Ethical Design Co.

A print and digital design agency that cares.

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Work with an award-winning annual report design agency.

As a leading annual report design agency, we don’t just make reports look good — we help you communicate your value, vision, and impact with clarity and purpose.

Our expert team partners with ethical companies, NGOs, non-profits, and purpose-driven organisations to deliver annual and corporate reports that engage stakeholders, build trust, and elevate your brand. With clean, compelling design rooted in our unique sustainability strategy, our annual report designers transform your data and achievements into a powerful storytelling tool that supports transparency, accountability, and long-term success.

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Medicines Development for Global Health Annual Report 2021 showing letter from the Managing Director spread mockup, by annual report design agency EDCo.

EDCo. has designed over 150 sustainability reports, annual reports, and other corporate reports for clients across various sectors.

We provide both standardised report design services for print and digital outputs, as well as tailored, flexible design consultancy across the full spectrum of annual and financial reporting. Whether you are developing a standalone document or require support with a digital reporting dashboard, we ensure your data and narratives are communicated with clarity and accessibility.

Annual report design agency solutions

Teal annual report or brand guidelines line icon depicting a page spread with lines and boxes to represent content
Digital PDF annual report

An accessible, digital-only PDF—beautifully branded and available in either landscape or portrait orientation—is our most popular solution. Additional interactivity, such as clickable menus and hyperlinks, can also be included to enhance user experience.

Teal logo and website design line icon representing a pen tool graphic – Ethical Design Co.
Printable annual report

An annual report designed to standard paper sizes for traditional CMYK printing. We can tailor the design for saddle stitching (ideal for smaller reports) or perfect binding (book-style), and can even manage the sustainable print process on your behalf. Learn more about our sustainable design strategy.

Teal line icon showing a desktop screen and smartphone with hearts, symbolising web design and development, annual and sustainability report design services.
Website annual report

An accessible, SEO-optimised, responsive website annual report—designed and developed as a custom project in either Webflow or WordPress. For a detailed overview of the process, see our website design service page.

Teal infographic and data visualisation service line icon showing a bar chart with a line graph above the four bars
Data visualisation and infographics

Transform complex data and KPIs into compelling visual stories—using dynamic graphs, intuitive matrices, and custom illustrations that bring your insights to life and captivate your audience.

Teal presentation and PowerPoint design service line icon depicting three stacked screens with dot point content on first screen
Summary report

Ideal for companies seeking a primarily digital or web-based report while still requiring printed materials for AGMs or other occasions, we offer beautifully designed printable summary reports that showcase your key data and highlights with clarity and impact.

Teal UX/UI dashboards and digital products line icon showing a website on a computer screen with a cog wheel in the centre
Document templates and toolkits

Editable InDesign, Word, or PowerPoint templates for internal teams or consultants to produce aligned, on-brand annual report documents each year.

Annual report design process

1

Requirements gathering and estimate

Contact us with your project details and we’ll discuss the scope of work and provide an estimate. We can also arrange a discovery call to discuss requirements if that suits you.

2

Quote sign-off and design discovery

We start by reviewing previous publications, your audiences, existing brand style guidelines and project goals to guide the creative direction and ensure our design approach aligns with your requirements.

3

Concept design

We create and present two initial design directions – featuring cover and page layout examples – for feedback and refinement. You can request more concepts for an additional fee if desired.

4

Report layout and refinement

Once you choose a concept, we work on the full report design, layout and typesetting – incorporating charts, key statistics, photography, iconography and other graphic elements.

5

Review and revisions

Our standard package includes two rounds of design feedback plus one final proofread and sign-off round to ensure the final report is accurate, polished and ready to share.

6

Final delivery and publication

We supply final files for digital PDF and/or print, based on your requirements.

 Get started

FAQs

How long does the process take?

This depends on the report length and number of revisions you require. As a high-volume annual report design agency with many years of experience, our process is quite smooth. We can usually put a designer onto your project within 1-2 weeks of quoting and report design takes anywhere from 2 weeks for short reports to 2 months or so for longer reports. We can sometimes do rush jobs for an urgency fee, just ask!

Our copy isn’t final, can we start anyway?

Most of the time, yes. We can start the process before final copy is ready and use whatever draft content you have available. However, once design concepts have been completed, we require all final copy to begin with step 4 unless you’re happy to pay for additional revision rounds to edit content at the end. We’re flexible and happy to accommodate you as much as we can.

Do you offer printing?

Absolutely! We can coordinate sustainable print production through our sister company, Ethical Print Co., using FSC-certified 100% recycled paper stock and low-ink coverage layouts that align with your environmental goals. All jobs include carbon offsetting and free delivery Australia-wide at no extra cost. If you’re located outside Australia (many of our clients are), we can help you find a sustainable printer that is local to you for a small print management fee.

Accessibility for annual reports

We follow the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG2) for all digital content to meet standard AA accessibility.

Read more at W3.org

For digital PDFs

We ensure correct colour and image contrast (we use an online tool to check), font sizing, and heading hierarchy. If you need your document to be AAA accessible, we can help with that for an additional cost. This would include the addition of meta data to be added throughout the PDF (to help with indexing), and alt tags and captions included on images.

For websites

AA accessibility compliance includes ensuring correct colour and image contrast, adding alt tags on all images, use of descriptive buttons, and other standard optimisation for screen readers. If you need your website to be AAA accessible, we can talk you through your options and costs.

