When I met Tim Lovett of Higher Ground Outfitters here in Beaufort, I was excited to find out he was ready for a re-design of his current website. It was a well designed site for its time, especially as e-commerce was the newest thing to be a part of for business expansion, but over the years his business focus started to evolve and he was ready for an upgrade. Not only was he ready for a simplified mobile responsive site, but he wanted to put the focus back on his "destination" store location as well as his passion of giving stand up paddle tours. Tim wanted to bring a laid back, adventure vibe to the site without losing the retail aspect of it, so that's what we did.
Finding balance between branding both "adventures" and "retail" was key, so I focused on adding in imagery of locals out on the water with Tim, featuring logos of the high-end apparel/boats/boards that Higher Ground carries as well as adding updated info to the tours and rental page. I took his current logo and gave it a sort of vintage wash for that laid back vibe and then chose a vibrant, yet slightly washed, color palette to complement various styling throughout the site. Graphic logo-mark bars are strewn throughout to add a fun element as well as break up the amount of text and images. Another big focus was also put on naming images, title pages, url's and other "behind the scenes" elements with key words and specific phrases to help boost the search engine optimization for his store, paddling tours and rentals and products.
If you're ever in the area, be sure to stop into Higher Ground Outfitters of Beaufort to gear up because... Adventure Awaits!
