WHAT IS A GRAPHIC SHOP CONCEPT?

A graphic shop is a book where a graphic designer offers to make graphics such as book covers, profile pictures, or banners, in exchange for payments such as votes on the designer's books or promotion for the designer.

To make their graphic shop stand out among other books, a designer might give their graphic shop a concept, a certain theme that makes the book well-organized and interactive. A popular graphic shop concept is the cafe concept, where a designer sets up their shop like a cafe, where they're the cafe owner offering graphics as if they're drinks and treats. They're not actually making drinks or treats, but the cafe concept makes a simple graphic exchange more fun and interesting!

DOES YOUR CONCEPT NEED TO BE CREATIVE?

The concept you choose doesn't necessarily need to be creative, but the way you present the concept is what matters! As mentioned earlier, the cafe concept is popular among graphic shops, so if you choose to give your shop a cafe concept, you'll have to find ways to make it stand out compared to the other shops.

If you're looking for graphic shop concepts or ways to make your concept ideas stand out, I hope I can help you through my ideas here! Feel free to use any of my ideas. You don't need to ask for my permission to use them, but I'd appreciate some credit if you do use them!

NOTE! ― TEMPLATES.

Many graphic shops include templates: ready-made covers with certain layouts that can be customized according to a customer's book! Designers usually name their templates so customers can easily differentiate and choose specific templates that they want. My concept ideas will also include name ideas for templates!

1! ― CAFE / BAKERY.

Notes: Cafe and bakery concepts are the most popular concepts that I've seen in graphic shops. They're super similar, so I just put them together here (though I guess bakeries are more food-based.) Since they're such popular concepts, it's important to make your cafe/bakery concept unique! Giving it a memorable name and an eye-catching look will help make your shop stand out. 

Function/Interaction: The designer is a cafe/bakery owner who makes drinks and treats for their customers! Customers will browse what the shop has to offer, then order whatever they'd like!

Template Names: The templates could be displayed like a menu of drinks and treats! The templates could be named after types of coffee or foods such as donuts or cakes. 

Extra Ideas: Cafes and bakeries sometimes have special drinks or foods made only for a limited amount of time. You could make an extra set of templates and promote them as a once-in-a-lifetime deal, or you could allow a larger number of customers to order from you for a month! This can make the shop more fun, and people would just have to take advantage of these deals. 

2! ― COMFORT.

Notes: I haven't seen any graphic shops with a comfort concept. It's a cute sort of concept, and if you make simple, light-hearted graphics, I think this would be a great concept to use! 

Function/Interaction: The designer and the customer are friends! If the customer is in need of some emotional help, the designer can provide them with comforting things. 

Template Names: The graphics could be named after comforting things, such as blankets, cookies, hugs, smiles, music, etc.! 

Extra Ideas: When giving a customer their requested graphics, you could write a little letter to them, complimenting them and thanking them for their time!

3! ― MUSIC PLAYLIST.

Notes: I've seen a couple graphic shops with a music playlist concept. It's a fun way to share your favorite songs with other people!

Function/Interaction: The designer is sharing a playlist of their favorite songs, and the customer can choose certain songs they'd like to listen to and also share some of their favorite songs too!

Template Names: The templates could be named after your favorite songs or even popular songs that you know plenty of other people enjoy. 

Extra Ideas: To make your shop a little more unique, you could name your templates after songs that fit those templates! For example, you could name templates with serious/dark themes after serious/dark songs, or fun templates after fun songs! This would also make your templates look more organized and memorable. 

4! ― MOVIES / TV SHOWS.

Notes: I've seen a few graphic shops with a movie/tv show concept. It's similar to the music playlist concept, where you can share your love of movies and tv shows with other people! 

Function/Interaction: Maybe the designer works at a movie theater and they're showing the customer different movies they can watch. Or maybe the designer and the customers are friends and they're trying to choose a movie or tv show to watch together! 

Template Names: The templates could be named after the movies or tv shows to choose from. They could also be named after movie/tv show characters, or anything else related to certain movies/tv shows. 

Extra Ideas: Similarly to the music playlist concept, you could name your templates after movies that fit those templates! For example, you could name templates with serious/dark themes after thriller or horror movies, or fun templates after comedies! This would also make your templates look more organized and memorable. 

5! ― GARDEN.

Notes: I don't think I've seen any graphic shops with a garden concept. It's pretty intricate and maybe complicated, at least the kind of ideas I have for this concept, but I think it'd be very fun and interactive!

Function/Interaction: The designer owns a garden, and the customer is helping them garden plants, or maybe the customer is ordering plants to be planted by the designer! When the customer requests a graphic or a template from the designer, it's like they're choosing a pack of seeds for a certain plant. Then, the designer plants the customer's chosen seeds, takes care of the plant as it grows, then gives the customer their plant after it's all done growing! Which is basically just the designer working on a graphic then giving it to the customer. (I hope that makes sense! I honestly love this concept, and I would love to see someone do it!)

