The Blog

The American Consumer Satisfaction Index out this month shows that Sprint Nextel’s rating jumped 11% from 2009 to 2010. The increase for the telecom industry over the same period was an average of 4.1%. This is wonderful news for Sprint Nextel, but it turns out that it only brings them up to par with their main competitors. Two years ago, they were at the lowest point of customer satisfaction in their history.

That made me wonder: did they do anything special which they can continue to build momentum with, or did they just stop sucking? Birch Studio’s first step into any project is research, so I figured I should research this as well in hopes of learning something. As one might expect, there was a slew of press around this and quite a few differing opinions. The original source of my data, ACSI, is a significant arbiter of information in the US economy so its reports carry quite a bit of weight. (more…)

Founded in 1897, nTelos has kept pace with the times and provided services to dedicated customers in the Central Virginia region. They hold their own against the big four telecoms through unparalleled customer service. Birch Studio has been a customer of nTelos since 1998 and has told everyone looking for a phone company about their incredible service.

As with most telecoms these days, the hottest side of their business is the wireless division. Most of the resources of their small in-house IT team are devoted to keeping up with the near-daily changes in that industry. So the wireline division was left behind. Wireline had a backlog of updates to make, not least of which was a redesign of that section of the website. Being that nTelos had a design in place for the wireless side, our goal was to integrate that look into the wireline side of the site and, instead of reinventing their brand, spend our time adding some additional improvements along the way. (more…)

Not all police agencies are created equal. In late 2009, we had the opportunity to work with the Washington DC Metro Transit Police Department (MTPD) on their annual report. They are the professionals in charge of the safety and security of millions of people within one of our nation’s largest public transportation systems which also reaches into the heart of our nation, a highly trafficked and symbolic area.

Metro’s goal was to tell the story of the dedication and vigilance that is the hallmark of the Metro Police. With thousands of hours of training, certification in three separate jurisdictions (DC, VA and MD) and specialized training in counter-terrorism, MTPD officers are some of the best trained in the nation. They are called on to support and train transit police departments in other cities as well. (more…)