5 pain points every designer faces (and how Kittl solves them)

A typical day in the life of a graphic designer involves creativity, collaboration, project management, and, of course, design. Juggling all these responsibilities is a challenge in itself - but five common pain points among graphic designers add unnecessary friction to the process.

From scattered workflows to managing multiple subscriptions, these pain points impact both project efficiency and work satisfaction.

Let’s dive into these five pain points - and how Kittl helps with each of them, providing a single solution that transforms how you create.

1. An excessive amount of subscriptions

The increased content demands that designers face today often means they need to rely on a collection of subscriptions to get a single job done.

Stock photos, mockups, vector and raster editing tools, and font libraries often come from separate sources – requiring separate costs. Not only does this add up financially, it complicates your project management. Jumping between tools, handling imports and exports, and managing file types wastes valuable time and energy.

That time and effort adds up – and it’s avoidable.

The solution: 

Kittl consolidates everything into a single tool, offering an extensive range of design assets. Here’s a quick breakdown of the assets you have access to in Kittl:

Stock photos

Kittl includes a library of stock photos that can be used directly in your designs. The collection covers a variety of themes, from business and lifestyle to creative and abstract visuals, all available for commercial use without additional costs.

Textures

Kittl offers a wide range of textures to add depth and enhance your designs. Gradients, patterns, and more organic styles like grunge effects, are all easily adjustable with blending features to suit specific project needs.

Backgrounds

A wide range of background options, including gradients, patterns, walls, and landscapes are available and easily customizable with blending features, giving you control of the image properties.

Templates

Thousands of free, professionally designed templates are available for everything from marketing, business, branding materials to merchandise, stationary, and art prints. All templates are fully editable, allowing you to quickly customize them to fit your vision.

Icons

A library of scalable icons, ranging from simple shapes to detailed illustrations are accessible directly in the editor. These icons are categorized and searchable, so you can easily add visual elements to your designs without needing external resources.

Fonts

You’ll find iconic fonts you already know and love, like Futura, Helvetica, Courier, and Times, alongside hundreds of unique fonts exclusive to Kittl - all free for commercial use. 

Mockups

Kittl includes a built-in mockup generator with a wide variety of image options. You can easily create realistic mockups for merchandise, stationery, and apparel without leaving the editor. We even have a selection of apparel mockups modelled by Kittl team members for a unique and authentic look.

With Kittl, you can say goodbye to multiple subscriptions and instead benefit from one streamlined design platform and one subscription cost.

2. Difficult collaboration

With high content demands across multiple channels, effective collaboration is more important than ever in the graphic design space. Yet, it’s often far from seamless. Feedback tends to come from multiple sources – email, Slack, and project management tools like ClickUp or Monday – and edits are hard to track. Having a professional business email setup can help organize communication and maintain clarity throughout the collaboration process.

With traditional collaboration processes, designers frequently need to export files to share updates, only to return to the editor to make edits. Then repeat the process after receiving more feedback. This cycle creates multiple file versions, leaving teams buried in emails or messages and unsure which version is correct.

This broken approach isn’t just frustrating – it’s inefficient, creating confusion amongst team members and prolonging project timelines.

The solution: 

Kittl enables real-time collaboration directly in the editor. Designers, marketers, managers, and other stakeholders can work on the same project simultaneously, with visibility into each other’s movements.

With commenting mode, feedback is made simple – no more endless email threads and scattered edit requests. Everything happens directly in the design tool, making feedback clear and actionable.

Additionally, Kittl allows you to manage user permissions, letting you control who can view, edit, or manage each design. So you can invite clients or stakeholders to leave feedback without giving them editing access.

With everything happening in one place, collaboration becomes smoother, faster, and far more effective than traditional processes.

3. Mixed levels of design experience

In many teams, designers come from a range of skill levels. Social media managers and content marketers might need to create simple graphics, while advanced designers handle more complex projects. Finding a tool that caters to everyone’s levels and needs is a challenge.

Beginner-friendly tools often lack the depth that pro graphic designers need, while advanced platforms can overwhelm less experienced users. This means no one is able to produce their best work. And the result is inconsistent quality across projects.

The solution: 

Kittl is designed to meet the needs of both beginners and experts. Its intuitive design interface makes it easy for newcomers to create professional-looking designs without a steep learning curve. 

At the same time, Kittl offers advanced features for more experienced users to create highly customized, professional-grade work. Plus, Layout Tools such as intelligent snapping, rulers, and grids make precision editing easy for all levels.

This accessibility empowers beginners to grow their skills while supporting the needs of experienced designers. This flexibility ensures that everyone can contribute to producing high-quality designs.

4. Scattered materials and multiple file types

Design assets are often scattered across different platforms, folders, and drives, creating unnecessary chaos. Designers frequently waste time searching for the right file or branding asset. Even worse, inconsistencies arise when team members use outdated logos, mismatched fonts, or incorrect colors.

Without a centralized system, maintaining brand consistency becomes a challenge.

The solution: 

Kittl solves this problem with brand kits. These kits serve as a single source of truth for those assets you return to again and again. 

You can store everything from brand colors and typography to logos and design elements in one easily accessible location.

With Brand Kits, everyone on your team – or anyone you invite – can pull from the same collection of resources. This ensures that all designs are on-brand and consistent, saving time and preventing mistakes.

5. Messy, inefficient workflows

A smooth creative flow is essential for designers, but messy processes can knock you off track. But a common problem we’re still witnessing in the design community is inefficient workflows that create blockers between design stages. 

Every step from moodboarding, editing, and gathering feedback to presenting and more require different tools, breaking smooth workflows. Having to jump between different tools, file types, and endless imports and exports creates unnecessary friction, interrupting focus and slowing progress.

A 2022 Harvard Business Review study of 20 teams, totalling 137 users across three Fortune 500 companies, revealed that the average user toggled between different apps and websites nearly 1,200 times each day.

This constant switching disrupts their natural flow and breaks attention, a serious issue highlighted by a separate study showing that approximately 45% of people experience decreased productivity during context switching.

Beyond being a time-waster, inefficient workflows also often cause frustration that impacts work satisfaction. It can even put a strain on team or client relationships, especially if it’s causing delays or miscommunications.

The solution: 

With all the capabilities listed above, Kittl brings everything you need into one centralized place. Whether you’re brainstorming, designing, presenting, or collecting feedback, Kittl seamlessly integrates every stage of the design process into one platform.

This all serves to keep your workflow smooth and uninterrupted. 

Unlock your best design workflow

You don’t have to deal with these graphic design pain points anymore! Kittl eliminates them with an all-in-one platform that’s efficient, collaborative, and built to meet your needs. 

As a platform created by designers for designers, Kittl is uniquely equipped to understand and tackle the frustrations of jumping between tools, miscommunication, and unnecessary file management. 

Our firsthand experience with these challenges allows us to empower designers of all levels with tools that genuinely enhance their creative process, enabling them to produce their best work in the most efficient way possible.

Are you ready to upgrade your design workflow? Sign up for free and get started with Kittl today.