Gregg Fraley

Another foray into London yesterday and happened upon the pub sign for The Old Red Cow. What lesson in creativity and innovation does this simple and creative sign provide us? Combination’s!  The simplest way forward to something new is to combine two or more old things. In this sign they’ve taken the image of the cow and combined it with human effects.  The bowler, the monocle, and the pipe.  Very English!  The contrast in the combinations is what makes this a successful sign. Of course it’s incongruous to see a cow smoking a pipe! That’s what gets our attention. So, if you want to create a new product or service, look around at the elements you have, or can get,

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In my travels within the UK I am forever seeing great pub signs. Pub names are creative and the signs tend to match. I was near Leeds going towards Wakefield when I saw this sign for the Wyke Lion pub. Wyke is a village. Okay, this isn’t a deep insight on creativity, but, creativity is everywhere if you look. Need I mention that the most basic marketing a retail shop or restaurant does is signage. It communicates a lot at a glance if you do it right. People will never say they came in because of the sign (except for nuts like me) but unconsciously it’s part of what helps them form a feeling and opinion. So — do the

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Innovation is not just for profit making companies is it? I was attending my first London Bloggers Meetup (LBM) this past Tuesday evening (April 28). Shish, was the hipster place to be, and LBM took over the basement. Kudos to organizer Andy Bargery for finding a cool spot, and, making it more relevant than just blogheads BS-ing about the vagaries of WordPress. The sponsor of the event was the breast cancer charity, Fashion Targets Breast Cancer (FTBC). We should have sponsored them! Credit FTBC for a creative approach to raising awareness and funds. On the way to the meeting I had noticed some striking posters in the tube of Fergie and Jade Jagger, and at the meeting I connected the dots.

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I can’t let the moment go by without saying something about the recent death of Studs Terkel. Studs was 96 years young when he died October 31, 2008. I have one degree of separation from Studs — I have Chicago friends who actually know him. I’ve heard him speak, only a few years ago when he was “only” 91. His lunch keynote at the QRCA conference was as lively and relevant as any speaker you could wish for. If you are unaware of this man, read his bio here.  I have a few comments to make about him related to creativity and innovation. Briefly, Studs was an award winning writer, broadcaster, actor, and a civil rights/civil liberties activist. He interviewed the

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I just returned from spending a couple days in Liverpool, the city of  The Beatles.  I stayed at the new Hard Days Night Hotel, sleeping below a huge air-brushed portrait of George Harrison. I’ll write more about the hotel, it was, to use a 60’s phrase, a trip. In the meantime, I have a lot of things to say about The Beatles, and their relationship to creativity and innovation. I spent an afternoon at The Beatles Story museum at Albert Dock, which had a great audio tour and memorabilia. The anecdote that struck me was one told by their producer, George Martin. He recounted hearing the first tape of The Beatles and thinking it was awful. Brian Epstein, their manager, was insistent

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Sarah Palin took pains recently to point out, once again, that Barack Obama has a passing acquaintance with 60’s radical William Ayers.  Apparently she does read the newspaper after all – she’s quoting the recent New York Times article. Actually, she says he “palling around with terrorists.” Fox “News”, in an effort to whip up something new and interesting to try to turn around the current polling trends, is paying non-stop homage to the attack. I’ve been watching Fox for about three hours and they are repeatedly bringing up the video of Sarah, posing questions to their audience, running the ticker under the screen, and bringing in experts from both sides (to be “fair and balanced”) to comment. It’s absolutely non-stop. What’s not “fair and balanced”

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Pressured for Ideas? Here are Seven “Ideation First Aid Kit” emergency tools to get you thinking creatively again. Professional creative people often find themselves needing a brilliant idea — and simply not having one. We’ll we’ve all been there, a deadline is looming, you’ve tried this and that, and you know in your heart it’s not there, you don’t have something you can use. Anxiety, frustration, and fear creep into your being, and the harder you try, the worse things get. Don’t push the panic button, reach for the ideation First Aid Kit and triage your challenge. Here are seven tools for coming up with an idea under pressure: Think positive. Even if you’ve been stumped for days, even weeks, start

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23 Creative Gift Ideas © 2007 Gregg Fraley It’s a challenge we face every year — what to do about gifts for Christmas. It’s daunting, its complex, and something we find it hard being inventive about. Panic, procrastination, and yes, fear, get in the way of creative thinking. Some people give up entirely! Don’t buy something awful just to cross someone off your list; there is no heart or creativity in that. Here’s an approach and some creative ideas to address the Christmas Challenge. It’s not about money, it’s about creative thinking! Many of these suggestions will work for even the most Scroogian of budgets. First, get out of panic mode. Decide to think creatively. Start by writing down some

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Anyone whose taken brainstorming training knows you don’t critique ideas as-you-go, you “defer judgment.” This allows for a flow of ideas to emerge. A few years ago Sid Parnes went a step further when giving a talk to a group at the Creative Problem Solving Institute. He said to be more creative, you need to defer judgment — as a way of life. It made sense to me at the time, I thought, getting into the habit of it would make you a better ideator in times of divergence. I still think this is true, but here’s a new insight: Deferral of judgment has a deeper impact. It unlocks your mind and allows for more intuitive thought. This occurred to

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It occurred to me that I don’t often share my very different thinking and frankly wacky ideas. I have a lot of ideas. I get paid to have them for my clients and because they are in the corporate for-profit context I’m not able to talk about them. However, I have ideas about a lot of things, products, the environment, government, services that just come to me from out of the blue (and observations). Here are a few I’ve been thinking about lately in no particular order. Feel free to send me builds — that’s what blogs are for. 1. Create a Great American Car I heard Bill O’Rielly on the radio a couple days ago and he was talking

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