Force multipliers for startups, businesses, and agencies who need senior-level design expertise without the complexity of building an in-house team.
Speed and Quality
Most teams sacrifice one for the other—rushing to market with poor UX or perfecting features that miss the mark.
Solution:
We move fast without breaking things, delivering strategic clarity that accelerates the right decisions.
Scaling Design
Growing design capabilities without scaling headcount, overhead, or management complexity.
Solution:
Senior-level expertise from day one, with systems that scale and integrate seamlessly with your team.
Vision Alignment
Stakeholders, users, and business goals pulling in different directions, creating costly pivots and scope creep.
Solution:
Our process aligns vision with market reality, reducing risk and creating clarity for everyone.
Strategy, design, & operations that scale with you
We partner with startups, businesses, and agencies to deliver senior-level design expertise without the overhead—accelerating launches, reducing risk, and creating elegant experiences users love.
Faster launches. Stronger products. Confident teams.
Explore how we've helped teams turn complex challenges into elegant solutions—from discovery to launch and beyond.
Flexible design partnerships that match your Goals
Startups need speed. Businesses need scalability. Agencies need reliability. We deliver all three with senior-level design expertise.
Design That Solves & Engages
Increase investor confidence with a polished, user-validated product vision that clearly demonstrates market potential and a path to traction
Lower risk by validating concepts early through user research and rapid prototyping—ensuring you’re building the right product for the right audience.
Access senior-level design expertise on day one without the cost or delays of recruiting and managing an in-house team
Aligning Design to Business Outcomes
Clear, effective design strategy tailored to your goals
Product design alignment with measurable KPIs like conversion, retention, and task success
Scale projects and access senior-level UX expertise without the overhead or complexity of building and training an in-house team
Intuitive, Meaningful, and Accessible
An on-demand extension of your team, integrating seamlessly to handle overflow work and meet client deadlines without adding permanent headcount
Work that wins and retains clients, delivering polished, market-ready products and experiences that strengthen your reputation and drive repeat business
Designs that build bridges, ensuring creative vision aligns with technical execution for smoother development and faster launches
"We’re driven to create standout user experiences through empathetic, results-focused design."
A Process designed to accelerate results
Every project is unique, but our approach stays grounded: uncover insights, solve the right problems, deliver purposeful design.
Loved by Our Partners
Jonathan Chichoni Warenne
CEO, Estate Guru
Marek Juda
Digital Chief Operating Officer, Flowbird
Greg Bebenek
Chief Technology Officer, EUVIC
Engagement options for your Needs
From quick sprints to ongoing partnerships, we offer clear, transparent options that adapt to your goals, timeline, and budget.
Hourly
Best for short-term consultations, audits, or design support when scope is limited or evolving. You get direct access and fast turnaround with no long-term commitment.
Project-Based
Defined scope, schedule, and budget. This model works well for initiatives like redesigns, websites, or system builds — where outcomes and timelines are known from the start.
Retainers
Ongoing partnerships built for momentum. Retainers offer dedicated time each month with flexibility for shifting needs — ideal for product support, team extension, or continuous optimization.
Fractional Design Leadership
Access senior design leadership without the overhead of a full-time hire. A seasoned design leader embeds seamlessly with your team to shape vision, scale operations, mentor talent, and ensure your product delivers real user value. Perfect for startups, growth-stage companies, and agencies ready to reduce risk, accelerate growth, and build lasting design success.
We're not just a design studio—we're strategic partners who combine design, strategy, and operations. While most agencies focus only on visual design, we help you find clarity before investing in development, establish scalable systems, and integrate seamlessly with your existing teams. Our 20+ years of experience spans enterprise-level fintech, mobility, and SaaS platforms, so you get senior-level strategic thinking from day one.
We generally follow a proven 4-phase approach: Discover (understand, research), Define (synthesize insights into strategy, align), Design (create ux/ui, test, iterate, etc), and Deliver (handoff to dev, implement scalable systems, launch websites, define metrics to be monitored, etc). Engagements vary depending on complexity, with milestone-based payments and approval gates at each phase.
All three! We tailor our approach to each client type. For startups, we accelerate launch timelines and build investor confidence. For established businesses, we scale design capabilities without scaling headcount. For agencies, we act as a trusted extension of your team with seamless client communication and developer-ready deliverables.
Absolutely. We excel at integrating with existing teams, whether you need us to plug into your Agile workflows, collaborate in your Slack channels, or work within your Jira and Figma setups. We adapt to your processes, not the other way around. Our design operations expertise means we actually improve your team's efficiency and consistency.
Design operations (DesignOps) is what makes design scalable. It includes design systems, streamlined workflows, clear handoff processes, and team enablement. Without it, design can become a bottleneck. We've helped teams ship features 3x faster with 90% fewer inconsistencies by implementing the right systems and processes. It's the difference between design that slows you down and design that accelerates growth.
While we're based in Austin, Texas, we work with clients globally. We've successfully managed remote partnerships and can adapt to different time zones and communication preferences. Many of our best client relationships are built on clear communication and results, regardless of geography.
We offer flexible options. Start with our Discovery Sprint ($8,500) to test our partnership and validate your strategy. For specific projects, we offer fixed-scope engagements. If you need ongoing support, our retainer model provides priority access and flexible scope. You can always scale up or adjust as your needs change.
For Discovery Sprints, we can typically start within 1-2 weeks of a contract agreement, depending on the size of your project. Full partnerships depend on scope and our current capacity, but we quickly provide custom proposals and clear timelines for kickoff. We believe in moving fast without breaking things—both in our process and our client onboarding.
An idea built by a life of design
R. Eric Tomlinson – Founder & Director of Design
A Stronger Idea is the vision and passion of R. Eric Tomlinson, a seasoned cross-disciplinary design leader with over 25 years of experience.
After years contributing to agencies, startups, and enterprise tech, Eric launched A Stronger Idea in 2021 to offer a smarter, more collaborative approach to design.
As the Design Director, Eric drives the creative direction and strategic vision—while staying hands-on with design. With a network of trusted, top-tier collaborators, he builds the right team for every challenge.
Eric lives and operates in Austin, Texas.
