F.A.Q.

Q. How many people operate your company?
A. Decibel is made up of two employees, Ryan Baustert and Jess Wolbeck. Ryan does 90% of the design, booking, and day to day stuff. Jess keeps track of bills and expenses, reaches out to new potential clients, and helps develop our web presence on a daily basis. She also does some design from time to time.

Q. How long have you been in business and what are your qualifications?
A. Decibel was established in August, 2008. So we are a new company that continues to grow on a daily basis. Jess also continues to work as the marketing director for Green Mill Restaurants in addition to helping run the company. Prior to establishing Decibel, Ryan worked for the last 4 years as a packaging artist and graphic designer at an advertising agency in St. Paul. He graduated in 2004 from UW-Stout with a bachelors degree in graphic design.

On the music industry side of things, Ryan is one of the founding members of Minneapolis rock act, Throw The Fight. The band was formed over 6 years ago. Ryan acted as the band’s agent, designer, promoter, and manager for the first 5 years. Through his dedication and direction, Throw The Fight has secured a record deal with Warner Music Group, toured the country numerous times, developed a massive online web presence, promoted successful college and commercial radio campaigns, found song placements on numerous MTV and VH1 shows, and sold over 5000 albums and 15,000 digital singles – among many other things. Click here to check out TTF. Though he no longer books the band, he still co-manages and oversee all aspects of the group’s direction, design, promotion, etc. Decibel utilizes the promotion techniques, industry contacts and work ethic that have worked for Ryan’s band in the past for our clients today.

Q. Do you have an office space, or are you home-based?
A. We are a home-based business. This directly benefits our clients since we are able to work longer hours and weekends if need be.

Q. Have you worked on this kind of a project before?
A. 9 times out of 10, yes. We have. When it comes to design or working in the music industry – we’ve dealt with matters in pretty much all areas. If by chance you are looking for something that we feel is out of our grasp, we probably know someone who we can send you to. So it never hurts to ask.

Q. How long is your turnaround time?
A. Our turnaround time depends on the type of project you are hiring us for and how much work we have lined up ahead of you. For example, creating a merchandise design is going to be less time consuming than designing and troubleshooting a Myspace layout. We always do our best to finish projects in a timely manner and keep our clients deadlines in mind when quoting projects. If you need something turned around in 24 hours or less, we can usually do that. But we apply a small rush charge due to the fact that we are putting aside what we are currently working on to put your project at the top of our list.

Q. What are your payment terms?
A. We accept check, money order, or Paypal. We can also process credit cards through Paypal. (Clients don’t need a Paypal account to pay with credit card.) Once a price has been mutually agreed upon, Decibel collects half the payment up front prior to starting work. The other half of the payment is collected when the client approves final designs. Once they are approved and final payment is collected, we will send final artwork files. No exceptions to this rule. Paying half up front lets us know that you are serious about our time. If we’re doing work that hasn’t been paid for, it’s not fair to our clients that have already put money down for their projects.

Q. What if I’m not happy with the design?
A. An important part of the creative process is collecting as much info about the project up front. It’s important that the client communicates exactly what they are looking for. As with most businesses, we have some clients that know exactly what they are looking for down to the final details. We also have clients that have no idea what they are looking for and let us run wild with their project. When we send you your first proof, we expect that there might be a round or two of revisions and we budget for that time. If you truly aren’t happy with what we come up with, even after a couple rounds of revisions – we can scrap it and come up with a new concept. If you still aren’t happy and we are on concept number 3, we start charging an additional hourly rate. The bottom line is that we do everything in our power to create exactly what you’re looking for within your budget. We ask all potential clients to be sure they have reviewed our work so they are familiar with what we have done in the past. And also that they supply us with as much info up front as possible.

Q. Do you have references?
A. Of course! References are available upon request. We also have several referrals posted on our website.