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Good Enough to Eat: The Best Easter Packaging of 2013

Here at Bloom, we all enjoyed last weekend’s excuse to consume our body-weights in egg-shaped confectionary and I suspect we weren’t the only ones. According to a recent study reported in Confectionary News, Easter is primarily associated with chocolate for 62% of Brits (compared with just 12% who primarily associate it with Jesus).  

In the midst of our enthusiastic guzzling, however, we did come across a few Easter treats that were literally too good to eat. Here’s our round-up of 2013’s best Easter packaging: 

Best for Children: Smarties Hen House

The hen house’s window reveals a golden egg and a chocolate hen with an egg inside, adding a playful element of discovery to this innovative alternative to the traditional Easter Egg.   

Best for Grown-ups: Hotel Chocolat All Milk Collection

Hotel Chocolat’s All Milk Easter Collection added a rare touch of sophistication to this Easter’s offerings. The delicate, black, white and gold carousel box features a traditional Easter design dating back to the 1930s. The extra-thick egg it contains comes with a chocolate tablet embossed with the same scene. 

 Best of the Countline Treats: Cadbury’s Dairy Milk Chick With Easter Buttons.

Only the most cynical Easter shopper could resist this smiling chick. Better yet, unlike most countline Easter treats, this chick isn't hollow, but filled with Cadbury’s iconic Milky Buttons.

 Best for Traditional Fun and Games: Cadbury’s Easter Egg Trail Pack

Cadbury’s colourful, basket shaped trail pack provides you with all you need to construct your own Easter Egg hunt, for some nostalgic family fun. 

 

Best for Gourmands: Rococo’s Praline Quail Eggs and Salted Caramel Seagull Eggs

Rococo’s Praline Quail Eggs and Salted Caramel Seagull Eggs are ideal for those seeking up-market alternatives to the traditional hen’s egg. Nestled in tastefully rustic crates, the delicately speckled eggs could easily masquerade for the real thing.

 

Most Eco-Friendly: Elizabeth Shaw

Elizabeth Shaw’s Easter packaging was designed for minimal wastage. The egg did not even require any extra fixtures to position it, as the box was cleverly constructed to grip it in place.

 

Best Offering from a Non-Chocolate Brand: Rowntree’s Randoms

Colourful, exuberant and delightfully random, Rowntree’s packaging for its sweetie-filled egg was perfectly on-brand and, with no plastic window, it was eco-friendly too.

 

 

 

Pleasure in a pop-up

It is no longer enough for brands to deliver satisfication simply through a quality product. Brands today, must 'excite me, involve me and respect me as an individual'.  No small task for businesses who historically drive profit margins through uniformity and volume. Hence the rise of the pop-ups.

Pop-ups are the perfect platform - a single-minded branded presence on the high street offering pure brand theatre through experience and engagement. Cost effective against the exposure they generate, they offer a visible and real channel to celebrate the brand by creating something special if only for a limited time.

So hats off to Magnum who have just opened up a pop up store in Westfield Stratford (conveniently near to a certain global event starting in a few days). We recently heard about the 'Make your own Magnum pop up store" and had to go check it out. All in the name of research, of course.

With 2 types of ice cream (vanilla or chocolate & caramel), 18 toppings ranging from caramel swirls to coconut shavings to edible rose petals, 3 dipping chocolate sauces (white chocolate, milk chocolate and dark chocolate) and the option to drizzle some more chocolate on top, there are over 104,500 different possibilities to create your own Magnum. 

 

Magnum-inspired cocktails were also available at the bar.

 

Twitter campaign to go hand in hand with the pop-up store

Our creation was a chocolate & caramel Infinity ice-cream dipped in white chocolate topped with hazelnuts, popping candy and brownies and finally drizzled with dark chocolate.

If that wasn't enough, once you've created your guilty indulgence you are invited to sit in the 'Pleasure Pod', to measure the pleasure that you give out whilst eating it.

 

The pod records your sensory output through measures of skin tension, facial expression, deglutition (aka swallowing) and heartbeat to capture your responses and displays them through a series of visual animations chart the pleasure journey.

This is just a short interpretation of the visual animation inside The Pleasure Pod.

 

Congratulations to Magnum and Unilever for creating such a compelling brand experience. So Mars was wrong...here is an example of Pleasure you can Measure.

Ocado blurs the line between virtual and physical retail

Ocado has announced today that it will be launching its first 'shopping wall' in the UK. From this Friday they will be placing a printed window display in a vacant shop in London's One New Change shopping center. Customers will be able to purchase selected items by pointing their mobile phones at a bar code below each image and adding them to their virtual basket. 

