France
Paris
What is Will speaking on this time? A recent CBA Brand Engine package design success story for Infusion Brands : I Made It On Late Night TV! What’s Next?
“We’ve seen the late night infomercials. And then seen the product on shelf proudly saying, u0022As seen on TVu0022, and had a laugh. Well, this story will have you laughing and cheering as we bring you behind the scenes on how we helped DualSaw go from a late night infomercial success to a prime-time big box retail success in less than a year.”
Join us at The Drake Hotel in Chicago Wednesday October 23rd at 9:30am and hear the DualSaw business success story. It’s one you don’t want to miss.
Find out more information about The Packaging That Sells Conference
What will Will be speaking about, you ask?
He will be bringing a unique cultural perspective to a very thought-provoking problem in our industry: Bad Package Design is Everywhere.
The Americans think the Europeans have got it right. And the Europeans think the Americans have it right. Who’s right? Take an insightful look at the multicultural world of package design, and judge for yourself what is bad design and how we can avoid it. Learn the bad habits that lead to bad design and how to avoid them.
Have you fallen victim to bad habits? Have a story to share? Will could chat on this topic for hours. Sadly, he only has 45 minutes. Mark your calendar for Tuesday, June 25th at 3:45pm. This is one session you won’t want to miss. And since this is Summer in San Francisco bring your jacket and possibly an umbrella!
Learn more at The Dieline Package Design Conference.
As we approach summer, I’m still on a ski high that ended 6 weeks ago. Amazing what fresh mountain air and light, deep powder snow can do to reinvigorate the mind, body and spirit. It was a fantastic ski season for me: I skied more days this year than the past three years combined; found a ski buddy in my oldest daughter, who is now officially a teenager – I think she loves tree skiing more than me; bought not one, but two new pairs of skis; and experienced the best powder day ever while skiing in Italy.
Two new pairs of skis – a first in seven years. Technically, only one pair was new, the other was a used pair of demo skis. The new pair – Salomon 2V Racing, 178cm – was a challenge to find. I rented a pair the year before while skiing at Madonna de Campiglio in the Dolomites. On the steep, hard packed and groomed conditions these were a dream. Put them on edge and zoom! The Italians do like to ski fast. Since these snow conditions were comparable to my ski resorts back home at Lake Tahoe, I knew these would be a great replacement for my current skis – Volkl 724 EXP, 184cm.
Yet finding a pair of the 2V Racing was a treasure hunt. Only after much on-line searching and phone calling did I find a knowledgeable ski dealer who informed me that Salomon only sold their racing line of skis in Europe. I subsequently found an Italian website that still had them in stock and the size I wanted. And with a little help from my Italian friend Giacomo – who completed the transaction for me–I had new skis waiting for me for my ski trip to the Italian Alps – Madesimo to be exact, this past Spring. With Giacomo as my guide, I had the best powder day ever.
While the Salomon 2V Racing was a more traditional piste ski, my second “new” pair – Volkl RTM 84, 171cm – was an eye-opening experience. These were the widest and shortest pair of skis I’ve owned as an adult. A little background; I learned to ski as a child in the mid-70’s and was a ski instructor in the early 80’s (Park City and Deer Valley) when I attended college at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. My class schedule for winter quarter was planned around getting in as many ski days as possible. Skis back then were straight and narrow. You measured your skill level by how graceful you skied (Stein Eriksen – a Norwegian, of course – was my role model) and how long your skis were (I think I got up to 205cm, about 20cm above my head). I recall some mogul runs at Park City where you could only enter if you had 200cm or longer skis.
Now fast forward to the future. Everything has changed about skiing. It’s no longer about maintaining proper form and technique. It’s about bringing your own style and personality to the mountain. Skis are shaped, wider, shorter and with multiple cambers. It was like trying to compare a 60’s F1 race car to those of the present day – anything after the 90’s. Or the difference between the first handheld mobile phone (the brick) and today’s Smartphone. So with 30 years of ski knowledge (baggage?) telling me, “Don’t do it, Will,” I broke with tradition and tested the RTM 84 for three days. They did not disappoint. It did require a slight change to my skiing stance, yet after a few runs, they passed every challenge I presented on or off piste. However, my “old school” mindset of what a ski should looked like and how you skied was clouding my judgment. How could it be that these wider and shorter skis were outperforming my traditional ski?! The truth was there; I just needed to open my eyes to the new reality. I needed to get unstuck to old and outdated “rules of thumb.” And I did.
