Epic Entrepreneurs

Harnessing Teamwork for Creative Success with Reggie Tidwell

• Bill Gilliland

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This episode centers on the innovative design agency 40 Hearts, exploring its founders' collaborative approach to overcoming challenges in the design industry. The conversation emphasizes the significance of community, work-life balance, and how their unique business model redefines success beyond traditional hustle culture.

• Overview of 40 Hearts and its founding partners 
• The importance of community engagement in design projects 
• Challenges and opportunities in transitioning from solopreneur to partnership 
• Defining individual strengths and roles within the agency 
• Embracing remote work dynamics as a modern collaboration tool 
• Focus on community impact through creative collaborations 
• Personal reflections on the journey toward partnership and success

Reggie's Bio:

Reggie is an award-winning, multi-disciplinary graphic designer and photographer. He received his BFA in Graphic Design in 1997 from Maryville University in St. Louis.

After 23 years of success running Curve Theory, a design and branding business, Reggie recently founded 40 Hearts with 2 partners. Their hope is to retain big design projects in Asheville and garner business from other markets across the country.

Reggie is considered a design leader in his industry. He created the multimedia class at Washington University as part of the Visual Communications curriculum.

A believer in community service, Reggie has served in many key Board roles in the community. Currently, he serves as the Professional Services Chair on the Art Coalition for Arts AVL. He is also the founding president of the Asheville chapter of the 111-year-old national, professional design association, AIGA. He currently serves on the organization’s National Board.

Reggie has dedicated his career to helping small and large businesses and organizations effectively connect with their audiences. 

https://www.40hearts.com/

Thanks for Listening. You may contact me at https://billgilliland.actioncoach.com/

All the best!
Bill

Thanks for listening. Please hit the subscribe button and share this podcast. You can reach me at williamgilliland@actioncoach.com.

All the best!

Bill

Bill Gilliland:

Hey there, welcome to this week's episode of Epic Entrepreneurs. Today we're talking to Reggie Tidwell of 40 Hearts. So, Reggie, welcome and tell us a little bit about 40 Hearts and what it's all about.

Reggie Tidwell:

Thanks, bill, thanks for having me on the show. Really appreciate it. So yeah, 40 Hearts is a design and branding agency right here in Asheville, north Carolina. Forty Hearts is a design and branding agency right here in Asheville, north Carolina. It's made up of three partners, three founding partners, and we all have been in the industry for years. I ran a small design entity called Curve Theory for 23 years. My partner, tim Scroggs, ran a couple of different agencies. The most recent one was Futures Bright with his wife and a couple of designers for I think 16 years or so. And then Joao Barbosa, our other partner, was really big in ed tech. He was a VP of customer experience for renaissance learning, um, and you know we all really came together through this sort of ashville creative connection. But I'm the founding president of aiga ashville.

Reggie Tidwell:

Aiga is a national professional association of design and you know there's chapters in every state, many cities, and we all, at one point or another, served on our local Asheville, I think all. Tim was a founding board member, so he served with me for the three years that I served. Initially, joão came in sort of in the interim and we formed a friendship through that connection. I think Tim and I had been kind of cultivating a friendship for years, but it was through that where we were able to consistently kind of see each other and build a relationship. But to take it back a little bit, we were all I guess this was in 20, at the end of 2023, we were all in New York for the AIGA National Design Conference. Aiga National Design Conference, and we had been sort of Tim and I had been talking about you know, how do we, how do we get these bigger projects, you know, and how do we keep these big projects that seem to escape Asheville and go to Atlanta, new York, la, chicago, when we have so much talent right here in Asheville? And so that you know, that sort of started us, you know, ideating on what that looks like and is this something that we could accomplish? And I think Tim and I had had. We actually had had conversations about collaborating, joining forces, doing a collaborative agency or something for you know a few years now, and that I think that conversation was coming to a head where we were like you know, we have to do something.

Reggie Tidwell:

So, anyway, we all were sitting in the big auditorium at Pentagram, which is one of the, you know, undisputably one of the best, most well-known design and branding agencies in the world. We have some friends over there Michael Beyroud, emily Oberman just a really good group of people. Paula Scher, you know we consider these people to be sort of design heroes in the industry and all of them have, have been involved with aiga at some form of fashion. And I'm now on the national board for aiga which is kind of in the path of some of these wonderful humans. And they had the five partners of pentagram, the women partners, on stage, and they were, you know, I think, debbie Millman, who's become a dear friend of mine. She's a wonderful designer, brand brand steward. She's run a podcast called Design Matters for Eons.

