Following on from last years success, Stand were invited to develop NHS Health Scotland’s stand for the NHS Scotland 2009 conference that is currently taking place at the SECC (16th - 17th June).

There are seven Health Improvement Heat Targets in total, each representing the following health subjects: Oral Health, Child Healthy Weight, Alcohol, Suicide Prevention, Smoking Cessation, Breastfeeding & Heart Disease.

With a reduced budget, and a requirement for the heat targets to be portable and easily constructed, we created an idea that utilises a cost effective modular system, sits well within the target concept, which is nicely topped off by some shiny balloons!

Despite the hot weather I managed a respectable 4:52:00, with a 10k time of 1:00:03,
and a 1/2 marathon time of  2:12:00.

Thanks again to all those that sponsored me, and those that didn’t - well you still have plenty
of time to get on there and sponsor me, all proceeds go to Macmillan.

www.justgiving.com/mikegbrooke

 The Drum have now published this, this, this and this photo of us receiving our Scottish Design Awards on Friday evening.

Left to Right: Mike, Jane from IKEA, Tim, Maggie, Stuart, Nathan, Marie, Anna.

Good news folks.  Stand won 2 awards at the Scottish Design Awards on Friday evening:

Best Best Exhibition/Point of Sale for IKEA Catalogue Launch Roadshow

Promotional Literature for the Glasgow School of Art Undergraduate Prospectus 2009/10.

A good night was had by all at the awards.  Official pics to follow but in the mean time, here are some snaps:

Saw this t-shirt on my Threadless newsletter today.  It’s from their new range of Twitter tees.

Promise this one wasn’t me.  Honest, Stuart.

Over the past 5 months I have been training for the Edinburgh Marathon and have endured cold mornings, driving rain, gale force winds, angry dogs, dog sh*t, angry neds, and most recently I have been unwittingly eating flies, gnats and midges by the bucket load!

So after  already covering 376 miles I only have just 4 weeks to go until the big day, with just over 96 training miles left to do, and 26.2 miles on the day itself - lets just say I can’t wait till its over!

I am running the Edinburgh Marathon on Sunday 31st May in aid of Macmillan Cancer support, so far I have raised a respectable £480.00 but would love to hit the £1,000 mark, and with your help I reckon I can do it!

So please, please, please go to my sponsorship page and donate to this worthy cause. http://www.justgiving.com/mikegbrooke

I’ll let you know how I get on.

Spotify is a free web based music application that lets you play music for free (with a couple of small adverts) through your internet connection, its collection is huge even for those with the most obscure of tastes.

Enjoy finding new or old music without begging, stealing or borrowing.

Its got to be the best invention since sliced bread and lovefilm!

Enjoy…

Stand are delighted to have been nominated for three awards at the Scottish Design Awards 2009.
We have been nominated in the following catagories:

Promotional Literature
Client: Glasgow School of Art
Title: Prospectus 09/10

Exhibition/Point of Sale
Client: Ikea
Title: Catalogue Launch Roadshow

Client: NHS Health Scotland
Title: Heat Targets Exhibition Stand

The results of the nominations will will be announced at the gala awards ceremony being held on the 29th May at the Crowne Plaza in Glasgow. 

We’ll keep you posted on the results, fingers crossed.

Innocent (the smoothie folks) have announced that Coca Cola are taking a minority stake in their company.  For those of us who still like to think of Innocent as a quirky, local(ish) brand that’s just done well in the world, this is a reality check.  Like all companies who get to a certain size, Innocent have had to make a call about how they fund their expansion plans.  Coke have the cash and will be more than happy to get a foot in the door at a much edgier, worthier, ultimately BETTER (in all senses) company than their own.

Of course, like all of us who try to be the defiant David to the overbearing Goliath, Innocent really hope that they can positively influence their new investors, and I really hope they can too.  The sad reality is often that these faceless, soulless giants often end up chipping away at what was once so special in the other, ultimately weaker, company.  Been there, done that, saw the destruction.

However, I guess they have a MINORITY stake, between 10-20% apparently, so here’s hoping it won’t change our friends at Innocent too much. Watch this space.

