Being a graphic designer for Bank One in the '90s, Phoenix, Arizona


I had a lot of fun working for Bank One in downtown Phoenix. Don't get me wrong, I worked hard, as a graphic designer for the Marketing Department, but I was one of those lucky people who made a career out of what I studied in college. When I first started at ASU I had no idea what a graphic designer was, but once I got my degree I knew that it was what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.

Well, until about forty, which is when I figured that I would move on to something else. Doing corporate graphic design is a high-pressure, fast-deadlines job that requires the kind of youthful energy that I knew I wouldn't have forever. So, like I say, I had kinda figured that when old age crept up on me, by my late thirties, I'd find something else to do, probably sales. In that pic of me there in 1994, posing for my photo with the new One Card, I was already feeling a bit long in the tooth.

If you're not familiar with Bank One, here's a quick explanation. Bank One took over Valley National Bank in 1993, and Chase took over Bank One in 2002. My checking account started as VNB and all that has changed over the years has been the logo. All of the old Valley Bank Branches, which are now Chase, were Bank One.

Anyway, I could never really describe my job to most people. Many people imagined that I just went into work every day and designed the logo. I guess over and over. That's about as far as most people understand what graphic designers do - they design logos. I didn't design the Bank One logo. I worked on what was called "collateral", which was everything except the ads, which were done by the advertising agency. And since I didn't design ads, that was even more confusing for people who knew that graphic designers design ads. They do, but not in-house corporate designers like me.

As it turned out, my transition to another career was helped along in 1996 by a new banking law which allowed national banking across state lines. This had been illegal since the establishment of the SEC after the stock market crash of '29, the idea being that banks had to be contained in a particular state, limiting the damage they would do if they failed. And when Bank One became a true national bank, they had no further need for redundant departments, like Marketing in Arizona. Everything was then done in their corporate offices in Ohio. By the way, Chase's corporate office is in New York.

So in 1996, I saw the writing on the wall, started seeing a lot of layoffs at Bank One, decided that I wasn't having fun anymore and reluctantly resigned. I wrote a nice letter and gave it to my manager, whom I respected. She wished me well, and it was time for me to go, and start my next career.
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