Merrill Lynch

Single-panel Cartoons for merrill edge retirement

It’s always appreciated when corporations realize the value of humor to promote otherwise boring and overwhelming topics like retirement planning. Even better when they hire an independent cartoonist for the job!

The media agency spearheading the project for Merrill Edge Retirement requested seven “New Yorker Magazine-like” single panel cartoons (of which they used five); they provided the captions and some basic scenarios / art direction. 

My one small regret with this project is that the artwork was requested in full color, but they ultimately posted the cartoons in grayscale; the translated values are not ideal. I’d have approached the cartoons differently had they started in grayscale, but c’est la vie! It doesn’t change the fact that this was a really fun project—I even learned some things about retirement planning.

Art Direction: Luke Meseke & Adam Shalvey of Meredith Corporation for Merrill Lynch