The system is very similar to Tesco's shopping wall in South Korea as featured in the Bloom Blog earlier this month. The difference being that Tesco's system used QR codes to link to an online website whereas Ocado's system works through the Ocado On the Go app that consumers need to download.

Is this the sign of things to come as retail shopping through mobile apps is becoming more and more prevelant?

Fresh fruit, nicely packaged

This little fruit stall from Fresh Carts caught our eye the other day. Situated outside a London hospital, it delivers its message in a colourful and simple way. Lots of lovely looking fruit, conveniently packaged, straightforward pricing with a clear health message.

Fresh Carts is an innovative project involving the Greater London Authority, Department of Health, NHS, London Boroughs and private fresh produce suppliers to deliver sustainable, accessible fresh produce direct to Londoners. We think it's a great idea.

Design trend: Looking to the past

Last week we posited that one of the reasons for Habitat’s demise was that its futuristic furniture was no longer to the public’s taste.  Increasingly in design we’re noticing a trend for reviving the old and making it relevant to the present.

A blast from the past

Since the mass fashion market exploded in the mid 20^th century every decade has had its own particular style – hippie in the 60’s, rockers in the 80’s, grunge in the 90’s. This century has certainly had its own style notes – leggings sadly being a defining feature – but increasingly fashion brands are reinventing the past for the present. Prada has done an exceptional job of this in their S/S 2011 campaign.   They’ve done more than just take influence from the 70’s, they’ve fully embraced the decade to create a retro collection that really stands out from the crowd. Modern Classic

Christian Louboutin has chosen to recreate a number of 17^th C portraits for his Fall collection. In doing so he has created a shorthand for ‘classic’, a statement that his shoes, a hallmark of the modern age, will stand the test of time. The age of ingenuity

Whether influenced by the Doctor Who revival or the imminent arrival of the final instalment of Harry Potter, we’re not sure, but Steampunk has become a thriving cult movement.  
Embodying a kind of neo-Victorianism Steampunk has spawned a whole culture, influencing everything from architecture to music to fashion. The movement’s appeal seems to stem from its roots in counterfactual history, which encourages followers to use their imagination and consider – what if?  Author G. D. Falksen, wearing a steampunk-styled arm prosthesis by Thomas Willeford, exemplifying one take on steampunk fashion.

The Golden Age

Despite many consumers having to tighten their purse strings, the upper echelons still have plenty of cash to splash.  However in an era where superstructures are a dime a dozen and 3D tvs are the norm it can be difficult to impress the jet set.  Yet the past is rarefied and can therefore form a compelling reference point.  The fog of time has a tendency to preserve only the most glamorous features, making the memory all the more precious. To this effect Van Cleef & Arpels have recently created a Bals de Légende collection of jewellery. Consisting of 160 unique pieces, the collection has been inspired by five of the most extravagant balls of the 20^th C.  Today equivalent events aren’t nearly as exclusive and many have been commercialised, making a celebration of a bygone era is even more fantastical for its rarity, you almost can’t help but be impressed.

A simpler life

The last couple of years have also seen growing support for The Prince of Wales’ rejections of modernist architecture and a long waiting list to buy a plot in Poundbury, his New Urbanism development on the edge of Cornwall.  Again this seems to stem from a desire to return, not to the extravagances of the past, but to a time when things were simpler and communities were smaller.

Breathing new life into an old brand

Brands are also tapping into the past.  The most recent example is the Little Chef redesign, which has leveraged one of the brand’s biggest assets - nostalgia.  The simplification of the marque helps the quirky chef to stand out even more.  Meanwhile the bright modern colours prevent it from looking dated, giving it greater longevity than the Hovis packs, which have arguably gone too far down the nostalgia route and now just look a bit dated.

The past can be used at all price points in a multitude of ways - to inspire, excite and engage. Furthermore it provides a short-hand of associations, meaning you don’t have to re-educate the consumer. It’s not suitable for every brand, but get it right and a strong emotional connection with the consumer will be your reward.

