StyleWorks Creative’s Tom Froberg and Alaina Caldwell on research, style guides – and greater recognition for designers

Guys, it’s great to catch up. Let’s start at the beginning – how did you find yourself working with brands?
Tom Froberg, Co-Founder & Managing Director, StyleWorks: I co-founded a creative agency early on called Frederick & Froberg Design Office. After an initial focus on home décor clients, we started working with Adidas and got involved with sports branding, which led us to licensing. We created a full team style guide for Major League Baseball and produced the first digital and online versions, along with the first-ever jewel event guides. We continued to work on team and event branding for all the sports leagues. And I knew Alaina for many years through family friends…

Alaina Caldwell, Co-Founder & Creative Director, StyleWorks: Yes, I was actually in college at the time – a painting major. But I knew I didn’t want to be a starving artist! I was interested in design, but I wasn’t totally sure of what I wanted to do. I knew Tom and said: ‘I will do anything to work with you and find out more about this industry – I’ll sweep your floors! I’ll organise your library!’ And that’s actually what I did. In the beginning, I organised the library at Frederick & Froberg, and then there was quite a bit of production work that needed to be done for the Major League Baseball projects.

After working hands on with designers and learning everything firsthand on the job, I basically fell in love with licensing. Our agency at the time had two sides, entertainment and sports. Tom and I were focused on the entertainment clients, and Tom’s former partner Bill was focused more on sports branding.

Tom: Right around the time Alaina came in, we started working with Penguin Random House, creating style guides for kids’ publishing in both the US and the UK. That led to other projects in entertainment and the opportunity to create the first licensing style guides for Hot Wheels and other franchises like Universal’s Curious George. We also, in the early 2000s, introduced the use of global fashion and graphic trend and colour resources for many of our projects. Eventually, we decided to focus on the entertainment and lifestyle side of things and that led us to launch StyleWorks.

StyleWorks has worked with a whole host of different brands, from Crayola to Toyota. Was it always part of the plan to have a diverse client list?
Alaina: Some creative agencies do get put into a bucket where people feel they only do a certain type of work, which is hard to overcome. For years, we didn’t have a lot of food and beverage clients, so people assumed we didn’t do that type of work. But now we’ve got lots of food and beverage work under our belts and people come to us specifically for it! We’re just proud to have so many repeat clients from Crayola to The World of Eric Carle. Brands trust us tell their story and that’s amazing.

Let’s dive into the work! How do you approach crafting effective style guides? And have the needs of guides changed over the years?
Alaina: There’s been some evolution. Some brands need a traditional toolbox of core elements, and others are more focused on seasonal or themed collections. It really depends on the client. Every style guide is different. Our job is to design for designers. We need to give them the tools to create stuff and be inspired. We also try to overlap with what the brand is doing with their marketing guidelines to ensure that everything works together.

Tom: What changed a bit was that it used to be a case of: ‘Here’s a whole bunch of assets’ and off it went into the world. Today, there are more considerations, whether a guide should be fashion-based or trend-based or retail-focused.

Alaina: And there’s always a balance to be struck, with a guide being on-trend while also needing to last the test of time. We’ll do style guides sometimes and it’ll take years for a programme to grow. Then five or even 10 years later, we’ll be in Target and see a whole collection featuring our creative. That’s always such a compliment, because it shows the design stood the test of time. Those examples remind us that creative can’t be too trendy; it must be anchored in core values that’ll work for a brand forever.

And how do you get to grips with a brand when working on a guide?
Alaina: We’re super research driven. Phase one is where we put together mood boards before we even start designing, trying to find those guard rails. That helps us focus on what the client really wants before we start falling in love with our own vision!

Tom: As an example, with Toyota, we had to really research it and work out what they’re going to be comfortable with. And with automotive brands, you also have to look at where they’re going, because in a year it all changes. All of a sudden, internal combustion engines are back in and EVs are out!

Alaina: And with lifestyle brands, there’s sometimes not a lot of IP to work with – in that it might just be a logo. You’re looking more at building creative around a brand’s essence, and that’s always interesting. A fun example was a style guide we did for Billboard after they rebranded the magazine. They were really focused on EDM at the time – they’d just dedicated a section of their website to EDM.

Tom: And with that brand, to Alaina’s point, you don’t have rights to artists or music. There’s just the logo and the tone and the potential for themed lifestyle extensions of the magazine to build from.

Alaina Right, and we kept seeing EDM pop up with them, so then we go onto WGSN, our trend forecast service, and there were lots of these glowing ink-type finishing techniques that we felt were perfect for EDM. That was key to how the style guide started to take shape.

Great example. And does it matter if you’re a fan of the brands you’re working on?
Tom: Licensing is all about servicing fandom, so you’ve got to embrace it, and if you already love a brand, that’s great. And if not… That’s why it’s great to have a partner!

Alaina: Ha! I was just going to say that. Luckily, Tom and I seem to thrive on different types of brands. And even across our staff, we have people that have different interests.

What are some north stars when it comes to successful partnerships with licensors?
Tom: Sometimes it’s about freedom and trust. Like in our work with Crayola, they come to us and say: ‘We have a theme – we want to celebrate people’s favourite colour’. Now that’s a pretty broad canvas to play with! So, there’s a freedom there, but also a trust within that, that we’ll do a good job and know where to go with the freedom.

Alaina: Totally. And I’d say communication is also key. It’s a partnership at the end of the day and communication is key to any successful partnership.

What would you like see more of from the licensing industry?
Tom: Well, I’ve always loved your Brands Untapped email blasts and constantly think: ‘Wow, we don’t have this in the States. Nobody cares about us designers over here!’ So, I’d love to see us designers get featured a little bit more. And even at the tradeshows, like Licensing Expo, Toy Fair, and BLE. I’d love to see better representation of the creative process across the industry.

Alaina: Agree. I’d also like for us to have more communication with our clients to see where our creative goes. We’ll set a style guide free and then it’s out of our hands. Sometimes we’ll see it firsthand on product, but I’d like more communication around where the creative ends up.

Tom: 100%. It’d be great to have data on how our creative might’ve moved the needle from a sales point of view for a brand.

What exciting future projects are in the pipeline?
Alaina: We’re very excited to be working with Feld Entertainment on the Monster Jam franchise and the opportunity to bring all our experience to such a fun licensing program. And many more we can’t talk about just yet!

Great answers. Guys, this has been a pleasure! And if folks want to know more, we can send them to your site here: https://styleworkscreative.com/.