SmartLab
SmartLab's passion is creating toys and games that give families opportunities to learn and play together. Their S.T.E.A.M products have earned more than 50 of the toy industry's most prestigious awards, including multiple Oppenheim Platinum awards, Good Housekeeping Best Toy awards, and Family Fun Magazine Toy of the Year awards.
As the Associate Art Director, I led the development and rebrand of becker&mayer’s educational S.T.E.A.M. based toy company, SmartLab. I built a team of talented designers and illustrators, to reenvision the brand from the from the ground up. I hosted focus groups, learned from our consumer, iterated on design directions, and presented findings to gain internal stakeholder approvals. By creating a clear system and delivery schedule, I empowered my team to design into an environment that respected the consumer’s needs while driving towards business objectives. SmartLab’s refreshed branding became modular, consistent in its visual identity, and strengthened with a scalable design language that could support a broader spectrum of products. The result was well received from both consumer and retailers and enabled us to regain accounts that had been lost such as Target and Barnes and Noble.
Notable Deliverables:
Company rebrand
Design research
Focus groups
Brand guidelines
Packaging design
Custom illustration
“Mike has the rare talent of being able to create visually stunning designs, but also create designs that the consumer can immediately understand and also prompt them to buy it! Everything Mike touched looked better, was received better, and ultimately sold better. On top of his accomplishments, Mike was a pleasure to work with: he has a great work ethic, an amazing sense of humor, and was beloved by his manager and his direct reports. He's one of kind!”