Case studies

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What our customers say…

  • John Lambert, retired General Manager at Atticus Medical, circle cropped greyscale headshot.
    5
    "It was great to work with EDCo as they built our website. The project was well managed, expectations were clear during the process and the final product was outstanding."
    John Lambert
    Atticus Medical
  • Téa McKenna headshot - Grants Manager at Fairground
    5
    "Thank you for bringing our vision to life so well and for all your fantastic work on the Fairground rebrand!"
    Téa McKenna
    Fairground
  • 5
    "Working with Ethical Design Co. was a rewarding and inspirational experience. They were responsible for the content development, website design and web development of the Brotherhood of St. Laurence's 2023 Annual report. They also produced a 52-page full report and 4-page summary report version and managed the printing of everything including our financial report. The result was spectacular! I would definitely recommend them and look forward to working with them again."
    Melanie Hailstone
    Brotherhood of St. Laurence
  • Emily McCaffrey, Head of Philanthropy at Medicines Development for Global Health, greyscale headshot.
    5
    "It's such a pleasure to work with the professional and friendly team at Ethical Design Co. Their creative vision is compelling, and the results speak for themselves. We love our new philanthropy pages! Thank you Ethical Design Co."
    Emily McCaffrey
    Medicines Development for Global Health
  • Headshot of Amanda Grace from Landcare Victoria Inc. - Testimonial thumbnail image in greyscale, circle.
    5
    "Ethical Design Co. have designed and printed a number of documents for our organisation, from simple flyers to complex reports, plus new brand guidelines, and we have been extremely happy with everything they have produced. Such a lovely team, too! Highly recommended."
    Amanda Grace
    Landcare Victoria Inc.
  • Allira-headshot-grey-200px
    5
    "I engaged Ethical Design Co. to turn my dreams into reality. From the very beginning of our engagement on my logo and branding project, business collateral, and website design and development, Ethical Design Co.’s professionalism and eye for design was apparent. I was impressed with their suggested improvements, felt confident in leaving them in charge of design decisions, and have continued to be impressed after completion. I recommend Ethical Design Co. if you're after a quality service with sleek and sophisticated results."
    Allira Panebianco
    Freedom Diabetes Management
  • Paula-Kaye Richards, Head of Marketing & Communications at Space Capital, greyscale headshot.
    5
    "I have worked with Ethical Design Co. on multiple projects and will continue to work with them in the future. They have been an amazing partner who has helped on projects as large as our rebranding strategy for three brands, to brand guidelines to our quarterly reporting. In all of these projects, they have provided a fresh perspective/design that has been impressive. Working with them is professional and easy without a single deadline missed. I would recommend them for all design work."
    Paula-Kaye Richards
    Space Capital
  • 5
    “I can't thank you enough and honestly couldn't recommend the team at EDCo. any more highly! Your work is truly professional and has encapsulated the core of my business better than even I could've hoped for!”
    Tim Thomas
    Celestial Sound
  • 5
    "The team at Ethical Design Co. designed the whole look and feel of our brand, something we are now proud to display. Because of the professionalism shown from the very first talks we had with them, we were able to put many creative decisions into their hands. When launching another business, I would not hesitate to get them involved from the very start. As a bonus, they deliver work on time too."
    Anthony Ward
    Noria
  • 5
    "As a specialist solutions consulting group that provides information and analytic services to our corporate clients, we engaged with Sonja Meyer to help add an additional level of professional design to our solutions.  From our very first engagement with Sonja we quickly realised that we received more than just her wonderful designs.  Other qualities like her professionalism, experience and fast turnaround have enriched our projects to a point where Sonja’s involvement has become a constant feature in our projects that have a high graphic or visualisation component."
    Zac Anstee
    Tridant
  • 5
    "Sonja has a fine eye for beauty. Her work is elegant and she has a remarkable capacity to reflect the taste of her clients. She is silken smooth to work with. She meets her deadlines, provides accurate information when required, contributes grace and intelligence to the development of every project. I am forever recommending her, and I recommend her again, here and now, to you."
    Donna Ward
    Inkerman & Blunt
  • 5
    "We often seek out Sonja’s assistance on UI/UX designs on particularly creative challenges that our internal designers get blocked on. Her work is always delivered timely and is always above the quality expected. Every time we deliver Sonja’s designs to a client they are blown away."
    Joe McCord
    Digital8
  • 5
    "Sonja has been our go-to designer for all our web-based needs, designing our web platform from initial mock-ups to a fully functioning product. She is a thoughtful, and nimble designer responding to our requirements and our user’s needs whilst retaining a clear vision for simple, engaging and user-friendly design. She manages to fit in with the fast-paced demands of an early stage start-up whilst continually creating beautiful designs for us. I would thoroughly recommend Sonja as a partner in design and we feel lucky to have found her!"
    Daneal Bassiouni
    Native
  • 5
    "As the owner of a small business and a design novice, it's been a pleasure to deal with EDCo. Their designs met my brief perfectly, making my business branding a breeze. Sonja is exceptionally professional and her designs are elegant. Over the years I have been in business I have always chosen to return to Sonja for any design needs. Her work has always been delivered well within deadlines with the assurance that all measures have been taken with environmental sustainability in mind - giving me peace of mind as well as strong branding. Thank you Sonja!"
    Angela O’Toole
    The Art of Eating
  • 5
    "Sonja has worked closely with me in designing our circa 30-page pitch deck, investor summary slides, and other multi-page presentations needed to pitch key partners. Sonja is an incredible designer, but she's also a great instructor too. Most importantly, Sonja is a pleasure to work with. There’s no BS, she is prompt and hardworking. Her performance has been consistently high and turnaround quick whether she’s working from home base in Australia or remotely. We will continue to use EDCo.'s services for the foreseeable future."
    Brandon Greenberg
    Mately