Brand, website and systems studio · Madison, Wisconsin
We make brands, websites and back-office systems for owner-run businesses.
One team works on all three at once, starting with how the business runs day to day. The partners do the work themselves, for clients in Madison and across the Midwest.
Your business got its logo one year, its website another, and its spreadsheets whenever somebody had a free afternoon.
Each piece made sense at the time.
Together they describe a business you ran years ago.
Signs of drift
What drift looks like in an owner-run business.
As an owner-run business grows, its brand, website and back-office systems get updated by different people on different schedules, until they stop matching each other.
A business can run like this for years. The cost shows up as a few lost hours each week and customers who give up and go elsewhere.
Brand
- “The logo was fine for year one. We’re in year nine.”
- “Our sign and our website look like two different businesses.”
- “Ask three of our staff what we do and you’ll get three answers.”
Website
- “Changing our hours on the site means emailing someone and waiting.”
- “We send people to Facebook because the website is out of date.”
Systems
- “The same booking lives in a spreadsheet, an inbox and somebody’s head.”
- “We have four spreadsheets, and only one person knows which one is right.”
- “Every inquiry gets typed in twice.”
What we do
One team handles the brand, the website and the back office together.
Look like the business you run today.
We work out what the business stands for and who it serves, then design an identity that says so. Your staff get a kit they can use on their own, from the sign out front to the next Instagram post.
A site your customers can use and your staff can edit.
We design and build the site so your staff can change hours, prices and listings themselves in a few minutes. Booking and inquiry forms land where your team already works, and every page is designed for a phone first, because that’s where most customers find you.
One place to see how the business is running.
We move bookings, inquiries, schedules and client files into one shared database, usually Airtable, and connect it to the forms on your website. Each thing gets typed in once. We use Airtable so often that we made our own apps for it: Air Fill lets your team fill in Airtable forms on an iPhone, and Air Gist puts your numbers on your Home Screen.
Who does the work
The people who work on your business.
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Michael Pilsner
Partner · Systems and websites
Before Knock Knock Bang, Michael ran the interactive division at Discover Mediaworks. He starts with how your business runs day to day, then plans the website and the systems your staff use, and he’s the one who sets them up.
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Beth Pilsner
Partner · Brand and print
Beth was art director at Kramer Printing. When a business needs a new identity, a long presentation or anything printed, she leads the strategy and designs the work herself.
Selected work
Recent chapters.
We write up each client project as a chapter: what the owner came to us with, and what we made.
Gallery
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Kuhl Entertainment
Kuhl Entertainment
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Sexy Nomad
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Ian’s Pizza
Ian’s Pizza
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State Street Brats
State Street Brats
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Taradiddle
Taradiddle
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State Street Brats
State Street Brats
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State Street Brats
State Street Brats
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State Street Brats
State Street Brats
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State Street Brats
State Street Brats
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MHB Real Estate
MHB Real Estate
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Wolf Flow
Wolf Flow
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Wolf Flow
Wolf Flow
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City Dog Vet
City Dog Vet
Clients
Some of the businesses we’ve worked with.
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Caiman Consulting
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Case Station
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Cat Care Clinic
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City Dog Vet
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Cortac Group
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FarWell
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Guardian Whiskers
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Ian’s Pizza
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Kayser
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Kiio
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Kuhl Entertainment
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MHB Real Estate
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Midwest Horse Fair
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Next Step Forward Africa
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Phillips
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Redevelopment Resources
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Sexy Nomad
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Slop Frog
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State Street Brats
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Taradiddle
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the art of education
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Volm Companies
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Wellbe
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Wolf Flow
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Wonderwheel Recordings
Built in-house
We also make our own apps for Airtable.
Most of our time goes to client work, and Airtable sits under more of those systems than any other tool. Two problems kept coming up: getting records in from a phone, and seeing the numbers at a glance. We made Air Fill and Air Gist to solve them. Both are on the App Store.
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Air Gist
Airtable numbers, on your Home Screen.
- Reads your views
- Tracks targets
- Survives field renames
- Multi-base dashboards
- iPhone · iOS 17 or later
- Free, Pro from $1.99/mo
- Part of Air Pack, a small suite of Airtable tools.
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Air Fill
Airtable forms, rebuilt for iPhone.
- Works offline
- Updates records
- Captures signatures
- Conditional fields
- iPhone · iOS 17 or later
- Free, Pro from $4.99/mo
- Part of Air Pack, a small suite of Airtable tools.
We set up the same kind of thing for clients: Measurement Layer Custom Platform Workflow Integration
Where our clients are
Most of our clients are within ten minutes of our Madison studio. The map shows where the rest are.
Redmond, WA
Caiman Consulting
London, UK
Case Station
Madison, WI
Cat Care Clinic
Madison, WI
City Dog Vet
Issaquah, WA
Cortac Group
Madison, WI
FarWell
Madison, WI
Guardian Whiskers
Madison, WI
Ian’s Pizza
Madison, WI
Kayser
Madison, WI
Kiio
Madison, WI
Kuhl Entertainment
Madison, WI
MHB Real Estate
Madison, WI
Midwest Horse Fair
Sun Prairie, WI
Next Step Forward Africa
Bothell, Washington
Phillips
Madison, WI
Redevelopment Resources
Ludington, MI
Sexy Nomad
Madison, WI
Slop Frog
Madison, WI
State Street Brats
Madison, WI
Taradiddle
Osage, IA
the art of education
Antigo, WI
Volm Companies
Madison, WI
Wellbe
Madison, WI
Wolf Flow
Brooklyn, NY
Wonderwheel Recordings
Contact · Winter 2027 slate: open
Tell us what you’d like to fix.
You’ll start with a call with one of the partners about how the business runs today. From there we usually write up a plan and an estimate, so you can see the work and the cost before you commit.
We take on a handful of clients each season and will tell you within a week whether we have room.
Start a project
[email protected]