Posted by Isaac Blankensmith | Date Posted: 12 January, 2011
During my time on the A Better World By Design Committee this past year, I had the pleasure of meeting many fascinating people, both inside and outside the RISD community. One of these people was Tino Chow ’09, who co-founded the conference and graduated from RISD with a BFA in ID. Chow describes himself as “a designer, a thinker, a TED fellow, an entrepreneur, an artist, an educator, a trouble maker.” While he was spending sometime in Hong Kong, I skyped him and asked a few questions about his past and latest ventures, particularly Big New Ideas studio.
What exactly is Big New Ideas?
At Big New Ideas we are activists, designers, community builders, and strategists. Our goal is to help make world-changing ideas happen though business strategy, story telling, and community building. It doesn’t matter how good your idea is if there isn’t a plan to execute the idea well, so that is our motivation in helping these people. On top of that, we also help craft the story that will activate a community of people who believe in the idea in order for them to become activists and agents of change. It is important to us that the projects that we work on are projects that we all truly believe in and that they have the potential to change the world. We are planting the seeds that will help companies get off the ground or transition towards the goal of making the world a better place. All we are doing is empowering other people to change the world; we are their catalyst.
How did you initially start Big New Ideas?
Big New Ideas started two years ago in 2009 on a John Maeda run during Wintersession of my senior year. It was the first time I met Aaron-Perry Zucker, my business partner. I was telling him that I was interested in starting a studio that helps make non-profits better, and it became clear that we both had a similar passion. Aaron and I decided to create Big New Ideas that winter. We were both passionate about changing the world with our skills and we decided to take the plunge to start the company right after meeting. It was pretty crazy that we decided to start it after just half an hour.
The idea grew within the next couple of weeks, which was just before I went to TED. When I was at TED I had the idea of our company in my mind, but at the time I didn’t know what it would be called. I got to meet a lot of people at TED who were as passionate as we were about trying to make the world a better place. It was at TED that we got our first clients. Since then we have added a third partner, Max Slavkin, from USC, who isn’t a designer, to balance out the left and right brain thinking.
Who was your first client?
With all businesses you always start small. Our first project was for a Non-Profit. We decided to do it pro-bono, since it was our last semester at school, and we didn’t want to stress ourselves out just to make ends meet. It turned out to be a very beneficial project, as it led to the clients that came to us for the next six months.
The client was Humanity Calls, which is a system in which people can learn about organizations and donate money to them. They wanted to come up with a better system to fundraise in times of need because during catastrophes organizations have to recreate a whole system for donations. It takes a lot of time and resources to do that, therefore designing a platform where people and non-profits are already connected made sense. We consulted for them, designing the backend system of how the product connected with people. Aaron and I saw this as the opportunity to get our business up and running and to take our first step in making the world a better place.
What are some of the latest projects that Big New Ideas is working on?
We are working on lots of new projects! One exciting project is called PeaceLove Studios, which is actually our first local client. They are a company trying to build a positive symbol for mental health in the same way the pink ribbon represents breast cancer. They have built an organization that is a for-profit and non-profit under the same roof, so that the for-profit wing can go mainstream with products that represent the community and spread their message. The non-profit end is working primarily on educational projects. What we are doing is coming in and helping with the strategy and building of a community. To break down the stigma around mental health you need millions of people around the world supporting your efforts. This is a really good example of why we started Big New Ideas; we wanted to make a difference.
Where do you see Big New Ideas going in the future?
We just had our company retreat where we were talking about where Big New Ideas is heading, so a very interesting question. We plan to keep working on a lot of grass roots projects because that is what we are good at and I think more and more clients will be coming to us with more resources and bigger ideas. We are basically living our dream, because everyone in the company is doing what they love to do. We have created our own opportunity and we are making an impact. We would love to make a bigger impact in the future. We hope to hire our first designers in the next year or so and really amp up the capacity to work with more people with big, new ideas. Ultimately, it’s about building this larger community where we all go out and change the world with our own passions.
How many projects have you guys worked on now?
15-20.
How has your experience as a TED fellow been?
Good. I got to meet Yves Behar and hung out with him at TED a year ago. I also got to hang out with Regina Spector. It has been so amazing to be able to meet all of these accomplished people and share ideas with them. One of the great things about TED is that everyone is on an even playing field; everyone is willing to talk to you about your ideas and encourage you to keeping doing what you are doing to benefit the world. It is the positive energy that draws me there. I have been there twice now, and I am going there this year to help them build upon their TED Fellows community.
So many people made huge impressions on me. One of the TED Fellows started a non-profit with the mission to smuggle North Koreans out of North Korea. Now he has another organization that is working with the North Korean and South Korean governments to ease the political tensions so that they no longer have to smuggle them out. So when you are among people like that it is really amazing to see what they are doing, it is really intimidating. The whole fellows program is full of people who have already done tremendous work.
What resonated most with you from the conference?
I saw Bill Gates wait in line for the bathroom. Even though he is one of the richest men in the world he is still incredibly humble. That whole moment really sums up what TED is about, isn’t about putting elitist people coming together with agendas, but everyone comes together to find ways to work together for a common goal — to make the world a better place. It definitely was an amazing, amazing opportunity. I will be live blogging again from TED and twittering the conference, so you can follow it.
How do you think RISD prepared you for the post-graduate life?
Is that a trick question? To be honest, I didn’t come out doing traditional Industrial Design in any way, but the training definitely got me ready to do what I’m doing now. I was able to transfer all my skills into strategic planning, and community building. What RISD has really taught me is the way of thinking, the ability to dissect complex problems and understanding them from a level that many people just don’t think about. That thought process applies not only to designing a product, but also to designing communities, businesses, or non-profits. You can simply add the word ‘design’ to everything that we are doing. We are designing business plans, strategies, and communities. We use the design process of refining our ideas, prototyping, and evaluating the product.
What advice would you give to any students?
Follow your dream – this might sound extremely cliché, but it will make sense at the end. There are two ways to look at following your passion. One way is what Aaron and I did, which is to take the plunge and start a company with little capital and little experience. Other people have different ways of following their dreams, but at the end of the day if you can’t sustain yourself, you can’t follow your dream. I have many friends who have day jobs to put food on their plate, and at night or after work they follow their passion. By doing what they want to do, their day job is what enables them to follow this dream. You have to survive after you get out of college, but don’t give up on that dream. Money will come either way; don’t forget your dreams.
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by PeaceLove Studios. PeaceLove Studios said: TED fellow Tino Chow sits down with RISD and discusses his latest project = PeaceLove http://fb.me/PdG6wDzU [...]