 

Marketing Week Live 2011

Yesterday Bloom attended Marketing Week Live 2011 and was impressed by the scale of the show, which is increasingly coming into its own.  The day demonstrated that marketers have the capacity for inspiring insights that drive real growth and gave attendees the tools to leverage those skills within their organisation.  Highlights included an empowering speech from Syl Saller on how to promote your ideas through the business, La Senza’s demonstration of how to go viral and of course Tom Rainsford’s hair, which proved to be the most popular twitter topic of the day. The main stage was unsurprisingly packed for Matt Brittin, Google’s MD for the UK & Ireland.  Some were disappointed that he didn’t mention +1 or any of the exciting new projects Google has in the pipeline but he did give an excellent demonstration of how the internet is becoming more social.  He rightly pointed out that ‘social’ no longer means just Facebook - the internet is interactive and can be used in a multitude of ways, activated by touch, sight and sound.  At this rate it’s only a matter of time until Google find a way to use the other two human senses - taste and smell.

The event is open to all and is particularly good at exposing entrepreneurs to the world of marketing and empowering them to run their business better.  After all, as Mark Brittin pointed out, they are driving internet growth & their innovations are likely to be the key to getting the British economy moving again. 

By the looks of things the event is going to just keep getting bigger and better.  If you haven’t made it this time around you should probably clear your diary for the end of June next year.

The erosion of Habitat

Severe cracks are showing in the High Street.  Border’s is gone, JJB, HMV and Clinton Cards are all under threat and Jane Norman is entering administration.  Consequently Habitat’s recent announcement shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise. Consumer confidence on the high street is still low, many retailers borrowed heavily during the boom times and are now struggling, especially with the rising prices of raw materials and the internet is finally proving to be a truly formidable foe.  Habitat in particular is suffering with fewer people moving house and putting off redecorating for a later date. 

The Independent asked ‘Why did we fall out of love with Habitat?  Was it them or us?’  But the question is redundant, both had an equal part to play - consumer habits changed and the retail brand failed to keep up. 

The high street is tough and overcrowded, natural selection dictates that only the fittest will survive, but this doesn’t mean that Habitat was doomed from the off.  We thought we’d have a look at where Habitat went wrong and what other retail brands can learn to avoid the same fate.

Founded at a time when chintz and willow china were de rigueur, Habitat, brought good design to the masses and revolutionised British taste in interiors. But recently it has been struggling, operating at a loss for the last three years and over £88 million in debt.  Where did it all go wrong?

Out with the new in with the old

There has been a shift in the popular design aesthetic.  In its heyday Habitat was the harbinger of modernism, baby boomers wanted to break free from their parent’s stuffy style and embrace something much more futuristic.  But this forward-looking aesthetic has come to seem somewhat naff in the 2010s, relegated to the interior of the now defunct Big Brother house. When it comes to interiors minimalism has replaced futurism, and nostalgia has taken the place of optimism.  Consumers prefer to decorate their houses with catchphrases from World War II (increasingly ubiquitous), not Habitat’s ‘sag bags’.

Habitat’s exaggerated emphasis on the new meant it lost out, while retailers like John Lewis experienced an 8.6% rise in sales last year.

Failure to lead from the front

Another contributing factor to Habitat’s demise was its failure to find an enigmatic designer to lead the brand.  Under Conran in the 60’s and 70’s and Tom Dixon in the early 2000s, the retailer flourished, but apart from a few token collaborations with celebrities, which felt more like something DFS would do, they failed to really capture the imagination of consumers.

Outwitted by the competition

Ikea entered the UK market in the 80’s and matched the design aesthetic that Habitat had been so well known for.  But Ikea didn’t stop there.  They easily beat Habitat on price and actually delivered on the British store’s original promise to bring design (although not quality) to the masses. Ikea offered utilitarian storage and a Scandanavian design ethos that Habitat just couldn’t match.  For the last few years Habitat has sat in no man’s land.  Unable to compete with Ikea on price or functionality, yet unable to match the more high end retailers like Heal’s, the heart and soul of Habitat went missin and they lost their reason to be.

Failed to leverage the in store experience

Interiors retailers have flooded the internet.  You can get everything from handmade pieces at affordable prices to cheap furniture delivered fast. To compete Ikea and Heal’s have launched their own online stores but they still capitalise on the in store experience and each offers something that you can’t get online.  Ikea guarantees the same experience no matter where you are and Heal’s holds the promise to surprise you every time, both are compelling reasons to actually make the trip to the store, reasons that Habitat failed to articulate and therefore lost footfall.

The future of Habitat is uncertain. Creating concessions in Homebase may now be the only viable solution for the business.  But it’s a sad reality for the brand. A retail icon becomes another piece of tat in a general home store.  How the mighty have fallen. For more ideas on the future of retail click here.

