Why move office after 25 years?
During our first decade in business our office near Yorkdale Mall – in clear view of highway 401 – served us well. Within minutes we could be in Markham, Mississauga and Richmond Hill to meet with clients, take briefs and present creative. The company sign shone out over the highway and generated so much awareness that we rarely had to explain how to spell our name. Most Torontonians, while they might not recall the sign, have a vague sense of familiarity with the name “Beakbane”.
So why move? Because the web and mobile makes communication easy. No longer do we need to deliver art boards and sit in front of clients to understand each other. In parallel with electronic communications becoming easier, driving the highways had been getting trickier. What was once a quick suburban commute had become a pain. Now we avoid the drive. Our new office is a short walk from Union Station so it is easy for young urbanites to use the TTC and suburbanites to use the GO train.
The nature of our office has changed. It is now an open, airy collaborative space. We no longer need lots of offices filled with drafting tables and filing cabinets. Our new digital docket system allows us to become virtually paperless (at least that is the plan). Another benefit is that we have jettisoned twenty-five years of accumulated junk – two large truck-loads. It was upsetting to see brochures, point of sale materials and packaging from Labatt, Duracell, Cadbury and other clients, jobs that at one point we had sweated over, get carted away, but it has also been liberating.