Working together: Eye-catching, business-building

Editor’s note: This short feature is one of several brief looks at local professional collaborations included in Xpress’ Business-to-Business Issue. 

Artist and muralist Jerry Cahill has worked with dozens of local businesses to bring a little color to their marketing efforts.

Whether handprinting T-shirts for local breweries from his co-owned studio at RAD Printworks in the River Arts District or creating eye-catching murals on buildings and vehicles, Cahill says that the ability to work with local business owners is one of the things that attracted him to Asheville years ago.

“Creativity can be a currency. It can help you connect,” says Cahill. “I feel like art is just a form of communication. When I work with local businesses, I get to have a conversation with them that helps them learn something about their work and share their brand.”

One of his recent collaborations was with local woman-owned junk removal and moving service, Move It Or Lose It. Owner Amalia Grannis first opened the business in 2020 after purchasing an old-box truck.

“It was a used U-Haul,” remembers Grannis. “It was like the sketchiest box truck you could imagine showing up to move your stuff.”

Since Cahill added his distinctive vision to Move It Or Lose It’s otherwise ordinary moving van in 2021, Grannis says that business has grown significantly.

“We’re a spectacle. Sometimes people are rubbernecking as we drive down the road,” Grannis says with a laugh.

Grannis says that working with local artists both helps support the community and create a unique product that drives business.  

“Relationship building is really the most important thing in life, as far as I’m concerned,” says Grannis. “I could have spent this money on Google ads or other social media ads. But instead, my entire advertising budget was cash money into a local artist’s hand. And that just feels aligned with my values.”