Don and Rob dive into the excitement of the Atlanta Cup, exploring the challenges and triumphs of bringing tennis back to Atlanta. From the creative process behind the event’s branding to the unique energy of a one-night-only tennis spectacle, they reveal how design and passion come together to create a memorable experience.
Episode Transcript:
Don (00:00)
We are here to talk about client presentations, I guess, right? Because on our last episode, we were talking about, hey, we got a crazy opportunity. ⁓
Rob (00:00)
No.
Yeah.
Don (00:07)
And Rob, I don’t even remember if we told everybody what the opportunity was. Did we even say that at the end or?
Rob (00:13)
I think
no, think we just teased it as a sporting event potentially. Yeah,
Don (00:16)
We teased it as a sporting event.
Alright, we’re back Rob episode 144 again.
Rob (00:45)
We’ve made a terrible mistake and we must, this is our apology to all of our fans out there. we, ⁓ we, we misidentified the last podcast ⁓ and called it 144 and it was in fact 143.
Don (00:57)
Yeah.
Was it it Roger Clemens when he was testifying for the steroids where he dropped the misremembered? Is it? No, no, no, no, no. You misremembered. Is that is that what it was? Or I don’t even remember. I think it was. But. OK, OK. Remember when that was a big deal? People taking steroids and baseball and it was like, my God, the world’s going to end, you know, like the records, the sanctity of baseball, you know, all that stuff. So I mean.
Rob (01:06)
I misremembered. I don’t know. remember. I’m misremembering that, so I don’t know.
Yeah, yeah,
well, yeah, is Pete Rose gonna get in? they gonna let him in?
Don (01:31)
I think eventually they’ll let him in, right? I mean, he’s passed away. It’s been a while since he passed away now. So like, I mean, at some point they gotta, I don’t know, but I mean, those baseball writers, man, they’re tough. They’re a tough nut to crack. you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Well, the constant lying, one could argue. ⁓ anyway, we’re not here to talk about lying. We are here to talk about client presentations, I guess, right? Because on our last episode, we were talking about, hey, we got a crazy opportunity. ⁓
Rob (01:33)
You have to.
Well, was, I mean, it was the lying about it. It was just the lying, you know?
No.
Yeah.
Don (02:01)
And Rob, I don’t even remember if we told everybody what the opportunity was. Did we even say that at the end or?
Rob (02:06)
I think
no, think we just teased it as a sporting event potentially. Yeah, yeah.
Don (02:10)
We teased it as a sporting event. ⁓ So
⁓ if it’s cool with you, I think here’s what we’ll do. I’ll just kind of crack open the presentation and then we just kind of run through the super cache, you know what I mean? And chat about kind of what the thing is and sort of go from there. And the title of the presentation, let’s see if I can share my screen here, is on there. So that will ⁓ give away.
Rob (02:27)
Dun dun dun.
Yeah.
Don (02:33)
to go share a screen.
Rob (02:33)
Well, should we talk a little
bit about what it is? I mean, we should. Yes is the answer to that question.
Don (02:37)
Well, yeah,
yes, is the answer to that question. What I was going to say, it’ll give away what the client is. So, ta-da. Yeah.
Rob (02:43)
Yeah. The Atlanta Cup.
Hey, Don, what is the Atlanta Cup?
Don (02:50)
Well, the Atlanta Cup is a new and exciting ⁓ one night only tennis event ⁓ here in the city of Atlanta. Very exciting. So ⁓ Atlanta has had the Atlanta open or I believe for a number of years. ⁓ And all sorts of stars come through. Most recently, I believe it’s been over at Atlantic Station, right? A lot of you know, it’s an official sanctioned sort of tournament, if you will, right? A lot of big stars come through Atlanta. It’s always in the summer. ⁓ I believe. Yes.
Rob (02:57)
Ooh, tell me more.
It’s in the heat of the summer. Like in the
heat of the summer.
