I'm a Boulder Colorado-based cartoonist, humorist, and illustrator - and began writing and drawing when I was old enough to hold a crayon without also eating it. This early self-imposed dietary restriction led to work for some school media and newspapers, (the pre-school media outlet was the back of a spare Pampers.)

Later, at the University of Illinois, I worked part-time as a cartoonist, columnist, and editor at the Daily Illini newspaper.

After graduation, I was an art director for a 10,000 employee company near Chicago creating artwork and humor for sleep-inducing presentations - to firms like Boeing, Ford, General Motors, and Northrup Grumman. In my spare time, I also created political cartoons for syndication to newspapers.

After two years, I quit my corporate job and moved to Colorado, to ski and to create a comic strip for international syndication. The former takes little effort, making it a perfect counter to the latter, which is a pursuit with notoriously low odds of success. 

"The largest syndicate, King Features, received 6,000-8,000 submissions a year, and chooses one. Sometimes they choose none. It is harder than becoming a professional athlete."   - Darby Conley, New York Times. I failed to beat those odds, for a while.

But finally, I became (only slightly) more respectable when King Features offered me a contract...and six months later, much more so when I met my future wife. (A good year.) Three years after that, I signed a contract with Tribune Media to create a second comic strip.

I wrote and drew multiple comics for several years, and having them also published in the Denver and Boulder newspapers allowed my neighbors to think I was more than "that grinning idiot". (I became the guy with the same name as the the cretin on the comics page.)

Unfortunately, my timing was terrible, as newspapers were languishing, and closing. Over 3,200 newspapers closed within three years. Most of the remaining papers cut their comics pages by 50%  - eliminating half of the cartoonists...particularly affecting the new folks like me. Contract payments diminished. As one of my colleagues at King Features said, it was like finally making it to the major leagues and being told the stadiums are closing, so there’s no place to play.

With a new family, I took a part-time job, and also began illustrating books and writing & drawing humor for corporations. The latter grew beyond my expectations, so I withdrew from newspapers, (which are now sadly on life-support.)

Shift to today: I draw and write humor full-time, (and then some). It's more fun than I could have ever imagined. My corporate clients range from startups to familiar folks, like Coca Cola, Fidelity Investments, Google, McDonalds, Ralph Lauren and Time Warner. I've also had the good fortune to illustrate over 40 books - published by Penguin-Random House, MacMillan, Pearson, Harvard Business Review Press, Prentice Hall, & McGraw-Hill, including some bestsellers.

It may sound like I've grown and evolved, but I haven't really. At times, I'm still mildly tempted to chew/suck on my drawing utensils. But I use a digital drawing pen now, so there is a 120 volt incentive not to do so. (Technology has come a long way.)

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My Process

The best cartoons are more than just funny drawings. It's usually the written idea that makes you laugh first  - with the artwork adding punctuation and flair. So, I like to start with ideas. If you already have ideas for cartoons or illustrations, I can create publishing quality artwork to bring them to life.

If you need help (or are feeling stuck) with concepts or ideas, I can either spray some verbal WD-40 in appropriate areas, or dive in head-first with humor writing.

98% of my clients are outside of my home state of Colorado...so I can create something for you, no matter where you are.

My agent helps to procure some of my work, but if you found me here, feel free to contact me directly. I'm often scheduled 2-3 weeks ahead, and that allows me to be fairly selective, choosing projects for which I feel I can do excellent work. But if you have ideas burning within you to come to life, I'm happy to discuss them with you now.

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Partial Client List (alphabetical):
 

Akamai/AWS, The American Red Cross, Arista Records, Armour Foods, The Atlantic Magazine,  AT Internet-France, Ball Horticultural, Bayer Pharmaceutical, Better Business Bureau, (national office), Blackrock Investments, Boeing Aviation, Boars Head Meats, Breck's Bulbs, Burpee Seeds, CapGemini - Paris, Coca Cola, Cold Stone Creamery, Cisco Systems, CNBC News, Eckrich Meats, Fidelity Investments, Forbes Magazine, General Motors, Golin Public Relations, Google, Granite Corp., Harvard Business Review Press, Hearst Corporation, Home Depot, Hubspot, Intel Corp., Kroger Foods, McDonald's, Macmillan Books, McGraw-Hill Books, McKesson Healthcare & Pharma, Merck Pharmaceutical, Merk Investments, NBC's Today Show, Northwestern Mutual, Pelican Books, Penguin Books, Pepsi, Prentice Hall/Pearson Press, Popl Inc., Ralph Lauren-Polo, Random House Books, Roche Pharmaceutical, Smithfield, Spyder Sportswear, Stanford Business School,  Steel Case Inc., Steuben Foods, SunTrust Financial, Taco Bell, Time Warner, Towers Watson, Univ. of Colorado, Dartmouth Univ., Univ. of Delaware, Univ. of Southern California, Univ. of Toronto, The Wall Street Journal, Wiley & Sons Publishers, Zoom Info Technologies, Zscaler.

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Feel free to stop by my blog to see what I've been working on.

Disclaimer: It may be antiquated, as journaling is my last priority when I am under deadlines, or hanging out with family, (or skiing, mountain biking, reading a good book...)