Research
Irregular Labs – Generation Z
“Irregular Labs connects the ideas, opinions and insights of girl and gender nonconforming Gen Zs to the world. With a founding team of “old” (not really) and “young” (aka Gen Z), Irregular Labs possesses an unmatched understanding of, credibility with, and access to 13-24 year-olds around the world.”
After hearing about this project during this weeks lecture I couldn’t help but want to know more about who they are and what they’re doing. I liked what I found.
Frankly, I’m not entirely sure what the difference is between Generation Z & the Millennial, all I know if that most of the time they’re not taking very seriously. On a day to day basis I hear a series of ‘you’re too young to’; listen to them, to understand, to know about that. Basically, in the eyes of some, I’m ‘too young’ to hold an opinion on something. Or so it seems. Due to this, there’s a lot of covering up of ‘Gen Z’ interests. People act older or appear differently to gain respect.
Irregular Lab however, wear ‘Gen Z’ like a brand. They scream out to draw attention on the matter using language and design in a clear & educational way. The tone throughout their website gives you the impression that you’re the only one being addressed, which is amazing seeing as one of their main goals is to make sure your opinions and hard work are valued.
I really like what they’re doing hear and would love to see this project grow into something huge.
http://www.strawberrytoo.co.uk
“We’re Strawberrytoo – run by graduates and apprentices, we’re the most unique and fearless design and digital agency around.”
Strawberrytoo was launched by its sister company, Strawberry, in 2014 in attempts to nurture the local talent in Hull. One of their main ethics was to employ and support local talents by creating an entire studio run by graduates, interns and apprentices. It now consists of 10 employees; however, their team are almost on a constant turnover as most of their employees are on yearlong placement – sometimes this can result in a full-time position however their main aim is to get the talent out and working for within the local studios.
I believe working with such a fast turnover of staff opens doors for Strawberrytoo as well as their clients to experience such a large variant of different creative skills, cultures and views. However, this does also come with its downfalls. Having worked with them previously, I know from experience how frustrating it can be from a client’s perspective to have to re-explain your entire brand and ‘vision’ to a new person after having your main contact with them finish their yearlong placement. Due to this, I believe this practice may work best for short term projects rather than on-going ones.
Their website and branding use a very loud, young style of language that gives you a transparent insight into their company and who runs it.
“We’re a curious and clever agency run by creative folk who love helping interesting people do interesting things.”
Strawberry was established in 1993 they’re a creative digital agency with a team of 35 highly talented staff – this includes the staff from Strawberrytoo. They’re based at the modern C4DI buildings in Hull.
Their approach to collecting clientele is very sales focused rather than client based, this is shown through the way they talk about their awards and results opposed to customer satisfactory. On their ‘why us’ section of their website, their main topic of discussion is completely based on success opposed to actually showing what they can do for you as an individual client. This implies that their main client base could potentially be start-up businesses looking to get their foot in the door in marketing or boost their sales.
Here’s an article I found on Drum that featured Strawberry’s Dominic Love and his view on whether Yorkshire has an agency scene within its region.
Drum – “Is there a recognisable agency scene in the region, and how does the area’s output measure up against work from the rest of the UK?”
Dominic Love, creative director, Strawberry – “I would say so, yes, but it’s in clusters at the moment. Being based in East Yorkshire means we’re at the end of the line. With that comes the need to create our own buzz. It’s happening in Hull and, as a city, real investment is going into digital and the creative sector. At the moment, Yorkshire is creating some cracking work, but that spans across the north as a whole now.”
Full article here: https://www.thedrum.com/news/2014/10/30/yorkshire-focus-there-agency-scene-region
With Strawberry and Strawberrytoo being interconnected companies looking toward the differences of them was interesting, you can clearly see a difference in the work that they create and a clear contrasting business model. I believe the reason for the Strawberry & Strawberrytoo divide seems to purely be based on budget for both Strawberry and their clientele. Strawberry are focused on the high-end clients, considering what they want specifically and creating work that is tailored to a use and a brief, they seem to build a high-end partnership with the companies and for this they pay premium.
Strawberrytoo are a company that are brought in to create specific pieces for companies whether this is for social media or otherwise. Whereas the company I worked for had a partnership with Strawberrytoo, it was minimal, and they where instructed with what pieces we wanted to be created. This discount option gives clients a taste of the work done by the Strawberry family and thus would help drive business towards the main studio. Strawberrytoo also always Strawberry to incubate and cherry pick people they believe have potential, moulding them into employee’s that already understand the company and its ethos.
Placement
Both Strawberry and Strawberrytoo are based in Hull, however their positions themselves show the key differences in the culture of each business. Strawberrytoo is based right in the centre of Hull, this is extremely accessible which implies that this is the main office used to meet new clients and a good place to meet for first impressions/interviews.
Strawberry is based on the outskirts of Hull near the river. This is a much more prestigious area which leads me to believe that Strawberry deals with the larger clients over Strawberrytoo.