Don (03:20)
Yes, the heat of the summer outdoors. ⁓ Good time had by all. I would say that’s definitely one of the challenging events or components to the event, right? Well, we lost our tennis tournament is what happened. Last Atlanta Open was the last Atlanta Open, but exciting news. ⁓ We have a tennis tournament again. Woohoo, it’s back. ⁓ So we have a great brand new client who wants to bring tennis back to Atlanta, right? And has decided to start a new. ⁓
I don’t want to call it a tournament, right? Because the Atlanta Open was a tournament. I mean, it was multiple days, you know, all day, all night, all the good stuff, right? But we’re going to do a one day ⁓ tennis event. Maybe I should call it an event called the Atlanta Cup, right? And so we need to kind of do everything for it. Start basically from scratch, right? Do the entire thing. ⁓ Soup to nuts on this guy, right? So and it’s just going to be a one day, a one day sort of event, six hours at gas south arena this December.
⁓ which is ⁓ kind of the most exciting part of the entire thing is how quick and how rapid this baby is coming, you know, so.
Rob (04:24)
Yeah.
Yeah, it’s kind of in between that. feel like it’s in between that. I mean, while it is a tournament, I guess by definition, it’s kind of an exhibition. It’s one of those exhibition slash tournament. We’ll call it a casual tournament. ⁓
Don (04:36)
Yeah, yeah,
yeah, there will be a trophy. are, I mean, there are stars that are playing. ⁓ So exciting times, right? ⁓ So we thought, hey, we literally gave this presentation to our client yesterday. ⁓ And today we are recording the podcast. All right, so let’s just run through this super cache and, ⁓ you know, interrupt me and all the good stuff. I always like to start off presentation when it makes sense, right? To talk about, hey, who are the big players in there? What’s the sea? What’s the landscape that we’re looking at? Right? We’ve got the big four here, obviously. ⁓
You know, is there anything we can take a look at there that they’re doing that’s interesting or just kind of, you know how unique and or maybe not unique, right? So Wimbledon and Roland Garros, you know, you’ve got kind of established marks and crests and sort of, you know, ⁓ legacy, right? Australian open there all the way on the right. Super modern, super cool, right? Which is pretty neat. ⁓ And then, you know, when we did our launch meeting, I just sort of took some notes on.
Rob (05:26)
Yeah, yeah.
Don (05:32)
You know, some of the key phrases that, that our client brought up, you know, we want to create some IP. We’re bringing tennis back, you know, it’s just one night. So it’s a high energy one night out, you know? ⁓ and is there any tennis terminology in there, right? For, ⁓ sort of the game set match that type of approach, right? ⁓ and then, you know, I did bring back the previous Mark. We did not do this Mark, but the previous Mark there on the left, ⁓ in regards to what, the general public is used to sort of seeing what the brand.
the previous brand of the Atlanta Open look like. But again, we’re not the Atlanta Open, we’re the Atlanta Cup now.
Rob (06:03)
Yeah, interesting to note that, know, and maybe I’m foreshadowing a little bit, but you know, those two marks up at the top, Australian open and rolling, like they don’t really not to tennis a whole lot, right? I mean, not obviously if there is, it’s very, very subtle, unlike the U.S. Open and obviously Wimbledon with the rackets and everything else. And I think also important to note that, and you mentioned this last time that.
Don (06:21)
Yeah, yeah.
Rob (06:27)
Typically when we do presentations, we go black and white first and we do a little bit more sort of exploratory work. This one, because it’s so time sensitive, was, hey, here’s kind of a foundation, if you will, a mark and a foundation and everything.
Don (06:40)
Yeah.
Yeah, we’re putting everything together, right? And coming up with basic thematics, if you will, of kind of everything together. So just to make the presentation fun and interesting and sort of categorize the different directions, we’ve got four directions to look at. We like to give them names, right? To sort of help instead of option one, option two, option three, you know? So first option here, athletic attitude. ⁓ I think it helps.
clients kind of latch on to what the general vibe is, I guess, right? Would you agree by kind of naming our directions? You know, I think it’s cool. Yeah. So option one, athletic attitude, and then jumping right into kind of what we’ll call kind of a key visual, right? Just for lack of a better term, right? ⁓ Just sort of get the vibe, the general direction of the idea across, right? Before we sort of, so it’s kind of just.
Rob (07:09)
Yeah, I think so.
