Offering accessories to keep or gift to a friend, Vector Penguin was founded with a playful spirit to bring joy in small packages.
Joy
There is a sense of joy that comes to mind when thinking of what I often refer to as ‘happy mail’. I often find myself smiling when I find a new package in my mailbox. Whether a gift from a friend or something I’ve ordered for myself arrives, it brings a certain kind of joy to open up those packages. It is this kind of sweet surprise that I wanted to bring to the customers of Vector Penguin.
Fledgling
I often reflect upon the early days before Vector Penguin began. Fresh out of college I had quite a bit of free time on my hands employed as a part-time graphic designer and I was itching to make something- anything to share with the world. A great passion of mine was (and still is) supporting pin makers on Kickstarter, to help them gather the funds to create enamel pins of their own work. It was from these makers that I began to understand the kind of challenges that making something into a product would potentially bring.
Vector Penguin was only a fledgling concept when it was born in August of 2017. I was leaping into the unknown with my first Kickstarter project, and I was surprised and elated to find myself welcomed into the pin community. It was with the success of this first endeavor that emboldened me to blaze on. With time and effort, the handful of designs I made has grown to over 200 designs and not only includes pins, but patches, lanyards and even journal stickers.
Change
Vector Penguin appeared at Naka Kon 2019 in its first in-person event. It was in June of that year that a re-brand project began with the intent to better match what Vector Penguin had grown into. While I had no idea what I was getting into in 2017, I had finally come to understand that I wanted the products and general feel of Vector Penguin to be: clean and simplistic, yet playful and bold. To reflect that change I decided to adjust the old branding I had created to better suit the new image I wanted to portray.
Vectorpenguinshop.com was created and launched in September of 2019. With the site launch came more emphasis on organization and navigation. A clean new photo style was incorporated that highlighted the pins and furthered the clean branding style.
Amber
As a passion project, I nurture the VP Shop outside of my full-time day job and my significant other is often helping with odds and ends. I like to tell my friends that by day I am a pre-press designer, digital press operator, and freelance graphic designer; by night I’m a small business owner. Throughout my journey I have learned so much and met so many lovely people. I still find myself learning something new each day and enjoy the challenges each new project brings.
