Forward Branding
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This document discusses Forward, a branding consultancy firm. It summarizes how Forward keeps clients happy through solving problems, understanding client needs, and developing effective branding strategies. Forward helps clients understand their strengths and develop brands that communicate their advantages in new categories. The document provides several case studies of how Forward has helped brand refresh and reposition clients to grow their businesses.
Forward Branding
- 1. forward thinking. forward solutions. ROCHESTER, NY: Their volleyball team is firms and are seasoned enough to look past the nicknamed the Brand Bastards. When probed for puffery to find real value. They may have been meaning, Duke Stofer, Senior Designer at disappointed in studies missing the mark, in the Forward, explains. “We have no brandfathers – level of service they receive, or in the fees we’re first generation. We didn’t come into clients they’re expected to pay. They’re looking for by joining a successful concern. We didn’t inherit something better. For passion without pretense. a reputation. We create it ourselves, every day.” For discipline and consistency. For them, we’re a breath of fresh air.” The volleyball team, which regularly pits some of Forward’s “elders” against kids half their age, They are not an ad agency, a promotions firm, doesn’t win much. But on the branding court it’s or a design studio. They are unlike any marketing another story. Win they do, on a regular basis. communications company you’ve ever dealt For the past 12 years, Forward has been winning with. They are Forward, and they know how to clients, winning awards and winning competitive grow brand equity. contracts with some of the world’s greatest brands. How does this small consultancy keep billion- dollar brands happy and healthy? “Simple. We solve problems,” says Carlo Jannotti, VP and often-irreverent Senior Brander at Forward. “Most of our relationships begin with referrals from satisfied clients. Many of these referrals have experienced the ways of the big city branding
- 2. Play to Your Strengths Before Kodak may not be number one in the ink jet aisle, but they are number one in pictures – an ownable position that transfers easily to ink jet photo paper. Forward’s Picture Paper strategy was adopted after a cross-country shoot out. After We’re Number 2! We’re Number 2! Forward helped RoseArt Industries understand that developing and implementing a valid number two strategy is more viable than fighting a long entrenched brand to be number one. The resulting designs leveraged positive associations from the category while creating an extendable identity system. To accompany the solid thinking, Forward came up with solid packaging concepts that elicited superior shelf-test results, then executed the designs for implementation. Go Ahead, Enjoy! Besides positioning new media, Forward Lactose-free products traditionally looked like medicine, has helped keep traditional product limiting appeal because they lost the wholesome, brands like Kodak paper up-to-date for healthful associations of milk. Forward’s aspirational more than a decade, including the “Turn Milk for Life positioning, naming, and identity changed Up the Color” and “Behind Your Best that for Upstate consumers. Pictures” positioning programs. if you don’t know where you’re Sure, there’s a lot of good design out there. Effective design is another story, going, you’ll end up someplace else and that’s where Forward comes in. More than once they’ve been brought in to rescue design projects that missed the mark. After reviewing the background and conducting their own due diligence, Forward staffers often discover the initial request was off target. “Identifying the problem is half the battle,” says Rob Parsons, the firm's chief communicator and master of the question “Why?”. “By its nature creativity can move in almost any direction. You need to harness it with a sound strategy.”
- 3. Be First In Your Own Category The crowded table wine and cooler categories left little room for new products. Forward’s positioning and design recommendations helped Constellation Brands establish Arbor Mist as the first in a completely new category – varietal wines with a splash of fruit. Arbor Mist is now hailed as one of the industry’s most successful product launches. Connect at a Higher Level Moving past functional benefits, Forward helped give new life to Almaden table wine by positioning a relatively minor packaging innovation in a new and unique way – as an instant party. This was not just another box of wine. It was fun, and it was a major success. Communicate your Advantage In a category they first established, InterPlak was losing share to Braun and Oral B. Forward helped them sell themselves (instead of the category) by branding their unique brush head technology – giving consumers the TheraTwist Triple Action dentists recommend while obsoleting the competition. And that they can do. Through workshops and interviews, Forward the team proceeds to deliver the right solution for the right problem. will help uncover the assets clients overlook. With insight and And since branding is so much more than just a logo, the right solution creativity, they will visualize the brandscape and help identify issues reinforces a message that extends through all marketing communications. and opportunities. They have an enthusiasm that’s infectious “Design alone will not make you number one. If you and a blue-collar style that helps demystify brand theories pursue a market leader strategy and there are five brands ahead and the creative process and at the end of the day, their of you, you’re going to fail,” Parsons reasons. “Instead, craft clients are better brand builders. a sound number two strategy, or better yet, create a whole new category With the big picture and realistic objectives clearly before them, and be number one in that space. Then design will really help you.”
