Southwold Cycle Hire
I founded a cycle hire company in my hometown of Southwold with my best friend. He runs the day-to-day hiring and logistics. I built the site and booking system and run all things brand and digital.
We've been running for just over a year and in that time have featured in Bradt Guides, The Telegraph and other media.
Website design
For the landing page, I wanted to capture that feeling of cycling in Suffolk: the open space, the freedom, the childlike joy. We felt this was more important that focussing in on the bikes or details. So we kept the homepage and key landing pages ‘aspirational’. The booking page was much more clinical and simple for ease of booking (see below).
The booking page
Due to our low research budget (i.e. no budget) I did lots of guerrilla testing on this booking page, mainly using my parents (which reflects a big chunk of our market as lots of older people come to visit the area).
The branding
The aim was have a sign-painted, organic logo with modern feel. The yellow colour is synonymous with the area and reflects the sun and vibrancy we want to capture. The branding was done by my good friend Nick Wills at the agency Busby Webb.
The photography
Was done by another good friend, Rosie Litterick. Photography is key in setting us apart from our competitors who focus on the bikes or use stock or low quality images. We wanted the photography to really capture the joy of biking in the sun, in the beautiful local scenery. We wanted the style to feel natural, un-contrived and ‘fly-on-the-wall’.