Lightboard

Lightboard is a Seattle, Washington company that provides on-demand marketing design services for business-to-business teams. Work is delivered by a network of print and digital designers coordinated by account managers, with clients submitting requests, tracking progress, reviewing work and downloading final assets through Lightboard's own project management and collaboration platform. The company positions itself as an extension of a client's in-house marketing or design team rather than a traditional agency, and describes itself at launch as "a general contractor for graphic design" that matches designers with spare capacity to companies with defined design needs.

Service categories include presentations (PowerPoint and Keynote sales, capabilities and pitch decks), branding, websites and landing pages (hand-off design files or full development in HTML, WordPress or Squarespace, including implementation inside marketing platforms such as HubSpot or Marketo), display ad campaigns for major ad networks including animated HTML5 units, custom illustration and iconography, case studies, eBooks, email templates and print-ready or distributable PDF documents. Standard deliverables of the engagement model include a dedicated account manager, adherence to client brand guidelines, a collaboration platform for colleague review and approval, and an asset manager holding completed work.

The stated workflow is: a client submits a request and receives a same-day estimate; work begins within one business day; revisions continue until approval; and final assets are then downloaded.

Founding story

Lightboard was founded in 2015 in Seattle by Brad Bouse and Dave Foley. Bouse, who previously co-founded the developer bootcamp Code Fellows, and Foley had first spent nine months building a visual collaboration product for craftspeople working with customers on one-of-a-kind projects; customers tested the MVP but would not buy it. The team then began running ads for graphic design services in June 2015, received immediate customer demand, and pivoted into the on-demand design business.

Business model

Lightboard operates a managed marketplace/service model: it recruits and manages an external network of designers and illustrators, assigns account managers to oversee delivery, and runs proprietary project management and collaboration software that clients use to submit briefs, monitor progress, approve work and store assets. Projects are scoped individually, with an estimate issued after a brief is submitted.

Revenue comes from client design projects quoted per request; a client submits a project brief and Lightboard returns an estimate that must be approved before a designer is assigned and work begins. The company reported generating revenue at an early stage.

Traction

The company reports more than 11,000 completed projects delivered for more than 600 teams. Early clients cited in 2015 included Toyota and Penguin Books; later customer references include Glowforge, Usermind, Brook.ai, VREAL, Zipwhip, higi and OneEnergy Renewables.

Latest developments

The company's website remains in service with a 2015-2026 copyright notice, active project intake, portfolio, pricing and careers sections, and cumulative figures of over 11,000 projects for more than 600 teams.