Books are judged by their cover

Today book covers straddle the divide between art and commerce. Just as great design must convey the brand essence, so cover illustrations must sell the story concealed within.

The changing role of book cover design reflects changing attitudes towards books over time.  In the Middle Ages tomes were encrusted in jewels and dusted in gold leaf, a testament to their value. With the proliferation of libraries in the Georgian period books were widely available yet reading was regarded as a rather sober affair, reflected in the era’s restrained leather-bound volumes. The modern dust cover, with vibrant illustrations and bold typefaces, owes its origins to the United States, where in the 1920s the rise of mass communications and increase in consumption encouraged publishers on both sides of the Atlantic to introduce richer visuals to entice passers by to purchase.

Penguin was one of the first to enter the fray. Instigated by Allen Lane and later refined under Jan Tschichold, the paperbacks marry a clear logo with a classic yet contemporary typeface and a colour coded three-band cover to create a range that has stood the test of time.

In the twenty-first century publishers are multi-national conglomerates and books must compete against a host of other forms of entertainment in crowded supermarket aisles. As a result some feel that book illustration has become formulaic and thoughtless, a case of shrewd picture editing rather than ingenious design. 

However if you look hard enough it’s still possible to find exceptional cover designs that sell their wares without prostituting themselves.

Ebooks may be convenient but they simply can’t compete with beautiful, tactile book covers.  Coralie Bickford-Smith’s designs for Penguin Classics are a case in point. Here she has managed to capture the essence of Fitzgerald, immediately transporting the prospective buyer to the louche glamour of 1920s New York. In a crowded marketplace minimalism and attention to typography make a book stand out. The unexpected also helps to get you noticed.  By opting for monochrome in a category awash with involving food photography Caz Hidebrand’s cookbook draws attention to the craftsmanship in every piece of pasta.  

So ignore the old expression - make sure you do judge a book by its cover.  After all that’s exactly how your brand is going to be judged. 

Following on from this post we'll be featuring some more of Bloom's favorite book covers on the right hand side of the blog.  This week’s suggestions came courtesy of Jenny Dean.  Let us know your favorites and keep an eye out for new additions.

 

The wedding

The biggest event of the two thousand and tens is taking place this Friday. With sales from wedding-related merchandise likely to top £26m and retailers anticipating an 11% increase in sales, brand owners are keen to get their slice of the pie - sorry - wedding cake. Some are more skeptical, with a recent poll carried out by JWT for Marketing highlighting that 66% of consumers said their purchasing behavior would not be influenced by associations with the royal wedding. Although this hasn’t been in keeping with our own experience of our local supermarket, where many Bloomers have witnessed consumers stuffing their trolleys with anything vaguely British, including the truly ridiculous Union Jack clown wig. 

With the one-off occasion demanding a quick turnaround and a limited running period, it’s important that brand owners are strategic in how they tap into royal wedding fever. We’ve noted that some brands are doing it better than others.

A large proportion of brands are doing the expected and tapping into Britishness.  While not particularly inventive this is a safe retail strategy, unlikely to put anyone off and with a shelf life that will extend beyond April 29^th if necessary.

However there are a number of brands that have taken it a step further and used this opportunity to cleverly accentuate their core brand proposition.

Pie Minister has brilliantly celebrated British wit and in the process won a well-deserved place at the heart of the street party spread.

 
Tate & Lyle’s pack eloquently highlights the brand’s British heritage and royal warrant while also reinforcing that the brand values simplicity and tradition.

Rowse has also done a special edition jar, as an evolution of their new identity, that is clearly British and uses a heart device, which ties it to the wedding in a way that feels quite precious and celebratory. It is certainly more successful than Relish, whose pack isn't celebratory and doesn’t really enhance or extend the brand proposition very far. 

The wedding is a real opportunity for brands which celebrate tradition at their core. Despite the fact that Wills and Kate have positioned themselves as modern royalty, they are still getting married in the Abbey that witnessed the coronation of William the Conqueror and riding around in a carriage built for Queen Victoria.  

Macallan has created a commemorative pack for Charles and Diana’s wedding using casks from each of their birth years.  This time they’ve done a similar thing for William and Kate, blending a cask from 1996 and 1999, both of which were filled on the date of the royal wedding, April 29.  This blend might lead to a better taste because they’ve been more selective about the year, but the story isn’t quite as compelling and perhaps the execution isn’t quite up to scratch. 

