COLLABORATION

Our creative process is inclusive and collaborative.

We believe a company’s brand is as important as their product or service itself. And to truly understand what’s compelling and different about them, we have to work as intimately as possible with them throughout the entire creative process.

We don’t believe in the big ‘Don Draper Reveal.’ Our client partners should be delighted and blown away by what we show, yes, but they should also completely understand how we got there and why what we’re showing is the most appropriate solution for them. Our process is a series of stepping stones, not leaps of faith. Collaboration is, and always will be king.

CRAFT

We’re only as good as our last project.

We do the best work we can possibly do on every project, no matter the client, industry, or budget. Without world class design, none of what we do would matter. To support this standard of excellence, we use as much time as necessary for collaborative concept development. This is further refined through foundational brand strategy and a rigorous bloodbath internal critiquing process, creating a much more pleasant experience for us and our clients.

CONTEXT

We see every project with new eyes.

Every client has different needs, hopes and dreams. There’s no one size fits all solution, and it’s our job to frame their unique opportunities and figure out how to make the most appropriate, beautiful, compelling work to achieve them. If we do our job right, their company will grow and their message will spread like wildfire.

If we really do our job right, our clients can create more jobs, pay for their kids’ college, donate to charity, buy nice toys for their dogs, care for elderly parents, shape their local community and create a better life for their family—we’re not just designing beer cans and websites, this stuff matters.

We’re purposely small.

We graduated from college on May 10, 2009 and founded CODO the following Monday. Through hard work, brave clients, and lots and lots of trial and error, we’ve grown to a 7-person team. We work with a select number of clients every year and have never taken on ‘filler’ work to keep the lights on.

We design for client success, not trophies.

We believe that awards are mostly an exercise in vanity, and that our work should be judged on quantifiable metrics, happy clients, and gobs of earned media. This is much more fulfilling than receiving a trophy from some asshole creative director who hasn’t actually designed anything in 15 years. There are no rockstars here—just a driven, hardworking team.

When a brewery buys two more fermenters, when a restaurateur receives a James Beard Award nomination, when a client comes back to us a year later to discuss an entirely different opportunity than what we first tackled—these are the metrics that matter.

We’re flat—we have no tiered titles and zero bureaucracy.

When you work here, whether as an intern, or a grizzled vet, you’ll be working on every project that comes through the door. We have an open office where everyone is free to speak their mind at any time, and we foster a culture that promotes craft, collaboration and candor.

We value our team’s work / life balance.

Outside of CODO, we’re gardeners, cyclists, wood workers, obscure B-movie VHS collectors, photographers, anglers, writers, readers, barbecue fiends, audiophiles, world travelers, vintage wrestling fans, home brewers, Indianapolis-promoters, dog people, cat people, family people. By having flexible hours and a relaxed work environment, our team is able to concentrate on the work at hand and then go home to do whatever it is that makes them tick afterward.