A Design Thinking Process

I’m no design wizard, but I have an eye for harmony and style!

These images were created as draft ads for a publication. They are not final but simply an example of my design strategy at work.

What strategy is that, you ask?

Well, for a multitude of reasons, there is always a small group of work that stands the test of time. I hold on to these works, for I know they will come in handy later.

And so, I found some old designs used to create our persona project Facebook ads and decided (ever-so-decidedly) that they were appropriate to appropriate (see what I did there) for this particular task.

So alas, using my trusted canvas called Canva, I copied the design in the new dimensions and spent about 2 hours iterating upon iteration, if that could be a thing!

So, what are your thoughts? Which one speaks to you the most? Which one do you think the team went with? Let me know!

Measuring Change

It takes a lot to muster up the courage to change.

Understanding.
Acknowledgement.
Compassion.
Kindness.
Curiosity.
Ambition.

Then once we decide it’s the route we want to take, we build a process to get there.

Preparing.
Taking time.
Committing.
Rooting.
Transforming.
Loving.

Day to day, I think of ways to express the importance of change. How it can help guide us toward growth. How by honouring and trusting in it, we can start to thrive.

Still, we have such a hard time adjusting our habits. They are formed and a part of who we are, though not always good for us.

What happens when you start the process of change and go backwards, reverting to previous habits, undeciding that you’re brave enough to follow through and succeed?

These are the questions I am constantly asking myself. What will be the conclusion? How come we’re not there yet? Will we ever arrive?

And so, as change is constant, we can only continue on our quest, taking the small steps to bring us closer toward our goals.

As you search, tell yourself you’re alright. Then, document your actions and take time to examine how you got to each stage. As Deepak Chopra says, “All great changes are preceded by chaos.” Chaos being –

Obstacles.
Limitations.
Fear.
Doubt.
Shame.
Laziness.

Despite these things, with intention, inner strength, and a mission you can stand by, you will stay on track; you will arrive.

Make change happen, guys!

We’re Tipping and We Need to Find Answers to Our Global Problems Soon

A United Nations report declares we have reached “a breaking point”.

So, what does that mean?

With almost 10% of the 8 billion people living on this earth suffering from malnutrition, 3 million lacking healthy diets, and climate change issues rising to the forefront, it is no surprise that we are in desperate need of a way to produce more food without harming the environment.

The report reviews a few critical ‘climate change impacts’ like reversing water degradation by choosing smart technologies and sustainable farming practices or sequestering greenhouse gases emitted during agricultural activities by employing regenerative farming principles.

And perhaps the most critical solution of all? Deploying technology to enable a more connected agriculture and food industry. In my opinion, we can become powered by data and collaboration, putting us in a better position to come up with answers to big global problems and, in the long term, create a more resilient economy.

Still, to make an impact today, we need to understand the challenges and realities that farmers face now. So your first stop is here.

Read the report – https://bit.ly/3nUtj9b

#savetheenvironment #sustainability #regenerativeagriculture #agriculture #foodindustry #growingpopulation #growthforgood #makingchangehappen

Agtech Career Series

I am so passionate about educational marketing. It inspires me to look beyond the standard expectations of my role. For this project, I tried to situate myself in the mind of a teenager reading a presentation about a job in farming. It’s so much more than that though. It’s igniting their energy with thoughtful and calculated design. It’s creating flawless headlines and engaging copy that will leave them fascinated and motivated. More urgently, it’s about arming that younger generation with the knowledge to pursue a rewarding career in an ever-growing and transitioning industry.

Our primary call-to-action invokes us to – farm smart start today. We’ll provide you with the education and the technology to succeed. To change your operation for the better. To help the planet survive. So let’s band together and fill each other with hope to prepare ourselves to fight with our minds and hearts to beat global problems like a growing population, food waste, and climate change.

I hope to participate in more projects like this in the future and maybe even join the classroom for some face-to-face interaction and hands-on teaching!

Read more about the project I launched here. Alongside a blog series, these are the assets I designed for the students:

And here are the blog graphics that were used to complement the content. I mimicked a rainbow effect because the colours of a rainbow positively impact our brains, affecting emotions, mental clarity, and energy levels. We all know long nights of studying could take advantage of a rainbow or two!

But Local First Facebook Ad

The ‘support local’ movement is a force driving change worldwide. It moves people to want to purchase fresh, healthy products from farmers. It creates a connection between shoppers, where we can ignite conversations to examine how we’re doing our part and why it’s so important. Products are showing up more readily and in places where you least expect to see them. Overall, there is a feeling of togetherness, kindness, and open-mindedness that helps promote awareness and captures the interest of new, existing, and prospective customers.

