Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Ellen Puls and Mila Samson. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Ellen and Mila, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you tell us about a time where you or your team really helped a customer get an amazing result?

In the spring of 2022,Totally Rad Vintage Fest reached out to Kazoo Branding. Throughout the pandemic they had managed several successful events featuring vintage fashion and toys, and the TRVF team had decided it was time to expand beyond the Twin Cities. However, they had outgrown their current brand identity and were in need of an update. Kazoo worked with the TRVF team on a re-brand with the goal of maintaining brand recognition with their current audience but also allowing them to grow. Our client in this project champions sustainability and rejects fast-fashion. We wanted to bring this rejection of mainstream culture to the new graphic identity. The logo’s hand-drawn letters are evocative of graffiti you might see along train cars or tagged on buildings in a city. It is also important for the Totally Rad team to maintain a sense of inclusivity for their events, and we wanted their graphic identity to reflect this. Rounded letters and bright colors bring a friendliness to the logo that feels approachable. Finally, we created an anthropomorphic UFO cartoon that Totally Rad can use on promotional materials. The character acts as the face of the Totally Rad Vintage Fest brand. Their new brand identity debuted with a collaboration with the St. Paul Saints, with tote bags featuring their new UFO character playing baseball handed out to patrons. Since then, they have promoted and hosted their vintage events all over the Midwest and at each stop, the new brand identity is incorporated into photo backdrops and immersive games that add value to their customers’ experiences. When a brand identity reflects your businesses’ values, it can be a powerful tool for connecting with customers and achieving your business goals. 

Ellen and Mila, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

Kazoo Branding is a creative studio that helps other small businesses with brand and marketing. Ellen and I both have a background in graphic design, and through our careers have learned how to combine design and strategy to create effective marketing materials. Because we are small business owners ourselves, we understand the variety of challenges that our clients navigate, so we are able to provide creative solutions that fit their needs. We first like to work with our clients to refine their brand message, determining what are the core elements of their brand and how to best communicate that to their audience. Then we provide design that brings the message alive!

Our clients often need a logo and visual identity design that better communicates their brand values. We also build websites that are capable of all the features they need to help their business function, such as e-commerce, memberships, scheduling, and more. Digital marketing tools are especially important right now, so providing social media strategy and templates, as well as newsletter design, is a major service. And print is not dead! Many of our clients still need items such as banners, fliers, and posters to promote themselves. 

How’d you meet your business partner?

I’m originally from Rotterdam in the Netherlands, and worked there as a freelance designer before moving to the U.S. After immigrating here, it was a lot of paperwork and uncertainty to get a Green Card, and during that time I legally couldn’t work. Finally in 2015 I received my Green Card and I started working for Kazoo Branding.

At that time, Kazoo Branding was owned by Tom Dupont. I knew he had plans to retire and together we made a plan for me to take over ownership of the business. The only problem was, I needed a business partner, I did not want to do this alone. I interviewed Ellen for an open design position and had a hunch she might be the person I had been looking for. Her background as a skateboarder meant that she had a fearless attitude in life and in design. She was also very organized, full of ideas, and community driven. Ellen started working for Kazoo in 2017. Then in 2019 Tom retired, and we became equal part owners of Kazoo Branding. 

How do you keep in touch with clients and foster brand loyalty?

As a routine, we send out a monthly newsletter to our clients and stay active on social media. We love to see what our clients are up to, and reach out directly when we think there’s something that we think we can help them with. We also try to pay attention to what’s happening in the industries of our clients, so that we can be ready to help them with promotions or communications that are relevant to their audience.

Ellen and I also like to send out something fun around the beginning of the new year to our clients. It’s an opportunity for us to play around with different creative ideas and produce something fun that will bring a smile to our clients’ faces. It’s a good way to start out the new year, we think! One year, we worked with a coffee roaster to pick out beans and created our own coffee brand. So it’s a way for us to connect with our clients through something that brings us genuine joy, and it also reflects the way that our creativity can be applied to marketing outreach efforts.

This year, we’re working with a local print shop to create a mini letterpress poster. It’s been a really hands-on process and we’ve learned a lot about letterpress printing in the process. We’d love to send these cards out to as many people as possible, so if you’re reading this and want to get a cool letterpress card in the mail, sign-up at https://kazoo-branding.mailchimpsites.com and we’ll send you one!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.kazoobranding.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kazoobranding/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kazoobranding/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/kazoo-branding/