Brand identity and coordinated marketing communications campaign for faux organic pet grooming company, based on strong market research and collaborative ideation, constructing a unique position for product in competitive market.
Project Course work for The Fundamentals of Branding at Mount Royal University
Skills Group Work, Market Research, Branding, Typography, Storytelling, Illustrating, Data Visualization
Tools Adobe InDesign, Illustrator
Date 2022
Brand and Marketing Campaign Creation: Shaggy Chic Organics
BACKGROUND
As a group of four, with combining majors in Information Design, Marketing and Journalism, we tackled the challenge of acting as a brand consultancy hired to design a complete brand plan for a faux start-up company. This company specializes in the production of organic pet grooming products for cats and dogs. We divided this process into three high-level steps with related subtasks: market research, brand creation and a coordinated marketing communications campaign.
In a world constantly shifting towards a preference for greener, more natural options, our goal was to create an identity differentiating this company among the expanding and highly saturated competitive market. All materials presented here include my design contributions to this project, including: brand name and logo, spokes-characters, identity moodboard, positioning statement + perceptual map, and sample of brand consistent Instagram posts.
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Market Research: Organic pet grooming product
Before brand development, we conducted research to better understand the market landscape. This included looking into target market, the product category and benefits among other varieties of pet grooming products, and getting to know both the direct and indirect competitors. In summary, we found:
-- Target market includes luxury-seeking, green-forward pet owners who think about the ethical impact of their purchases (PRIZM profiles: stressed in suburbia, downtown verve, latte life)
-- Organic pet grooming products use natural ingredients and are produced without the use of certain chemicals; benefits include being skin sensitivity/allergy friendly, immunity boosting to protect pets from viruses and diseases
-- Direct competitors are brands such as Black Sheep Organics and Burt's Bees; Indirect competitors being more economic, basic producers such as the Great Choice brand
Brand Name and Logo: Shaggy Chic Organics
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Brand Creation
Next step was to transform findings into a brand identity that would leave a lasting impression.
-- Brand name: Shaggy Chic Organics captures the product being sold and the personality and traits the brand is trying to communicate to the target segment.
-- Brand logo: Funky and organic imagery, with colour palette and typography to match; displays cat and dog that are chic and trendy, giving off an air of the ‘cool’ kids on the block, nodding to research showing a distinct growth in the natural pet grooming industry.
-- Brand spokes-characters: Worked into the logo, the cat and dog are the spokes-characters of the brand, which have the potential to be promoted through advertisements and brand events.
-- Identity moodboard: Forms a picture of Shaggy Chic Organics brand and identity–target market and product benefits, visual identity, products, relationship of brand and pet owners, shared brand/ audience values, and attributes and feelings associated with purchasing from brand.
Positioning statement + perceptual map: "Shaggy Chic Organics is aimed towards the pet owner who values luxury and conscientious decision-making in pet grooming products, in need of a brand whose capacity to actively practise values around sustainability and responsible pet wellness are approachable in a way unrivalled by other pet grooming brands, and whose conscientiously-crafted features are at the minimum on par with other organic pet grooming products in the same class."
Brand Identity Moodboard
Brand Perceptual Map
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Coordinated Marketing Communications Campaign
In a combined effort, we created a coordinated marketing communications campaign which included the utilization of social media influencers, Instagram and Twitter posts, and an experiential brand promotion. My main contributions included a sample set of 10 on-brand Instagram posts (seen below), and a detailed concept for an experiential brand promotion: a locally held grooming and adoption event.
Shaggy Chic Organics Instagram Posts