Brian Gardner is a web designer, blogger, and WordPress master. He founded the Revolution WordPress themes, back in the day, which has evolved into his well-known theme business, Studio Press. In this interview I talk with Brian about the future of the WordPress theme market and the state of Studio Press.
Name: Brian Gardner
Location: Chicago
Age: 35
Site(s): Studio Press
Twitter: @BGardner
Brian: Hi Brian, thanks for agreeing to this interview. Please tell us a little bit about yourself and your background on the internet.
Brian Gardner: I am a self taught web designer and internet consultant – everything I know has been learned by trial and error. A few years ago, I was working a day job for an architectural firm and started blogging. I really began to enjoy the idea of publishing content and when I sought out a WordPress theme to use on my blog, I couldn’t find anything I wanted. So I took a theme and started hacking away – only to find that I enjoyed that more than blogging.
Brian: What is the current state of the Premium WordPress marketplace?
Brian Gardner: The current state of the premium WordPress theme marketplace is… alive. There are a lot of newly formed theme development companies, many of which might not make it very fair due to the enormous amount of competition. This amount really has been a great thing for WordPress as a whole, as it has caused us all to push forward with better and easier ways to do things.
Brian: In 2008, when Revolution went GPL, it took the WordPress marketplace by surprise. Now, in 2010, StudioPress, your current business, is back to selling paid themes at $60 per theme. What changes have occurred that’s led to this different business model?
Brian Gardner: Ever since 2008 we have stayed GPL – our license hasn’t changed. At the beginning of that, we did provide download links our site – but chose to remove them as that isn’t a requirement of the GPL license. We really wanted to present our packages as a combination of themes/support – which is the way it is now.
Brian: You’ve spent a lot of time recently pushing the Genesis theme framework. What is your take on WordPress frameworks and their future in the Premium WordPress marketplace?
Brian Gardner: The Genesis theme framework was really a result of wanting to simplify the way we handled themes, design and updating. It only made sense since most of our themes shared common code and css to base them all of one solid core of files. While I think that there’s a place for theme frameworks, if done well – there will always be a market for traditional themes as well.
Brian: What’s next for StudioPress? What features, tools, and themes do you have planned to continue pushing the envelope for WordPress development?
Brian Gardner:This one is easy – continuing to build out Genesis as a solid choice for WordPress and develop the theme marketplace into a point where there a huge amount of designs to choose from.
Brian: What advice would you offer to young entrepreneurs looking to establish themselves in the online world?
Brian Gardner: This is a tough one – as I stated before, competition in the WP theme market is brutal. Be wise, and understand that success is not achieved overnight. It’s really important with any type of business to be unique and to offer something that the “other guy” doesn’t. Otherwise, you end up being overlooked as and considered inferior.
Thanks again to Brian Gardner for this insightful interview. Please feel free to leave your thoughts and opinions in the comments section below!
Giveaway
Brian Gardner has very kindly donated three Studio Press theme packages to you, Elite By Design’s readers. Each theme package is worth $60 and provides access to Studio Press’s support, tutorials, and the ability to download any future upgrade to the theme.
How To Win:
1. To enter this giveaway you must tweet this giveaway
2. All tweets made before April 1, 2010 will be accepted. Winners will be announced during the first week of April.
4. Three Winners will be chosen randomly.
sriganesh
March 10, 2010 at 11:03 am
nice interview and thanks brian,
RT done
http://twitter.com/animhut/status/10279656721
adone
March 10, 2010 at 11:05 am
My RT: http://twitter.com/warstwydotcom/status/10279756464 Nice read.