Another year of Boostage

Boost just celebrated its 2nd birthday. Birthdays are a good time to reflect on where you’ve been and how far you’ve come. And for us, its been been a short but jam-packed roller-coaster ride right from the start.

Boost Begins

Steve Boris and I launched Boost in June of 2010 in our hometown of Boston, MA. But our first project, Carpe Diem Guesthouse and Namaste Spa, began 6 months prior to “Boostage” and proved to be a true test of our relationship: we needed to know if we could successfully “mesh” our skills on a complex, multi-level project, and work together side-by-side as two creatives (prima donnas) without coming to blows. The project involved just about every aspect of branding and design possible: two identities that had to work together yet remain distinctive, a 72-page website in 3 languages, print collateral from brochures to table tents, advertising, signage, and merchandising from turn-down treats to beach bags. As you’ve probably guessed since we are still here, the project was a major success and Carpe is still one of our best clients. We are grateful to them for giving us the “boost” we needed to start our business. But, 5 months after the launch, we put ourselves to the test again by up-ending our personal and business lives to move to the south-end of the east coast.

Boosting Boost

By the time we arrived in Sarasota, the economy had already crashed, our long-time clients began cutting back, and we quickly realized we were either going to sink in sarasota or go for a long hard swim in paradise. So, we dove-in and rebranded ourselves in only one month, joined almost every chamber of commerce and professional association in the area, began networking 5 days a week, placed a series of ads in Biz941, and offered our services to some of the most prominent non-profits in the community including Selby Gardens and South Florida Museum.
We must have done something right

Everyone told us to hang in there during our first year because it typically takes 18-24 months for a new business to get any traction in a new town. And here we are, just passing that milestone, and things are looking good. In fact, in the past 3 months we have been invited to submit a record number of RFP’s (two national), signed 5 new clients (Sarasota, Tampa and Boston), rebranded one of the most prominent and respected restaurants in the area, Michael’s on East, and launched the new brand, identity, and design of the Longboat Key Chamber and Visitor Website.