Founded by a counsellor

Open Door was founded by Brian Gao, a counsellor and the founder of BG Counselling, a virtual counselling practice. The studio grew out of building that practice's website, and seeing how few designers understood the rules health practices work under.

Why "Open Door"

An open door is what every practice hopes a new client will feel: that they're welcome, that it's safe to come in, and that taking the first step is easy.

It's also how we build websites. Clear prices, plain language and booking that takes a minute, so nothing stands between someone looking for care and the practitioner who can help them. And it's a promise about how we work with you: our door is open, with questions always welcome, before, during and after your project.

Why health practice websites

A health practice's website is often the first place a client meets you, sometimes weeks before they're ready to call. It has to feel calm, answer the practical questions, and make the next step easy for someone who may be in pain, worried, or nervous about reaching out at all.

It also has to respect rules most web designers have never heard of: advertising rules that differ by profession and province, crisis information that's easy to find, and privacy that takes health information seriously.

We take those rules seriously because our founder works under them too, as a counsellor. The details differ between professions and provinces, from massage therapy to psychology, but the care behind them is the same. That's what this studio is for: websites built with both the craft and the clinical side in mind. You know your practice and your college best, so you review and approve every page before it goes live.

How we work

You'll have one main point of contact from the first call to launch, and after it. We keep the process simple, the prices published, and the writing plain.

Separate from BG Counselling

Open Door is a separate business from BG Counselling. We don't provide counselling through the studio, and working with us on a website doesn't create a therapeutic relationship. We'll never need your clients' information to build your site, so please don't send it.