New Orleans entrepreneur Beth Salyers hires Andi to refresh her website, and winds up with an entirely new company. 

Welcome to Passion Meets Process: a Brand

Design Story from Andi Mints Design.

Hi, I'm Andi from Andi Mints Design. Thanks for

joining me for the next few minutes. A lot of my clients and

people who are considering working with me have questions

about what it means to go through the brand design

process, and I thought one cool way to demystify that would be

walk through a project so that you can see how it works, and

how it might benefit you and your business. So, here’s

a Brand Design Story.

It just opened up that space for something new to

be created. And she's really good at that. And I think that's

been kind of a hallmark of most of our conversations, especially

those where we, you know, tend to make decisions or get some

clarity and, you know, be able to put words to this whole

process.

That's Beth Salyers, an entrepreneur and

educator in New Orleans, who turned to Andi Mints Design for

help in bringing her business to life. Initially, Beth came to

Andi for a new website. But soon their design process led to

something more—to a fundamentally different

conception of Beth's business. It wasn't logo design, it was

brand design. It's applying the art of design thinking to the

very idea of the business. Here's Andi.

I know the visual part of design is better when we

take a deep look at, and really establish, the brand foundation.

And that's what I mean by strategy. I think a lot of small

business owners get so hung up on the logo and the website part

that they feel stuck. They feel like their business isn't going

to be successful because they don't have that one piece. So

for me, getting to help them feel unstuck, and help them

realize that there are so many other questions that brand

strategy can solve to help them grow their business, is really

beautiful.

So here's the story of how Beth Salyers got

unstuck. Through working with Andi she was able to reimagine

her business and put it on stronger footing, not to mention

getting a new name and website and that awesome new logo. To be

clear, not all of Andi's clients go through this level of

reinvention, nor should they. But the idea in telling this

story is to showcase how working through the design process with

Andi can yield a lot more value than you might expect. Here's

Beth story.

I'm Beth Salyers. I'm the founder and CEO of

Custom Learning Atelier, and we are based in New Orleans,

Louisiana. I guess our work is to help socially and

environmentally conscious organizations increase their

capacity so they can amplify the good that they do in the world

through customized learning experiences, whether that's

training programs, one-offs, onboarding.

Beth’s path to entrepreneurship started as a

teacher in North Carolina. She was passionate about the work

and about her students, but that’s not to say everything was

clicking.

I was getting frustrated, and was not super

enjoying … I needed something different. I felt it internally.

Like instinctually, I was like, something's not right.

Something's not right. Something's not right. I'm not

as happy. Like, I can't keep doing the same thing year after

year, teaching the same subject year after year. And so I went

to work one morning, I was at the board, and I literally just

fell down. And I was diagnosed with depression, and put on an

antidepressant and basically told I need to figure out how to

de-stress from my job. And I was like, ‘Okay, well, what am I

going to do? Am I leaving education, or am I going to do

something about it? There needs to be change.’ And I decided I

was going to try to do something about it, so I applied for the

Ph. D program. And thankfully, I got in I remember getting the

accepting acceptance email, and I literally fell to the floor in

my apartment and started crying. I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, thank

you.’ Because then I could do something about it. Like there

was a—I didn't have to give up education.

So twice Beth falls to the floor, first at her

low point, and then again as she turns the corner, heading to the

University of North Carolina-Charlotte to earn her

Ph. D before becoming an education entrepreneur. But her

business didn’t emerge fully formed, and when Beth first

approached Andi about a new website, it happened to

correspond with a moment of significant reinvention—a

breakup, and a move to Louisiana.

I was like this is it like how many chance how many

opportunities do you get in life to like, really start a new

foundation in this way. I came to visit my brother in New

Orleans, last September, and I never left. And I said, ‘Well,

screw it. We're gonna stay here, I'm closing the business in

Ohio, I'm opening a new one in New Orleans, I'm changing the

name, I'm changing everything, I'm getting more focused. And

I'm doubling down.’

Right away, Beth sensed she had found

someone in Andi who could help her bring to life, that

doubled-down version of her company.

