UNDER THE RADAR James Nelson, drawingincWHEN JAMES Nelson returned from a year away in Australia, the then 26-year-old graphic designer was faced with the choice of many returning travellers - what to do next? For some, it can be difficult to settle down after a year or two travelling the world.

But Nelson had a clear idea about what he wanted to do. While working as a designer in Sydney, he felt that the Australians had a different approach to customer service. So with this experience and the knowledge he gained working in Irish design firms, he borrowed money from his family and set up drawinginc in 1998.

"I returned from Australia with a clear vision in mind - to provide a high standard of design with strong customer focus," he says. "My goal was to encourage repeat business and build up a relationship with the customers."

In an industry with a churn rate of around two to three years, Nelson saw an opportunity to start building much more solid relationships with customers.

"Some agencies expect customers to move every two to three years," he says. "Some agencies are happy with that. It is acceptable for companies to move on for whatever reason - whether it is just to get a different flavour of design. I saw it as an opportunity to turn a short-term business relationship into a long-term one."

And after taking a year out to travel, Nelson felt he had nothing to lose by giving it a go.

"I had it in my mind that this was something I wanted to do," he says. "Because I was returning from Australia I thought it was a prime time to approach the market."

He started small - the loan from his family allowed him to buy some computer equipment and software, while he sub-let a desk in an office. "In terms of the initial outlay, it would not have been a huge amount of a financial investment," he says.

Ten years later, it's a much different story. Nelson now has over 10 staff and drawinginc is housed in a 1,500sq ft premises that he owns. Staff numbers and turnover have doubled in the past two years - the company is turning over more than €1 million and the plan is to grow the business by 40 per cent in the next five years.

Nelson says he has put a key focus on customer service skills in recruiting staff, and trains them under the drawinginc model which focuses on customer service training, over and above the expected creativity of designers.

"One of the main assets we look for is an understanding of the business when it comes to customer service," he says. "We expect with designers that creativity is a given. Effectively, you're looking for the individual to have the same ethos as the company."

He says this emphasis on customer focus, which includes regular customer surveys and benchmarking exercises, is the reason he has kept many clients.

Clients include Pfizer, the Marine Institute of Ireland and ACCBank. The financial institution has moved with him in every design firm he worked for in Ireland and was one of his first clients when he started off on his own 10 years ago. He credits them with giving him the credential to work with other, larger companies.

"We are still dealing with ACC and that has stood to us when we are approaching new customers," he says.

In the early stages, the company benefited strongly from referrals and word of mouth to generate new business, but in the past few years it has been aggressively targeting new customers.

"Quite recently we have been aggressive in terms of looking for new customers," explains Nelson. "We have done a direct mail campaign with telesales and followed that up with appointment setting, where we go in and present to new organisations and to get them on board as new clients."

Such a proactive approach is necessary as the economy slows and businesses have to tighten their belts, says Nelson, but he says the company's client range across a variety of industries - including financial services, pharmaceutical, the fast-moving consumer goods sector and the arts - will stand it in good stead.

"We don't specialise in one particular sector," he says. "A lot of design companies would be dependent on one particular sector. If one sector slows down, we are kept busy with other sectors."