Don (07:29)
I don’t know, is this a poster? Is this a website? Is this a header? It’s just a general visual that encapsulates sort of the idea of the thematic. So here we’re super expressive type, call this your Nike ad, your Puma ad, your Adidas ad, a little bit of throwback, a little 90s, early 2000s with some super bright colors, super extended letter forms, and then have the players. We’ve got Naomi Osaka and Ben Shelton, Sabalinka and Curios here.
kind of interacting with the type. We’ve got some interesting textures there with maybe some wheat paste sort of texture on top of that. And then a super interesting sort of modern ⁓ wacky kind of logo kind of hiding up there in the top left, right? ⁓ So from there, kind of jump into a little bit of the specifics. Hey, let’s take a look at the logo, you know? And this is the first time the clients are seeing this. So we’re very cognizant that we’re hitting them with a lot of information, right? ⁓
but showing, here’s some color palettes, here’s some textures, here’s what the logo mark might look like. It’s an interesting cup. ⁓ Rob, as you mentioned, we’ve got tennis ball, tennis ball, and tennis rackets kind of in those earlier logos, right? We thought a lot of tennis stuff really leans into the ball. So we thought, hey, what if we take some inspiration from the racket instead, right? And that logo kind of the general shape of the racket, but also, as you mentioned, while we were developing, it’s kind of got a net vibe to it too, right?
Rob (08:50)
Yeah, yeah,
it’s giving me it’s giving net. I think they say and then also we went back and forth to ⁓ with this one specifically a little bit with the green and how do we do the green and what is the color and do how close do we want to get to you know traditional tennis green versus not. We kind of wanted to go away from that and do something nice and bright. I mean this one’s to me has got a lot of just energy to it, especially in the key visual. ⁓ It is electric. ⁓ It’s got a little bit of 80s to it too, which I which I think.
Don (08:53)
It’s giving net.
Yeah, it’s electric. Yeah, it’s cool. It’s cool. Yeah, it does.
It does. It’s got a hyper color vibe to it. ⁓ But you know, we’re talking excitement. We want to bring people in. Everybody thought tennis is gone. It’s just a one night event, know, really focusing on the stars. Here are some individual ⁓ kind of star power, you know, expressive typography paired with some some, ⁓ some photography, which I think is interesting, you know, and you know, we built a logo that
could work tournament after tournament, right? By changing ⁓ the date, right? That type of thing. yeah, so that’s option one, ⁓ option one, kind of interesting, right? Anything to sort of finalize on that one or no? Go to the next one. All right. ⁓ Personally, I love mid-century modern design. It’s one of my most favorite design eras. So I’m gonna sneak that in wherever I can. So it’s not mid-century modern. It’s modern mid-century, right? ⁓
Rob (09:52)
No, I think we’re good.
Don (10:07)
And wanted to do one that was a little bit ⁓ not obvious, right? But hey, as much as we talked about, let’s not use the ball in the previous one. Hey, let’s develop a pattern. Let’s develop a system that kind of works with a deconstructed tennis ball to a certain extent. Bring in some sort classical typography. And then, you know, can we use the court as kind of the lines painted on the court as kind of some graphic elements to house some typography, right? So develop this interesting, very simple.
by design, key visual. You can overlay that with the players. The players can interact either in front of or behind the baselines or within the tennis balls themselves, things like that. ⁓ And then from there did this really interesting kind of retro modern, I don’t even know if I can say that, but retro modern kind of logo where it’s an abstract version of a letter A, but it’s also the ball and the line ⁓ of playing tennis. ⁓
Rob (11:00)
My ball is in.
My ball is in.
Don (11:02)
The ball is in the ball is in. Yeah, I. It’s weird to me that they just use computers for all that now. I don’t know how much Tennessee watch, but it’s all just instantly done by all the cameras and everything in terms of what’s out, what’s in all that good stuff. So ⁓ that’s a weird side note, but you know, very sort of, you know, again, I’m going to say bright and modern color scheme, but kind of with this mid century throwback in terms of typography and layout structure, right? So how does that pair with some player posters and things like that? We’ve got.
Rob (11:15)
Yeah.