Reggie Tidwell:

She asked the women partners a question from the audience and it was how do you become a partner at Pentagram? And I think it was. Paula Scherer answered first and she said you have to work hard, hard, hard, hard, hard, hard, hard, hard, hard. And then Emily Oberman, I think, took over and said well, you know, once you become a partner, you then have to work hard, hard, hard, hard. And we kind of looked at each other, we kind of laughed, we're so like God, that sounds exhausting, like why can't we just spread the work around, and so that really was, honestly, the. At that point we decided we were going to try to create an agency that took on sort of a new form, where we work hard but not to the point where design is our only mission in life. Like we have families, we all love our families, we all love to travel with our families. We love, you know, our friendships, and what we wanted to do was cultivate a business where we can have enough revenue to work with.

Reggie Tidwell:

So we're talking $500,000 and up, projects that not only we will retain here because we have an agency that has the capacity to do the work, but also we become attractive to other markets because we're sort of fresh and new, we have the, the, the tenure, we uh, and we have the talent and we're already doing amazing work and so, um, yeah. So, ultimately, our model is to do projects large enough that we can do really impactful work while not having to stay in that sort of hustle mentality where we constantly looking for the next project so we can, you know, keep money coming in.

Bill Gilliland:

Got it. So say you've been doing this year and a half or so something like that not quite.

Reggie Tidwell:

Yeah, uh, really just last year we launched um and right out of the gate we landed a project. Purely just by happenstance, we were, we were at a thing that some friends of mine put on called a fun day, sunday, or sunday fun day and we were, uh, we were at this, this event where basically it's a bunch of parents with their kids. It's an opportunity to build community. Parents get to know each other while their kids play.

Bill Gilliland:

It's pretty awesome.

Reggie Tidwell:

And there was a CEO there. We didn't know anything about him at the time, but his name was Tim and super awesome guy. We all just started talking. I had invited both of the partners there with their families and so we were there, we met Tim, we all just kind of talking about what we were doing and Tim sort of perked up as he heard us talking about 40 Hearts and he's like, wow, that sounds amazing.

Bill Gilliland:

He's like can I invite you guys out?

Reggie Tidwell:

for a drink next week and we were like sure. So Tim and I met him for a drink next week. And we were like sure. So Tim and I met him for a drink my Tim Tim Scroggs. We sat down and we had this great conversation with Tim Tim Mitrovich is his name and he said you know, you guys, whatever you're doing sounds amazing. And my tech company it's an 85 person tech company, not a small tech company, big international. They're doing really amazing things in the world of AI and cloud tech. And he said you know, I don't want to shop this around. I need a full rebrand and website.

Reggie Tidwell:

and you guys, are it, and so he gave us this big job. We were able to build out our team with two developers who are now permanently our developers, and we brought in two other designers to work with us and we were able to feed some friends, obviously, and also do a really amazing job for this company, so much that he you know, he said we absolutely knocked it out of the park and wants us to be his sort of design partners as we continue on doing work with them.

Bill Gilliland:

Yeah well, congratulations. I mean, obviously y'all have got a lot of experience in the industry and collaborating. So what have you noticed? I mean it's interesting. It sounds like you've had three paths. It may have been two entrepreneurs and now you're all entrepreneurs, or maybe it was three entrepreneurs and now you're throwing in together. What kind of challenges has that presented? Or opportunities, I guess would be the positive way to look at it.

Reggie Tidwell:

Yeah, you know, I think, address challenges and opportunities, and I think, honestly, even the biggest challenges so far for us have been totally manageable. The biggest one was that we hadn't even actually had a chance to launch like we didn't. We hadn't even had a chance to do our branding or anything when we landed the job with artisan studios, and so we were instantly, uh, thrown into this really great project that took all of our skills and leadership, and we, you know, hadn't really had a chance to think about who we are as an agency, and we've a lot of conversations around it, but nothing on paper yet. And so now we find ourselves in this place where that job is launched. We're waiting for the next projects here to start later this month, and we are now trying to understand exactly what our path is, exactly what our offerings are. What does that look like? We have a general idea of how that breaks down, but how do we articulate that to the world so they know that what we have is what they need?

