Case Study: ACERA

Title: ACERA Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) and Annual Report to Members

Client: Alameda County Employees’ Retirement Association (ACERA), Oakland

Background: ACERA is the public employees’ retirement organization that manages and administers a $4.3 billion fund for retirees and current employees of Alameda County. For five years, Tobi Designs has developed the concept, art direction, design and production of the 80-page CAFR and the 24-page summary report to members.

Challenge: Before coming to Tobi Designs, the CAFR suffered from choppy editorial that lacked smooth readable flow. The report’s design had a poor graphics-text relationship, resulting in a document that was hard to read. Senior management knew that most members did not bother to read it.

Solution: We put a copywriter to work making the report more readable and approachable, used pictures of actual association members and used a page layout that created a better balance between text and images. We also created a 24-page summary report that went to all the members and retirees – its brevity insured a wider readership. The full report continued to be produced in limited quantities for the readership that demanded in depth detail.