How does this ski tale relate to branding? While the fundamentals of skiing have not changed, everything else has evolved dramatically. Branding is no different. We still need to start with the basics – who am I, what am I and why am I. Yet, like ski technology, the environment and audience for brands has evolved and become more complex. So how we brand, how we talk to our audience, how we design our packages and environments – real, online or augmented, must advance. The old “rules of thumb” about how you brand must be put aside. Like my fixation on ski size kept me from accessing a new skiing experience, adhering to “tried and true” branding approaches limits your brand engagement potential.
The successful brands of the future understand this new reality and will unburden themselves of old and outdated “rules of thumb.” They realize that context is as important as content. Are you ready for the future of branding? – Will Burke
It’s fitting that at the end of February I would be concluding my story of this January. I ended Part One with a simple reminder to find your WHY – for your business and your brand. WHY is such an important concept that I’ve made it my personal mission to use WHY in every strategy and design conversation, both with my team and my clients. WHY keeps everyone focused on the big idea. I’ve found that when the conversation stays focused on the WHY, that the strategy and design concepts are also very focused with solutions that are immediately apparent and appropriate. Yes, it really does not take showing up with a dozen or more design concepts to choose from when you fully understand and embrace your WHY.
If we’ve done our homework properly, we find that no more than 3-4 design concepts are required to solve The Burning Question (that phrase again!). And just deciding among the 3-4 can be a (good) challenge itself. No longer are we arguing about the size of the logo. Instead we are debating how each concept captures the essence of your WHY and communicates that to your consumer. Now those are fun (and meaningful) conversations!
WHY is such a powerful tool and yet most clients fail to embrace it’s magic. As a lifetime observer of design, it is easy to spot those brands that have failed to fully understand and embrace their WHY. They’re the followers. The me-to brands. The cheaper alternative. The spec. driven. The irrelevant. Some of these brands are always in constant rebranding, redesigning mode just to keep in the conversation. Others just seem to fade away – no longer part of the conversation or in business for that matter.
CES. I used to go almost every year during the late 90’s and early 00‘s, when technology really was breakthrough and accessible to consumers. In more recent years when it was technology for technology sake vs. empowering the consumer, I started to go less and less – every other year or longer. This year we decided it was time to go again to CES as we had just completed the branding and design for a new breakthrough product for our clients Ryan and Pete Santangelo. Yes they are brothers. From Detroit. Their product is the worlds first (and best) sleeping and breathing monitor system for babies. It really is an amazing product that empowers consumers. I’m proud that we helped them with their WHY and as a result of our collaboration, they are off and running with great success. We’ll post the full Case Study in our Portfolio section soon. In the meantime you can learn more about the product and see our work at SafeToSleep.
So, it was me, Jean-Marc, Anna and Elainne for two days in Las Vegas. Our first day was at the main exhibition place at the Las Vegas Convention Center. Even splitting up, we only saw about 25% of the show. There were some interesting brands and even new product ideas. Yet, overall I was not that impressed. The big news was 4K television. Ho-hum. It reminds me when printers were touting 1200dpi. No matter that the human eye cannot see the difference after 600dpi. I was having a hard time finding the WHY at CES. Time for a break.
After day one, we met up with Ryan and Peter and two additional members of their team, Levi and Jay, in Nobhill Tavern by Michael Minna (highly recommended) at the MGM Grand. They had just arrived and were ready to get into the Las Vegas spirit! As Ryan and I chatted about my disappointment of the first day, he mentioned to me that the place to really check out was the exhibit pavilion called “Eureka Park” located at the Venetian. I’ve always wanted to check out the Venetian and Eureka Park sounded promising.
On day two, Anna went back to the Las Vegas Convention Center to follow up on leads, while Jean-Marc, Elainne, and I headed to the Venetian and Eureka Park. We were not disappointed. We found some amazing breakthrough innovations and more importantly businesses (many of whom were startups) that really understood their WHY. Their branding and design could use help, but I digress. The three that really stood out to me, were simple products that had profound positive impact to humanity. (Wow, did I just write that?)