I wanted to create a fun digital ad that spoke to the nature of the ‘support local’ concept, one that explores options (expressed using a carousel format), eliminates predisposition (articulated in the ad copy), and ultimately grants us the ability to choose (the call-to-action ‘but local first’) – take action (decide what you want to eat for breakfast) or take action through inspiration (are your eggs local? Well, you can get them laid the same day of delivery! How awesome is that!). The inspiration trickles through in a matter of seconds affecting all those involved (conveyed through various images, colours, animation, and the image of a family). As individuals watching the ad, we feel more attuned to thinking about what’s on our plates, how it got there, where it comes from, and why our consumption habits can negatively or positively impact the planet. The focus remains on the following values –

Support local

Empower people

Help the planet

Grow the community

What are your thoughts on this ad? If I could make one change, I would use a graphic of a globe in place of the farming graphic (at the end of the video). Does it speak to you and make you feel empowered to support local? Let me know your thoughts; open to discussing with you!

Food for Thought

We all wonder about things, everyday things, that lead us to research and ponder.

For example, are you starting a new diet? Curious about trying fresh, healthy food? Just nosy about the history of something? Well, these graphics will satiate you.

The #AllAbout campaign explores a variety of fresh, local, and healthy products, giving customers the chance to learn something new in a colourful and digestible way. As part of an ongoing strategy to define the tagline #TrulyFarmtoTable, I explicitly position an image at the bottom of a newsletter, like my brother Alan would say when we were kids eating dinner at the dinner table –

“The Ultimate” a.k.a. the last bite.

It satisfies and perfectly wraps up the meal (conversely idea) (metaphorically conversation).

Are you munching on words or proverbial nuggets or just vegan nuggets?

Well, these images will work in the same way! Once again, satisfying and perfectly wrapping up your dinner.

Another analogy – who didn’t chew Bazooka bubble gum only to unwrap the tiny comic folded neatly on the inside? Take it apart. Pop the pink gum. Immediately unravel the humorous reward.

It’s a ritual in a sense, and these graphics were indeed a ritual to create. So, I hope you enjoy them and that they will entice you to…Munsch!

Instagram Grid Layouts

A grid, which features multiple images split into a visually appealing frame, is one way to brand your business on Instagram. 

Three benefits (that connect in the end) – 

  • Command attention: make a lasting first impression; if a viewer’s average attention span is about eight seconds, they will have some time to absorb what you have to present to them.
  • Stand out: imprint your audience’s mind with a quick taste of your identity; give them immediate access to your information and interests while establishing credibility and authority.
  • Tell a targeted story: communicate who you are to your existing and potential followers while stimulating emotions, and on a practical side, organizing the layout of your images into a narrative.

I created these grids when reviewing the masses of content I have made over the past year for DirectFood. store’s email marketing strategy (a whole other topic on its own). I like how the colours and shapes seem to speak to one another, and the creative copy helps deliver a message in tune with the selected graphics and photographs.

If you like this sort of work, let me know. I’m happy to share more impromptu design posts here for you!

11 – Tripping

Daisy was always looking for inspiration, the appearance of cursive writing or the look of a padded, bulky knit sweater featuring crimson and indigo animal characters like Filburt. Anything creative, really, would do.

The day she noticed something, she quizzically peered into a bathroom mirror, hoping because she was in the large stall, her sweater would reverse. 

Utterly distracted, Daisy made a note never to do it again.

“My progress has become insuperable from all the months of writing exact-sized phrases and headlines with five words or less.” Daisy thought fast while twiddling her phone in her hand.

“Have things changed in A Day? What were things like when I first started anyhow?” she thought. “Well, I was definitely more satisfied. Had a bounce to my step, could care less about the matchy-ness of my outfits. I also felt more powerful, like people were listening to me, learning from me, and so on.”

Stroking her phone, Daisy continued, “However, today, everything is an exercise—an exercise in recalling (all types included).” Distracted, she goes on, “I have great hair, and my skin is young, it seems. On that note, ageing has not necessarily imparted more wisdom or money in my purse.”

She was always digressing.

Back home, Chona grabbed her fire orange Frank & Oak bucket bag and booked it out the door. She was late, again. Always leaving the house ten minutes post-shower. She hopped into her 2008 white Rogue and took off toward the light. 

The road was slick, and rain dripped down hard, like her binary code pleated skirt that streamed neon pink zeros and ones from her waist down to her thighs. 

She hated driving, though. It was dangerous in Elevententeen, and she knew one day it would kill her. Still, she cranked the radio and listened to old 90s songs like The Cranberries’ Linger. She hummed this tune imagining it more regal played on the baby grand piano at her dad’s house. 

When she sat back to play, his gigantic TV wouldn’t let her use the old music books, so she had to carefully balance grade 8 Royal Conservatory in volumes six, seven, eight and ten. The chords? They prevented her from falling. 

Daisy’s next big project was sitting in her bag. She put it in there to prevent its glorious shimmer from stirring the Outsiders’ eyes. It could kill, and she didn’t want to be a murderer tonight.

