Founder

EARLY YEARS

Townsend learned to crawl and draw at the same time. His first scribble was a rabbit. His mother regularly drove him to the Museum of Natural History and Hayden Planetarium in New York where his imagination ran wild. He drew animals and gazed upon star shows for hours. At Lyncrest Elementary School (Fair Lawn NJ), he wrote a lengthy poem on the fall of Pompeii (Italy) and published haiku in the local newspaper. His first exposure to technology was building robots in the school’s Gifted & Talented (G&T) program.

COLLEGE

Townsend earned his first dollar in marketing as a student at the University of Richmond (1992). He designed music packaging for local groups. During a rare snowstorm, when he was prepared to present to his sculpture class, he instead walked the class to a nearby field where his band performed. The band again joined him in a Japanese art and culture class to perform a reworking of a beloved renga poem. Townsend was a regular contributor to The Messenger, a Richmond-based literary magazine. One of his short stories (Torn) was runner-up for the Margaret Owen Finck Award for Creative Writing.

PROFESSIONAL CAREER

Townsend’s agency career began at Landslide Creative Services (1994). A former classmate saw his potential and offered an internship-to-hire arrangement. He then contributed at a division of The Martin Agency (Richmond VA), Zinc Agency (Washington DC), SQN Branding, Billy Casper Golf (Tysons Corner VA), SplashKit, ESTMKTG, and now leads Glimpse Digital (Fairfax VA).

INNOVATION

Townsend has always been driven by doing things better. His modifications to a line of beanbag chairs for Gold Medal Products (Richmond VA) directly lead to today’s loungers for gamers. He transformed a bulky annual report for Pact International (Washington DC) into a menu you could unfold and read in minutes. To challenge architects, he once portrayed Washington DC as a plain ice cube tray (turned upside down) on the cover of the American Institute of Architects’ monthly magazine. He was an early adopter (and later opponent) of Flash technology on websites. He pushed the merits of ebooks and released work through a digital imprint while the publishing industry wondered what was next.