Reggie Tidwell:

And so that's the phase that we're in now, while one of our partners, tim, and his family, are actually traveling around the world for this 10 month, I'd say almost like a cultural journey. They sold their house and are going to do sort of an Asheville 2.0 after they're done traveling towards the end of the summer They've been to Ropa de Papa, they were in Luka for a while, then Croatia, and so having a partner that's remote, even though he's full time he's still, you know, we see him and communicate every day. We don't get to have that in-person time, so I say it's not really a challenge as much as it is an opportunity to kind of see how we can stretch the modern days of, of, of working um together.

Reggie Tidwell:

You know, having somebody that's fully remote and being able to leverage that while also having clients in the mix. So far it's been absolutely smooth. You know, you wouldn't even have to know Tim was, you know, thousands of miles away.

Bill Gilliland:

Yeah, it's, it's interesting. We, um, you know, our firm is virtual. I was. I was actually looking for an office before COVID and you know that was smart. I was glad I didn't buy an office right before, right before COVID. But yeah, and since then we've been 100 percent remote and that's that's. That's worked great. I mean, it's not, it's, it's an interesting that does present different challenges. So that's great, that's fantastic that that's worked out and you know. So you guys are coming together as a partnership trying to figure out who you are as a company and you got one of them who's remote. So I think, once you figure that out, I mean I just think that's helpful actually.

Reggie Tidwell:

Yeah, I think so you. Once you figure that out, I mean I just think that's helpful actually. Yeah, I think so too, and honestly, I think one of the silver linings of COVID having a global pandemic was, I think companies learn just how easy it is to have remote oh, I think yeah.

Bill Gilliland:

I think, yeah, I think it's awesome. So, um, the I mean you're putting three people together. Do you have? I mean, is there a division of labor? Is are you guys all do the same thing? What, what? How's it working?

Reggie Tidwell:

That's a great question, bill. So so my strengths are branding I'm also a commercial photographer. I do a lot of have have done in the past a lot of stuff for explore, ashville, mountain biz works, some great local, local agencies, um entities. I you have a bachelor of fine arts in graphic design, tim. Also also branding thought leadership, which is thought partnership, which is actually one of the services that I think is one of our strengths.

Reggie Tidwell:

Tim and I do what we call brand story development and brand story mapping, where we actually articulate what a company does, but also, as it is relative to the audience that they seek out, I think a lot of companies have a problem conveying that, because they constantly want to talk about what's exciting to them, about their offerings to their audience, but they don't think about the problems that their audience, that their customers, need to solve.

Reggie Tidwell:

But they don't think about the problems that their audience, that their customers, need to solve. And so if you switch that around and approach it from your client's perspective, like what are their pain points, what is it that they want, and how is it that we can convey that we have the thing that they want, that creates that through line, and Tim and I do that work. João is a completely different beast. He comes from the user experience world and he is what I would call a multifaceted technologist. Maybe he knows all the software. He can tell you what software you need to do a certain thing. He's really amazing with creating user journey maps and customer experience maps, ux maps anything that gives us intel on the sort of big picture thinking of a company and how it works and what they're doing and how it connects to their user base. He is that and that's such a huge part of our business, and so he's a massive asset.

Bill Gilliland:

Yeah, that is cool. It seems like y'all are you kind of worked it out. Yeah, yeah, how to use strengths, and I've always said strengthen strengths and then defend against weaknesses, so you can always you know outsource or or hire whatever other, what other help you might need to fill in, fill in the gaps? But at the top level, it seems like you got it covered.

Reggie Tidwell:

Yeah, part of two bills, cause part of 40 hearts is actually bringing in those other, those other people. Like we don't we don't want to be the ones doing it all. Like we have such a vibrant, amazing creative community and, uh, when you have the kinds of budgets that we'll have to work with, that's an opportunity to change a lot of people's lives. And as someone who really loves this community and has seen our creative community strive and thrive and sometimes barely survive, it has always been on my heart to figure out a way to be able to impact a lot of people at once. And so you've got a million dollar project and you can bring in, you know, 10 other people or more on this project to help, you know, expand your capabilities. It gives you the possibility to not only feed those people but enhance the offerings because you're now I'll give you a perfect case in point One of the projects, one of the things that we did for Artisan was we had this whole different sort of design direction, whole different sort of design direction and, because of my work with AIGA and knowing the the sort of disciplines of so many of the designers here and illustrators here, we had this idea of this sort of drop cap logo design.

