My life as a graphic designer started in ninth grade when my art teacher told me that I had talent. He recommended that I go to a special technical school for high school instead of the one I was bound for. Under his direction, I went to Tampa Bay Vocational Technical High School and majored in Commercial Art.

While still in high school I worked for a printer who taught me about the printing process and how to create the artwork needed for high quality printing. From there I worked at other printers until I was introduced to Benito Advertising. I presented my portfolio to them and they hired me as a freelance graphic designer.

While there, I met some amazing art directors and worked on award winning projects for Cadillac, Publix, Hawaiian Tropic, and Visit Florida. Not only was award winning creativity bursting at the seams, but we all had so much fun doing it. Everyone in the building would play as hard as they worked. I am so grateful for the experiences that I’ve had working there. I also worked for other advertising agencies in Tampa such as; Sound & Vision Communications, Chenoweth & Faulkner, and more.

I eventually moved to the Gainesville/Ocala area for personal reasons. I worked at a computer store called “Mr. Data” where I was able to learn about computers and software. After a year, the store owner made me the Assistant Manager. I ordered products from the suppliers, paid for the shipping, placed products on shelves, set prices, sales, and other store functions. It was here that I was able to purchase my first computer and the Adobe Creative software. I used tutorials to teach myself Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign and more.

From there I was able to obtain a graphic design job in Orlando, FL with an ad agency that mainly produced newsletters. At the interview, they said they were impressed with my knowledge of the Adobe programs. Self taught!! Unfortunately, this company was going out of business and I had to find another job after two years.

I found another graphic design job at the Florida Travel Saver, but it was in Ocala, FL. So, I ended up moving back to Ocala. For my interview, I had to create an ad from scratch. They were impressed at how quickly I produced a very clean and creative ad. I was also able to design a brochure that won first place in the Flagler Award for creativity. I worked at this job for over 5 years until the company was bought out by a competitor and moved everything to the Gainesville office and I was laid off.

At this time, I decided to attended the College of Central Florida “CF” and graduated with my AA degree. After I graduated, I worked for a company in Ocala called Zefon. They had me creating product photography, videos, literature, catalogs, trade show booth designs, and website maintenance. I was even able to create an animation of their “Dr. Z” caricature and had him waving to everyone on the home page. I also created animations of how their products functioned. I put these animations in the videos that I created, scripted, and did the voice overs. That was so much fun!

Later on, I was able to work for a company called Conimar Group. This company manufactured many decorative home goods such as place mats, coasters, mugs, dishes, trays, signs, and so much more. What I loved about working for them is that they saw me as their top designer. Even though they had many top artists that they purchased artwork from, they used my artwork for some of their top clients such as Cracker Barrel, Wal-Mart, and Dollar General. I visit these stores and other gift shops and see the products that I designed still being sold. I love that! Many of the designs that I created were top sellers!

Career Change

As much as I love being a creative designer, I still felt that I was limited by my education. So I decided to pursue my Bachelor Degree in business. I was able to graduate with honors in May of 2018. Before my graduation, I had to do an internship with a company for a job that I would like to pursue. It was at that time I found an internship with a company called ANCORP in Williston, FL.

This company was way different from anyone that I had ever worked for! They are a high-vacuum product manufacturer. They make high-grade stainless steel products such as chambers, flanges, ball valves, and other metal products for space, research, and manufacturing. The more I learned about this company and what they do, the more I loved it!

As the intern, I was responsible for promoting them on social media, creating literature and catalogs, learning about the products, and the manufacturing of those products. I would take photos and videos of this process and post them on social media. I discovered that our “Likes” and “Shares” increased when we posted videos of welding, lathes in action, and the building process.

After my internship was over, they offered me a job as a Marketing Coordinator. That was so new to me, I had to learn what that was and what was required of me. In this new role I was responsible for communicating the corporate goals, visions and strategy to the internal and external stakeholders of the company. I would coordinate and attend trade shows, pay for advertising, create the ads, design the trade show banners, and literature. I would also maintain the Marketing budget and created monthly and annual sales reports.

After a couple of years, I was promoted to Marketing Manager and I worked directly with the Marketing Director on the budget, sales reports, strategy, messaging, and much more. Before I left, I was the project manager on the website redesign. We hired a website design company to rebuild our current website into a WordPress site using Elementor. I had three Marketing Assistants that helped me with copy writing, images, and structure of the new site. I taught them how to use WordPres, Elementor, and Plugins so that we could add functionality and edit our new site in-house. Once the website was finished, I was let go for unknown reasons. I was devastated!

My next job was at AdventHealth Ocala as a Marketing Coordinator. Again, this was new to me because I was working at a hospital and everything was medical related. I organized Health Happening lecture events between the community and physicians, update the website content, created screen savers for internal communications, created literature, and email marketing. About one year after I started I was let go due to corporate downsizing.

A couple of months later I was hired by National HomeCraft as their Marketing Coordinator. They are a local home renovation and roofing company and they needed me to create ads, social media, website content, and help with coordinating trade shows. Approximately six months later I was promoted to Marketing Manager. I created a Marketing Budget, Google Analytics, and represented the company at trade shows and events. Unfortunately, the economy has hit this line of work very hard and many employees were laid off.  Which brings me to today.

Current Situation

I am currently working part-time for National HomeCraft while seeking other employment. I am open to new opportunities in Marketing and Graphic Design. Please contact me at 352-789-2108 or email me at: nancy@vikchicgraphics.com