With about two hours’ notice, no make-up or wardrobe available and very little retouching time at our disposal, the lovely Paul Hampton took this shot of us for The Drum’s piece on us winning Design Consultancy of the Year.  Our Stuart (Gilmour, not Gilmore as the video states) even has a go at being interviewed on camera by Stephen Lepitak.

Stand have just been announced as this year’s winners of Design Consultancy of the Year.  We’re rather chuffed.  Maggie’s even been celebrating from the ski slopes of Switzerland and has vowed never to go to the lunch again since both times she’s missed it Stand have been winners.

More news, gossip and maybe even photos to follow.  We’re still on a high. : )

Just posted something to a Facebook event and this is how it was displayed.  00:32 tomorrow - I have the power.

Saw this and rather liked the sentiment behind it.

According to the Artefacture mini-manifesto:

“The role of all design is to optimize human experience from a functional, emotional, aesthetic and enviromental point of view.

Close-mindedness and profit motives aside, given the opportunity, design can, should and will save the world.”

If you’re a believer then proclaim your faith with one of these or any of these.

It has been more than a decade since Tennent’s Wellpark Brewery has had a signage make over and we got the chance to do it! Along with the Tennent’s team we were briefed to contemporise the signage without losing the site’s strong heritage. At first it appeared fairly straight forward, but physical scale, coordinating the build, securing planning permission, proved to be a great challenge - after 3 months build we’re sure you’ll agree it looks pretty impressive!

And following on from this… we’re again working with the Tennent’s team to create a new meeting and reception area at the brewery - what a great job, we’re really looking forward to it!!

Following on from my Twitterific post I thought anyone who wasn’t quite sure about how to use Twitter would find this and this interesting.

If you work out how to get yourself on there then follow us on Twitter at this address: www.twitter.com/standunited

The wonder of Twitter is revealed in this interesting piece from the BBC technology blog.  It seems Twitter users are beating regular journos to getting news online, in the public domain as quickly as possible.  There are some pitfalls however so as with the wonderful world of Wikipedia don’t believe everything you read on Twitter.

We’re going to make the effort to update our twitter profile with any news or interesting goings on so watch this space!

One minute we’re babbling on about all the good that Google can could do with their power these days,  then a quick search of the BBC’s technology news today revealed that Google searching can actually be bad for you, or rather for the environment:

Bad Google

As we say in Glasgow,  ‘you just cannae win’.

Scary stuff.  It seems the bright young things at Google might be better at predicting how healthy (or not) we (or at least our pals in the US) may be at any point in time.  How?  Well read this and it all sounds very simple.

According to Google they can accurately predict how significant or not a breakout of flu will be by looking at the number of people searching flu-related terms via Google.com.  Then Google can accurately estimate current flu levels one to two weeks faster than any other professional report.

 I’d like to think that this was just a nice, helpful thing for Google to do for the greater good but no doubt it’s  the kind of time-critical information the Marketing people for Lemsip, Beechams and the like would be willing to pay top dollar for.

We’ve also just won a project to design a new visitor centre & associated marketing materials for Glendronach Distillery just outside Huntly in Aberdeenshire. The distillery has recently been bought over by Ben Riach who are looking to refresh the brand and distillery in 2009, something we’re really excited to be involved with.

“Stand put a lot of time and effort into their proposal and they had some valid and creative ideas. We’re really excited about the development of the Glendronach visitor centre and feel that Stand will help to create an inspiring and educational environment for our customers.”
Kerry White, Marketing Executive, Ben Riach Distillery Company Ltd

Our sixth pitch win of the month is for another Homecoming Scotland project entitled ‘Where Tomorrow Begins: Reflections of Scottish Innovation‘. We’ve been tasked with designing the brand identity, exhibition, marketing materials and website. 

The exhibition itself captures images of the innovation taking place in Scotland now which will change the world of tomorrow. In images by award-winning Sunday Herald photographer Kirsty Anderson and words from Scottish writers this exhibition will explore the breakthroughs taking place in Scottish universities.

It shall be first shown in the Scottish Parliament on the 1-12 June 2009. It’s hoped the exhibition will also be used internationally and in the first instance, around the cities of Scotland.