We were lucky to catch up with Jake Gonsalves recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Jake, thanks for joining us today. Often the greatest growth and the biggest wins come right after a defeat. Other times the failure serves as a lesson that’s helpful later in your journey. We’d appreciate if you could open up about a time you’ve failed.

One story of failure I have comes from a freelance project for a Japanese-style shave ice food truck. The design process was going smoothly despite the language barrier. Once the artwork got approved, I moved on to the production phase. As an additional service, I offer to oversee the production of goods with products like apparel, accessories, and printables. After a week or two, my printer calls me up letting me know that some elements of the design are too thin and would potentially muddy out. Now at this point, it had been a drawn-out process and I became impatient. With this client, there was some lag time with communication because it needed to go through a translator. If I couldn’t get an answer in time to my printer, we would get our project bumped back a week. Hoping the client wouldn’t notice, I decided to make an executive decision so we could continue production. The client noticed. They were quite unhappy with it. So to reconcile my wrongdoing, I waived the production charge and gave them an additional free design. In turn, I learned to keep constant communication with my clients regardless of the situation or deadline.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My name is Jake Lalapa Gonsalves and I am a freelance graphic designer. I was born and raised in Hawaii and I am currently located in the greater Denver area. I offer graphic design solutions for start-ups, small businesses, and bigger brands. Other services offered are logo design/logo clean-ups, branding, packaging, and production of select goods. I was exposed to graphic design when I was at Waimea High School which was how my career path began. After learning the basics, it’s been a steady flow of self-taught learning and mentorships to get to where I am today. I’ve been designing professionally since 2013.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

The most rewarding is being able to help other businesses with some of those graphic/visual problems that might have held them back. Giving them a more marketable look that can get them noticed by their target market.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

My Hawaiian heritage plays a big part. For example, my Dad taught us to take the time to kilo (observe) the environment before doing things like hunting, diving, and surfing, which played straight into seeing what the market is doing so you can create something that is more impactful. Another example was seeing him commit his time to honor our ancestors by being a member of the Royal Order of Kamehameha. Watching the protocols during ceremonies they host and setting the intention and place influenced my growing desire for intentional design. These things influence me to not create things we don’t need but to create designs that help move the Hawaiian culture forward.    

Contact Info:

• Website: www.gonsalvesgraphics.com
• Instagram: jgons2
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jake-gonsalves-88676b186/

Image Credits
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