Training Tutorials for Web and Graphic Design

Some good advice given to me by Christy Collins about 5 years ago: "Imitation is the highest form of flattery." We tell ourselves that almost daily here at RHD, and as it's been pointed out numerous times, a lot of graphic designers imitate the design styles created by RHD. About a year ago we started the RHD Boot Camps, as a way to help train others in the graphic design and web design skills. We've found that helping others develop professionally is just one of the rewards of being at the top. That's why we're happy to help people when they have a technical question. Or happy to give advice to a starting designer who needs some professional direction. People like Julie French did that for me, and I'm happy to do it for others.

The RHD Boot Camps have been a huge hit. We've had people from the United States and even Australia come here to learn from us. We've had individual ranchers wanting to learn more about doing their own advertising, staff members from corporate businesses, and communications professionals from organizations and associations. Each day we spend at a boot camp is fun for both us and the campers. It's a great feeling when people say things like "WOW!! That's going to save me tons of time!" or like...."Nice...I never knew how to do that!"

Maybe one of my favorite boot camp stories is about Kelli Brown of R.A. Brown Ranch. They just had a tremendous bull sale. Kelli is responsible for putting together their sale catalog....which is about 200 pages. Prior to coming to RHD Boot Camp, she was spending about 6 weeks on the catalog, and typing in each pedigree one by one. After coming to boot camp, she learned how to do automated data merge, which cut her production time in half!!!!

Boot camps are currently being scheduled through December. The holidays make a great time to come down to Texas. The camp costs $500 and you can choose your preference of what you want to learn: web, print, or both. It's your day and we customize it to help you get the most out of the camp.

Another option we are going to be adding is online tutorials on this blog. These will be short little instructional bits that will help other designers or aspiring designers with common tips to speed up your workflow and improve the quality of your work. We'll try to do one a week, but you know during busy times we sometimes forget to blog, so don't hold us to that!

We are also offering our graphic design template packages available for sale at $25. Watch for more nifo on this in future blogs. This package will include the basic templates needed for graphic designers with set up templates for different size ads and formats such as full page 4-c ads, signs and banners, 2 page ads, half page ads, etc. These come in really handy when you are getting started to help you make sure you are following guidelines for page size, bleed, and margins.

So watch for upcoming information coming soon, and keep checking weekly for new training information!

Employee of the Year

Here at RHD,we like to have fun, and one of the most inspiring "fun-lovers" is Jessica Hobbs, a friendly face to many of our web site clients.

As previously mentioned, Jessica always likes doing little jokes around the office. For example, one time, she filled up Tricia's office with pictures of herself. She also recently suggested that instead of answering the phone with "Good morning, Ranch House Designs," that we might spice it up by saying "RHD, What's Poppin?"

One of the stunts Jessica pulled on me was about a year ago, when I arrived at work one morning with a picture of Jessica on my desk, with this caption:

She also did a similar photo on Liz's desk:

So in the spirit of Jessica's fun jokes, I thought we might actually have a REAL contest for RHD's Employee of the Year!! And just to be fair, I listed Jessica at the top of the poll. You can vote on this poll over on the right side of the blog. We'll leave the voting open til December 15th, right before Christmas, so the winner can get their PRIZE!! (Now I'm not saying what exactly the prize is.....it might be that the winner gets to take out the trash at RHD for a month....or it might be something good ha ha)

But seriously, vote for your favorite, and we'll see if Jessica really does live up to her title! :)

Halloween Costume Contest

Last year we had a fun little "contest" here at RHD for the cutest Halloween costume.....and we're doing it again this year! We're asking all our friends to send us the cute pictures of their little ones all dressed up for Halloween. Actually, the contest isn't limited to just kids....it can be adults as well. Last year's winners were Avery Blunier of Duis Farms and Heston Turner of Melatonin Implants.

So after you get those adorable Halloween pictures off your camera, send them to us. We'll give everyone a few days to get the pics on their computer then announce our favorite costume winner about a week after Halloween.

THE PRIZE: The winner of our favorite Halloween Costume Contest will each receive credit for one free quarterly web site fee if they are a current customer....and if you're not a current RHD customer and you win, you can cash that prize in when you do get us to do your web site :)

Christa is going to be our official coordinator of this contest, so send in your cute pictures to updates@ranchhousedesigns.com or christa@ranchhousedesigns.com and we'll pick the favorites!

