About Studio Plus

Studio+ is a national architecture and interior design firm with studios in Florida, Michigan, and California. Founded by Cameron Golightly and Kirsten Curtiss, the firm has grown from an eight-person practice into a multi-office team serving healthcare, education, commercial, and community sectors. Guided by the founders’ values of client focus, collaboration, and design excellence, Studio+ delivers comprehensive services from concept through completion.

The firm is recognized for going beyond standard practice, adopting emerging technologies early and integrating innovative tools into its process to enhance efficiency, accuracy, and client satisfaction. Its work is defined by functional, sustainable, and people-centered solutions that achieve client goals while improving the built environment.

Executive Summary

Studio Plus, a multi-office architectural firm specializing in healthcare, K-12, retail, and municipal projects, has successfully integrated Snaptrude into its design workflow to enhance client collaboration and accelerate project timelines. By leveraging Snaptrude's real-time design capabilities, Studio Plus has reduced pre-design phase time by 75% while significantly improving client satisfaction and engagement.

1. Rapid ROI: 75% time reduction in critical design phases delivers immediate value
2. Client Satisfaction: Interactive design process transforms client relationships. Their client expressed, "It's fully worth doing... we would do it again in a heartbeat."
3. Competitive Edge: Technology capabilities become a key differentiator in the market by cutting client pre-design time by weeks.
4. Scalable Solution: Quick learning curve enables firm-wide adoption.

Adam, Senior Designer and Project Manager at Studio Plus, recently spoke with us about his team's experience using Snaptrude. Having been with the firm for two and a half years, Adam shared first-hand insights from multiple successful project implementations, revealing how Snaptrude has transformed their client engagement and design process.

The Challenge

Studio Plus faced familiar but critical inefficiencies in their traditional design process, as Adam describes:

• Time-intensive pre-design phase: 35-40% of project effort concentrated in early design development with lengthy iteration cycles
  

• Client comprehension gaps: Non-technical clients struggled to understand architectural drawings and visualize spatial relationships, leading to misalignment and extended decision-making
  

• Workflow bottlenecks: Manual processes, software transitions, and the inability to make real-time changes during client meetings created delays and frustration
  

The Snaptrude Solution

Studio Plus integrated Snaptrude to address these challenges head-on. Adam explains their technology-forward approach: "Yeah, I push quite a bit of technology at Studio Plus... We used to use tools that were very simple to get initial designs out and work with them hand in hand... since we're capable of using something like Snaptrude and showing clients, how quick and easy this is, we've applied that in our current workflow."

Implementation Approach

Rapid Onboarding

• 1-hour training sufficiency for new users to become productive
• Intuitive interface that eliminates common CAD software complications
• Immediate productivity compared to months of training for traditional tools

Adam tested Snaptrude's learning curve with a new hire: "I had tasked her and said, you're new, you're like a sponge. Let's have you soak all the information in... she did a one hour training with you guys and was able to get something out."

He contrasts this with traditional software:

"The learning curve is quicker. It's insane how quick it is compared to something like Revit especially, or sketch up... whereas [Snaptrude] is just, gonna get you what you want quickly."

Live Client Collaboration

Direct integration into client meetings with real-time screen sharing and collaborative design sessions.

"We do involve the client a lot more," Adam explains. "We gotta keep them interacting with us. You can gauge their comfort level of what they understand really is the biggest thing."

Workflow Compatibility

• Seamless Revit integration maintaining existing file standards
• Multi-format import capabilities supporting various design inputs
• Presentation-ready outputs eliminating software switching during client meetings

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Results and Impact

Dramatic Time Savings

75% Reduction in Design Iteration Time: What previously required two full days of work now takes approximately four hours, representing a 4x improvement in efficiency.

Adam provides specific metrics on efficiency gains:

"I clocked it. Within four hours of that day, I opened Revit, exported, imported into [Snaptrude], and had a plan ready to share with our design team to figure out what to do next. That normally would've taken two full days. You'd cut your time into a quarter."

Enhanced Client Experience

Immediate Visual Feedback: Clients can see design changes in real-time, dramatically improving comprehension and decision-making speed.

Interactive Design Sessions: Live collaborative meetings where clients participate directly in the design process, leading to higher satisfaction and buy-in.

Adam recalls a particularly successful session:

"We did interactions in [Snaptrude] Live with the owner on teams calls... we loaded their program, built the plan they had initially sketched out for us. Then we jumbled it all over the place and resized and redesigned it on the call."

Project Examples

Surgery Center Projects

Adam detailed two successful surgery center implementations:

Project 1 - Standalone Surgery Center:

• Exported existing Revit program room-by-room
• Complete design iteration completed in 4 hours vs. previous 2-day timeline
• Enabled rapid design changes and client approval

"One was already designed and we were able to tweak a few things with a design change from the owner... I exported our program room by room from Revit and then imported into [Snaptrude], and it was already there."

Project 2 - Hospital-Attached Surgery Center:

• Live collaborative design sessions with out-of-state clients via Teams
• Real-time site planning and building placement optimization
• Integrated presentation materials including 3D views and reference projects
• Client feedback: "Fully worth doing... we would do it again in a heartbeat"

"The other one was even more fun... that one was attached to a hospital, so that was kind of tricky to line up bridge, access with roadways. But in [Snaptrude], we loaded their program, built the plan they had initially sketched out for us."

Adam highlights the presentation capabilities:

"We put the site plan image, we did 3D views on sheets and had sheets set up so we could easily click through... Snaptrude allowed us to import images and other projects that we've used as an example. So we used it as a presentation type, which is kind of cool."

Adam shares powerful client testimonials: Client Feedback

"I remember we had clients fly in to do a design event. They said, why are we even here? What are we gonna accomplish? We said just wait. It's gonna be worth it... Then right after that was done, we went through all that with design and moving things around [in Snaptrude]. They came up to us and said, it's fully worth doing what you guys have asked us to do, and we would do it again in a heartbeat.”

Adam sees Snaptrude as a key differentiator:

"I would say as far as getting new clients up to speed, of getting the design out in front of them... if we showcase a program and say, here's how we can do it. One, we can get you a design and work with you, live with it. And then two, we can cut your timeline down and pre-design, by weeks. So that's a good selling point."

Key Takeaways

1. Rapid ROI: 75% time reduction in critical design phases delivers immediate value
2. Client Satisfaction: Interactive design process transforms client relationships. Thier client expressed, "It's fully worth doing... we would do it again in a heartbeat"
3. Competitive Edge: Technology capabilities become key differentiator in market by cutting pre-design time by weeks.
4. Scalable Solution: Quick learning curve enables firm-wide adoption.
5. Workflow Enhancement: Integration improves rather than disrupts existing processes.

Conclusion

As Adam concludes, "Having you [Snaptrude] guys that have helped us out has really sped up our design process. So that's been important."

Studio Plus's successful integration of Snaptrude demonstrates how architectural firms can leverage modern design technology to improve efficiency and client satisfaction simultaneously.

The firm's experience, as told through Adam's detailed account, illustrates that the right technology tools can transform traditionally time-intensive processes into streamlined, collaborative experiences. "We gotta keep them interacting with us," Adam emphasizes, and Snaptrude has become the key tool enabling that interaction while delivering measurable business results.

Start designing in Snaptrude today.