I could tell the first time I met Beth that she

was someone who was very passionate, and who had a strong

vision for this company. That’s so exciting for me—I love

working with people like that and we also just really clicked

in terms of our creative partnership.

She comes with questions, and she comes with

better wanting to understand and, and I think that first

makes me very comfortable, because I know she cares. Two, I

can tell that she really wants to understand what in the heck's

going on in my head, and I am grateful for that, because I do

as well. She's wanting to make things better based upon what

I'm bringing her in conversation, and then what she

knows with her own expertise, and her experience. And so I

think they they mirror each other quite beautifully.

So Beth’s website project turns into

something else—a full-scale reimagining of her business,

undertaken in partnership with Andi. And the first thing Andi

does is focus on finding the creative common ground for the

two of them to feed off of one another and get the ball

rolling.

Beth’s approach to her work is similar to mine, in

that it’s all about process. She really wants to know everything

there is to know about her clients and what they're trying

to teach whomever they're teaching. Context is big—knowing

where people are coming from and where they're going, is just as

important to her as the thing she’s trying to teach. And same

goes for me. I need to know as much as possible so I can design

from an informed place.

Another part of that first stage was building

trust. For Beth and Andi, that meant getting a little

vulnerable, acknowledging that there was a lot to figure out,

and that the steps toward a finished product wouldn’t always

be polished themselves.

I was asking a lot of super basic questions: “Why

do you do this?” “What is that, and how does it work?” But that

also opened up space for Beth to ask really basic questions about

brand design, or to consider aspects of her business plan

that maybe seemed a little soft.

To work together that way takes trust,

confidence and vulnerability. Gradually, Andi and Beth built

that foundation.

It wasn’t natural at first, right? It never is. But

Beth, you’re so comfortable with that process of exploration, I

feel like we got there pretty quickly.

It's finding that place where you feel it's okay

not to know. And it’s magic. If you hadn’t done that, I wouldn’t

know my business as well as I do…and that sure as hell is nice

not to do that on your own.

So together they broke it down. They broke

through the grad-school jargon that was holding Beth back, and

Andi got a clearer sense both of what Beth was trying to do, and

also of her passion and what makes her great at her job.

I just got the sense of how much you care about

education, and about teaching people with this specific

approach where context matters, and the particular human that

you’re teaching matters. It’s so different from the way I’ve

experienced education, and that felt rebellious to me in the

best way. It clicked, and I wanted to draw it out.

Isn’t it Michelangelo has that quote

about, he just starts chipping away to reveal things. So the

sculpture actually is already in the stone, and he’s just—it’s

his job to like chip away at it until it's formed. And I felt

like it was more like that, like it’s been in there, way down

deep, to the point where I didn't have words to express or

to think about. But the discovery process and going

through these steps with you, is like chipping away and trying to

reveal what could be. And give life to it as opposed to it just

being an idea.

The other thing we did here is think in terms of

differentiation. Ultimately, this is the most important

aspect of branding. And the key to getting it right is answering

the question, “How am I supposed to feel when I interact with

this brand?” And in Beth’s case, the answer to that question was

this idea of customization—that each client was getting an

expertly crafted solution tailored specifically to their

context and their needs. That’s tough to wrap up in one image or

one line.

The whole idea is that everything we do is custom.

So we have a process that we follow that is inquiry- and

question-based. There are no templates. You know, if you need

a one-off by by Friday, we're not your people.

We wrote a mission statement, we wrote a vision

statement, we outlined company values. Those are important

because definition and clarity matter on a foundational level.

Then once all that is set, you can really start writing the

other pieces.

Early on, it was the discovery process helped me

focus in that every single detail matters in who I'm trying

to reach, why I'm trying to reach them, how I'm going to

reach them, what for what purpose, and to really be narrow

on who it is that I'm seeking to serve. Because, quite honestly,

like the process and the philosophy and the desire and

the why, you know, will be there no matter who, you know, knocks

on the door, but to really focus on who—who does it make sense to

serve? Who will I be honored and overjoyed to serve and to work

with?