Reggie Tidwell:

It's very specific style. There's a guy in town named Dan Greta who we know very well and we know that that is his like thing. Like he can develop logos in that style like no one else, and so that was an immediately an opportunity to bring someone else in to do a few concepts that we were able to then take and expand upon. Um, but there's going to be so many opportunities like that and, ideally, while we will always be the three founding partners, our hope is to grow with profit sharing partners that all have their own teams built out, that have different specialties that they're able to. Actually, you know, we're able to have multiple projects going on at once, projects that have come in from all over the world, and be able to keep a lot of people busy.

Bill Gilliland:

Man, I love that. I really love that. You know, in marketing, branding, advertising, there's so many disciplines and so many talented people I don't you know. It's one of the industries that you know. As I was learning business and being in business for a long time, I've noticed that you just can't do it all by yourself. You have to. You just can't do this stuff by yourself.

Reggie Tidwell:

So it's super cool.

Bill Gilliland:

Yeah, it's super cool. Well, this I think we could talk for hours. So I get why this. Your first client, Tim, wanted to sit down and have a beer with you because I would love to do that too. So, yeah, I think we need to do that because I think and I'm going to need to have you back we're a little short, but you know this is sort of running up against our time here. Let me ask you one last question, and the question is what do you wish you had known? Hmm, so, in other words, you know about all this, or about your whole journey, or about creativeness, or anything. What do you wish somebody had told you years ago?

Reggie Tidwell:

You know it's. That's a great question. Thanks, bill. I think it's funny because I think I've known it for a long time. I think part of this industry and certainly being in an area where you see a lot of the fun and bigger projects going to other markets I've always known that I couldn't do this alone, or I shouldn't be doing this alone. I've always known that collaboration is key, diversifies your offerings, but also, you know I love people. You know I love people, I love this community, and the more opportunities I get to collaborate with others, the better I feel, and so what I wish is that years ago, I started what I'm doing now.

Reggie Tidwell:

Now, granted, I've got 23 years of expertise and notoriety, but I think the journey of a designer that is doing the solopreneur thing can be really, really challenging, and primarily it's because you can only do so much, you can only go up to your bandwidth, and oftentimes we are beyond our bandwidth and that's not a good place to be.

Reggie Tidwell:

You're making okay money, but you're not having the best quality of life. You're just working, working, working, and so one of the things that's been really enjoyable now with the agency is having two really amazing partners that I know are working on different things and I'm working on my thing and I'm not feeling like I have to do it all. I don't feel this anxiety of like as soon as I'm done with this. I got to jump over that. As soon as I'm done with that, I got to jump over this. So it's, it's already increased our my quality of life, I think for all of the partners. I mean, I don't think Tim would be able to do what he's doing right now If we hadn't started our agency. I think that was at least one of the things that freed him up to be able to do that in terms of traveling around the world with his family for 10 months. And so, yeah, it would have been nice to have done it, but better late than never, they say.

Bill Gilliland:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I think it's great that you finally pulled the trigger. I can tell you're really a people person and that's why, yeah, you finally pulled the trigger. I can tell you're really a people person and that's why that's a great thing that you know you wish you had collaborated. I'm sure you collaborated, but you wish you had gone into business with some of your friends earlier. So that's, that's awesome. Well, listen, it's been a great conversation. Thanks for being on. If people want to get ahold of you, what's the best way?

Reggie Tidwell:

on. If people want to get a hold of you, what's the best way? Uh, well, uh, we are. Uh. 40 hearts is our tag on instagram it's brand new, so not a whole lot of content up there and our website is 40heartscom. Uh, you'll see a landing page up there. But, as you know, asi mentioned, we are now in that uh sort of selfbranding phase and so you'll see that evolve out over the next few weeks. But definitely, you know we're around and we're super excited to be a part of Asheville's economy. It's creative for us and I don't think this will be the last you'll hear of us.

Bill Gilliland:

No, no, no, I think the runway is long and skies are blue. I think that's amazing. One of the things I love is that you guys just got to work. You didn't worry about trying to make your website perfect. You're trying to make all this other stuff perfect, even though that's your business, but y'all got to work because you had clients to take care of. So congratulations on that. Appreciate you being on here and, yeah, I look forward to having you back on, because we got a lot more to talk about.

Reggie Tidwell:

Thanks, so much, Bill.

Bill Gilliland:

It's been a wonderful time have a wonderful day, yeah, and until next time, all the best.