Writing for Brands Image © by Brian E. Faulkner
Client Article: Artist Jon Kuhn On the northern edge of Winston-Salem’s central business district, in a town still more widely known for its sound-alike tobacco products than as a City of the Arts, internationally acclaimed glass artist Jon Kuhn has created a vision in light. Walk into Kuhn’s spacious gallery, in fact, and it would be tempting to think that he has discovered light’s inner secret, has divined a way to capture light and release it in a more enlivened form. Light is everywhere. It infuses his studio and animates his inner being. Light is Kuhn’s music, and it glows from each of dozens of pieces, some fixed, some turning slowly on motorized pedestals. Patterns shift and mingle on the walls. Kuhn considers that part of his canvas. It’s hard for visitors to turn away, whether mesmerized by the apparent depth of a small tabletop cube priced at $8,000 or awed by a computer-driven, million-dollar monumental sculpture in glass and stainless steel. Kuhn’s art comes in a profusion of geometric shapes that continue to evolve, including trapezoids, ribbons, circles, spheres and, more recently, religious crosses. The radiant heart of most Kuhn sculptures is an inner matrix of ultra-refined, astonishingly pure lead crystal and bits of colored glass most often arranged in the form of a cube, a complex, compact array of core material that Kuhn considers his “spiritual architecture.” The creative process ... (continued) |
Perspective ...Some years ago, one of my clients caught the tone of his times perfectly. "Business as usual is a cruel joke," he said, trying to find words to describe his company's place in a rapidly changing world.
That was back before everything really changed, a time when network television and the daily papers were still bumping along like their reality would go on forever. The internet as we know it today was off in the distance somewhere. So were personal blogging and powerful pocket- or purse-sized phones with cameras and mini-movie screens that, in time, would help disintermediate contact between marketers and their customers. One thing hasn't changed, however: the need to communicate authentically, quickly, and clearly - without wasted words or creative dross. So, if what you need is brand writing that will attract the clients or customers you want (with just enough style to move the idea along), you've come to the right place. The right words at the right time for the right reasons - without fuss or long-term commitments. Strategic writing. Nothing more. |
The PCI Story: Packaging that Produces Revenue
Image © by Brian E. Faulkner
From day one, Package Containers, Inc. has focused on a single business purpose: making produce look more fresh and appealing, so people will be attracted to our customers’ produce departments and buy more of their fresh fruit and vegetables. Today, our purpose is the same. PCI’s high performance totes and ties attract the consumer’s eye, prompt the purchase of more produce and increase revenue for our grocery and grower customers. But like nearly every successful business, we trace our beginnings to modest roots.
PCI’s first product was developed for growers to use in their roadside stands. We called them Home-Toters® because that’s what they were: strong, shallow, flat bottomed bags with a single handle that farmers could pre-pack with seasonal fruit for their customers to tote home. Of course, that also made buying produce more convenient, so people bought more fresh fruit and vegetables, which made our customers happy and motivated them to buy more Home-Toters®.
At first, growers called our totes apple bags – and still do to some extent, although they’re just as handy for peaches, plums, potatoes, onions, avocados and most any produce with a roundish shape. In time, our Home-Toter® brand evolved into a line of paper produce merchandising containers primarily used in grocery produce departments. Other variations have become mainstays in the food service and specialty retail markets.
In 1947, the year we were founded in Portland, Oregon, the evolution of small locally owned grocery stores into the first national supermarkets was nearly complete. Chains with names like Kroger and Safeway had been in business since the ‘20s and expanded greatly during the 1930s. At one time, A&P alone had some 10,000 stores, although some were not much more than a counter staffed by two or three employees ... (continued)
PCI’s first product was developed for growers to use in their roadside stands. We called them Home-Toters® because that’s what they were: strong, shallow, flat bottomed bags with a single handle that farmers could pre-pack with seasonal fruit for their customers to tote home. Of course, that also made buying produce more convenient, so people bought more fresh fruit and vegetables, which made our customers happy and motivated them to buy more Home-Toters®.
At first, growers called our totes apple bags – and still do to some extent, although they’re just as handy for peaches, plums, potatoes, onions, avocados and most any produce with a roundish shape. In time, our Home-Toter® brand evolved into a line of paper produce merchandising containers primarily used in grocery produce departments. Other variations have become mainstays in the food service and specialty retail markets.
In 1947, the year we were founded in Portland, Oregon, the evolution of small locally owned grocery stores into the first national supermarkets was nearly complete. Chains with names like Kroger and Safeway had been in business since the ‘20s and expanded greatly during the 1930s. At one time, A&P alone had some 10,000 stores, although some were not much more than a counter staffed by two or three employees ... (continued)
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Print Ad: Amarr Garage Doors
Image © by Brian E. Faulkner
Beauty & The BeastWhen Beauty met The Beast in the famous love story, the beautiful girl had no way of knowing that under that beastly exterior was a handsome prince.
With garage doors, it works the other way around. Because when your customer sees how beautiful a garage door can be, it hardly seems possible that underneath the peaches and cream exterior lies a heart of steel, Every Amarr garage door, whether commercial or residential, has commercial strength built right in. That way, your customer never has to decide between beauty or the beast. With Amarr, they can have them both. |
Web Video: Blowing Rock Art & History Museum
Image © by Brian E. Faulkner
Mountain SongThere's something about North Carolina's mountains that draws you in. We come to the high country because it gives us perspective and because we need beauty (like we need love). Our mountains have been a lifelong love affair for many, especially folks who have moved here.
