Can we talk about how white space actually matters

I was making a flyer for my neighbor's garage sale last weekend and I jammed every single item onto the page. Prices, times, directions, photos, all crammed together. I printed it out and it looked like a wall of text nobody would ever read. My neighbor took one look and said 'I can't find the start time anywhere in this mess.' That hit me pretty hard. So I made a second version with big gaps between each section and way less stuff on it. She actually smiled and pointed right to the time. I never realized leaving empty space could make the important things stick out so much. Anyone else struggle with this urge to fill every inch?

2 comments

2 Comments

tessawebb2d ago

Ha, my friend did the exact same thing with her bake sale menu.

the_gray1d ago

Oh man, that reminds me of this time I helped a buddy with his food truck menu and we spent three hours arguing about whether to call something "artisan" or just "handmade." In my experience, the simpler names always win with customers. @tessawebb, your friend probably ran into the same kind of overthinking trap I did. We ended up scrapping half the fancy descriptions and just went with "good cookies" and "decent brownies," and people ate them up anyway.