Partner and Creative Director, Jeremy Banas, serves as the mind’s eye of Mirror Matter. Directing and overseeing all design creative, Jeremy works closely with fellow Partner and Creative Director, Dan Stout, ensuring brilliance and continuity across every deliverable our Creative Team executes.
What is your name? Do you prefer to go by a nickname?
Jeremy—but also Jer.
What is your role and what are you responsible for doing?
Creative Director, Design. I am responsible for making sure the creative crafted within the walls of Mirror Matter looks and functions to the best of its abilities.
How do you describe what you do to friends and family?
I conceptualize and create the visuals our clients rely on to make their brands succeed.
What’s been your favorite project to work on?
It would be impossible to pick just one. The projects that allow us to start by defining a brand’s identity and the seeing that crafted story, look and feel, and personality carry through all brand communication and advertising bring me the most pride.
What do you listen to when you’re working?
Spotify’s entire catalog.
What was your first job? Did you like it?
A plant and tree nursery. I didn’t enjoy it as a 15-year-old kid, but it taught me a lot of lessons in hard work and perseverance.
How would you describe yourself?
I’m determined, selective yet open-minded, hard on myself, but always looking for an opportunity to laugh.
How would you describe Mirror Matter?
Mirror Matter is an agency built on principles of advertising of the past, the present, and the yet-to-be-seen. We are an agency that wasn’t born to replicate what we’ve seen in the rearview mirror, but to pave a new road forward for ourselves, our clients, and the industry at-large.
Apple or Android, and why?
Apple. I used to have Android phones that would break and need replacing every year. Then I gave the ol’ iPhone 6S+ a shot and it lasted me three whole years. I’ll never go back.
How did you get linked with Mirror Matter?
After working with Dan and James for a few years, the abilities between us were recognized in a way that it became very clear new opportunities were on the horizon for us to explore.
What part of “agency life” do you like the most?
The experience that is a kernel of an idea being thrown into the air at 3AM that sparks the creation of an entire campaign, and seeing it through to the point where we’re reviewing the metrics and results of the efforts.
Ideal retirement plan?
If there comes a day where I’m not being professionally creative anymore, I would start with seeing every mile of the country through a camera lens. Having enough classic and iconic vehicles that I wouldn’t drive the same one twice in a month would be a great plan as well.
Coffee, tea, or other?
Unfortunately, anything with caffeine that isn’t coffee or tea.
What book, show, or podcast would you recommend to the world? Why?
Jay Leno’s Garage on YouTube. Not the celebrity-focused TV show, but the YouTube series. They are intimate, fascinating, and enlightening 20-40-minute episodes of Jay being his true self, dedicated to the world of cars. Without the need to fulfill TV-ratings, the episodes incredibly educate you on cars and car-related topics you wouldn’t have known existed otherwise. To quote Jay Leno, “This show will be about anything that rolls, explodes, and makes noise,” and he fulfills that to its truest extent.
Winter, Spring, Summer, or Fall? Why?
Buffalo in Summer might just be the greatest place on Earth.
What are you looking forward to most about the next year?
In the agency, I am looking forward to our team continuing to grow, succeed, and support one another. In my personal life, I am looking forward to giving myself new creative challenges, continuing to try new things, and biking across New York State again.