It’s also important to suggest a sense of heritage while ensuring the packaging is still appealing to the modern consumer.  In the case of McVite’s and Quality Street, both of whom hold a royal warrant, it feels like this balance is slightly off with the former seeming a bit too Queen Mum and the latter a little too Fergie.

Finally you have to admire the brands that, true to their British roots, have taken this opportunity to have a bit of fun. Harvey Nichol’s commemorative mug certainly stands out from the crowd and who would turn down the Crown Jewels to mark this special occasion?

 From all at Bloom, enjoy the Wedding and the extended weekend.

 

Greener branding

Sustainability has been a hot topic since the 1960s. But should it just be confined to boardroom discussions or should all brands have sustainability at their core?

Changes in consumer behaviour and the commercial environment mean that businesses and brands would be foolhardy to ignore sustainability altogether. This shift has been influenced by:

• The maturation of the flower power generation.  Their original principles have lost their anti-establishment edge and entered the mainstream.  In fact many former hippies now run some of the world’s biggest corporations.
• Consumers are able to navigate brands better, are more concerned about making the right choices and are more sceptical of brand promises.
• Digital has helped make consumers more brand savvy and given environmentalists a tool they didn’t have in the 60s. Consumers can immediately access a depth of information about a product.  If they have objections they can readily link to other like-minded people, strengthening their voice and making it difficult to ignore.
• Increasing regulation. For example the UK government’s 2008 Climate Change Act. Corporations need to stay ahead of the curve if they want to avoid government intervention.
• The economic downturn. Businesses are learning how to make their operations more efficient and less dependent on finite resources for long-term profitability.

A number of very successful enterprises have sprung up in the last 20 years that have shown strong ethical values needn’t preclude commercial success.  The pioneering work of The Body Shop, Pret and Innocent have paved the way for other brands to build their businesses around ethical principles.

But it is not just entrepreneurial outfits that are making a difference. Big corporations are transforming the way they operate to become more socially and environmentally friendly. 

Wal-Mart, the American behemoth, has instigated an exhaustive sustainability initiative.

1. Own Store Sustainability - Plan to run all of their branches off of renewable energy - that’s over 3,000 stores. 
2. Changing consumer behaviour - They have also created a new retail category ‘home efficiency’, an aisle in store where consumers can find everything they need to make their home more environmentally friendly. 
3. Supplier Sustainability - Wal-Mart has also been putting significant pressure on its suppliers to make their operations greener.

 

Wal-Mart’s efforts to go greener are not purely motivated by altruism, they are also trying to make their operations cheaper and more efficient - just one example of how sustainability can act as a cost-saving exercise. Increased efficiency and reduced dependency on finite resources can result in massive savings and shield businesses from the fluctuations of the market. In 2006 Boots’ changed its transport strategy, which reduced carbon emissions by 5% and saved the company £1.4 million in fuel costs.

Businesses are also using sustainability to inspire employees to devise innovative solutions as PepsiCo has recently.  Sustainable products’ social kudos also helps them stand out in a market saturated with new formats and flavours. Consumers are grateful to find brands that cut through the clutter and offer them simple ways to buy into environmental sustainability.

For many new businesses sustainability is as much a consideration as delivering value.  But how far should it lead your strategic growth plan? Tom’s Shoes has sustainability at its core.  It stands out from other shoe brands with its clear 'One for One' message and has made the espardrille hugely fasionable. Isklar Water on the other hand, is a carbon neutral company but their message is centred on the story of their exceptionally pure glacial mineral water. Isklar’s eco-credentials are useful for counteracting critics of bottled water but they’ve cleverly focused their communications around the most compelling idea for the consumer.

 

For established brands, embracing sustainability is a much greater challenge. Increasingly it’s the responsibility of big blue chips to drive the agenda. But commitment must be 100% as consumers and the media are very aware of green washing, as Tesco recently experienced in Hugh Fearley Whittingstall’s Fish Fight.

It’s crucial to take the long view when determining the value of sustainability initiatives.  Many of them demand significant investment upfront and often the benefits of such initiatives are not black and white, making them difficult to sell in to finance directors. Businesses need to balance the size of the investment required to carry out their sustainability plans against long term ROI in brand value.  It’s difficult to measure but not impossible and a recent white paper from Atos Origin gives a number of useful tips on how to get started.

All to often sustainability gets passed over by politicians and brand managers alike in favour of more immediate priorities.  But the way the market is going, with changing consumer priorities and increased pressure on raw materials, brands that refuse to embrace sustainability will become increasingly untenable.