Don (11:31)
Nick Curios and Naomi here, know, ⁓ interacting with the court, interacting with the logos, you know, so it’s kind of, you know, it’s kind of sporadic. It’s kind of all over the place, which is kind of interesting. ⁓ It did have a very US open color scheme. This one does. ⁓ So we did. And again, we’re hitting clients with tons of information all at once. Right. So we did do an alternate color scheme, like a mint green, just for fun, just to sort of showcase. Hey, you know,
Even though the cake looks fully baked, it’s not fully baked yet. We may love the logo, but not love the color. Or we may love the color, but not love the logo. So it’s, again, with this particular presentation, we’re showing kind of the kitchen sink here. So it’s trying to get them to lean in and bite on certain things. yeah, it’s kind of a, it’s cool. I really love this mark. It’s an interesting direction. So what are your thoughts?
Rob (12:25)
I like this one. mean, for me, the sort of deconstructed tennis ball, as you call it, works really well as just a nice pattern for this one. think, you know, it goes without saying, but go to the original page, the first page of this presentation. Yeah. So that, and again, I’m going to state the obvious, you know, it, by design doesn’t have quite as much energy in it, right? It’s just sort of displayed. And that’s why all of sudden you throw the players on it and boom, it changes the whole vibe of it. For me anyway.
Don (12:32)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, totally, totally.
Rob (12:55)
Again, by design and obviously with something like this, you’re gonna lead with the, are the stars, right? ⁓ So it changes the energy of it in a good way. So I think this is a cool one. I do like this one as well. like the mark as well. ⁓ Yeah, on this one.
Don (13:07)
Yeah, Marcus Fong. Fong.
So from there, what we did was we talked about, know, hey, we are talking about Atlanta. You know, is there something specific to Atlanta, right? That no other tennis tournament could claim, right? ⁓ And kind of the colloquialism of the A, right? So we developed this this third thematic, right? That kind of leaned into, ⁓ hey, what if we use the letter A? Let’s use the letter A as kind of a holding shape.
a graphical element, kind of a pattern or a quilt, whatever you want to call it. And can that be of interest, right? To sort of interact the players and give sort of a foundation graphically for the event, right? The other thing we talked about was, you know, bringing the peach back. mean, love it, hate it. You know, we’ve got the peach. I mean, we’ve got peach colors. We’re the peach state. It’s on our license plates. I mean, we’ve got peaches, you know? It is unique to Atlanta. It’s kind of our vibe, right?
So do we bring in that peach color and then what do we pair that with? In this instance, we’ve got a couple two different shades of blue that I think really counterbalance and really work with the peaches nicely, right? And then from there sort of lean into, hey, how do the players interact there? You know, like how does the type work? You know, what does the logo mark look like? In this design instance, we wanted to develop a logo system that kind of was like a seal almost, right? That kind of overlapped everything, right? And modular in its color approach that can kind of bounce around different colors, right?
⁓ So with the seal, can really put, could put in a tagline, you know, one night only if we wanted to, again, we’re just kind of pie in the sky right now. We could put in the date, you know, right? So, you know, the logo always travels with the date. ⁓ We’ve got, you know, a literal cup in this instance. We’ve got a cup, a tennis ball and a peach that kind of comprise the mark of the logo, which is kind of interesting. Here’s that page and sort of what that color scheme might look like, which is kind of interesting ⁓ using sort of a seal on the left-hand side. And then if you don’t need a seal,
you know, that top right component of the screen, you know, just sort of more of a traditional ⁓ centered design for a logo mark, which is kind of cool, right? And then, you know, you can do the grid however you want. You could do just the single letter A, right? Just the one grid over on the left with Sabalenka. We’ve got the grid of nine. You could do a grid of four over on the right-hand side, mix and match all the different colors. ⁓ Maybe these are Instagram ads. Maybe these are, ⁓ you know, website graphics. I mean, whatever the sort of…
visual is, think you can kind of understand sort of the thematic pattern of this approach, right?
Rob (15:33)
Yeah, I like the sort of abstract A as a holding shape. I think it’s cool. I actually, for me, I like it when it’s just a single A with the player. Yeah, because to me, really kind of brings a lot of energy to it and a lot of motion and just sort of energy. And so to me, that becomes really nice. And again, we talk about own ability, if you want to call it that. And to me, that really hits home with Atlanta and everything that’s going on. But I love this color scheme. And I think…
Don (15:47)
I agree.
Yeah, I agree.
