An incident earlier this week prompted this thought: When business is booming, does great design even matter?

In this episode (19 mins), we talk about a fellow design colleague who posted a passionate video rant over a very successful restaurant’s brand, publicly shaming it –– and then tagged them in it.

The post stirred cheers and scorn within the design and business community, plus it racked up thousands of views on social media.

But, it also stirred some conversation in our office. If people love a business so much that it quickly grows to 24 locations, honestly, how much does investing in a good or bad design even matter?

We don’t take sides in the viral(ish) video’s intense critique, but listen and hear as our guest and agency designer Shelby Rinke and I explore the 3 ways that businesses succeed without great design.