Wendy.

Garret Ohm
http://www.orange-element.com

It’s hard to find an American that isn’t familiar with the concept of the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile. This iconic vehicle was created in 1936 and has seen a number of iterations over the years. Among the newest is a Mini Wienermobile, shown here by former New York Giant (cringe) Michael Strahan: 

I’ve been thinking about the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile for a couple of weeks now, because we’ve been in discussions with a new client about how to use a limited budget to expand awareness of and generate interest in their product. It’s tough these days with a fragmented, yet congested media landscape.

My take is that it is no longer about the frequency of interactions with a brand, but the shift is being made toward an emphasis on the quality of brand interactions. You’re seeing it more now with Twitter, where you can interact directly with brand representatives from organizations like the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Comcast, Ford, JetBlue and even local brands like Towson University.  David Armano, a marketing expert that I respect greatly summed it up on his blog post about the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile recently:

Had Carl G. Mayer, nephew of Oscar Mayer and creator of the Wienermobile put his concept in front of a bunch of marketing executives, I’m not certain it would have ever gotten the green light to move forward. Think about it — if you never saw the Wienermobile in action, how would you estimate return on investment? I mean it’s not actually selling hot dogs and it is dependent on fuel and maintenance. Aside from giving out coupons in front of grocery chains, how do you measure the ROI of something like the Wienermobile? How do you measure smiles? What do those get you? 

The answer to his question, I believe, is brand loyalty. I think these quality interactions with brands are going to be something that people look for even more so than expensive, elaborate advertising campaigns. And I think clients are going to have to have the guts to make strong, out-of-the-box decisions like creating these new ways for their brand to foster these interactions.

Garret Ohm
http://www.orange-element.com

I ran across a pretty awesome blog post that celebrates the use of hand drawn elements in Websites recently and found myself fascinated by some of the intricate designs. As anyone that has taken a moment to review our own creative portfolio knows, when budget brand permits (hand drawn won’t work for every client) we love to incorporate illustration and hand drawn elements to our work. 

As we get more and more into interactive and Website design work at Orange Element, we’re always looking for new inspiration. The blog post over at This is Engage has a great list of 49 Websites that have hand drawn elements incorporated. It’s a great list. Here are a few of my favorites, including one for a higher learning institution:

You can see the full list HERE. Found on Twitter via @wwillard.

Garret Ohm
http://www.orange-element.com