We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Misty Amizich a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Misty, appreciate you joining us today. Earning a full time living from one’s creative career can be incredibly difficult. Have you been able to do so and if so, can you share some of the key parts of your journey and any important advice or lessons that might help creatives who haven’t been able to yet?
I have. In 2024, I gave up full time employment to pursue freelance full-time. I was able to secure a part-time yearly contract with a smaller boutique agency and have been pursuing and doing additional work on the side. I’m still learning the ups and downs of freelance and the best way to go about getting new clients and work, but so far, that has happened almost entirely by word of mouth.
Misty, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I’m an art director/graphic designer by trade, and have been working full-time professionally since 2011. Since college, my passions in the design world were focused on illustration, typography and infographic design. I started out at a small local agency called Boxing Clever, where I worked across a slew of clients (namely Brown-Forman, owners of Jack Daniels and Southern Comfort, St. Louis Rams and Blues, Adobe, and many local clients) directing photo shoots, creating everything from Point-of-Sale, main visuals for print, and digital activations. The BC team also greatly valued creative passion projects, which allowed me a breadth of experience I otherwise wouldn’t have had. Boxing Clever launched their own record label and publishing company, and through that I was able to illustrate a 70-page children’s book called “Archibald’s Next Big Thing” for Emmy-award winning actor Tony Hale. In addition, we got to create event posters for local record store Vintage Vinyl and packaging for artists on our label. All in all, it was about the best experience you could want for your first job out of school.
In 2015, I went to Nestle Purina PetCare as part of The Feed, the in-house social team. Purina has a large in-house agency, CheckMark, and The Feed was a small, nimble off-shoot of that made up of CheckMark creatives and those on Purina’s marketing team. Social for brands was kind of at its height at that time and we got to do so much fun, scrappy, stuff with dog costumes and impromptu photo shoots, and coverage for large Purina sponsored events, like the Westminster Dog Show. We worked closely with the social platforms and became very data-driven and intentional with our content across the Purina portfolio, testing everything either in real-time based on performance, or via studies post-campaign. Our biggest focus for content was short-form video, and I got a lot of experience animating in After Effects and adding that to my arsenal.
Post-Pandemic, I could feel a shift in my priorities and how I spent my time. As someone who struggles with a chronic illness and is also a mom, remote work became irreplaceable to me. As people started being required to head back to the office, I secured a full time remote role as a Senior Art Director at HLK, a local. St. Louis agency. HLK had several crop science clients under the Bayer umbrella, and I was part of the Channel Seed team, diving headfirst into quarterly campaigns, which included everything from landing pages, email and social communication, print, and my first experiences designing for events, which proved to be a lot of fun. I got to spearhead the Seedsman’s Summit, a yearly sales conference, doing a hotel takeover and a hype video which involved our clients faking guitar solos on green screen. It was also my first time participating in the Farm Progress Show and creating what Channel’s footprint would be there.
Other clients I worked on at HLK were cannabis brand High Five/Teal, including packaging and social, Envu, Bayer’s environmental science division, and American Cancer Society, creating an app for their Hope Lodge cancer patients and caregivers, to help navigate their stay as well as the new city they were potentially staying in during treatment.
In 2024, I got the opportunity to freelance for Active Ingredients, a California based boutique shop that specializes in CPG food brands, such as Chicken of the Sea, Marin French, Genova Seafood and grocery giant Albertson’s, where I’ve been focused on the digital space, eComm, email and campaign visuals, as well as continuing to sharpen my skills in short form animation.
The autonomy of being a contractor has gifted me a more fulfilling life and has freed up time for me to pursue my own creative passions. While the uncertainty that can ebb and flow as a freelancer can be daunting at times, ultimately, I always wanted to end up here. I’m continuing to pursue other clients and hope to continue working for myself for the foreseeable future.
What’s worked well for you in terms of a source for new clients?
Honestly, word of mouth continues to be the most reliable source for new clients and projects, which only serves to reinforce the idea that relationships matter, and if you do good work and have a good attitude, you’re likely to be surprised by the connections that continue to happen.
What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?
I think the most rewarding aspect is always going to be creating something that didn’t exist before, whether that be for a brand or just for yourself. It’s hard to know what the future can hold, but I think there will always be a place for human-centered design.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://mistynoelle.work
- Instagram: @mistynoelle
- Linkedin: https://linkedin.com/in/mistymanley
Image Credits
Headshots – Vein and Vessel Photography