VIVOplay is a child size wrist-watch communicator and location monitor. Dick Tracy we’ve finally arrived. If you have small children (pre-teen and younger) you’ll love this product. It empowers both the child and parent. They’re slated to launch in June and I can’t wait. GeckoCap treats taking your asthma medicine like a game and makes you healthier in the long run. Again another product that empowers the user. It gained a lot of press at CES and was on several top 10 lists. Unfortunately they seem to be struggling for investors. Their indiegogo crowdfunding page only managed to get $5,000 in pledges from a goal of $90,000. With 9 million people suffering from asthma just in the US, this does not make sense. I believe they understand their true WHY, and it is their branding, design and communications that is letting them down. This last one is my most favorite of all. Luci. Fast Company just posted an article on this product, so I’ll leave it to them to fill in the details. The short – it’s an inflatable solar powered light. So basic in it’s shape and appearance and yet it’s impact on humanity will be enormous. Think fire 2.0. They knows their WHY : to provide safe access to bright light to everyone. I’ve order my Get a Luci, Give a Luci on the MPOWERD website. Will you?
So as we bring January – and February for that matter – to a close, I’m sending out the call to innovators who know their WHY. If you believe you (or someone you know) have a groundbreaking, innovative product in need of branding and design to help you get successfully launched or expand your business, we want to hear from you. We’re looking to collaborate with only 5-10 innovative consumer product brands this year. The criteria for consideration is tough – do we believe in your WHY? Do you think you have what it takes to join us in designing brands with heart? If so, send me an email. In the subject line write : I know my WHY!
– Will Burke
Happy St. Valentines Day! What a wonderful day filled with love and great expectations for the future. This happens to be a very special day for CB’a Brand Engine as we officially introduce our new branding. I really love (yes, LOVE) our new brand as it truly reflects the people and personalities behind the name CB’a. If you’d rather go directly to the CB’a Identity Case Study and take a peek behind the curtain please be my guest.
The project took about six months, with collaboration from all the offices. It was just one of several internal initiatives being done in Paris at the time including the consolidation, renovation and move to the new Paris office, and the planning and execution for the 30 year anniversary party of CB’a – nothing really important! Yet it is moments like this that brings out the best in everyone, especially when you are working on the floor or out of a closet for two weeks as we’ve run out of tables, chairs and space. These are the stories you will recall fondly 10-20 years from now.
I came midway into the project to support the core team in the strategic storytelling and design work; once the upfront discovery and general positioning framework was established. Basically getting to work on the FUN part! A key challenge with any international branding program is the language differences and cultural meaning of words. This project was no exception. We had a good laugh (or more correctly, a scare) with the word “blooming.” The French expression was wonderful, it just didn’t work on Oxford Street. Cooler heads prevailed and we moved forward.
Our core goal was to express who we were as a company – our beliefs, our personality, our story – and not sound like every other branding and design agency. That can be hard to do when your audience fits a narrow segment and has specific ideas of what an agency should sound and look like. We had to break from convention, yet still be believable. Something we prescribe to our clients, we now had to take ourselves.
The first couple iterations of our positioning didn’t meet our goal. While relevant to WHAT we did and would have been positively received from our clients, it lacked our personality or simply put “the French touch.” With the 30 year party upon us, I joined the core team in Paris along with my counterparts from Milan and Dubai, Gianfranco and Paul, to discuss the work to date and lend assistance if necessary. Little did I know that my 3-day holiday in Paris would now becoming a working trip.
In Paris how you work is a bit different from our daily routine in Sausalito, at least it has been my experience. With my partner at CB’a BE, Jean-Marc now leading the team behind the new brand initiative, our working style is unconventional to say the least. After much discussion and brainstorming over a working lunch in the studio – the details while very engaging would take another ten minutes to properly write down, that I’ll leave for cocktail conversation – we had a positioning statement that was unanimously agreed to by everyone in the room, even Louis! This was unheard of. I think I took a few photos to just mark the occasion. Our statement – “Designing brands with heart” – was true on many levels, and everyone in the room had their own personal connection to it. It wasn’t just words on paper, it was us.
Yet the work was not done. We needed to stress test our positioning and define our guiding principles and underlying story of our brand – our WHY. Having been volunteered by Jean-Marc, Paul and I (I can only assume we were the right choice given our un-Frenchness!) were given 24 hours (really 12 hours) to come back and present our WHY. What happened to just coming over for a party? Taking advantage of our location, Paul and I left the office for a local cafe. Paul with his laptop, me with a few scrapes of paper and a pen. A few glasses of wine, a little bread and brie, some people watching, and a few hours later we had something we could be proud to share with the team. That night we made it to the party, hosted at the Musée d’art Moderne located just off the Trocadéro. CB’a designed their new identity and the museum was gracious to allow us to celebrate our 30 year anniversary and have full access to the art on display. Unfortunately we could not take any art home.
