Founded by three Mikes and shepherded by Sarah Conrad, CREW is a messenger built for sports fans. Labelled as ‘UK Mike’, the team asked me to help them create a brand strategy, define the visual direction, design the identity and conceptualise an interface built specifically for sports fans.
Story
Testimonial
Mike is a true talent for building brands and designing identities. He’s been integral in fleshing out our brand strategy and been so much more than a designer, helping us with product development and consumer definition. His passion and deep understanding of how design functions make him an invaluable partner to our business.
My Thoughts
CREW was a great project to be a part of from the off because of the creative freedom in creating something new for sports fans like myself and being responsible for defining the visual direction. I enjoyed working on the strategy and product features with the team as much as the design work.
Story
Created for sports fans, by sports fans.
Founded by three Mikes and shepherded by Sarah Conrad, CREW is a messenger built for sports fans. Labelled as ‘UK Mike’, the team asked me to help them create a brand strategy, define the visual direction, design the identity and conceptualise an interface built specifically for sports fans.
Challenge
The many aesthetics of sport.
Sport is hard to encapsulate into a single aesthetic. The identity needed to be simple, inclusive and incorporate the inspiring sporty boldness used by major sports brands.
Identifying themes and feelings in what makes sport, sport. Scoreboards, camaraderie, pitch lines…etc. Developing visual territories to express what it means to be a sports fan.
SOLUTION
Direction identified
We decided on CREW as a name, refined our direction, and created the sporty, bold and versatile identity inspired by successful sports brands.
Product GUI
Simple sports conversations
Shared Content & Suggestions
Selecting athletes, teams and leagues crews create a custom feed of shareabele infomation. Stored in a simple drop-down to avoid endless retrospective scrolling.
Who’s in the Crew
The crew drop-down provides a simple list of crew members and identifies who’s currently active.
Product GUI
Inbox
With diehard sports fans in mind, we kept the inbox simple and easy to use. Using court icons to label a crew and sport, combining them for multi-sport crews.
Box Scores
To avoid app changes and create sports-relevant displays. We created a score box that displays live scores of recent results and expands to show the Box Score.
PRODUCT GUI
Playbook
Sports fans LOVE stats & enjoy a competitive debate. We created Playbook, a series of sports-specific tools to help people win their next bargument.
Game simulation
Simulate matches with actual sports data.
Player stats or team stats
Reference stats to prove a point.
Past scores
Recall what the score was last time.
Future fixture
Share a fixture to start the debate early.
Sports highlight
Remind people of that last-minute winner.
Product GUI
Chat while the games on
To create a unique sports experience and better organise messages, we created in-game chat, including the game timeline.
Live updates
In-game chat sends live game updates, goals, substitutions, injuries…etc. Delivered to the crew for those not watching and those keen to catch every moment.
In-game reactions
Nothing can replace being at a live game, but we wanted a way to emulate it. In-game reactions enables fans to celebrate, exclaim and express themselves.
The Bottom Line
Testimonial
Mike is a true talent for building brands and designing identities. He’s been integral in fleshing out our brand strategy and been so much more than a designer, helping us with product development and consumer definition. His passion and deep understanding of how design functions make him an invaluable partner to our business.
My Thoughts
CREW was a great project to be a part of from the off because of the creative freedom in creating something new for sports fans like myself and being responsible for defining the visual direction. I enjoyed working on the strategy and product features with the team as much as the design work.