Here are the diagrams I found on StreetCheck, these show the social grade of studio’s area based on their postcode. I find it astonishing that two areas that are seemingly so close together already begin to show distinct differences based on this research.
Social Grade approximations are derived from an algorithm created by the Market Research Society. The figures shown are per-household rather than individual – more specifically, the job title and employer of the “household reference person” is used, analogous to what traditionally was called the head of the household. Only household reference persons between the ages of 16-64 are included.
Interview
After conducting my research, I thought I’d drop Strawberry an email to directly ask a few questions. Today I heard back from Jess, Strawberrytoo’s Creative Director, here’s what she had to say;
Firstly, I like to know why you chose the name ‘Strawberry’ to represent your business?
The business was named Strawberry as our first offices were based down Strawberry Street in Hull.
Does your location have an impact on your client base? If so, how?
I don’t believe our location has an impact on our client base as we have lots of ‘out of town’ clients based in places like, Leeds and London which we travel to see regularly, as well as lots of local clients too. I think word of mouth is very powerful and once you’ve done a cracking job for one client, the word just spreads!
What finalised the decision to create StrawberryToo? What was the biggest change/impact this had to Strawberry?
You can read some of the articles published about StrawberryToo from when we opened, to our most recent business changes below:
https://www.thedrum.com/news/2014/06/24/strawberrytoo-created-war-against-north-east-brain-drain
https://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/news/business/strawberrytoo-continues-combat-brain-drain-91863
https://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/news/business/hull-creative-marketing-firm-cements-1321515
This hasn’t had a direct impact on Strawberry in terms of clients or business, however it has allowed Strawberry to hand pick graduate/apprentice designers and marketers who have had a full year working on real client briefs at StrawberryToo to potentially join the Strawberry team if they really impress during their placement.
“We’re a small creative-led design studio based in Leeds.”
Split was established in 2007, they’re a creative-led design studio based in the centre of Leeds. Their a small team of 4, however after looking through their work it’s been made clear that they have a select few of regular third-party photographers and designers that they work with too.
What really drew me was the definition of their studio name, Split, that was found on their ‘about’ section;
“None of us is a single thing. We all exist between any number of extremes. As both individuals and communities we embody conflicts, complexities and contradictions. Our identities flex depending on the context or time. We demand both romance and pragmatic function; we want simplicity and clarity, but not at the expense of the messy truth. — We are all Split.”
I feel that having such an open, expressive explanation of what the company stands for really allows anyone looking from the outside in to get a grasp on what they’re about as a studio. The openness displayed here also reflects in the work they’ve created as each piece has a clear message and a clear-cut style about it. I really enjoy their story-telling nature behind each piece. I particularly liked the branding created for Yorkshire Dance & That Old Chestnut as these two projects demonstrated the possibilities of telling a story through deliberate choice of the shapes and colours used. Each element chosen to showcase the brand had a reason behind it, some were obvious, but some were left for the viewer to find on their own and I really like that. I feel that their approach to design is very much in line with my own in the sense that they breathe life and fun into each piece created to tell the story of a brand, a concept or an opinion.
Each element of their studio is extremely detail orientated and driven with purpose. From their graphics all the way to their glass shaped business cards, you can see the efforts they’ve put in to ensure that they provide their clients with an individual, unique experience each time they make an exchange.
They’ve also included a shop section on their website where they’ve displayed their personalised projects which completely differ from their business designs. This leads me to believe that instead of the sole business to business selling as seen in the other two studios, they would rather see their work as pieces of art, created by them for the public directly.
Here’s a diagram showing the social grade of studio’s area based on their postcode. This shows that the area is primarily populated by with who fulfil supervisory/junior management professional positions – this tells me that this is an area filled with opportunity for growth along with a variety of well-established businesses.
Speaking of opportunity, they also happen to be situated right opposite Leeds College of Music and one of BBC’s offices – I’m sure this gives them plenty of opportunity to spark up new ideas using the influences of what they produce.
Overall, I feel that all these studios have completely different ways to connect with their audiences. The Strawberry family look to drive business to business sales and their main goal seems to be profit and business turnover. They seem to look towards what their clients desire and create exactly that in a fast-efficient way. Really taking on board the wording of “Agency”. This seems to contrast to the artistic approach of Split, they seem to investigate the projects more and attack it with much more artistic flair while creating the clean images that tell a story. They call themselves a “Studio”, they approach each project and task as a piece of art rather than a piece of work and I believe this really shows within the work that is created.
Downloadable Content
Sian Laüra 
Week 2
Good Reflection I would love to see some shots of the arewas you are talking about – maps, street shots to get a real sense of place. Great that you are pulling research from a variety of different articles etc.
Very interesting that you are looking at the relation of place and the social grade info in relation to the area of each studio – where is this research from quote it – some more insights into the social, ecomonic and historical background of your areas would be really interesting here Sian and demonstrate that you are thinking above and beyond in terms of what has influenced industry today, in these areas. Fantastic that you are conducting primary research and interviews. May this continue in other tasks! Great stuff!
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