We arrived at a streamlined business concept

focused on helping a very specific type of business—one

with a mission that combines social good with profit to build

out learning experiences like onboarding.

We're here to help socially conscious organizations

increase the capacity of their people so they can do good in

the world.

And once we had that part sorted, the last step

before I started the visual design process was to name the

company. We started iterating on names and trying to draw out

that concept of the company that would create truly customized

learning experiences, always and completely based on the client’s

individual context, so nothing off the shelf. We tried a lot of

names. Finally we found a few options that were starting to

resonate, and we sent it out to people in various fields to

gather feedback and gauge their responses.

Yeah, I mean there was part of me when we sent it

out that I was like, man, I hope everyone comes back and saying

that this one is, like, it. And that would be so nice and simple

and easy wrapped up package. And yeah, check it off the list.

But … that’s not what happened. Pretty much

everybody hated all of them. With passion.

How you respond to an obstacle such as a

fairly resounding wave of negative feedback is a defining

moment for any creative partnership, any creative

process. And remember, Beth is someone who has in the past been

brought to her knees, literally, by depression. But in this case

she didn’t waver—she believed in herself, in her business, and in

the work she and Andi had undertaken.

I was so impressed with her in that moment. I mean,

I was a little offended, but Beth didn’t miss a beat.

Everyone came back and was like, ‘Nah, not at all.’

I was like, okay, so that little small voice inside of me that's

going ‘I don't know yet’ was right. ... That's progress,

because you have to go through that in order for, like, the

right thing to come along.

Okay, so the essence of the feedback is that the name

wasn’t resonating, and that the mission statement was coming

across as a little over-ambitious in the sense that

it promised to change the world of learning without really

showing how it might be able to do that, or why that’s important

in the first place. And people could see that. So getting that

feedback, we sort of took a deep breath and then dug back in: why

didn't these things resonate? What were we not saying, that

actually needed to come through? And we were then able to be

really honest and distill it even more clearly down to the

mission and vision and other things. We started being really

forthcoming about Beth’s work in a way that I was a little

apprehensive about before. It was actually really freeing.

And just then, while Andi worked with Beth to

tether some of that lofty language to the everyday

practices that would set her business apart, Beth found the

company name. She and Andi had spent so much time looking for

just the right word or phrase for a way to capture the concept

of custom learning, and finally, like a lightning bolt, it came

the magic phrase was, in fact, “custom learning,” and it

had been there all along. The only thing it was missing was a

little more personality, so Beth added the word “atelier,” French

for a workshop or studio, perfect for a New Orleans

startup.

From the beginning, we wanted Beth’s brand to be a

little bit rebellious, but still trustworthy and smart and

professional. And ‘atelier’ has just that level of intrigue.

The approach that we take is more of a workshop

style, more of a studio style where, you know, the silos come

down, and the multiple mediums and the backgrounds and, you

know, that idea of like cafe or salon life where you don't box

yourself into specific industries to solve a problem,

and it's much more transdisciplinary. And so I just

like that idea that you come and you actually work on it—we're

not a factory, that you just put one thing in one end and it

comes out the other the same each time, but really more of an

artistic blend.

We just had to trust that the process would get us

where we wanted to go. You don't have to be so concerned with the

end result during the process of making and trying things and

iterating. But you do have to get through it.

There's some perseverance required at this

stage, but Andi and Beth also found it to be kind of a blast.

One thing that made this project special, Beth, is

how game you were to really experiment with, well, pretty

much everything.