Rob (16:02)
Yeah, well, while bringing back the peach color seems like a pretty obvious one, sometimes obvious is a good thing. And there’s a reason that it’s the obvious thing, because it might be the right thing to do. But I like how this isn’t, you know, straight peach color, right? It’s a little bit muted, right, from peach, but it’s a nice nod to it. And I think it works really well with the blue. Yeah.
Don (16:12)
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I think this is a fun direction. I mean, if
you want to lean into Atlanta, let’s lean into Atlanta.
Rob (16:28)
And it feels different.
Like it just feels, it feels unique. This color palette, which I really like.
Don (16:31)
Yeah.
Yeah, it’s fun. ⁓ And then we have one final one. Speaking of peaches, we had a late minute addition to the presentation. Sometimes inspiration strikes, right? ⁓ And Deadline’s Compel Focus, we worked to the deadline, right? So we’ve got option four, the fiery peach, as we like to call this one, right? ⁓ So thought, you know, let’s lean into the peach. Hey man, if we’re going to do peaches, let’s lean into the peach, right? And what if we actually eliminate the blue?
Rob (16:37)
Fiery.
furry peach.
Don (16:58)
and just lean into a very limited color palette of black, white, and peach, right? Maybe a few tones of peach, right? And bring some of that, ⁓ you know, not necessarily graffiti, but expressive, you know, aggressive sort of sports-inspired typography back and pair that with a super-duper modern mark ⁓ for the Atlanta Cup, right? Where we’ve got a little bit of almost like a crest, like an emblem, excuse me. I mean, it’ll look really, really good on a hat and on your…
Polo and vest and whatever the case may be right, but you know, we’ve got it’s it’s inspired by a tennis racket with the letters T AC a little see inside the racket So if you see it great if you don’t see it, that’s okay, too. I think right But it’s super modern super different sort of different approach but brought back that same methodology from the first idea of Date stamping the logo, which I think is cool, right?
So we have kind of ⁓ the idea without it, a nice clean little shield or emblem, but then you can also date stamp the tournament 2025 in there, which I think is pretty cool, right? ⁓ And then just bring in some fun typography, some fun half tone imagery, almost kind of like a Xerox copied kind of approach to it, which I think is pretty cool. Here’s an example of a couple other sort of interesting pieces of creative, maybe on the right, it’s a little… ⁓
more in in audience, you know, or on the website type graphic, right, because we’re not really talking about tennis. ⁓ Over on the left, it’s a little bit clearer, right by tickets to the Atlanta Cup, you know, roar for me Atlanta with Ben Shelton, which is kind of cool. So so totally different vibe, totally different approach, you know, limited color palette leaning into the peach. But you know, it’s not just a passive peach. It’s a fiery peach, Rob fiery. Yeah.
Rob (18:38)
⁓ I repeat. All right. Yeah, I
really like this direction. It’s funny when I was first looking at it, ⁓ I saw the tennis racket, but I also saw the an upside down cup upside down sort of trophy shape, which I thought was interesting and not necessarily done by design, but to me kind of became this happy, cool kind of accident, I thought. ⁓ But I really like this mark. I like the symmetry. I like how it’s balanced. I think it’s yeah, you’re exactly right. This one, I think out of all of them,
Don (18:49)
⁓
Yeah, yeah.
Rob (19:08)
looks best on a polo or on a hat, right? ⁓ But I think what’s cool about this too is to me, you juxtapose that sort of refined mark with that type, to me it says, hey, this is gonna be an exciting, like not super formal event. Like it’s a fun, unique energy, you know? But it says, yeah, I mean, this is not a Wimbledon, this is not a, to me it says, hey, this is gonna be exciting. ⁓
Don (19:10)
Yeah.
Yeah, energy.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Rob (19:37)
and not so formal. I think this is cool. I think it’s really smart going in, you know, limiting the color palette for this direction. I think it works really well. ⁓ So I really like.
Don (19:47)
Yeah,
I got a light peach, a regular peach and kind of the fiery peach in terms of color palette and sort of bring it in the half tone, which is cool. So and then one of the things we like to do when we present to clients is, you know, not necessarily fall off a cliff on the presentation, ⁓ but do a little bit of a recap page kind of at the end, right? And it’s interesting to look in this instance, we’re just looking at the marks. Now, Rob, we were talking about how, you know, most of our initial logo presentations would look more like this more like page 22 here at the end, right?
