With the opening of the baseball season, and E3 presentations, I have been putting a lot of thought into pitches. As designers we are visual storytellers, so I ask you, how often do you sit down and have a pitch meeting?

That’s right, a meeting to actually discuss the story of the pitch. Not the concept of the experience, but a meeting solely focused on the story of the pitch.  The beginning, middle, end and media format. 

As inspiration here are a couple of samples. The first one is Jim Henson’s pitch for the Muppet Show.

This one from Saul Bass for the redesign of the Bell Telephone brand is a little long, but it takes a point of view (OK and serious attitude) and sticks with it.

And with that, my point is this; do you tiptoe around in your presentations? Do you say what you mean and what you think is best for your clients? And at the same time tell them what is wrong with what they are doing?  Part of the story has to describe where you started or what is wrong so that you can show how what you are proposing is better.

Another great example (and in this case the sale is being made to the consumer) is the new Starbucks logo.

“From the start, we wanted to recognize and honor the important equities of the iconic Starbucks logo. So we broke down the four main parts of the mark — color, shape, typeface and the Siren. After hundreds of explorations, we found the answer in simplicity. Removing the words from the mark, bringing in the green, and taking the Siren out of her ring. For forty years she’s represented coffee, and now she is the star.

The details came next. The 20-year old logo was built in the early days of AutoTrace and it showed — points everywhere. We improved composition, brought in more sophisticated stroke width and spacing and a smoother line flow. When it came to her — the Siren — we enhanced her form in subtle ways, smoothing her hair, refining her facial features, weighting the scales on her tail to bring the focus to her face. We enlisted the branding firm of Lippincott to help with these refinements, and give us a better global perspective on the entire identity system”.
Mike P., senior creative manager

Starbucks example from Under Consideration’s Brand New Blog a wonderful source for seeing the reasoning behind the logos; original link here.