- 4. Come Again If there’s one rule in retail, it’s that you can’t stand still. Being category leader has its advantages, but it also has its obligations. To help the Sensitive Eyes franchise stay one step ahead of the competition, Forward has twice helped Bausch & Lomb use graphics, colors and messaging to refresh packaging and restage the brand. Traditional Equities, Advanced Products With a mix of colors, graphics, and typography, Forward helped Kodak marry the advanced structural cues of its Picture Maker kiosk to its traditional position of trust, quality, and ease of use. The result? A new product consumers weren’t afraid to try, and now a category in its own right. Maximum Return on Investment Forward helps Kodak make the most of ongoing brand investments by consolidating the company’s many graphic guidelines into a single coherent volume, along with programs to keep the information up-to-date and easy to use. it takes more than a logo “Once we know what makes your brand special, we’ve got to Forward does not have their own “style”. They do not create fanciful make it tangible to your audiences. It’s got to have impact and meaning, designs just to please the eye or themselves. In their world, people need to remember it, and you’ve got to be able to design walks in lock step with strategy. They do this protect it. That’s asking a lot of a logo,” explains Jim Forward, through a proven process that turns brand equity theories President & Creative Director. into actionable objectives. Those are met through a “Instead, you should leverage all the tools at your disposal: combination of visual and associative elements. colors, typefaces, image styles, graphics, symbols, tag lines, even
- 5. House-branded, Well-branded Retailers are rapidly moving to extend their brands as they expand their businesses. Forward developed unique graphical approaches to help retailing innovator Wegmans Food Markets improve the image, and the sales, of its pasta offering. Forward also developed a new name, tag line, and color palette to create the right associations for Wegmans’ expansion into a new category with its Trenditions line of “accessories for food lovers”. Got Fresh Milk? Helping Upstate Farms see that the only relevant, ownable position was based on their location, Forward crafted a robust identity to express a “Taste Upstate Freshness” position. The visuals enhanced shelf impact and memorability, and gave what was previously a commodity product new access to vital retail accounts. packaging structures. Unfortunately, many organizations lack the “You can’t noodle your way to impact,” contends Dillon discipline and mechanisms to take full advantage of their identity.” Constable, one of the firm’s outspoken and talented brand Too often, companies manage a stable of logos and call it branding. implementors. “What you can do is manage all the elements of your New problem? New logo! Soon they’re holding a handful identity. Make them work together to more effectively of pebbles, instead of the boulder they need to smash through communicate what makes your brand different and why the competitive clutter. So they alter designs, introduce new that difference is important. Turn them into a great symbols, new names and sub-brands, never focusing on the real source symphony, with meaning, power and longevity. Don’t create a logo. of the problem. Never finding a solution. Create a brand identity that’s impactful, memorable and relevant.”