I think that's one of the reasons why I love

working with you and can't imagine working with anyone else

on any of this sort of stuff ever, is that play aspect of

getting messy and knowing that if you trust the process and yo

trust what you—of how you'r knowing yourself in the world,

it's gonna be okay. Like, y u're gonna come up with some

hing pretty awesome. And in the east case, it's still gonna w

rk. And I think that's where ike that magic comes from w

ere people are like, ‘Well, h w do you do it?’ Like, well, yo

know, like, you're saying, l ke, you just play around. You'

e like, that's it that

I agree. It’s an informed play, but yeah, a lot

of the like, great discovery comes from just trying some thin

s out and not being afraid to

So, missio , check. Vision, check. Nam

, check. All that remained was that last, small step that, once

upon a time, had been all t at Beth wanted: for Andi to m

ke her a logo and a

I started designing with a list of words to guide

me, based on the larger process with Beth—words like curious, ni

ble and intelligent. Using the e words is really helpful in ord

r to make design decisions, and in this case it led me to expe

iment with something that was oth playful and knowledge-seek

ng. People need to know they re going to be learning

omething from this place, an it needs to kind of feel famili

r, but we're also going to urn it on its head. The rebellio

s side of Custom Learning Atelier meant that I wasn’t goi

g use the expected iconography f r an educational organizatio

, like a book, or a pencil or n apple. That was a very easy d

cision, but, then, what do y u use? I ended up with a collect

on of six triangles arranged n a wreath, that nods to the si

-step process that Beth uses w th her clients. And becaus

I wanted to reference Beth’s creative process, the design

walks this fine line betwee messy and buttoned-up—you can

see how these triangles could f t together really neatly,

but instead it’s a bit loose.

It rings the most rue to me because when I look

t the logo and and what Andi's c eated, it captures the idea t

at this is not just me. people a ong the way have been like, w

ll, you just call it your last ame, or why don't you just use t

is? Or I'm like, No, it's not a out me—like, whatever. That's

not that's not the thing. nd when I look at this, and I k

ow how I know how far it's co e, I know what you know, the con

ersations that went into it. And so I can look at from that stand

oint and love the process. An like, I just pulled it up on my

computer, and I'm looking at t and I want to be part of that

And it, it's interesting, and it's thought provoking, a

d it's bigger than me. And I ge that sense from it. And I li

e the fact that we took our tim with it. And we trusted ours

lves we trusted the process and can't imagine the name or the l

go being anything differen .

Yeah, I agree in one sense, but also, one of m

favorite aspects of this projec is that Beth’s vision

nd personality are very m ch reflected in the finis

ed product. Once we had the lo o, we took that idea of walking

he line between playful nd professional and carried it o

er to the website. It’s very cl an and modern, but there’s als

a lot of Beth—her passion, h r method, her ambitions to chan

e the way people think abo t learning. Even though some

f the manifesto-esque language h s been toned down from t

e original mission statement, th t fire is still very much presen

, and you can tell that when y u hire Custom Learning Ateli

r, you’re hiring someone who wa ts to start a revolution

in learning.

More to the po nt, Beth feels like her revolut

on is on, and like it has bee equipped with the brand i

entity it needs. She feels like he has been given the platform

he needs to do what she has lon dream

‘Oh, this is what can do!’ All these years I have

been looking for some way to make a positive impact on how we

utilize learning in this world, this is it! What a roundabo

t, ups-and-downs, hilarious-st ry-kind-of-craziness to get he

e, but I'm so grateful. I feel he least amount of anxiety I've

experienced in my adult life i probably forever. And I t

ink it's because I've fin lly reached that place of, ‘

h, this is what I'm supposed t be doing. This is it. This fe

ls nice. And this feels supporte .’

It’s also getting the job done. Beth’s new

company is off and running, winning new clients and doing

the sort of socially conscious innovative work that Beth ha

always wanted to do. For Andi that’s the fun part

I feel proud of Beth’s logo, and of her website

but for me this project—or an project, really—isn’t abo

t whether some visual element th t I created is effective in

a vacuum. It’s about whether I w s able to help someone bring the

r business to life, and for th m to think about that busines

with the clarity and the confi ence they need in order to thriv

. In this case, that abso utely hap

It can happen for you and your company, too. I

you’d like to explore th possibility of a creativ

journey with Andi—and, by th way, as your narrator, I’m hap

y to report that, I, too, have d ne so, also with fantastic resu

ts—if you’re ready to beg n the process with Andi, you

an find her at andimints.com—tha ’s Andi

Passion Meets Process was produced by Cedar Cathedral

Narrative Studio in Chicago, wit original music from Graha