New blog to read: Z-N-T Cattle

I came across a new blog yesterday after reading the cattle.com blog....Zane Mai's ZNT Cattle blog. I really enjoyed it. I first read the topic that Jeff was talking about: "Enough is Enough", then I started looking around at other articles and I found myself spending an hour on the blog.

After reading Zane's thoughts on online sales and e-mail blasts, I felt a smidgen of remote guilt because at RHD we do send out a lot of e-mail blasts. I sure hope he wasn't talking about us! But I don't think he was, because we take e-mail and spam issues very seriously. We have about 12,000 names on our email blast list, all voluntarily signed up. We sort clients by the species they like, such as club calf, swine, etc. We don't really even send out goat email blasts so I think we're off the hook from Zane. :)

Anyway, if you like reading blogs, check his out, I know I sure enjoyed it.

Fun Day with Cam Smith, Allied Beef Genetics

We had a real fun day today at the office with Cam Smith of Allied Genetic Resources, who was here with us doing a boot camp on print design. Allied Genetic Resources is a new concept in the beef industry as a firm that helps beef producers with commercial success and added value for their cattle.

Cam works at AGR with two of our good friends, Marty Ropp and Troy Marshall, another RHD client at Marshall Cattle Company. Whenever we first met Cam this morning, I remarked that she looked familiar, that I think I knew her someway. Then she informed me that maybe we met through showing, because her family was the owners of 3C Ranch, as in owners of 3C Macho, owners of Meyer, etc. Wow, we did not know we had such a celebrity in our mix!

While Cam came to learn about print design, we actually put her to work on another task: our new RHD staff pictures!!! We had a photographer lined up, who had to cancel at the last minute. Since everyone was dressed up and ready to go, we asked would she mind if she did the photos! Way to put someone on the spot, right? But she agreed and served as our stand in photographer to take our new company pictures. Watch for them coming soon!

After the day of training in Photoshop and InDesign, where Cam actually pretty much did an entire pretend sale catalog from start to finish in one day, we decided to go learn about something new: Brahman cattle. You know me, I'm not going to miss an opportunity to tell my northern friends about the role of Brahmans in the beef industry. Despite the fact that Cam said she thought Brahmans resembled a buffalo (WHAT!!!!!), she loved them. I warned her that the Brahman bull at the V8 showbarn was a big pet and would chase her out of the pen....because he wanted to be scratched and petted more! And sure enough, the big fellow followed us right up to the gate begging us not to leave.

So here are some pictures of our Simmental breeder with her new Brahman bull friend. Who knows, maybe we'll see Allied Genetic Resources utilizing some Brahman blood in their commercial crossbreeding programs! :)

Potter's Emmett Valley Ranch

If you’re looking for cattle or sheep, check out Potter’s Emmett Valley Ranch. A family owned cattle and sheep operation in Southwestern Idaho, they are committed to producing quality Registered Angus and Gelbvieh cattle, along with competitive show lambs.

The backbone of their program is cattle. Potter’s Emmett Valley Ranch keeps the daughters and granddaughters of their strongest cow families and continues to AI them to the best sires available.

Their bull crop is chosen based on performance and phenotype and raised to be fit and ready to work - durable with balance, muscle and substance. Take a look at their herd sires and discover why the best ranches in the west use their bulls.

Potter’s Emmett Valley Ranch is building their sheep flock with daughters and granddaughters of the best ewe families, selecting for productive ewes that are sound made, well balanced with ample rib and muscle.

Visit Potter’s Emmett Valley Ranch, where producing quality cattle and sheep is their family’s passion.

October Blog & Facebook Special

Happy October! We're ready for some cooler weather! Our blog/facebook special for this month is 10% off any print project booked with us in the month of October. Here are some ideas of ways to use the coupon:

-New business cards or re-order of your existing business cards...a great time to stock up before Kansas City and Louisville.

-A flyer design or ad design. There's still time to book ads for November magazines, and this coupon can be used for an ad design or a flyer design. Again, flyers make a great way to promote your stuff at stock shows.

-Envelopes or letterhead - For local businesses, order or re-order your company letterhead while it's on sale.

There are tons of ideas to use, so give us a call or email tricia@ranchhousedesigns.com to book a project and take advantage of the savings.