- 6. Wake Up to a Robust Identity With typography, symbols, and a product Enhancing the identity with a distinctive color palette, descriptor that left behind the negative equities unique graphics, a strong use of type, and the universal of extended wear, Forward helped present benefit of “Wake Up and See”, Forward created a PureVision lenses as the revolutionary coherent, multilevel launch program that spoke simply breakthrough they represent. and powerfully to patients and practitioners alike. A robust identity system, condensed onto a single package – a look so distinctive that it served as the brand signature as often as the logo. By managing the elements of the identity, Forward was able to use new imagery to refresh PureVision collateral to match up with new advertising messages while staying true to previous efforts and equities. keep it simple, keep it consistent As Jannotti regularly proclaims, what you do with the design Sure, they know all the theories, and have a few of their own, but can be more important than the design itself. “Is the Nike swoop staffers at Forward have a certain savvy about them too – really that impressive?” he queries. “No, the consistency is an intimate knowledge of the dirty details you acquire only the real power. The symbol serves as a mnemonic linking after you’ve worked in the trenches. It’s this intimacy with new generations of images, icons and colors with the brand reality that ensures solutions offered by the team will actually work to refresh and revitalize it. And the message never really changes. – a failing of more than one big consultancy they’ve been hired to In the end, that’s what makes it impressive.” clean up after. This level of excellence is achieved with commitment – to
- 7. Next Components Complex Problems Demand This maker of next-generation digital printing Simple Solutions presses doesn’t sell at retail, but awareness is still From dealers to developers to distributors, everyone wants an issue. Thanks to branded operator replaceable to leverage their association with the Kodak brand. components that play off the product identity, Unfortunately, there often were not adequate systems in Forward helps the NexPress brand stay top of place for third-party business-to-business applications – mind as parts move from plants around the world it was a management challenge, and a squandered to their destinations. opportunity to lever these many positive exposures. Forward helped clarify the true scope of the problem, then came up with a deceptively simple solution that offered flexibility and consistency in one neat bundle. Say Cheese Sorrento brought innovation to the string cheese category, but the new products were no longer string cheese. Forward updated the identity and created a simple naming system that helped the company introduce unique offerings within the context of the overall franchise. simplicity and to consistency. The KISS principle applies to Senior Designer, rushes to point out. “It doesn’t have to be boring. branding, just as it applies to everything else. Complex solutions Any designer with a passion for branding can create fresh new looks are hard to execute. They leave too much room for from an existing set of visual tools, as long as they understand interpretation, making it easier to deviate, inevitably into the essence of the brand. That’s the key to successful branding the weeds. But like a catchy tune, the repetitive beat of a – passion and understanding, not gimmicks or trendy consistently managed identity supporting a sound strategy will techniques.” That’s why Forward’s success will continue. Their eventually find a comfortable place in the public mind. passion is for the brand, not just the design. “You can be consistent without being dull,” Brenda Benedict,
- 8. looking for goliath… M a ke n o m i s t a ke ; t h e s e a r e bu s i n e s s professionals who have thrived for more than a decade, and plan on being here for the long haul. They know that in today’s business climate, you had better provide superior value. Their’s is the role of the underdog – a role they love to play. Just ask Dean Faklaris, Account Executive Forward is a full-service brand and identity development and project manager extraordinaire. “We firm specializing in strategic design and integrated brand communications. consistently deliver more for less, especially when you stack us up against the big boys from Their services include: Strategy the big cities.” • Essence/value proposition • Positioning/repositioning With a well-defined workflow, streamlined • Brand architecture • Executive brand workshop facilitation processes, and disciplined resource allocation, Identity they deliver the double-digit cost savings clients • Naming and nomenclature are now demanding. And they do this with an • Logos and symbols • Color studies & systems unmatched level of strategic accuracy, design • Tag Lines excellence, and speed. It’s a well-oiled machine, • Graphics and imagery Communications and it’s a sight to see if you’ve ever been let • Package design down by missed deadlines, surprise rush charges, • Marketing collateral • Launch kits and half-finished presentations. • Marketing toolkits • Print advertising Go ahead and give them a call, and try a little • Sales promotion • Sales presentation Forward Thinking for yourself. Once you’ve • Point-of-sale experienced the responsiveness, results, and value, Controls • Brand identity audit you’ll come back for more. • Standards & Guidelines • Research concept development For more information call Carlo Jannotti at 585-872-9222 or cjannotti@forwardbranding.com 34 May Street Webster, NY 14580 www.forwardbranding.com. Trademarks are the property of their respective owners.