It’s funny looking back, isn’t it?

When we founded bruxton in 2013, it all came together in a bit of a whirlwind. We were fully immersed in our respective day-jobs when an exciting opportunity pulled us in a new direction nearly overnight. As most entrepreneurs will echo, the beginnings of our agency were quite the blur of pure adrenaline, learning experiences, relationship building, and just getting our sea-legs in this new endeavor.

A few things we knew at the outset. First, Jeff and I were born to be partners. Somehow, our deeply contrasting personalities mesh with mutual respect to create an ideal business pairing for the both of us. Jeff runs in the analytics lane, I run in the relational lane, and we converge with a desire to provide personal and collaborative designing experiences for our clients. Second, we’re all about learning. We know what we’re good at, and we know that there is so much space to grow. Honestly, our passion for learning trumps our fear of failure. I guess that’s what makes this entrepreneur thing a good fit for us. Third, we were ready to strip it down. After pursuing design in the mega-agency world, we understood that there is no substitute for impeccable output. Yet, even a great output can notably lack some soul without the collaboration of a personal client-designer relationship. So bruxton was born: a boutique branding and design agency that champions the power of brand/designer collaboration to produce projects with both heart and excellence.

By early 2018, we knew it was time for some serious soul searching. For the agency to flourish, we needed some grounding. We couldn’t fly by the seat of our passion alone anymore. As I mentioned before, Jeff and I run in different lanes. And soul-searching is something that doesn’t fall too easily in either of those . So, on a little desperation and a lot of gut feeling, we hired Natalie.

Natalie came to us with an account manager title and business therapist potential. As she observed the basic functioning of our agency, Natalie not only learned the protocols, she sought out our ever elusive “why”. It quickly became clear that strategy was Natalie’s lane, and her fresh eyes were perfectly suited to help us refocus. We hired Natalie hoping for a step in the right direction. Instead, she brought a breakthrough. After workshops, hard talks, discussions surrounding what may have been lost, and brainstorming about what we hoped could be found, our team came together. It seems that when you find the right people and put in the right efforts, your results will consistently outdo your expectations.

After literally years of varied and unspoken goals and hopes for the agency, bruxton finally articulated who and what we are and aim to be:

• Our passion: the creative process.
• Our purpose: to champion both strategy and meaning in our own work and our clients’ deliverables.

It’s funny. Out of our own brand exploration, we confirmed our purpose in exploring yours. bruxton runs with this mantra: Designing brand experiences with Purpose + Passion

We love what we do. Part of that is because we love design. The other part is because we love you. Your endeavors inspire us. We’re honored to be your friends and grab beers with you while you pour out everything you imagine your brand will be and do and accomplish. There are no people we’d rather work with than our friends. There are no goals we’d rather explore than the ones that make your passions come alive. Your journey is our journey. As you learn, we learn.

As bruxton turns five, we look gratefully back at our beginnings and expectantly towards what is to come. As always, we’re stoked to design. More than ever, we’re honored to be a part of your journey. Here’s to inviting you along on ours. With a reset of our passion and purpose, we find ourselves more equipped than ever to propel our friends forward through experience, strategy, and deliverables. And wherever you’re at in the resets, thanks for having us.

In the words of Tony Fahkry, “I draw your attention once more to Thomas Edison, having failed one thousand times before creating the electric light bulb. A strong will matched with a powerful vision means failure takes a backseat toward greatness.”

We’re in this together.

Onward.