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[ Journal / Essays, playbooks, field notes ]

Things
we thought
out loud.

Working notes from the studio. Writing about brand, design and running a small creative business. We publish once a week, rarely longer than needed.

Featured · Essay · 6 min read

Why your brand guidelines keep getting ignored.

If your team needs a PDF to stay on-brand, the system is doing half the work. What a guideline that actually sticks looks like in 2026, and how to build one in under ten pages.

Apr 14, 2026·Monkey Business
GUIDE
BOOK
Guide · 7 min

How to write a design brief that gets results.

One hour with a good brief saves twenty hours of revisions. The 7 questions every brief must answer.

Apr 21, 2026Monkey Business
Playbook · 8 min

6 website mistakes quietly losing you customers.

Your site runs 24 hours a day. These six issues are quietly costing you visitors and revenue.

Apr 08, 2026Monkey Business
Playbook · 9 min

A D2C launch plan that does not burn the founder.

From kitchen-table idea to first 1,000 orders. The 90-day sequence we run with every consumer brand.

Mar 28, 2026Monkey Business
Playbook · 7 min

Content strategy for small brands: the one-page plan.

Start simpler than you think you need to. The framework that actually gets executed.

Mar 20, 2026Monkey Business
Field notes · 4 min

Small studios, sharp teeth.

Why a room of eight will out-ship a floor of eighty, and how we protect the quiet hours that make the good stuff happen.

Mar 06, 2026Monkey Business
Essay · 7 min

Craft is not decoration. It's the whole pitch.

A case for why the best-performing ad is almost always the best-looking one. With data you can actually check.

Feb 22, 2026Monkey Business
Playbook · 8 min

Running a naming sprint in two weeks.

The exact schedule, the legal checks, the shortlist ritual, and why founders should never be in the first naming meeting.

Feb 08, 2026Monkey Business
Studio life · 3 min

How we run a studio critique.

Twenty minutes, three rules, zero ego. The ritual that has kept our work honest for six years.

Jan 25, 2026Monkey Business
Essay · 5 min

In praise of the physical deliverable.

Why we still courier printed samples and what that does to a client presentation.

Jan 12, 2026Monkey Business
Playbook · 6 min

The one-page creative brief.

Our brief template. Copy it, use it, change the logo. Costs you nothing.

Dec 28, 2025Monkey Business
Field notes · 5 min

A year without pitch decks.

We killed the sales deck in 2024. Here's what replaced it, and what it did to our close rate.

Dec 14, 2025Monkey Business
Essay · 6 min

Loud brands aren't rude brands.

Unpacking the quiet-is-luxury bias that has made every wellness brand look the same.

Dec 01, 2025Monkey Business
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