Relax is excited to welcome Rubén Pérez as he takes on his new role as Marketing Creative Lead. Rubén joins the company with just shy of 20 years’ design experience and will be responsible for the creative direction, visual communication and design operations within the marketing department. Prior to joining, he occupied similar roles at Swintt, GiG, and Cherry.
Outside of work hours, Rubén spends his time experimenting to accomplish the ultimate ceviche recipe and endlessly researching branding, marketing, and design; seeking outstanding creativity, storytelling and UX. With a high-visibility role for the brand, we sat down with our latest teammate to get to know the person behind the portfolio and fantastic track record.
• First things first, what are you looking forward to tackling at Relax Gaming?
The main challenge will be to elevate the creative team output to ensure that the brand and products’ marketing reach is optimised via every channel we have available. The company has achieved great success on the business front and I’d like to ensure that the branding and marketing efforts can match the impact and level of excellence accomplished. Relax offers a variety of products to different audiences, and I am particularly interested in making sure we communicate the correct values to the relevant segment, in a clear, distinctive, and memorable way.
• What’s the best part about being a Creative Lead and what’s the most challenging?
The best part is always the interaction with the team members. How we approach projects, collaborate and find new ways to raise the bar together. I love fostering out-of-the-box thinking in others and boosting motivation to enable each individual to reach new heights. I particularly enjoy mentorship, helping and facilitating everyone’s work and personal development, it’s very rewarding for both parties.
The most challenging aspect is always trying to strike the right balance between expectations, time, resources, quality, and most importantly, creating a process and a result that works internally and externally.
• What’s your proudest project to date?
I like to believe that my proudest project is always the one I’m currently working on. I am particularly critical in this way, and expect that each project will be better than my last.
I believe in constant improvement and that the only way for one to keep refining his/her skills is by resisting the thought that you’re great at what you do and have done your best work. Self-esteem is good, but self-criticism is better! Personal criticism will keep you hungry; researching, reading, learning new skills, tools, and disciplines. I like to live thinking that the best is yet to come!
All that said, I’m still proud of the work I’ve done in the past, namely Volvo’s XC60 website back in 2008/09 and developing the Motiongraphics approach for Banc Sabadell between 2013-2015. In iGaming, I was really happy with the Betspin rebrand, which unfortunately never came to fruition due to a business re-structure, and the work I did for Thrills right before it became a Pay’n’Play product.
• You describe yourself as a ‘natural-born designer and brand strategist’, tell us a bit about where that came from, did you recognise your passion early on?
I’ve always been drawn to art and creativity. When I was 10 I started copying drawings I liked, by 12 I made my first clay stop-motion animation, and at 14 I was doing graffiti. However, I didn’t realise that art could be developed into a career until I was around 19, travelling through Brazil, where a friend of mine drew my attention to a cigarette packet that lay in front of us, he explained how people work to develop packaging, how they play with colours, shapes and type, using art to create brands and identities.
When I returned home to Barcelona, I came across a Graphic Design for Advertisement course and didn’t think twice before applying. It was an exciting time to be part of the field, graphic design was just starting to incorporate computers into the design process, can you imagine? It was 1998, and back then the iMac looked like an egg.
As the years went by, I grew more and more interested in the preliminary stages of a project – identifying audience’s needs, devising strategies to meet those needs and of course, translating that into a visual direction. I was fascinated and hugely influenced by the work of a Creative Strategist at Elogia, the agency I worked at in my early days. I felt he truly understood creative direction and had a vision that could project how a creative concept and design could develop at much later stages. By following his work, I started to realise that many design projects could have been better executed if the initial direction was considered in-depth and was made flexible enough to welcome future opportunities. This ultimately led me to pursue creative and art direction myself!
• Were you the mind behind the line ‘The Sky is the Limit’ that colours your LinkedIn cover image at the moment? What does this statement mean to you?
I can’t take credit for the statement, but I completely believe in the sentiment. It means the same as Adidas’ “Impossible is Nothing” i.e.There is no limit.
The same applies to each individual’s capabilities. I believe we should all think big, reach for the stars, and challenge ourselves to execute magnificently. All in all, what this phrase says to me is to keep striving for greatness, try to do better every time and you’ll get there.
Rubén takes the helm of our creative visuals and content at an exciting time for the company. Building on rapid successes and a distinct brand look, he’ll be focusing on further elevating the brand as we move into 2021.
If you’re a talented creative looking to take on a new challenge working alongside our Creative Lead and expanding team of passionate marketeers visit our careers page, we’re always on the lookout for great talent!