After the official party was over, a few of us banded together and headed out to find a suitable location to continue the festivities. The first stop was a bit stuffy and cold, although we managed to empty a couple bottles of Champagne before moving on. As it was a cold October evening we ventured just across the street and settled into Le Marie Susy. The staff greeted us with open arms as the night was slow and they were thinking about closing early. With about a dozen of us, we took over the place including their music system, dancing, drinking and eating (the dim sum was excellent!) the night away. After some time I was staring at the red wall and noticed the pictures hanging. Looking more intensely, I realized they formed the shape of a heart (see picture above)! I took that as a sign we were on the right direction. I think we finally left around 3am or so, and 500 Euros lighter. Great evening. Oh, yes, I was still presenting that morning!
The morning came quickly – no hangover (probably no time for one) – Paul and I presented our work and … well, this is Paris and love was in the air…
Bon Baisers de Paris et Joyeuse St Valentin! – Will Burke
It’s Chinese New Year, the year of the Snake – my birth sign. I’ll let you guess what age that makes me this year. And no, I am not 24. Back on topic, what happened to January? It’s all a blur and yet so much has happened with CB’a. First I should mention that this is my first posting in a very long time – since beginning my partnership with CB’a and forming CB’a Brand Engine in 2010. It was like a new startup and while the culture was a fit, the business side of transforming our design agency took most of my time such as focusing on the basics, growing new relationships, and accepting change. Yes, change – this would be the biggest change to the agency that I started out of my one bedroom apartment back in 1997. We were now part of a larger family, with a new purpose, a new personality, a new perspective when it comes to branding and design.
It wasn’t all work – there were a few trips every year to visit colleagues in Paris or Milan or Barcelona to recharge the spirit and know that this was the right move for the future of Brand Engine. As we enter the third year of CB’a Brand Engine, we have much to celebrate. We can hardly hold in our enthusiasm and soon you will know why. More on that in a future post.
Now back to January. It started with a 5 day strategic summit in Sausalito (our first outside of Europe) with key brand and creative strategists from our Paris, Milan, Dubai and Sausalito offices focused on developing a common structure for how we design. Sounds simple. We all use the same or similar design tools, share similar design backgrounds, and create design primarily for consumer brands. Yet, while we value our multi-cultural diversity we often fell back into our provincial norms and failed to take full advantage of our talent and resources around the globe. To build the agency we wanted, we knew we had to do better, and we could.
Our first step was to ask the one question we ask our clients at the start of any engagement, “Why?” Why is a difficult question. We are not use to being asked “Why” we do something – unless you have child under 5 years of age following your every move. From our experience to get to the “true Why” takes asking “Why” at least 5-7 times. Really, it does. A “true Why” goes beyond a logical, fact-based statement, it has a humanistic, emotional element to it. The latter being the most difficult to capture as it requires one to look deeper and inward, then having the courage to express that emotional Why. Yes, it is scary to put yourself out like that. Yet, once you’ve done it a few times, you find it liberating and rewarding. When it comes to us solving branding and design issues, we call finding this “true Why” The Burning Question (I’ll cover this topic more in a future post).
It took most of the first day to get to our “Why.” Some people were nervous that we would not get to the “real” work that we were here for. The reality is that this was the real work, the most important work. Finding your “Why” makes understanding and articulating “How” and “What” you do so much easier. The remaining four days were very productive and we accomplished what we set out to do and more.
As you plan for your next strategic initiative either for your business or your brand, take the time to find your “Why.”
I’ll leave it there for today and continue with part 2 in a future post. And for those that are curious, the inspiration for the image above comes from our CB’a Asia office and their animated 2013 Chinese New Year greeting card. The saying in Chinese reads: soar to great heights. Gung Hay Fat Choy! — Will Burke
Tweens, the new eldorado for cosmetic brands
Pre-teens or tweens have been behind hits such as Hannah Montana and Harry Potter. They thus showed advertisers that they had a high purchasing power, considered to be worth nearly USD43 billion in annual expenditure. Cosmetic brands have also followed this trend and now offer products that address this target, as evidenced by the success of fragrances by idols of the young such as Justin Bieber and Taylor Swift.
Wal-Mart, the U.S. retail giant, has replaced its collaboration with the Olsen twins by creating GeoGirl: a natural brand of skincare and make-up designed for 8 to 12 year olds.
