Broken spoke bakery

Objectives:

Broken Spoke Bakery is a two-person operation in Grand Junction, Colorado, built on cookies, soft pretzels, and the belief that good food shouldn’t need an excuse. Amanda and Jimmy came in with a product, a name, and a clear feeling they wanted people to have, but no visual language to carry it. They were preparing to launch at the Grand Junction Farmers Market with a table, a tablecloth, and an old cruiser bike, and they needed an identity that could hold up on a folding table on a Saturday morning and still make sense on a shelf downtown a year later.

Solutions:

We started where I always start, with listening. The brand questionnaire pulled out a personality with strong opinions: unapologetic about butter and sugar, allergic to fads and dough conditioners, deeply skeptical of the eight-dollar artisan pretzel. It values consistency over novelty, hospitality over salesmanship, and being a neighbor over being a chain. That conversation shaped everything that followed, and gave the visual work a reason to exist beyond looking good.

The Process:

The real creative tension was geographic. The soft pretzel is an East Coast memory, street carts and paper wrappers and something warm handed over with no ceremony. The bakery lives in the high desert, in a valley whose whole identity is shifting toward dirt, bikes, and getting outside. The identity had to speak both languages at once.

That’s where the collared lizard came in. Desert palette with one absurd flash of color in the middle, a little quirky, a little unbothered, entirely at home here. Paired with the clunker bike already living inside the name, it gave us a mark with a sense of humor and a sense of place. Everything else followed the same rule Amanda applies to her ingredient list: flour, eggs, sugar, nothing you have to explain. Warm without being precious, no flash without substance, the kind of brand that makes you want to say hi to whoever’s behind the table.

Deliverables:

• Visual direction and mood boards
• Full logo suite (primary, secondary, brand mark)
• Custom color palette and type system
• Supporting brand elements (pattern and iconography)
• Comprehensive brand guide plus mini quick reference guide
• All final files delivered in SVG, PNG, JPG, PDF, and EPS