The Competitive Audit: Gauge Your Brand’s Performance
Most of our client engagements kick off with our Competitive Audit. It identifies not just other brands adjacent to yours but everything that competes for the consumer’s attention and dollars. The Competitive Audit is a primary tool in our kit because it’s so useful for gauging a brand’s performance. And it unlocks the path to […]
6 Steps Toward a Competition-Proof Brand
Brand leaders often look to other brands in their space for validation and inspiration. I get it: There’s security in following other brands’ moves because they’re already proven. But … what if you could ignore what everyone else is doing, in full confidence that what YOU are doing is right? What if your brand wasn’t […]
What Package Architecture System is Right for Your Brand?
When you add a product to your lineup — a new flavor, perhaps — how easy is it to crank out the package for the new SKU? If you’re considering extending into another category — say, from tortilla chips to fresh salsa — will your existing packaging easily adapt to the new form and the […]
How Great Packaging Delivers on a Brand’s Promise
Marketers love the idea of creating disruption in their category. And packaging is usually the spark: Something so radically different that consumers can’t resist putting the product in their carts. But being different isn’t enough. The most breakthrough packaging design has to be rooted in the brand’s promise. Our latest white paper shares guidance on […]
Good Creative Lasts a Moment. Great Strategy Lasts for Years.
You’re in a hurry. There’s a deadline, perhaps a category review with your primary retail partner. Or maybe a new CMO wants to put their stamp on the product. So you want a new package design for your food and beverage product, and you want it now. A new package or identity is exhilarating. It […]
How to Increase Your Food or Beverage Brand’s Shelf Presence
We often say that package design is like curating your online persona: Everyone knows that there’s a messy life that goes on behind the idealized, perfect story you’re sharing on Instagram … but nobody’s got time for that. The same goes for food and beverage brands. There’s so much that happens behind the scenes in […]
Struggling Brand? Fix Your Strategy, Not Just Your Packaging
We know how easy it is for Food & Beverage brands to miss the mark on brand strategy, too often mistaking it for design application, or even marketing strategy or activation. When your brand is faced with a problem — and time, budget, and business are on the line — the alluring promise of immediate […]
Understand the Stacking Effect of Brand Values, Brand Equity, and Brand Value
Marketers and brand managers face tons of pressure to be “boardroom-ready” — to look smart and think on their feet in front of the C-suite. That’s created a sort of buzzword stew, where business terms get used interchangeably. I’m thinking of terms like value and equity. People think they know what the lingo means, but […]
Your Marketing Team Needs to Pivot Quickly. We Can Help.
I’ve recently been having convos with my contacts in the CPG world, and here’s what I’m sniffing: Companies are reducing staff, quietly (not like the headline-grabbing layoffs in tech). And the first departments getting hit are creative and marketing. You may be feeling this pinch yourself. Here’s the thing: The people may be gone, but […]
Your Brand’s Growth Opportunity Is Not Where You Think It Is
Whitespace gets its own square on the Business Buzzword Bingo card. Brand managers and C-suiters use it to describe an almost mythical place where their companies have room to maneuver at will, where their competitors can’t get a toehold. I can assure you that whitespace is not a myth. You’re just looking for it in […]