Template Names: The templates could be named after plants, such as flowers, fruits, or vegetables! They could also be named after bushes or trees, it's up to you!

Extra Ideas: I don't really have anymore ideas, but I think there are a lot of ways you can adapt this idea and make it unique!

6! ― BOUTIQUE / CLOTHING STORE.

Notes: This concept is something I haven't seen in any graphic shops, but I'd absolutely love to see it! I think it'd be very fun to make a little pretend clothing line with accessories and makeup and shoes (when they're actually just graphics haha)!

Function/Interaction: The designer is a boutique/clothing store owner, and they're selling clothes, shoes, and accessories to the customer!

Template Names: The templates could be named after specific kinds of clothes, such as blazers, turtlenecks, blue jeans, combat boots, fluffy socks, etc.! 

Extra Ideas: Book cover templates could be named after main clothing items, like shirts and pants, while theme/profile picture templates could be named after accessories, like hats and bags and jewelry. 

7! ― FLOWER SHOP.

Notes: This concept is similar to the garden concept, but this concept is flower-focused and there's no seed-planting function/interaction. I've seen a handful of graphic shops with this concept, and I understand why because flowers are really really pretty!

Function/Interaction: The designer is a flower shop owner who gives the customer the flowers they want! 

Template Names: The templates could be named after certain flowers!

Extra Ideas: Just like in the comfort concept, you could write little letters for the customers when you give them their flowers!

8! ― MAGIC.

Notes: I think I've seen a few graphic shops with magic concepts, but they're all very different because there's a lot you can do with a magic concept! Magic itself is a really fun theme to play around with, so using a magic concept can make your graphic shop lots of fun! 

Function/Interaction: The function/interaction depends on what kind of magic concept you choose to use. If you go for a witchcraft sort of concept, you could be a witch/wizard offering the customer potions! Or if you go for a wizardry/sorcery concept, you could be a masterful sorcerer teaching the customer certain spells/powers! 

Template Names: The templates could be named after kinds of potions, spells, powers, etc.! They could also be named after magical items such as wands, staffs, or magical jewelry- the possibilities are endless!

Extra Ideas: I don't really have any ideas for a general magic concept, but I might be able to come up with more ideas for more specific magic concepts! You can be as creative as possible with a magic concept because anything goes!

9! ― SPACE.

Notes: I think there might be a few graphic shops with space concepts, but there aren't any that I can really remember. Space concepts are similar to magic concepts. They're both really flexible concepts that you can have lots of fun with! 

Function/Interaction: Just like the magic concept, the function/interaction depends on what kind of space concept you choose to use. You could be a space travel captain giving the customer a tour of space, or maybe you're leading a team of space travelers to different planets! That's just one idea out of so many possible ideas you could come up with! 

Template Names: Templates could be named after planets or maybe space bodies such as stars or asteroids. They could also just be named after space-related things, like rockets and moons and constellations. 

Extra Ideas: Again, the extra ideas you could come up with depends on the specific kind of space concept you choose to use. There are endless possibilities!

10! ― WORD MAKER.

Notes: This is a really weird, random concept idea that I added last-minute. I've never seen a graphic shop with this concept because it's not even well-organized in my head yet, but I think it sounds fun!

Function/Interaction: When a customer requests a graphic from the designer, the customer will give the designer a little random combination of one consonant and one vowel, like go, ot, um, py, etc. Then, maybe after three or so customers have requested graphics, the designer will put together all of their letter combinations to create a new random word! For example, the letters I listed earlier would create the word: gootumpy! And the customers who helped make the word could decide the definition of the newly created word! (Such a weird idea lmao-)

Template Names: I don't have any ideas for how templates would play into this concept, but you're free to come up with ideas yourself!

Extra Ideas: I think this concept might be too small of an idea to be its own concept. This word-making concept could be a little fun function part of a bigger concept. Like maybe a magic concept could include a word maker function to create new names for spells! 

STORY-DRIVEN CONCEPTS.

I used to see a lot of story-driven concepts in graphic shops, but now that sort of concept as stopped being used. Story-driven concepts are just concepts that follow a story of some sort. Every update in the graphic shop would reveal more of the story, which would make the book more fun to look forward to! It's basically a graphic shop with a story to go along with it. 

Using a story-driven concept for your graphic shop can really hook people in to follow your designing and writing journey! It can, however, be a bit time-consuming and requires a lot of preparation to execute well (though I guess that depends on how intricate you want the story to be). 

THE SKY'S THE LIMIT!

Personally, I get bored by graphic shops with generic concepts. I love when designers add a twist or extra flavor to a concept that's been used countless times before. Try something new with the layout of your shop or with the concept itself! Go crazy with it! 

I hope I was helpful enough to get your creative juices flowing! If you'd like any specific help with your graphic shop, I'd love to help you out! Just ask and I'll help you as much as I can! 

If I think of anymore graphic shop concept ideas or tips, I'll comment them inline here!