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Design for Music 1
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Meet Earicon 5, the latest edition of a form-with-function invention. This earicon is a graphic way of saying "you can hear this artist on our Acoustic Guitar Highlights Volume 5 CD." Visual shorthand saves space, saves reader "copy fatigue," sells CDs.

A catalog is a catalog. Not. The Acoustic Music Resource catalog is the only "coffee table" catalog in its industry... and that's part of the strategy.

These catalogs are designed to be printed matter that people want to keep around, not just skim and trash. They deliver copious amounts of information — reviews, tidbits of "insider" info, juicy descriptions — that mean value to the reader. It's value that pays off in sales and loyalty... and it's not an accident. It's design that's designed to sell.

Shadowfoot Studio has been building catalogs, updates and advertising for AMR since the company started in 1994. The latest edition has grown to twenty-eight 8.5 x 11 pages, reflecting AMR's own growth.

 

What a joy to be able to use a guitar that graced the cover of a GRAMMY-winning CD as the front cover of a catalog (above left -- right is the back cover). But the GRAMMY logo and the look of the catalog are just hooks: the copy is where the real fishing takes place. A very nice fellow who just happens to own a major music library (a licensing business...not the sort of music library you and I own), made the unsolicited comment to my client that this was the best-written catalog he's ever encountered. Not being very comfortable receiving compliments, I admit that one made me blush. Nice heat, that.

A typical content-heavy page spread shows some key organizing elements in action. The artist or product category names are in black bars that bleed off the outside edges of the pages. This makes them easy to find when thumbing through. Same concept for "new" and "holiday" arrows. Pawprints are used to link artists in the catalog that appear on the new Pink Guitar CD, one of the catalog's hot new products. Usability generates sales.