Rob (20:14)
Right.
Right.
Don (20:16)
We wouldn’t
have all the rest of the brand thematics and everything in there. it. No, go for it.
Rob (20:20)
Well, you’d also have not to interrupt, sorry, but you’d also have
you’d also have iterations of each of these. So we usually do like let’s pick on on upper left. You’d have that, but then we might have it done slightly differently over here. So we do variations of the first round, but again, time constraints sort of forces into this one.
Don (20:25)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, exactly. ⁓ You know, sometimes you just got to talk through some of the modularity of it, you know, like, especially with this last one, the fiery peach, you know, it’s it can work with the type and the shield. But sometimes you might use just a shield. Sometimes you might use just the type, you know, that type of thing, right? ⁓ It is the one that kind of interestingly enough to me reads a little bit of the least amount of tennis. So I think it might rely on, you know, headlines around it and photos of the players and things like that. But that’s OK. You got to start somewhere, you know.
every year. So it’s kind of an interesting sort of pause recap. Let’s just talk about the marks, you know, and then, you know, clients are crazy, right? Sometimes it’s like, Hey, I like this mark. I like that brand idea. I like this color. I like that. You know what I mean? Like, do we start to sort of pick and choose our likes from different things and things like that, right? So it’s nice to sort of look at this in a one color environment, just clean. It’s like, Hey, we need to pick kind of ⁓ a general vibe, a tonality for, you know, the mark itself, right?
potentially independent of what’s happening here, which is like, know, know, brand thematics, things like that. So.
Rob (21:40)
But we also tell
clients to, ⁓ hey, first reactions, give us your first reactions. We love initial reactions. We love to hear that because I think it’s very informative, right? What do you naturally just, boom, gravitate towards? But then we tell them, okay, great. Take it, go live with it for a little bit, right? Put it under your, don’t show it to too many people. Don’t show it to too many people. But go live with it for a little bit. Put it under your pillow, put it on your fridge, we say, and then come back to it see if you still feel the same way or see if you still feel a little bit different ⁓ is a good way to kind of.
Don (21:49)
Yeah, totally.
Yeah.
Yeah,
Rob (22:10)
kind of think about it.
Don (22:11)
it’s important. So the two of us already know which direction we’re going in. Right. The question is, Rob, do we tell people on this podcast right now what we’re doing or do we tell them next time? Next time? thought. ⁓ Yeah, this would you know what? This would be a fun one for audience participation in regards to hey.
Rob (22:16)
Yeah.
until next time. Because we need everybody to live with it for a little bit and think about it. I don’t want to give it away right away. I think we wait till next time.
Don (22:34)
Which one would you pick? You know, if you were starting a tennis tournament in Atlanta, right? I keep saying tournament, I should say event. ⁓ You know, which one would you like? Or how would you potentially what mark do you like the most? You know what I mean? Or things like that. So
Rob (22:50)
Or if you happen to
be, I’ll take it one step further and say if you happen to be a designer out there, submit one. Let’s see what you got. I would love to see some submissions. yeah, I think we’ll wait till next time and we’ll let the people know.
Don (22:55)
Sure.
Yeah, yeah. Okay.
Yeah, all right. We’re into well, hey, this is real time. I mean, we legitimately gave this presentation yesterday. ⁓ And we’re rocking on it. So I mean, we were under the gun here, timeline wise, right to ⁓ create the next presentation for the next podcast, I guess, right? Yeah.
Rob (23:19)
That’s right. Which
will be podcast number.
Don (23:23)
Yeah. So what are we gonna do? Are we gonna have 2144? Is that what’s happening? Or no, no, we never had a one. This is 144. Who cares? Yeah, we draw we draw pictures for living. We don’t do podcasts, math numbers, you know, so
Rob (23:23)
That’s right. That’s right. All right. Thanks everyone for tuning in.
This is 144. There’s one that.
Alright
everybody, thanks for tuning in. appreciate it. As always, you can find us on all the socials and online at mocktheagency.com and we look forward to sharing the ⁓ sharing the outcome with you next time.
Don (23:45)
Totally.
Yeah.
All right. We’ll see you next time, everybody.
Rob (23:52)
Bye.
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