Elliot Daingerfield, the early twentieth century watercolorist, who had three summer homes in Blowing Rock and whose work inspired the organization of Blowing Rock Art and History Museum in 1999, found his escape here from the pressures of life in New York. Visions of our woodlands, mountains and streams appear consistently in his work ... (cont.) |
Brochure: IT Recruiter
Image © by Brian E. Faulkner
Staying PowerWhen we decided to launch our business back in 1991, we wanted it to last forever. Staying power, we concluded, must be derived from two equally important ideas:
1. Providing the marketplace with service unavailable anywhere else - not a better recruiting mousetrap but a substantially different one that works better, faster, more thoroughly and with greater value for IT professionals and their clients than any other applications management solution. That "different mousetrap" is our unique, focused approach to the vital QA and Testing process that assures the success of each IT software ... |
Contact Brian Faulkner about potential writing and/or narration projects:
336-251-2203
[email protected]
336-251-2203
[email protected]
Positioning for a Photography Business:
 Image © by Dennis Kale
What qualities make a successful image? CHARACTER: An elusive something that moves people when they see an evocative photo - that makes an image pop and sizzle, inspire and convince. CONCEPT: Great design speaks clearly. The best images need few (if any) words to explain. You get it right away. TEXTURE: The interplay of surface, shape, and shadow to suggest quality or illuminate an idea. TECHNOLOGY: The marriage of equipment, materials, time, knowledge, and the creative experience. |
 Image © by Dennis Kale
Why does one picture "sell" and another not? STYLE: How it all comes together; the difference between ordinary pictures and High Performance ones. CONTEXT: The picture is effective in its setting. It declares its purpose without drawing undue attention. COMPOSITION: Balance, eye appeal and pull. Everything works. LIGHT: Light is the lead actor in each arresting image. Light is where memory lives. |
IMPACT PHOTOGRAPHIC
High Performance Images
(since 1979)
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Positioning Copy: Goodman Millwork:
The Goodman family has been supply-ing custom millwork to North Carolina architects, builders and interior designers for a very long time. We are as well known for design and installation problem solving as we are for our consistently high quality products. Today, millwork crafted by the people of our 106-year-old company is found in the region’s finest homes and commercial establishments. Projects range from finely finished interior architectural detailing for residential or commercial installation and includeg moldings, mantles and doors, to extensive design-based custom renovation of kitchens, baths, home libraries, media rooms, entrance ways, stairways, porches and gazebos. |
Recently, we also have begun offering a new line of products to builders and homeowners for use in renovation or new construction projects. The first of these are our Architectural Heritage Collection phone nooks and home storage cabinets, solid wood products with more than a hundred years of quality, service and creativity built in.
Whether a new product, or one that’s been part of our business for many years, each is custom-designed to |
harmonize with our customers’ unique architecture and design.
As you might expect, a great deal of time and care is invested in each Goodman Millwork product. That's why they sell for slightly more than mass market millwork, a price premium that our many delighted customers perceive as an enduring investment because of their obvious quality and the degree to which our products have enhanced their homes' appeal. So take you time. Browse our gallery. Consider the many creative approaches we've taken to interior and exterior millwork. Then consider how Goodman Millwork may enhance your next renovation or home building project. Because our designs and applications are limited only by your imagination. © by Brian E. Faulkner |
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Good News/Bad News Annual Report Letter to Shareholders:
The past year marked a watershed for our company. More change occurred during the last quarter than in any other period in Broadway & Seymour's history. Because we chose to undertake these changes, including some with short-term negative financial consequences, our company entered the new year with a sharper market focus, a more flexible, productive organization and a stronger management team. Several promising development efforts are underway, and relationships with our employees, customers and alliance partners are strong. The major story for the year, however, has been a penetrating and painful self-analysis, a reordering of the way Broadway & Seymour targets its markets and conducts its business as well as continuing organizational change in the wake of a difficult and disappointing fourth quarter. |
Image © Brian E. Faulkner
This report discusses positive and negative influences on our results and explains rapid changes made to eliminate or substantially reduce causes of our $11.4 million after-tax loss for the fiscal year, a loss of $1.26 per share on revenues of $114.7 million.
Our disappointing performance was caused primarily by slowness in adapt-ing our business strategy and operating model to a changing marketplace. We did not have an organization that max-imized the value of its people, processes, products and projects or a well-focused strategy. There was, however, no market opportunity problem. Financial services, marked especially by the |
growing need for integrated call centers, is one of the most technologically intensive industries and shows all signs of remaining so. In addition, management and accounting systems for law firms, as well as other professional firms that must account for and manage personal time, are undergoing a wave of modernization as they become aware of the productivity and profitability improvement potential of advanced information systems.
This report also outlines changes we are making to focus on our considerable strengths, As a result of these changes, Broadway & Seymour is becoming a significantly transformed company, but there is still much to be done. Despite the remaining challenges, our company is now advantageously positioned and organizationally streamlined. We are prepared for growth and ready for the future. Our major changes can be summarized in three points ... (continued) |
Contact Brian Faulkner about potential writing and/or narration projects:
336-251-2203
[email protected]
336-251-2203
[email protected]