The half coffee cup of the “Caffeinated Creative Studios” (CCS) logo has popped up on most of the campus’s bulletin boards and cafeteria table inserts this semester.
The six students who form the CCS team have designed posters, logos, e-mail ads, and banners. They’re regularly asked, “Do you get paid for this?” Nope. “Do you receive course credit?” We may in the future, but not this semester. “So you’re just super nice?”
They really are nice, but that’s not their sole motivation for working on designs and ads.
Yinka Araromi and Josh Duttweiler, members of the CCS team, lounged on the grey couches in the Chamberlain Center Atrium. They’d both come from working in the Mac lab.
Duttweiler shared, “We started Caffeinated because we wanted to get some real world experience with design. We knew that clubs and organizations on campus were looking for advertisements, and we knew we wanted to get involved.”
The CCS team consists of Yinka Araromi, Josh Duttweiler, Nicole Mason, Amy Coon, Alex Hood, and Morgan Loghry. They are each communication and art majors who are interested in graphic design and hope to potentially work in professional design in the future.
Araromi said, “I hope this is kind of good practice for me to understand how this kind of business works.” He looked at Duttweiler, laughed, and said, “I pretty much talk about it every day. I don’t know about Josh, but I talk about it every day. It seems to come up at least once a day.”
Duttweiler said this service is available to Houghton College student organizations, academic departments, and residence life staff. People can find them on Facebook and start their design requests by clicking on the link: http://bit.ly/13SsXxE.
Araromi said, “I usually check when the jobs come in every day. I see who of us is maybe the least busy and then I ask them first. Then if they can’t do it, I’ll send it to the next person. We then send the designs to each other to kind of like critique. We don’t send anything out until most of us are okay with it.”
Duttweiler described this collaborative process, saying, “The clients have something they envision. And then it’s what they envision and what you envision and the design, and what’s the best way to communicate. So there’s a lot of back and forth, making sure everyone is happy.”
Once a month the CCS team meets to plan and dream. Duttweiler grinned and said, “There’s coffee!” “Josh brings the Keurig,” said Araromi, “I bring the snacks. Always chips and dip and chocolate.” “We sit around in the presentation room close to the computers,” said Duttweiler. “And I feel like half of it is kind of socializing, and half it is kind of business,” said Araromi.
Duttweiler also shared the story of CCS’s name. He said, “We spent months putting together lists of names. Kind of like the idea of caffeine, you know energy and excitement, and it’s kind of a cool thing, coffee, especially at college. And then creative studios – it all fit.” Araromi added, “‘Caffeinated’ just felt appropriate for students.” He grinned. “We do consume a lot of caffeinated beverages.”
This semester, CCS has been overwhelmed by the positive response they’ve received. Duttweiler said, “We got a lot more interest than we expected originally. We’re glad that people can trust us and want us.” Araromi and Duttweiler shared that this support gives them confidence that CCS can continue into the future. Araromi said, “It’s meeting a kind of need at the college.”
“Caffeinated was created to inspire, train, inform and empower students,” said Araromi. “It’s exciting.”