This morning a friend wrote to me. This is a friend that I have done some websites for in the past, in fact, quite a lot of websites! He told me that he is going to take a stab at putting up a new website on his own, and had a question for me. Here is what he asked:
Question: Why do you use the Genesis Framework on top of WordPress? Clearly you see some advantage there.
Well, before I share my answer that I sent my friend, let me explain what the Genesis Framework is, for those who may not know.
Brian Gardner, the man behind Genesis
Genesis Framework is a theme framework for use with WordPress. It works with “child themes” to customize the looks of your website that is built on the WordPress platform. I have been using Genesis pretty much since it first came on the scene. I use Genesis on all of my own websites that are built on WordPress, and for nearly every client site that I build.
Now, here is the answer that I e-mailed to my friend’s question:
Congratulations on taking the step toward learning more about WordPress! I think you will do great! I will be happy to help you if you have questions along the way. That’s what friends are for!
Back about 6 or maybe 7 years ago, I saw a WordPress theme that I really liked, called “Revolution”. It was a new sort of theme that was… well… somewhat revolutionary! 😉 It was one of the early “premium” themes, in other words one fo the first themes that you had to actually pay for. I liked it a lot, though. I looked into the theme and learned about it and found that it was developed by a fellow named Brian Gardner. I also learned that Brian had another 8 or 10 themes in addition to Revolution. I liked all of them and saw some possibilities of using his themes on my various sites. One day, while I was still “thinking about it”, Brian had a sale where you could get all of his Themes for something like $299. Given that I had never spent a single dollar on a theme, $299 was a lot of money, but I decided to take the leap. Under the deal, Brian promised that in addition to all of his current themes, if you paid the $299 you would also get every theme that he ever created.
A year or so after buying Revolution, Brian started up a new theme company, I don’t recall the name. As i recall, he partnered with some folks on the company, but it didn’t work out. A year or so after doing this, Brian started up StudioPress. He had a whole team of developers, and they came out with lots and lots of great themes. I was in heaven, given that I was getting them all for free, based on my purchase of the “all in deal”. After a couple of years, StudioPress developed Genesis Theme Framework along with a lot of Child Themes. At first, after working with “regular” themes, I found it difficult to learn Genesis, and really didn’t mess with it at all. After a while, though, I decided that I needed to take the plunge and learn how to use Genesis. I’m glad that I took the time to learn it!
So, now you know the back story about my use of Genesis. But, what you are really asking is why I use Genesis. Well, the back story is part of the reason. I kind of “grew up” in the WP world with Brian and his team. I trust them and find their work beautiful and powerful. Also, most of the very top WP developers and bloggers use Genesis, because (in my opinion, of course, and their opinions too) Genesis is so powerful. I was on the Genesis bandwagon even before these “big names,” but some of the people using Genesis include:
1. Matt Mullenweg – the creator of WordPress
2. Darren Rowse – Problogger
3. Chris Brogan – HB Works
4. and others….Bob Martin with WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg
I just feel that Genesis can do things that other themes can’t do, or are much harder to do on other themes. It is very SEO friendly. Very flexible. Great community of fellow users who are willing to help you out when needed, etc.
After buying that $299 Revolution “all in” package years ago, I worried about spending so much… since then, though, I have come to realize that in the blogging world, it is probably the best money I have ever spent!
Hope this helps.
After emailing this to my friend, to answer his question, I thought about it and figured that others may also wonder why I use Genesis, or why they should use Genesis. I hope I gave you information that you find helpful.