Today we’d like to introduce you to Claire Holmes.
Claire, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
Through Double H Design Co, I help busy people preserve and share their memories through photo books, video slideshows, and custom keepsakes. Looking back, the story of how I arrived at owning a company focused on these things is clear to see. I have always been my family’s historian. When I was younger, I would sift through boxes of old photos and organize them into binders and photo albums. As technology advanced, I became our family’s go-to person for creating special keepsakes like vacation photo albums, rehearsal dinner videos, team party and birthday slideshows, memorial slideshows for funerals, and several really special projects that involved collecting letters and contributions from hundreds of people to compile into memory gift books.
My dad worked in the technology industry so we relocated from Houston to the Silicon Valley near San Francisco for several years. That was a formative experience for me and helped broaden my perspective on a lot of things. We eventually moved back in Houston and I later attended the University of Georgia, majoring in advertising (Go Dawgs!). I was lucky enough to have had two opportunities to travel and study abroad while in college, once to Innsbruck, Austria for a summer and then to Barcelona, Spain, for an entire semester. You can’t even begin to imagine the amount of pictures and videos I took on these trips! I was able to see the world, and I most definitely wanted to find practical ways to remember it (other than having a million pictures just sitting on my digital camera’s memory card). I made several photo books and a video commemorating these special times, including some for my friends who went with me.
I’ve always been a “multi-passionate” person in the sense that I have lots of interests, skills, and strengths that I was never quite sure what to do within a professional setting. So if you were to look at my resume, you’d see I had many different jobs from Manager of a baby gift and interior design shop to Marketing Coordinator for an oil and gas-focused law firm. Trust me… I’ve been made fun of this “job-hopping” more times than I’d like to admit. The best job I ever had was my most recent, at a boutique strategy and consulting firm. I was able to draw upon different strengths and my creativity while working with an amazing boss, from whom I’ve learned so much about being an entrepreneur, a working mom, and how to set myself up for success in my career.
I have two young sons and when I became a mom, the desire to preserve and celebrate family memories became more important to me than ever. I also realized that in today’s digital world, the sheer number of photos and videos we have is totally overwhelming and the amount of time we have is extremely limited – even for me! Recognizing this as a problem, and knowing where my passions and talents lay, I was excited to be able to formalize the side-projects I was already doing for friends and family into a real business where I can help more people than just my immediate family! With Double H Design Co., I feel like I’ve truly been able to tap into all the kinds of work I love and feel lucky to be able to leverage all of my skills while also helping other people in the process.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
I publicly launched Double H Design Co. in April 2020. Admittedly, trying to start your own business right after having a baby (my youngest son was barely two months old!) and in the middle of a global pandemic was not the original plan but for many other reasons, it did feel like the right time. Needless to say, both of those things have made the first few months of Double H Design Co. more complicated than I’d ever imagined.
Aside from the obvious issues that 2020 has brought for working parents regarding childcare. I won’t even go into that right now! I originally envisioned a large portion of my income stemming from wedding-related work. Things like Rehearsal Dinner slideshows, wedding and honeymoon photo books, and this fun Bachelorette “Newlywed Game” type video I specialize in. But since most weddings have been postponed or canceled, that work has been more of a trickle than a steady stream.
However, in the wake of the devastation of the COVID pandemic, something really joyful has emerged in my work. I saw a need for a new type of project – the Group VideoGram, which helps people celebrate special occasions together even most people are stuck apart. A Group VideoGram is a video gift that you can send to a loved one to celebrate a special occasion such as a birthday, new baby, graduation, anniversary or just to say hello. We compile video messages collected from the friends and family of the loved one into a comprehensive, professional video gift to share with them. I have made them for lots of traditional occasions, but some of my favorites so far have been those created for more unique situations. I recently created a VideoGram just meant to show appreciation and support for a nurse on the frontlines. I also just wrapped one up for a young woman who elected to get a preventative double mastectomy after testing positive for the BRCA gene mutation, whose friends and family wanted to send motivational messages to her before her surgery.
Double H Design – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Double H Design Co. transforms people’s memories into customized keepsakes. We help tell our clients’ stories through the design and production of custom photo albums, memory books, and slideshow videos that commemorate favorite memories, special celebrations, and big milestones. We know that busy person whether working 80-hour workweeks in an office or serving as CEO to their household – need help to maximize their time to get things done. Especially the important memory-preserving projects that tend to fall by the wayside as schedules fill up.
That’s where I come in. Passionate about design and serious about the organization, it is truly my pleasure to take on the burden of preserving clients’ old memories and creating special keepsakes so they can focus on what’s most important: making new memories with their family and friends. I enjoy helping people that don’t have the time, don’t know where to start, or are overwhelmed by their photos or videos.
I’d say I’m known for my intersection of creativity and logic. After earning my Advertising degree from the University of Georgia and a decade-long career in marketing project management, I am able to draw upon a mix of graphic design experience and imagination with an analytical mindset and strong eye for detail to create beautiful keepsakes through a streamlined, simple process that takes the stress away from our clients.
My goal in every project is to make my clients cry. Happy tears, of course. My absolute favorite thing about my work is finding out that one little thing about a client that leads to a breakthrough moment of creativity to elevate a project from being great to being truly amazing. For one of my clients, I found out he was very into movie trailers, so we turned the intro for his Birthday VideoGram into an intense action movie trailer. For another client whose 60th birthday trip was cancelled, I just happened to be talking with her kids about how sad she was, and we decided to create a surprise Memory Book for her, which is a beautiful photo book full of notes and pictures from family and friends that she was able to open the morning of her birthday. It wasn’t a vacation to Greece… but it really helped make her day special (and I was told she did cry a little!). It’s those little things that can make all the difference for someone, and is the human element I don’t believe you can get when you go to some of the bigger box-type companies for these projects.
Has luck played a meaningful role in your life and business?
I’m not sure I believe in “luck,” but I do believe in opportunity, the power of positive thinking, and learning to a roll with the punches to make the most of things when they aren’t going your way. For example, when the COVID crisis began in earnest this Spring, we were all trying to adjust to our new, quarantine normal and figure out how to still celebrate important occasions. My husband’s grandmother turned 80 at the beginning of April. We were supposed to have a big party but obviously, those plans had to change.
I came up with the idea that maybe we could get everyone in the family to send in a cute video message and that I’d put it together for her with a fun, personal intro. It didn’t seem like it was going to make up for missing out on a big, in-person birthday celebration but I thought it could still be something nice for her to get on her birthday! As it turns out, she called me and told me it was one of the most meaningful gifts she had ever received. That is what spurred me to finally officially, publicly launch my business in April… amid a global pandemic! At the time, I hoped my services could help more people like her celebrate and commemorate special moments and I’m really proud to say that they have.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.doublehdesignco.com
- Email: claire@doublehdesignco.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/doublehdesignco/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/doublehdesignco
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