Rebranding from DriftwoodFoto
Why rebrand from DriftwoodFoto to Benjamin Ginsberg Photography?
The current million dollar question, answered:
There are a few reasons to rebrand. A major factor is the current trend in identity within the services industries, partially fueled by social media. Another is that my work has always been published as “Benjamin Ginsberg” — or just “Ginsberg” — and this helps with continuity.
When I first started this journey, I both had a different mindset and marketing trends were different. To stand out, branding as a unique entity was crucial. Also, as I was just starting out and didn’t necessarily have a specialty or unique style yet, I was working on location, renting studio spaces as needed, and even partnering in a couple semi-permanent studio locations–hence “studios” (plural) in the original Driftwood Photography Studios.
Some interesting things have happened over the 10+ years I’ve been shooting professionally. For one, as I mentioned above, all my published editorial works have always been under my name. Part of this was before I came up with DriftwoodFoto. “Driftwood Photography Studios” was often just too long of a tagline for publishers. Other times, certain publications either refused to publish my company name, would only credit “Driftwood” instead of the whole name, or even if they agreed to still regardlessly ran my name for photo credit.
Additionally, I found that I was largely working outdoors: action and adventure sports; outdoor lifestyle; travel; and as part of the overall storytelling for all of these, portraiture. Crucially, as most all of these are location dependent, I’ve found I’d rather bring the necessary equipment on-location (including lighting, reflectors, etc. for lifestyle and portraiture), to more honestly tell the story and capture the mood as it all transpires, instead of bringing the subject separately, after the fact, back into a studio. Despite that, I still love studio work, and when necessary for a project I’m happy to arrange for a space.
The last reason is social media’s prominence and influence on marketing trends. With the ever increasing popularity of social media, people want to know and see who is behind the brand; who is creating the imagery; even behind the scenes content. They don’t necessarily want a faceless brand. Whereas 10-15 years ago there was a move to stand out with a unique branding package, as sole proprietors and small businesses, overall we’ve now largely shifted back to identifying by our own names, leaving the branded identities to companies solely selling products and multi-national media companies.
DriftwoodFoto, Since 2005
I will always keep the DriftwoodFoto brand. I’ve spent years growing it, I love it, and I have great plans for it in the future. Please stay tuned!