In the midst of the craziness of moving to the studio, I wanted to let you all know where are thoughts and hearts are really right now.
We recently learned of the unexpected death of who we knew around Different By Design as "our favorite client".
The first time we met Randy was late last year and I remember sitting in the waiting room being more nervous than ever before for a client meeting. Would Randy like us? Would he think we were just kids? Would he trust us to create design work that would well represent and communicate the ethics and high standard of Randy Meyer Investment Management, LLC?
Thankfully the answers to those questions were: Yes! He liked us, No! He didn't think of us as two kids and always treated us with the utmost respect and Yes! He did trust us. In fact, I remember at one point during the meeting he turned to his righthand man (and another person we love from his office) and asked him, "So what do you think?". To which Justin replied, "I think we should let them go for it. Let's not put any limitations on the project and trust what they can do." "I agree." said Randy and then he turned to us.
There it was! Full creative freedom on a huge project: rebranding the best and most trusted financial services management company in Yuba City, California.
During our meeting (we met only Justin and Randy that day, but at later times met and equally loved everyone else in the office) Randy made us feel right at home. He showed us pictures of his darling grandchildren and spoke with warmth telling us about how they came down to stay with him and his wife every summer.
He spoke highly of his son, telling us how well he was doing working in the music industry and it was just clear as day that Randy loved his family, his coworkers, his clients, and his career.
Over the next several months we were in and out of Randy's office, Billy more than myself, which I always hated when I wasn't able to go because I just loved being there so much. I remember one day after leaving from dropping off a business card order, I told Billy, "Man. I'm really going to be sad when this project is completed. We are going to have to make up reasons to pop by and visit them all." Of course Billy agreed.
In fact, Billy was just in the office on Tuesday delivering some proofs and when he walked in Randy was the first person out front to greet him, shaking his hand and making Billy feel at home as always.
I have two favorite memories about Randy and the first is when we got a call saying to come by and pick up the deposit on the design work. Billy ran in and grabbed the envelope and when we went to open it to deposit it we found that Randy had left a handwritten note with the check: "Your work was worth every penny." It's hard to articulate exactly how good that letter and his gesture made us feel. We knew Randy was extremely busy, and he didn't really need to write us anything and yet there he stopped to scribble down those words to us. One of our goals at Different By Design is to create a wow experience for our clients...I can't tell you how many times Randy and his team created those wow experiences for us. It's true. People may not remember what you say or what you did, but they will always remember how you made them feel. Randy made us feel valued, appreciated, and special. We told everyone we knew about him and everyone that knew him held the same high opinion that we did of him.
The other treasured memory I have was our presentation meeting to show Randy the two concepts we had worked on. We could tell Randy (along with the whole office) immediately loved the first proof Billy was walking them through...and then the second proof came along.."Man!" Randy told Billy, "You just had to show me two that I love. Now how am I going to pick one?" Of course that is good news to any designer's ears and it wasn't just that but that sometimes in a service based business, people don't quite understand what you do or the value you can add to their business. It was always clear in our interactions with Randy that he respected and valued everything we did for him.
Needless to say that we were floored when we heard the news that Randy had passed late last week. Our eyes immediately filled with tears and our hearts with disbelief. There are some things in life that we may never understand, and during those times we are reminded more than ever of just how much we need to rely on God to walk us through the dark and confusing times. I am so thankful that He is an ever present refuge because we have needed it more than ever this week. And not only us, but obviously Randy's family, friends, and every other person whose life he touched. Please continue to pray for everyone who is mourning the loss of this great man.
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