We know the social impact space.
Our designers have spent significant chunks of their careers working with NGO’s, Crown Corporations, advocacy groups, associations, museums, universities, BIAs and other social institutions.
They understand the pressure of your work, know the ins-and-outs of navigating your executive team, and they’ll push your campaigns to the next level.
“They’re our Swiss Army knife for design.”
Jasmine VesqueManager, Creative & Digital @ Nutrition International
“The Art Department does killer work, fast.”
Rob CollinsSenior Manager, E-commerce & Digital Marketing @ Royal Canadian Mint (2012 - 2018)
“INCREDIBLY creative team... with fantastic storytellers.”
Jarrett LaughlinCEO and Founder @ Sprig Learning
“They really make working with them so easy.”
Brian WilsonPresident @ Ottawa International Buskerfest
Approach
We make the design process uncomplicated.
Whether we’re working on your organization’s website overhaul, or even a tiny social media post, we’re in constant contact with you through our production management platform to keep we keep meetings to a minimum.
For larger, more complex strategy projects, we kick-off with a collaborative workshop we call Adept, where we’ll design solutions with your stakeholders and decision makers —on the spot— helping your team to think like your audience, feel ownership over design decisions, and unite on a vision for growth and social impact.
Expertise
We deliver great creative work.
We're called The Art Department for a reason.
FAQs
Questions?
We've got you.
Hiring a designer can be a heck of a process. You have to know what to look for, take months to find the right person, and then you can expect to pay $50k/year or more for a Junior Designer, and over $100k for a Senior Designer or Art Director.
Then, once you’ve hired, you have to cross your fingers they can deliver good work quickly, and that you don’t run out of things for them to do.
With us, you get access to Senior Designers and Art Directors who deliver great work — whenever you need them. The designers on our team have 10-25 years of experience in everything from web, to print to motion. You never have to worry about whether or not your designer knows how to produce what you need because we’ve done it all.
And when you don’t need us for a while (or even just a couple of days), you can pause your subscription until your next project or task.
Our core design team currently consists of three Senior Designers, one Art Director, and one Creative Director, each with 10-25 years of experience in branding, print design, web design, motion and more.
When we need additional support, we call on trusted senior designers — and ONLY trusted senior designers — to help us out.
Our subscriptions go month-to-month, but you can pause it on any day in the month without wasting any remaining days, and then come back to it when you have more work.
So, let’s say you sign up, but then discover that you only need a designer for two weeks. You can pause your subscription and then fire it up once you need design help again. Your remaining two weeks will be there waiting.
Not only does this keep things flexible for your own needs, but it helps our clients with sole-source purchase caps pick up fantastic contingent design labour easily.
We’ll provide you with access to our request management platform, AD Studio where you can submit and prioritize your requests, upload and manage your briefs and assets, or upload Loom videos explaining what you’re after.
What’s more, you can view the status of your requests, review proofs, share feedback and communicate directly with your designer(s) via our platform. And we’ll provide you with as many user accounts as you need for your team.
Whether you have one request or dozens, you can always work with us and pause your subscription when you need to. We’ll be there waiting when you have more work.
And if your single request is a big one, we’ll break it down into smaller chunks to we can deliver in our typical 24-48 hour window.
Not a problem! We will revise our work until you’re 100% satisfied… even if it means changing designers to get there.
If you change your mind about the service before we’ve done our initial discovery call, then we’ll gladly provide a refund. After that, we won’t provide a refund, but you can pause your subscription until you need us.
Talk to us
Let’s see if we fit.
Get a guided tour of The Art Department, see how we can elevate your campaigns and make your life easier.