it all began with a wild idea.

with visions of code dancing in his head

with design theory and name that font swirling in her head

It was the Spring of 1996 (with two young boys at home) when me (Gina) and my hubby (Leon) had the idea of translating our talents in interior design, graphic design and website development and started our marketing agency, O'Daniel Designs, in the Seattle Area. 

1996 was the Wild, Wild, West of designing, marketing, developing and communicating in a whole new way - digitally.

It was an exciting, new and challenging time. Changing (and oh, do I mean changing) so frequently that if you blinked you might be left in the dust having to catch up.

This was the start of the “You’ve Got Mail” era and dial-up (with the very distinctive dial up sound) and where computers were becoming more and more accessible for people to own. And, business owners were now able to communicate with people (their customers) in a new and exciting way. It was (and still is) a time to strategically push the boundaries on what can be done in our digital world.

Our journey has lead us to some exciting project through the years like creating all of the graphics in Expert Software’s “Brochures” and all of the fonts used in their McDonaldLand T-Shirt Fun Software Programs to creating highly secure database driven applications like Silver Cloud Inns and Resorts Guest Rewards Program. A big interior design dream of mine came true (but not as an interior designer) but, as a graphic, brand and website designer by  working with The Seattle Street of Dreams to develop their website and show graphics.  Throughout the years on our journey we also had the pleasure of being able to work on many, many cool projects by helping individuals and businesses of all sorts of industries around the world.

This journey also led me to help business owners starting with co-authoring and publishing my book Demystifying Graphic Design. From there, and my love to help business owners succeed with creating their brand identity and attract their ideal customers, I created more tools to help them including creating (and teaching) the Master Class - Brand Sparks and the product Brand Cards for daily brand promptings. I then created a self-study version of Brand Sparks Masterclass and released Brand Sparks as a self-study workbook. My educating business owners on strategic branding didn't stop there. I also had the pleasure of being a guest on radio shows, podcasts and have spoken in front of many business groups on the importance of creating a brand that gets noticed. 

We recently started O'Daniel Creative as a division of O'Daniel Designs because on our journey, that started over 27 years ago, we are so much more than a "basic design company" we are a creative, strategy driven branding and marketing company.

Whether we were working with soleprenues or business owners of small, medium or larger businesses, we have always started our project relationship with strategy. Because, without strategy, you are just throwing darts blindfolded and hoping to hit the bullseye.