first came the logo
The most compelling feature of these water bottles is that they are double-wall vacuum-insulated. My immediate concept for the logo was that it should be readable from any angle and had to express the concept of the two walls with a vacuum space in between. The logo needed to be strong and confident because we were throwing our hat in the ring alongside some already established heavy-hitters in this category. But it couldn't lock the bottles into a specific category as we wanted to have a presence in a wide variety of markets, including sporting goods, leisure, beer and wine drinkers, fitness enthusiasts, and soccer moms.
then came brand identity
Because our bottles were offered at a lower price point than the competition, we needed to have a high-end look to avoid being perceived as cheap or poor quality, while still feeling inclusive and a little sporty. This was accomplished through a two-tone grey and white color scheme and clean but approachable fonts, with added neon green accents to keep everything fun and fresh. I also used big, beautiful lifestyle shots whenever possible to show the colorful bottles in a wide variety of uses and backdrops. Being a small company, I did all of the product photography for the website, product catalog, advertisements, social media, etc.
okay, now we need to sell them
Being the manufacturer and distributor of the bottles, we had to walk a bit of a tightrope with advertising. We didn't sell directly to consumers - our number one target market was buyers for retail stores and chains who would order in large quantities. So many of our advertisements were placed in tradeshow and commercial publications.
But we also needed to create brand recognition and loyalty among consumers, even though they couldn't buy directly from us. I built our digital marketing strategy with the goal of creating a community around the bottles where our customers could share photos and experiences with their bottles. I designed a simple website to really show off the bottles and used a mix of internal photos and re-posting to build a community online, largely through Instagram. I engaged with our community by liking, commenting on, and sharing posts from our customers that included our bottles. And often created contests to win branded swag or free lids or bottles.
gotta have social media
and branch out with seven/fifty wine growlers
Targeting a much more specific demographic, we created a separate logo and branding strategy for the wine growlers. The name is a play off the fifty/fifty name and the fact that the wine growers held 750mL, the volume of a standard wine bottle.
