Some people have asked us, “Do you actually DO the work?”
Are we actually creating work? Who do you use to create those graphics, websites and advertising?
What a puzzling and slightly disturbing question we thought at first. Then after further investigation, there are many ad agencies in our area that use freelance designers, web designers, etc – many not even local, to produce their work. These designs are re-packaged under the agency or person’s name and sold as original work.
When we first relocated to Southwest Florida we found it puzzling (and slightly disturbing) of the numerous people either claiming to be marketers or graphic designers. What is surprising is the vast majority of these so-called agencies are nothing more than “General Contractors” farming out the marketing, graphic design and pr and simply marking it up.
It’s a bit of a stretch and a questionable practice since these folks aren’t employees of the company, yet their skills are pitched to potentials as standard offerings, yet the owners of those companies lack the talent to produce the original designs, marketing programs etc. It’s sort of like a general contractor offering services of his subcontractors as his own, with the exception that they do not disclose this to their clients.
At SplashWrench Design and Marketing we are all active designers and marketers. We work either both independently of collaboratively on projects to completion with no account managers.