Owning a machine that can cut vinyl and other materials has transformed the way that I think and work, because now everything is possible!
About a year ago I was contacted by a customer who had been referred to me by another balloon company. Their request was for something that was not available or achievable within the given time frame, and even then I am not sure that it would have been possible, so I had to choose, do I tell the customer that their request is not possible or do I tell the customer that although we cannot provide exactly what they were requesting we can certainly make something that I believe would work well!
The client had a deadline, it was less than a week away and therefore they were happy to listen to my ideas and suggestions.
I started out by creating an 'artists impression' of my idea. I like to do this as it means that I can quickly make a graphic of a design on my computer to show the customer what my idea's are without spending time making up a design that they could easily reject.
I don't use any fancy program to do this I simply use a basic draw facility in word or pages depending on whether you use a PC or a MAC, although I have recently purchased Deco Builder which is a very comprehensive design package specifically for the balloon industry, that allows me to create even more sophisticated designs to share with my clients, but I still use my basic version too especially when I am playing around with ideas and colours!