In April last year, JohnJohn created two games for the new Ribena Web site. The work was outsourced from Netsite Pro which was building the site. "Netsite Pro had taken on the contract, but they couldn't fulfill it all themselves. They came to us needing four games and we were the only people prepares to deliver it within the budget and the deadline." says Viellefon.

The result was a group of games based on classic computer gameplays, reworked to feature the Ribena-berry characters. The graphics are quite simple due to the file size constraints, and the games are simple and intuitive to play; by way of example, there's a multi-players racing/athletic-type game and a Ribena version of the classic Breakout-style bat and wall game.

The engine of these games have proved useful again in September last year when Dresdner Bank of Germany contacted JohnJohn for a job. "They wanted us to create a one minute movie, a CD-ROM, and a game. They gave us the brief on Friday and wanted the products by Monday 9am."

JohnJohn managed to complete the work by finding a range of images to use for the movies on the Internet, and by reusing bits of coding from the breakout-style game created for Ribena. "People often came to us with tights deadlines, to get them out of trouble." says Viellefon. "Since the new media industry has suffered its slump, things are actually better for us. People don't want the expense of a big agency and we're able to do the jobs quickly, cheaply and deliver quality results."

Electronic Arts (EA), the computer games company, is another of JohnJohn's clients. EA has localized Web sites for its products in several regions, which require translation and updating. JohnJohn had the task of working on EA's Fifa 2000 Web site and the other EA Sports site in Europe. "On top of designing pages, we had to do a lot of updating, most of the time without any style guide or technical documentation". he says "This means you have to work out what fonts are being used and follow someone else's design."

Frustrated by the restrictions of this commercial work, Viellefon and Boulanger set up JohnJohn Records in November last year. This is a record company centred around an online showcase, which also provides promotion , management, marketing and music production. This allows Viellefon to be more creative with the Web design and focus on his other passion, music, since he's a trained musician.

There are 10 bands signed to JohnJohn Records, including the established saxophonist Ted Milton from the group Blurt. Johnjohn Records receives artists portfolios, CDs, albums and demos from Europe and the US but it is very selective about the bands signed. The label has links with music producer Peter Dry, who has produced albums for several of JohnJohn's bands.

The Web site for JohnJohn Records is rolled with the site for the design agency. Delivered in cartoony Flash Animations the home page features a high street, with each shop representing a different aspect of JohnJohn. There is a design shop, a press area, stores for JohnJohn Records, the recording company and indie music. There are also shops for games and an art gallery, since JohnJohn also showcase artists and illustrators.

A lot of graphics on JohnJohn's site were drawn by Boulanger, who used to work as an illustrator. "We wanted to use a comic strip style because it's a universal language. Not so much in the UK, but in most of Europe and in the US, people grow up with comic books and there's a strong tradition" says Viellefon.

Incorporating a design agency, a records label, and an online art gallery, JohnJohn achieves a lot for a two-person operation. In these hard times for the new media industry, it's refreshing to know that there's even more room for the little guy.