June 3, 2024
This month, Fanatic sponsored “Towards Change,” an inclusive advertising exhibition, and launched our annual T-shirt design competition. Alongside our usual website production, branding projects, and digital marketing activities, our team also attended a Klayvio Conference.
We were thrilled to sponsor the exhibition of Towards Change: Rethinking Representation in Advertising, a project launched by Rika Holden, an experienced advertising consultant with the WPP group. This project aimed to challenge stereotypes and promote diversity in advertising through civic engagement.
A series of workshops were conducted, during which community members analysed and reimagined problematic adverts. The project culminated in an exhibition that showcased alternative ads reimagined by participants to replace those banned by the ASA for perpetuating stereotypes or inappropriate representations of gender.
Upfest, Europe’s largest street art and graffiti festival, is back, transforming BS3 once more with over 170 stunning paintings and murals created by artists from around the globe. We take pride in being situated at the heart of the action, at the venue where it all started, The Tobacco Factory. We’ve spotted a number of impressive artworks decorating the area around the Tobacco Factory.
We are excited about the return of our annual T-shirt design competition. Each year, our team gets the chance to showcase their design skills and compete against one another by creating unique designs around a given theme. This year, the theme centres on the Fanatic logo. The requirements are that the logo outline must remain intact; however, we can be as creative and playful with the logo as we want without deconstructing it.
So far, our designers Annie and Sam have been the reigning champions, but will this be the year they lose their crowns?
Fyahfly Screenprinting, our screen printing partner, will bring the winning design to life by printing the artwork onto organic T-shirts.
Fanatic is incredibly proud to have had the opportunity to be the sponsor of North Somerset RTC this year.
A few weeks ago, the boys became the Junior Premier League South West Champions, and in May, they competed in the National Finals.
They faced the 12 top teams in the country, played the games of their lives, and found the tenacity and self-belief to win and become JPL National Champions.
This represents the team’s hard work (including their coaches), talent and resilience, but most importantly, their excellent attitude of supporting and playing for each other – we are incredibly proud to have our name on their shirts.
This month, we’ve been working on three separate branding projects simultaneously. As a design team, these are some of the most enjoyable projects we get to work on, as we get to learn all about a brand-new client while collaborating to develop creative concepts that fit the brief.
Across the team, we usually approach each brief with our own styles, which then merge together as the project progresses. This means that even the simplest of logos (like the brand we created for AMT over a year ago) has passed through the hands of the whole team.
We can’t show exactly what we’re working on just yet, but here are some snippets of shapes and typography that we’ve enjoyed creating over the last month.
Recently, the Dev team has been bringing some of our new website projects to life by using subtle and engaging animation.
The team has been using GSAP, a powerful tool for creating stunning website animations. Imagine scrolling through a webpage and seeing images smoothly slide in, text gracefully fade into view, or buttons that come to life with a little bounce when you hover over them. GSAP makes it possible to add these kinds of engaging effects efficiently, turning ordinary websites into interactive experiences that capture visitors’ attention.
Website animations do more than just look good; they also enhance the user experience. For instance, they can guide the eye to important information, making it easier to understand and navigate a page. Subtle animations can provide feedback, like showing a spinner while content is loading, which helps users know that the website is working and reduces frustration. Overall, well-designed animations make websites feel more dynamic and enjoyable, encouraging visitors to stay longer and explore more.
Harley took a day out at the end of April to attend K:LDN in London, where he learned about new features from Klaviyo. One of the highlights was their industry-specific benchmarks, which allow you to compare your email performance against similar brands, helping you uncover new opportunities. They also showcased their AI-driven form display optimisation, which determines the best time to show forms to visitors on your site, thus supporting submission rates. They presented many new impressive features, and it was great to learn more about these tools and see live examples. Harley is looking forward to testing these new features to support our clients’ growth at Fanatic.
Thomas, Graphic & UX Designer and Amy, SEO Specialist
I recently went to Compiègne, France, to commentate on a tournament for the video game Trackmania. The event was a huge success, with 32 players competing over the course of two days for the title of Champion. I was part of the English-language broadcast, working alongside the French production team to put on a great show.
The weather was incredible and the city itself was lovely. My French was a little rusty (having not studied it since I was 14) so I stumbled through most interactions with a handy phrase, “Tres Bien!” Luckily, most things were in fact tres bien.
At the end of April, I competed at the ICU Cheerleading World Championships (country championships) and the IASF Dance World Championships (club championships), both taking place in Orlando. This was my fourth time competing at the ICU Worlds and my fifth time at the IASF Worlds. It was my first time representing England at the ICU, having represented Wales in my previous three appearances, and my second time representing my current club, Angels Dance Academy (ADA), at the IASF.
At the ICU, I competed on Team England Jazz, finishing 6th overall. England performed spectacularly, finishing 4th on the medal table with 3 Golds, 3 Silvers, and 1 Bronze. The team’s success filled everyone with a deep sense of pride and excitement.
At the IASF, I competed on ADA Gemini Lyrical and ADA Virtues Jazz, finishing 12th and 7th, respectively. ADA took seven teams to the IASF Worlds and brought home 3 Golds and 2 Silvers—the best result from any UK team. The atmosphere was electric, and the team’s success highlighted our hard work and dedication.
As a gift for making it to the World Championships, all athletes were given 3-day park tickets for Disney World and entry to an after-party at Animal Kingdom, where the park was open exclusively for athletes from 9 pm to 2 am on the last day of competitions! After the competitions finished, my boyfriend and I rented a car and drove down to Miami to enjoy the Formula 1 Grand Prix – with the icing on the cake being watching Lando Norris’s first GP win!