Kate Abbey
Who printed it?
ProCo in Sheffield, UK
Who designed it?
The wonderful Pete and Mark at Caslon&Co.
Tell me about the images?
Last year was my most prosperous year as far as great accounts/brands go, which meant I had very little time to concentrate on personal work. The result being a large crop of brands, which when ordered up, pretty much covered the alphabet. A few of my clients had commented on the strong brands I worked with, so it seemed natural to do a promo around this. The downside is I had lots of strong names with the same letter and could only show one and perhaps I wouldn’t have shown a weaker image on another letter, but had no other option – but as a collective group, the idea works and the concept pulls it altogether.
How many did you make?
I printed off 300 for my UK contacts and will do the same for NYC
How many times a year do you send out promos?
Historically, I’ve been terrible and do it every few years, but I so enjoyed doing this and the feedback has been worth the investment. It’s inspired me to do it 3 times a year, but possibly on a smaller scale for the next 2 mailouts. More recently, I’ve been able to fit in personal work, so the next promo will be based around that.
Do you think printed promos are effective for marketing your work?
Absolutely. My promo goes out to creatives who appreciate the tactile nature of a mailer and are the type who would smell the paper and study the manufacture of it, and file it away for future reference. It has to stand out if you’re wanting to capture someone’s attention in the sea of imagery. And besides all of that, it’s something I’ve enjoyed doing and love the results, so I get a thrill form the process too.
