LEE DEAN / BIO

Concepts are my passion.

CAREER EXPERIENCE

Feb. 2023 – Apr. 2024

GRAPHIC DESIGNER at Toyota Insurance

Returned to my first passion, pure graphic design. Brand building for a small startup within Toyota. Supporting brand awareness and lead generation in the digital space and print. Company growth is exponential.

Dec. 2021 – Nov. 2022

GRAPHIC DESIGNER at Cyber Defense Labs

Brand building and maturing after a recent overhaul. Increasing lead generation with banner ads, paid media, and personal contacts. Designing brand elements applied to website, social media, magazine inserts, digital and print collateral, ad specialties, presentations, icons, internal signage etc. Promoting CEO’s book, creating and producing videos and still photography. Producing trade show materials. Generating everything from campaign strategy down to t-shirts.

Aug. 2021 – Dec. 2021

DIGTAL DESIGN LEAD at Evalueserve, Inc.
Improved and enhanced client relations with a financial services client. Liaison between Dallas-based client and Evalueserve international design teams, based in Chile and India.

Jan. 2020 – 2024

PRINCIPAL at Lee Dean Design & Logo Hammer, Freelance. Using people skills and strength for distilling complex information, develop logo concepts that instantly communicate the business’s brand. Best logos include: Muse Art Bar, a restaurant and gallery. Success Vectors, providing web services.

Nov. 2019 – Sep. 2020

ART DIRECTOR at Altisource. Charged with raising the level of sophistication of the brand, to that of the clients. Clients such as JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Fannie Mae and other large institution
• Re-branded this comprehensive real estate company.
• Created the look and feel of the first industry virtual summit, due to COVID-19.

Sep. 2016 – Jan. 2019

CREATIVE MANAGER/A.D. at thyssenkrupp Elevator Corporation. Hands-on manager who led a small creative team.
• Managed two successful product launches. The first, AGILE was expected to sell about 10 units right after launch, it sold 50+.
• Brainstormed comprehensive campaigns, ads, collateral and various other projects, within brand, with the team.
• Overhauled process efficiencies in the marketing department.
SENIOR GRAPHIC DESIGNER at thyssenkrupp Elevator Corporation.
Sep 2016 – Nov 2016
Until promotion.

Oct. 2005 – Jun. 2016

ASSOCIATE CREATIVE DIRECTOR/SENIOR ART DIRECTOR, Behringer. Created the highest ROI for a measured advertising campaign (online and print) in company history. Developed compelling internal branding. Initiated video communications as video director/producer/ part time editor. Built the video studio. Vendor liaison as needed. Managed creative team and freelancers.

Nov. 2001 – Aug. 2005

CREATIVE DIRECTOR, Triad Business Marketing. Presented speculative creative to win 80% of target accounts. Promoted from Art Director to C.D. to lead creative team of writers, artists and web masters. Ensured brand consistency for clients. Hired and directed freelancers. Streamlined production flow and filing systems. Performed account services as needed. Broadened experience in business-to-business market.

May 1998 – Oct. 2001

CREATIVE DIRECTOR, Baxter Marketing Group, Inc. Creator of Blockbuster Videos and many other brands; launching them towards greater market awareness and sophistication. Created ad campaigns, corporate identities, collateral, point of purchase materials, tradeshow booths and websites. Broadened experience in the concrete, financial, foodservice, healthcare, office products and transportation industries. Increased experience in Powerpoint and Flash.

AWARDS

Won numerous local “Addy” awards Houston Art Directors Club Merit awards

EDUCATION

Highland Park High School, class of 1979 / Southern Methodist University / East Texas State University Honors: E.T.S.U. “Top Ten” Art class E.T.S.U. “Working Class” (in-house advertising agency) E.T.S.U. Dean’s List

Professors: Jack Unruh Bart Forbes Rob Lawton Mike Presley Charles McGough Student Show Awards: Houston Art Directors Club Dallas Soc. of Illustratorstop

CLIENT LIST

AirLogix
Ampad (American Pad & Paper)
Aviall, Inc.
Behringer
Birds Eye
Blockbuster Video
Dairy Queen
FreshPoint, Inc. (SYSCO)
Frito-Lay
IBM
JCPenney
Kewaunee Technical Furniture Group
K-C Aviation (Kimberly-Clark)
KOAI Radio (The OASIS)
KTKS Radio (KISS 106)
LEWCO
LeTourneau, Inc.
Lockheed Martin
Mark VII (Exel) Logistics
Nu-Kote/Pelikan
Oilfield Electric Marine
The Perot Group
Southland Corp.
Sunkist (Lykes)
Teledyne Continental Motors
Texas Instruments
Viking Plastics

Info

(214) 697-9849

leedean@me.com

I found this LinkedIn post. Very gratifying. Tap the "Comment" field to join.

Blockbuster Videos

The original brand, my claim to fame. This won an “Addy”, an award from the Dallas Ad League show.

The first question people ask me after I've told them I designed the Blockbuster Videos identity is, "YOU did that?" The second question is, "Do you get royalties from it?" If you're in the advertising business, you already know. When I created the brand, I don’t know what my employer charged, but all I got was my salary. The account executive told me to buy stock, even if I had to borrow the money. I thought he was crazy, but now…oh well.

Here's the overview of how it happened:

David Cook and his ex-wife partnered to create Blockbuster. They knew an account executive at the Rominger agency where I worked as the art director. I was assigned the branding job, starting with the logo. They originally had an amateurish, whole ticket using the typeface "Broadway", an old art deco face. I changed the typeface to "Machine" to match the power of a blockbuster film. My original color scheme was a variety of ticket colors, one for each deliverable. But Mr. Cook wanted to attract investors at first, and it so happened gold and blue were his high school and college colors, as were mine. That cemented the color scheme.

I continued the theme for the video cover, stationery and collateral. I created the original ads, highly directed by the studios. However, as Blockbuster grew by leaps and bounds, we gained creative control over the ads.

Unfortunately one of America's great brands is no more. The funny thing is it started out like any other project. Back in 1985, no one had ever heard of Blockbuster or even renting videos, for the most part. David Cook and his ex-wife/business partner started it all. Those were interesting meetings. Mr. Cook's expertise was in digital scanning. He created software for large quantity industrial applications, for the shipping industry. One day he got tired of waiting in line to buy videos and the idea for Blockbuster was born. I believe that if Mr. Cook had not sold, Blockbuster would still be here and the dominant force in movies watched at home.

Blockbuster Corporate Identity

The original logo contained a tag line and their USP (Unique Selling Proposition) 10,000 VIDEOS which at that time, the amount of videos in a single store. Most competitors had far less, along with pornos.

Blockbuster signs and package design

I designed the original in-store signage and the widely used package (Amaray covers) for the old tapes.

Blockbuster letterhead second sheet

The original letterhead was meant to contain the address and phone in the graphic. However, the company added stores too quickly for that to be expedient. So subsequent redesigned were simplified, as it should be. I also designed the rarely seen second sheet, which has the rest of the torn ticket on it.

Blockbuster business card

The original business cards were die cut on the left for the hole punch, and to represent the tear on the right, a deckled edge paper was used. Each card became unique using that method.

Blockbuster membership card

The original membership cards were die cut, laminated and tied to individual stores.

The rest is history. Too bad the new owners didn't keep up with the times.

https://www.ldeanportfolio.com/#/corpid/

https://www.blockbuster.com/