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Alternative Fuels Website
a large website (uncoded) project by johnfoster

johnfoster has picked a winning large website (uncoded) design

For $1800 they received 165 design concepts from 37 designers!

  • Award 1
    homepage4 by mapmedia

Over 25,500 small businesses - and some big ones - trust crowdSPRING with custom logo design, web design and writing services. 96% of them would recommend that you try us too.

Find out more
Dates

Starts:28-Sep-09 10:32 p.m. GMT

Ends:12-Oct-09 10:32 p.m. GMT

Awards

Award 1: $1800, was awarded to mapmedia

Formats

HTML,PSD,JPG

Contract

Preview: crowdSPRING Contract

Materials

File 1: 1836594_PST logo FINAL... (699.1 KB)

File 2: 1836595_PST Thomas P G... (42.4 KB)

File 3: 1840748_PST Content (C... (214.5 KB)

File 4: 1840751_PST Thomas P G... (42.4 KB)

Creative brief

The buyer added updates to the brief. Read them.

LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT US:

If the title didn't excite you, think about this: When oil prices rose $50/barrel in 2008, costs for a family of 4 increased an average $4,800/year, and increasing demand from China and India will cause oil prices to rise again. PST can help to find lower-cost alternatives, but only if people know who we are.

Pennsylvania Sustainable Technologies, LLC [PST] is a 2-year old start-up company focused on using inedible biomass (e.g., corn stalks) and other waste materials (e.g., municipal solid waste) to produce alternative liquid fuels that can replace gasoline. PST’s fuels are less costly to produce and deliver better mpg than ethanol. They are compatible with current vehicles, pipelines, and pumps and deliver a >50% reduction in GHG emissions.

HERE IS WHAT WE NEED:

The subject matter is complicated and technical (and perhaps a little dry), so we need the website to make it easier for people to digest. We want a fresh, clean, youthful, informational website (i.e., non-transactional) with the following pages:
• Home
• About
• History
• Market
• Technology
• Products
• People
• Partners
• Contact Us

The website content (attached) is in a .doc format and provides copy for each page. There are several intended links (included in blue) in the text - they can be moved if appropriate for better navigation. Additionally, the text for some pages is relatively long and can be broken into segments if desired.

PST’s logo (attached) is a blue spark on a field of green representing the creation of energy from biomass. ‘Fueling Innovation™’ is a PST trademark that is generally used with the logo.

PST’s business cards (sample attached) are provide for reference only. They use a variation of the font – ‘Candara.’

OUR TARGET AUDIENCE IS:

Potential customers, partners, investors. PST doesn't make or sell fuel - we license technology (intellectual property) - so our customers are not gasoline consumers, they are biofuel producers that will implement our production processes at their biofuel facilities.

WE LIKE THESE DESIGNS:

We like cleaner, less cluttered websites that make it easy to find the information that the reader wants. In the biofuel space:
• www.rangefuels.com (Range Fuels)
• www.ls9.com (LS9, Inc.)

WE ABSOLUTELY MUST HAVE (OR WE DON’T WANT TO SEE) THIS IN OUR DESIGN:

Please avoid Pennsylvania-related images (e.g., keystones) on the website. PST is based in Pennsylvania and funded partly by the State, but our technologies are intended to benefit the entire world.


Brief updates

7-Oct-09 10:38 p.m. GMT
Some clarification on image choices (WHAT TO AVOID):

Corn and corn fields: PST's fuel synthesis process uses inedible biomass (e.g., corn stalks) as a feedstock. It does not use the edible part of the corn. Today, biofuels in the U.S. are dominated by grain-ethanol (i.e., ethanol made from fermenting corn or wheat grains). Ethanol has been criticized (right or wrong) for its use of food as a feedstock and its impact on food prices. Further, ethanol fermentation is 'old' technology. Since images of corn and corn fields are closely associated with ethanol in this industry, I would like to avoid using those images prominently on this site. Since PST's process can use biomass and specifically corn stalks, I hadn't put that in my original project brief - and I believe there are ways to show corn stalks that would not be objectionable. If you have used corn images in your design and I've given you feedback without mentioning it, I probably didn't have a problem with the images that you chose. But please keep this in mind for any future entries.

Gas pumps: Likewise, most people don't get warm fuzzies from fuel (gasoline) pumps. I believe that fuel pump images can be used effectively to convey information on the site, but again gas pumps should not be used as the most prominent or primary images.


8-Oct-09 7:31 p.m. GMT
TIMING:

This contest closes on Monday, October 12. I will consider new entries up until the closing time, but I will not have very much time to give feedback on new submissions after Friday, October 9 - that means that if you don't enter soon, there won't be much of an opportunity for iteration. If you intend to submit an entry after Friday, you should make sure your design is spot-on.

ORIGINALITY:

I made this contest public because I thought that it would be in PST's best interests for all of the creatives to be able to read all of my feedback. I think you can learn a lot about what I like and don't like for PST by doing that, and I think it benefits the final product. I also believe that it is natural, based on similar feedback, for there to be some convergence in the designs. That said, I'm looking for originality. If you're planning to submit a late entry, please don't show me a slightly different version of something I've already seen.

RATINGS:

If you have been working on this project and have a rating of 4, you are in the running. Your objective now should be to show me any changes that you think might make it more likely for you to win.

If you have a rating of 3, read my feedback carefully. You need to be the judge of how much time you want to invest in the project. Whether you can win or not depends on the impact of your next iteration.

If you have a rating of 1 or 2 or you haven't entered yet, you're not in the running. This contest isn't over and you absolutely still have a chance to win, but you'll have to show me something different and it will need to be great.

Good Luck!!

12-Oct-09 9:56 p.m. GMT
ON WINNER SELECTION:

First - Thank you all for your hard work and the effort that you have put into this contest. I truly appreciate it.

As I mentioned previously, if you have a rating of 4 or above, you're in the running. Over the next couple of days, I'll be reviewing the leading designs with a few of my colleagues and asking them to weigh-in with their opinions. The winning creative will be chosen based upon:

1.) The overall quality of your design(s) - home page and any other pages
2.) Your design skill and how easy I expect it will be to work with you
3.) How well your design represents PST

During that time, I may contact you with specific questions.

Thanks again!!