How Two High School Friends Turned a Summer Project Into A Global Design Agency

Amber and Tian met on middle school bus ride to Connecticut. Little did they know, they would become co-founders of a youth-led creative agency.

At first, they barely spoke. But over the years, a shared love for design, social media, and entrepreneurship brought them closer—and eventually, into co-founders of PRISIT, a youth-led creative agency offering free graphic design services to student founders and nonprofits around the world.

What began as a summer project turned into a thriving global team. With over 2,000 designs created for 200+ clients and a peak following of nearly 10,000, PRISIT is now a creative hub for young designers.

Let’s see how Amber and Tian built this community from the ground-up!

#1: How did you two become interested in graphic design, social media, and creative work?

Amber: I started experimenting with Canva when I was 12 and I immediately loved it. I took my first real design class in high school. That gave us inspiration for the foundation of the organization.

But what inspired us to take on the task of building a strong social media presence was how often the two of us were on social media. When I was younger, I actually went viral online playing Roblox.

Tian: I had a similar experience too with a TikTok edit page. We had a lot of similarities.

#2: What is PRISIT today?

Amber: We’re a student-run graphic design agency that offers free branding and creative services to nonprofits and youth-led initiatives. That includes logos, social media posts, reels, even full visual campaigns.

Tian: Sometimes it’s just one design for a client - most of the times, we have clients who request multiple designs for the long-term! I’d estimate we’ve worked with over 200 clients and produced more than 2,000 unique designs.

Amber: At our peak, we also built a following of nearly 10,000 people.

#3: Your team built a following of nearly 10,000 people. What was your strategy?

Amber: Honestly, the process was all trial and error. We posted a lot of content that didn’t get traction and our following was stagnant for a long time (200 followers). But we made sure to keep consistent. It wasn’t until we started implementing Reels and UGC content when things took off. One reel finally went viral and that changed the trajectory of the entire project.

Tian: We’ve also been able to build out our team which helps us manage everything. We have Directors of Operations who handles mainly client work & client communication. We also have Social Media Managers who post the most consistently, and Director of Marketing Communications who help promote our competitions and events.

#4: What made PRISIT stand out compared to similar student initiatives?

Tian: All of our services are free.

At the same time what we do lets members of our team build their own portfolio early and be able to share their designs/skills out there.

Amber: For us it’s a win-win situation. Our designers love what they’re doing. And our whole team is so young that we have the best understanding of trends. PRISIT’s always been a warm, welcoming community. And we try to treat all of our clients & members as friends than just strictly professional partners.

#5: What/who has left a lasting impression on you from PRISIT?

Amber: So Haley is one of our current presidents. We appointed her because she’s so amazing. She’s so talented at design and hardworking. We decided to give her a space to create her own workshop where she’d teach people how to use Canva, alongside different tips and tricks.

Tian and I were just monitoring the workshop but I was super touched by seeing Haley in action. She was doing such a great job, and I was just so proud.

Tian: Yeah, I remember being on the workshop and I learned so many things from her that I did not know before. I had no idea Canva had all these features even with a free account. Haley is seriously so amazing.

Amber: It was really cool to see the progression as well.

Tian: We love you, Haley.

#6: For a current student who’s passionate about graphic design & wants to start a similar organization - what are the best practices?

Amber: Start small. You can’t do everything at once.

Then figure out your own brand image - because to be a graphic design company, you have to have good quality content yourself - have your own logo, color palette, and typography.

As for creating a team: reach out to people you know in-person first. It’s hard to find that in high school sometimes, but the Internet is a big resource. You can always find people on social media to connect with on Linked-in.

Tian: I agree with all those things. I also feel like even if things aren’t going well, don’t give up. You never know when you’re going to blow up one day and then everything’s going to change.

Amber: I’m really grateful we started it early because if you were telling me to start it in sophomore or junior year, I wouldn’t have done it. I remember as a junior, I was trying to embark on a different project, and it just did not work out. There was way too much on my plate.

Last piece of advice is to reflect on everything you post and everything you do, especially within graphic design and marketing. We changed our structure like a bajillion times because our old model just wasn’t working.

Tian: As we grew, we had more social media managers too because one manager for 50 people was not enough.

Finally, if you have a business partner or another friend you want to do something with, do it with them. Amber and I both motivated and pushed each other to work on PRISIT. There were times that I wanted to give up, but Amber was like, “no, we’re not giving up.”

You can definitely go even further knowing there’s always someone there to be cheering you on.

Stay Connected

• PRISIT’s official website: https://design-prisit.square.site/

• Amber’s Linked-In

• Tian’s Linked-In