MIX interview

Stills life

´You´ve got to attract their attention, and know what you´re saying to them.´ If you want to read a piece about brands that´s stuffed with marketing cojones, chock full of buzzwords and acronyms and worse, then look elsewhere. When Chris Carpenter of Stills Design talks about brands and marketing, he says it in a way that makes sense. He´s a man worth listening to.

‘I was born in Weston-Super-Mare, but was a real nomad early on. Dad was in the RAF, so we lived all over the place; Singapore, Germany. I went to boarding school at High Wycombe RGS where my interest in art was encouraged. I enrolled on an Art and Design Foundation course at Exeter. There was a project that made me think about the difference between art and design. They sat you down with a sheet of A1 paper, a big tin of emulsion and a stick. You had to make a mark and pass it on to the next person. I think I realized I’m not messy enough to be an artist, too controlling maybe – perhaps I‘m post-rationalising!

Artists answer their own brief; designers answer someone else’s brief. I get off on solving other people’s challenges – that’s what drives me. When companies say things to me like ‘I want to attack this market’ or ‘I want to brand this’, they’re serious commercial issues. The first questions I tend to ask is ’Why?’ and ‘Is it real?

It’s important to try to think about brand as a personality. You’ve got to understand who you are, what you say and who you say it to. There’s a big difference between a brand and a corporate identity. A logo is a mark that represents an organization. A brand has a personality which influences buying decisions. A brand has a public presence ¬and it’s controlled, not accidental. The best companies sell their brand, rather than their products. By understanding their personality, enlightened companies can use their products to reinforce the brand values and differentiate themselves form their competitors.’

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