Finally arriving, she stepped out of her car. There were Dreams everywhere! She blinked. Then, blinked again. Her eyes started to roll back into her head, and she could feel the surge streaming now from her crown down to her feet, hiding neatly inside her red rain boots. 

In her room.

Someone painted her Brooklyn studio apartment bright orange-red! So, she knew the test had begun.

Should she attack? Chona could barely hold her head up, let alone break out into dance and song. She would just have to sleep it off, her phone continually buzzing that darn song. Then, like all the other times, she passed out. What remained Wide Awake in complete consciousness (forget Artha today) was her supple orange bucket bag. And within it, her project, slipping away…

The Modern Farming Community

How the Fraser Valley’s Modern Farming Community Is Driving the Evolution of AGTech on a Global Scale

Divided by the Vedder River and Sumas Mountain, the Fraser Valley ranks first in BC’s AG-driven economy with over $1 billion in gross farm income generated every year. As a result, the region is quickly becoming known as the AGTech Capital of Canada. Characterized by a gentler climate in winter months and intensely heated summers, this new title comes as no surprise.

Local farmers are armed with more than ideal growing conditions, terrain, weather, and viable water sources, providing them with the groundwork to grow diverse crops, including many fruits and vegetables in high demand and exported across the globe. Plus, with proximity to educational and research institutions, the region is becoming an epicentre for production and innovation, developing and producing world-class agriculture technology, known as “AGTech”.

For example, homegrown agriculture and food tech companies Agrilyze and DirectFood.store are joining hands to advance the food supply chain and improve food traceability. Since 71% of Canadians say they need to understand where their food comes from, these technological advancements play a huge role in helping the region progress.

Still, looking toward the future, the Fraser Valley faces many challenges, ranging from the seasonality of production to labour costs and supply to globalization and more. And like other farming regions worldwide, one of the biggest dilemmas we have to confront or face dire consequences, climate change.

For this particular reason, the agriculture industry is examining the foundations of farming and re-evaluating traditional methods of planting, collecting, and selling crops. A modern approach has been imminent for decades, and today, as the Fraser Valley leads the way, we are witnessing our paradigm shift. The Modern Farming Community changes our framework, including policies and approaches, to redefine how we acknowledge our conditions as much as changing the tools themselves.

More so focused on building farming systems that create beneficial outcomes, such as increased productivity and positive changes in socio-economic and environmental conditions, the MFC benefits impact farmers directly, not to mention our entire society. The main drivers, in this case, innovation, sustainability, and reliability are helping to transform the agriculture industry one step at a time.

The transformation includes sharing our successes and encouraging those with access to technology to consider developing stronger, smarter, and more advanced processes that also go beyond our regular expectations. Simply “do more with less” and ensure our actions lead to a reduced negative impact on our planet.

Our mission then is to continue to deliver real and sustainable technology solutions that will empower our people and planet on a local scale to make a global impact. The MFC concept is now at the precipice of attention and more relevant than ever as the agriculture industry evolves amidst the current crises and a rapidly growing population.

Farmers today are asking how a more modern approach can and will create substantial change, change that will protect and enrich the soil, reduce water needs, and decrease energy costs, just to name a few aspects. And connected to this, knowledge has become a considerable part of the bigger picture. Yet, we are still enthralled by our romantic vision of the traditional farmer, wheat in the mouth, tractor driving into the sunset.

Nevertheless, the picture has become much more significant. It is now comprised of a repository of technologies, ranging from drones, robotics, vertical farming operations, GIS, and GPS to the application of AI, machine learning systems, and more. Our farmers and others worldwide are using AGTech to help overcome new barriers or obstacles concerning productivity and the overall efficiency of their land.

The onset of the AGTech movement or our Modern Farming Community is giving our farmers a choice – intensify innovative, sustainable, and reliable practices that enable more intelligent, precision technologies or face the fate of the worldwide population rising to 9 billion by 2050.

As the Fraser Valley’s farming community evolves, newer methods are being used to optimize farm output. This includes adopting modern technologies that save time and costs. And as we develop more answers and solutions, the question becomes – how can we amalgamate the MFC fundamentals (innovation, sustainability, and reliability) with pure, actionable knowledge to continue to drive the changes that we see today?

Without a doubt, technology has become the baseline allowing us to meet our current and future needs for food, fibre, feed, and fuel. Our Modern Farming Community is the beginning of our examination. We must recognize the state of our planet and invest in developing new technologies to confront our challenges head-on and headstrong, causing a ripple effect of change.

So, unleash the power of AGTech to solve some of the world’s biggest problems? Yes, indeed. After all, we are now relying on agricultural innovations to increase the production of major crops – why wouldn’t we use it to help define a whole new planet? The pursuit starts right here, in the Fraser Valley, the AGTech Capital of Canada.