Design is the Business

Why Good Design Matters, Where to Focus, and What Makes a Great Process for Startups

This past October at Celebrate 2015 I delivered a talk to the startup entrepreneurs in attendance (non-designers) about how they should be thinking about using design within their companies. In summary, design is the business. I hope you will pick up one or more ways of thinking about your business that maybe you haven’t before, or arguments to advance design thinking within your company.

I divided my points into three areas:

1. Why Good Design Matters
2. Where to Focus
3. What Makes a Great Process

Why Good Design Matters

In short: money. You’ll make more of it.

The typical Apple store does 17x more revenue per square foot than the average retail store.

My first example: Apple retail stores. They generate 17x more revenue than the average retail store. $300 per square foot is considered pretty good, Apple makes over $6,000. Every part of the retail experience is thoughtfully considered, including even filling…