Parallax Scrolling & an Out-of-the-Box Insurance Agency

Parallax website design cartoonLynnae Insurance Group certainly breaks the insurance industry stereotype.

First, it’s easy to see the difference from its outward appearance. There are no old guys in suits carrying briefcases. In fact, Lynnae owners Mike and Jill Kahn look more like they’d be running a trendy local restaurant than an insurance agency. There’s no humdrum office space with bad coffee. Their place is sleek and modern, and they even have an espresso machine if you’re looking for a little pick me up before your life, home, or car insurance meeting.

Secondly, and most importantly, Lynnae prides itself on being different and not merely in outward appearances. The business is family-owned. Mike and Jill have been building relationships with hundreds of families over the past 10 years. For Lynnae, it’s not “business as usual.”

Lynnae goes beyond the typical insurance agency look-and-feel and it needed a website that emphasized that philosophy.

“Our vision was to have a totally different looking website than any other insurance site on the web. We wanted a site to match our culture of being young and up-to-date with technology,” said owner Mike Kahn. “With the flood of competition, we knew that if it didn’t look different, we would get lost in all the other insurance websites.”

With that in mind, Back40’s team of designers and developers began the process of creating a site that was both professional and innovative.

The newly launched site is as sleek and modern as Lynnae’s office space. One notable feature is the parallax scrolling on the homepage, a motion feature designed in 2011 by a Nike web designer. It’s the espresso machine of web design: super hip.

T”he thing about parallax scripting is there is a lot of stuff you can borrow out on the web to take shortcuts. But none of the available options reflected
Mike’s vision of the website, so we decided we needed to code this thing from scratch if we were gonna get it right,” said Matt Milburn, Back40’s Senior Web
Developer. “It took some patience, reverse engineering and a lot of javascript
tweaking but we ended up with something unique that we were happy with.”

The parallax effects allow users to discover all Lynnae has to offer in a unique way. As the user scrolls down, scripted elements come into view animating Lynnae’s core business messages. It’s a sort of journey, a building of a relationship, and very much like how Mike and Jill envision their relationships with their clients. The site reinforces “discovery.”

On Lynnae’s website you won’t find bullet lists, “buy now” buttons, or rate calculators. It’s not how Mike and Jill do business. They work one-to-one with their clients and custom tailor plans to meet their needs.

Their website is a prime example of Back40’s innovation. Just like Lynnae, our business is not”business as usual.” It’s all about vision, collaboration, and creativity.

Check out the parallax scrolling feature at www.lynnaeinsurance.com