Renewal of distribution channels
Beauty boxes: the new business model of e-commerce
In 2011, beauty boxes flooded the market, offering subscribers – for a fee of €13/month – a few samples or miniatures of beauty products delivered to their own home. These surprise packages allow subscribers to discover new brands and products, and also offer beauty tips in partnership with influential bloggers. The relationship with subscribers continues on the Net, via Facebook, YouTube and regularly updated forums. In return, brands obtain figures and opinions about their products, through surveys undertaken by users, but especially via their comments on blogs. Thus, less than a year after its launch, the pioneering GlossyBox already has more than 150,000 subscribers worldwide.
Digitization of points of sale
Digital technology also plays an increasing role in the cosmetics industry, to provide more services to brands and their consumers, and thus offer a more engaging and surprising shopping experience. After the well-known Realtime Make-Up Simulator by Shiseido, which is a virtual make-up tablet allowing consumers to try a product free and virtually by simply scanning its bar code, we can observe a clear emergence of virtual walls. Initiated by a large supermarket in Seoul, this technology is now used by the cosmetic industry: for example, Glamour magazine has created the Glamour Apothecary, a virtual pop-up store inviting passers-by to scan products from major manufacturers, make instant purchases and receive their shopping at home in the heart of the Meatpacking District in New York. In May 2012 in France, Carrefour launched a similar initiative by installing in its shops at La Madeleine and Gare de Lyon, a static panel presenting over 200 products from the new range Les Cosmétiques Design Paris, sold exclusively in Carrefour supermarkets. Passers-by are invited to scan the QR codes of the products of their choice to win one of 3,600 prizes in the form of vouchers for Les Cosmétiques Design Paris products.
All these initiatives are recent – less than a year for most – and it is clear that the cosmetic industry remains an innovative sector, even in times of financial crisis. The brands of the beauty industry have managed to renew what they offer by providing more engaging product or shopping experiences to consumers. All indications are that they will continue to surprise us in the coming years.
Today, every CPG brand is struggling to stand out on shelf, to break through the noise of the thousands of products vying for shoppers’ ever-dividing attention. As designers, we know that package structure can be an obvious way to differentiate. Look what it’s done for Method, Apple or Jawbone… structure can be a telegraphic signal that a company is unique, innovative and knows the consumer better.
The thing is, elaborate structure design explorations, creation of unique structures, and implementation of new production equipment can be prohibitive. For brands with limited resources, these types of innovation might not be in the cards, at least in the short term. This doesn’t mean they need to get left in the dust.
Often, innovation is simple and its simplicity can make it all the more striking. Case in point: we love seeing brands take readily available structures and do something unexpected with them. When we created Essn, it was long before the mini-can had become popular, and this eye-catching structure gave the brand a serious leg-up in market. And when CB’a Paris revolutionized the Daddy Sugar brand, they were able to leverage a series of existing structures and bring a new face to the brand.
Today we’re looking at just a few brands who are capitalizing on some of this structural low hanging fruit by taking existing structures and simply turning them on their heads:
Heinz took a functional issue (the last of the ketchup getting stuck in the bottom of the bottle) and used gravity in their favor… creating a new iconic bottle profile in the process. Head & Shoulders created a harmonious pair with their shampoo and conditioner. Nutzo peanut butter embraced the fact that consumers often store natural peanut butter upside down before mixing to incorporate the naturally separating oils. And Wonka channeled their playful personality to package ice cream upside down, thus standing out in a crowded freezer.
We see so many products every day, and we tune out most of them. Sometimes all it takes is a subtle difference, a delightful surprise, to get our attention.
art serving packaging
If it seems that collaborations between artists and brands are the preserve of luxury brands – such as Louis Vuitton and Japanese artist Takashi Murakami in 2004 – the mass market has began using ‘art packaging’ too. This is notably the case of Evian, which each year partners with a big name from the fashion industry to create its limited edition bottles, or Compagnie de Provence, which for its 20th anniversary, commissioned the Marseille designer Stéphan Muntaner, to celebrate the origins of the Marseille soap brand.
Consumer brands are not the only ones interested in using artists, retail stores are too. At Christmas, Barneys department store invited Lady Gaga to take the reins of a spectacular pop-up store on the 5th floor of the department store, where fans of the singer could find unique items, ranging from fashion to confectionery, created by ‘Mother Monster’ and the Haus of Gaga creative team.
