Where is design going? I have no idea, but here is my opinion

In a world where you can get free templates and your Macintosh can create killer brochures in no time flat, where are businesses like ours going? I have given this much thought over the past few months and these are my thoughts:

1. everyone has become a designer
Many of my clients are now coming to me with layouts they mocked up on their macs and telling me this is what i want, don’t change anything, just make it seo safe and add a cms.

This is not bad because [for now] cms integration is still quite a technical field and optimization and seo really need someone that knows what they are doing. So on this i am not so negative, it is also a plus when your client doesn’t waste your time butchering your beautiful template.

2. Free templates and logos
Many sites are now offering free templates that just bolt on to various cms’, no technical expertise required…

On this i am not so negative because this type of client is the type that takes most of your time and pays you least, i consider this a loss of margarine, it wasn’t the source of your main income anyway (bread and butter).

So I am wondering where we are going, we have ten times as many folks saying they are designers, half as many real customers and half as many again who really are looking for quality designers…

We are going to a time where, to be honest, design is going to get really good – a lot of competition leads to high quality and niche and such – then it will get really bad – anyone with enough time to be innovative will soon decide they can make better money on other things…

anyway, these are just ramblings… design is forever where quality matters, i worry because quality is mattering less where clients are paying and even then they are paying less… i’ll stop here and think about my current project instead 🙂