🧠Redesigned our product for 4200 stores. Here's why and how

Hey there,

Welcome back for the 9th edition of Brandish

Your guide to crafting an iconic brand

In this week’s newsletter, I’ll talk about branding and packaging for retail specifically.

Why?

Because we recently went through a minor rebranding of our packaging design when we entered 4200 Walmart stores

So in this newsletter, I’ll show you the changes we made to make our product more appealing to retail shoppers as well as the rationale behind the changes.

Without further ado

Kick up your feet, grab your Brez, and let’s get rolling.

From DTC to Retail: Why we had to change it up

Most brands don’t think all that much about the messaging on their packaging when initially starting out to sell online.

Why?

Because by the time the customer has your product in their hands - they’ve already swiped their credit cards and are sold.

So, even if you can’t afford to spend a ton of time and resources to perfect your packaging - it’s not that big of a deal in the beginning (again, assuming you mainly sell online)

Now, in retail - it’s a bit different.

Because here…

You don’t have 1 minute ads

You don’t have landing pages

… and last but not least, the customer doesn’t have time to look you up on review sites and actually research your brand

Therefore, the only way to convince a customer to buy your product in a retail aisle is to have picture-perfect packaging.

Now, any creative person knows that it’s never possible to make anything picture-perfect.

But we tried, and I think we got something pretty good.

So, here are the changes we made to make the packaging better suited for retail:

Highlighting “Collagen” instead of protein

First and foremost,

One of the biggest changes we made was changing the big highlighted text from “Protein” to “Collagen.”

This is because many consumers got confused about whether this was a protein powder or a collagen product.

Now, although collagen is a protein - our product solves an entirely different set of problems compared to a protein powder product.

And this brings us to the next point…

Be clear, not clever

If you look at our old packaging, it says:

“Hydrolyzed Grass-fed Bovine Multi-Collagen Protein”

If I saw that on a retail aisle…

Even I wouldn’t know what that means.

And as a result, instead of informing the consumer, it’s confusing them (which is typically not a good idea when you have 30 seconds to sell them)

Now, after re-working our packaging, we changed this to “All-In-One Beauty Nutrition Powder.”

Easy, clear, and understandable

Clear value props on the front

If you’ve never used collagen, the first thing you’ll ask yourself is: What does this help me with?

Now, on our old packaging - we also said that it supports hair, skin, and nails.

But information that’s as crucial as this needs to be more apparent and easier to understand

Therefore, we decided to change it up and add it right below the sub-headline in an easily understandable icon-format

Killing the scepticism

People are inherently sceptical when buying supplements

… and rightfully so.

Everybody should know what they’re putting into their body.

Therefore, we added the ingredients to the front page of the packaging.

This way, they also don’t have to turn the bottle around to look for further information.

They have everything they need in one place and can make an informed buying decision.

I’m sold, but how?

Now, last but not least - we also changed the “how to consume it” information on the packaging so that’s more apparent as well.

How to test packaging

The easiest way to test your packaging design is to put it in front of actual consumers and let them vote.

We used Pickfu to do this.

It is super easy (and affordable) to set up a test and get feedback within 24 hours

Beyond packaging

Packaging is one part of the equation.

But another part of the equation is your photography and how good your product looks in your content.

Is it the right setting?

Are the right props included in the content?

Is the lighting in the content?

And last but not least, how skilled is the photographer to capture exactly what you need to make it look the way you want?

We’re using soona studios to help us with this, and we couldn’t be happier about working with them.

They’re a product photography studio that’s made specifically for CPG (consumer) brands - and therefore, their photographers have a great understanding and intuition of how to make just the right content for your product.

Vendor of the Week

soona studios is unlike any other photography studio you’ve ever worked with.

Why?

Because, as a branding guy - I like to focus a lot on the small details and make sure everything is as close to picture perfect as possible.

And at the same time, I’m also a business guy - so I need to optimize my costs as much as possible.

Now - here’s the problem I was facing with more or less every other photography studio I’ve ever used:

1. You can’t control the content shoot

As founders, we don’t have time to be at every product or video shoot.

And as a result, you’re forced to delegate the responsibility of the shoot to the photographer.

Now, even though that sounds cool - it often means you won’t get exactly the content you wanted back.

With soona, it’s different…

I get to be at every single product shoot, live and remote, to help the photographer with the small details that matter to me

2. You pay for content you don’t like

Them: “Here’s the invoice for $3000”

Me: “Really - but I only liked 6 of the images you shot”

Ever found yourself thinking this…? Trust me, you’re not alone!

“Pay only for what you like” is the smartest move I’ve ever seen from a photography studio.

Period.

I don’t think I’ll ever work with a photography studio that doesn’t operate with this model (that is, if I ever work with another studio than soona, full stop)

As you can tell - they’re great. So go check them out. You won’t regret it

Click here to check them out

Thanks for reading along

As always, thanks for reading along.

I look forward to seeing you again next week. Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

- Ankit