Each month, the Dudes Factory shop in Berlin invites an artist or designer to redesign the shop and its range of products, a great way for the store to surprise customers, renew itself and also discover new talent… But the democratization of art also takes place through distribution and pricing, and there are emerging concepts that make art more accessible, either financially or physically. This is the case for the network of Yellow Korner photographic galleries in Paris, which publishes and distributes limited and numbered editions, framed or mounted, by established and promising artists from €20 to €2,000. The Frère Indépendant association offers works by underground artists, exhibited at the Pool Art Fair, or, more surprisingly, in hotel rooms in New York.
giving the amateur artist more value
Patron brands are numerous and include for example L’Espace Pierre Cardin and the Cartier Foundation for Contemporary Art. However, they focus more and more on their community of fans and give more value to amateur artists through unique partnerships with young artists, creativity being all the more stronger when such initatives are numerous. As such collaborations also generate more sharing and thus more visibility and impact, brands now encourage their customers to participate in the creative process, thus making them not only commercial players but also real contributors to the cultural scene. Take for example Brisk iced tea, a PepsiCo brand, which partnered with the photo sharing application Instagram for the SXSW festival. Users were invited to send their pictures with the hashtag #briskpic to decorate 4,000 limited edition cans.
Brands are also more and more interested in young artists, who represent an opportunity for them to renew themselves in an engaging way, while also being a showcase for the artists themselves. This was the case for Virgin which rewarded amateur filmmakers in the Media Shorts Festival, or H&M, which launched the first Design Awards in February 2012 as part of the Stockholm Fashion Week. The winner, Stine Riis, a graduate of the London College of Fashion, will have her collection sold in selected H&M stores, gaining recognition throughout the world while winning a €50,000 prize.
Art is therefore a great way for brands to engage with jaded consumers, speaking their own language, thereby creating complicity. They invest more and more in this area, to the point of organising artistic events in an engaging and subtle way, such as BT, which will launch BT River of Music, a music festival on the banks of the Thames during the 2012 Olympic Games. This new form of storytelling allows brands to engage with their consumers, provided that these campaigns bring more meaning to the brand and are not purely gratuitous.
Audacity and mystery to (re)generate interest
In the confectionery market, Hollywood is the brand that has dared to go furthest. At a time when all F&B brands are transparent, this brand of chewing gum has created a product with a ‘mystery’ taste. An ambitious gamble, because on the face of it, which consumer would use a product that could have a bad taste or leave them with bad breath? The packaging deliberately does not solve the mystery, with its enigmatic question mark and its colour code looking about as chemical as it gets. To support the launch, the brand has implemented an integrated communications campaign around the theme of mystery: internet users were invited to discover the product’s recipe and the true identity of a band – Mega Mystery Band – who they could also challenge by creating their own mix via an application specifically designed for this successful viral campaign. All this took place on the top social network for young people: Facebook. An audacious brand content from Hollywood, which engaged thousands of people.
The brand has created a niche in the market, because other brands have followed the ‘mystery taste’ concept, i.e. Lay’s potato chips…
Audacity by totally breaking away from market codes
Standing out, attracting consumers and giving them the desire to buy… Isn’t this the dream of any brand? To do this, you must sometimes free yourself completely. This is true of the English brand The Icecreamists. The store took a bold brand vision by combining the world of cocktails and ice-cream, and using visual codes and an interior design more reminiscent of rock clubs and English punk bars than of the hyper-gourmet and colourful atmosphere which you normally see in this market. As for product innovation, once again, the brand played the audacity card and dared to shock: it created a stir a few months ago by launching ‘Baby Gaga’, the first ice-cream made from breast milk and served by a young woman with an uncanny resemblance to the pop diva Lady Gaga. Indeed, the singer has threatened to sue the brand if it did not change the name of its star product. ‘Viagra’, ‘Sex Bomb’, ‘Espresso Yourself’… All these product names are inspired by provocative pop culture. Finally, regarding communication, the brand managed to maintain the buzz by launching the first gay ice-cream boutique in the world.
Audacity means inventing the standards and philosophy of the future
Method, the brand that revolutionized cleaning products. Ecological through and through, it caused a stir by turning around the claims of efficiency from its competitors. With its ‘100% natural’ philosophy, Method surprises and attracts consumers by developing a much more ‘detox’ approach to cleaning, and with this manifesto, it engages its consumers. In Seattle, where the ‘Detox your Home’ campaign was launched, and incidentally where the brand was born, people were encouraged to get rid of their toxic and dangerous cleaning products, and replace them with green products offered by a Method representative. A branded pop-up store with the same colours as the product was also created so that people could buy products and get advice from the brand’s sales reps, the ‘people against dirty’.
Method also breaks the mould with its packaging. It capitalizes on its modern, simple packaging design, similar to cosmetics, so that consumers do not ‘hide the products under the sink’, but are proud to be users of this brand.
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