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The Need For Speed: Synchronization
Ensures Brand Success
By Janice Jaworski, Managing Director, Anthem New York
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| Janice Jaworski |
There is nothing new about the idea that the package is where
brands and visual branding were born. The package, as icon, is the
key to consumer mindshare, trial, purchase, and repeat purchases.
Through the personal process of discovery and acceptance, the package
becomes the brand. The relationship the package develops
with all who come in contact with it creates the bond with the brand.
Packaged goods companies are rediscovering that ultimately the package
is the primary expression of brand that truly matters. It’s
the package that makes the emotional connection and carries the
promise that consumers rely on.
What is new are mass-market retailers that dominate the marketplace
and a burgeoning global economy, resulting in packages that require
a more complex skill set to produce (knowledge, processes, and technology)
and the need to move from design concept to shelf quickly and efficiently.
This often means bringing together disparate teams and partners
who usually have never worked together, causing coordination that
is more problematic, designs that often can’t be produced,
and delays in getting a new product to market. Simply put, the old
way of getting out the core brand message—often spending an
extra six months figuring out production problems—is the death
knell to any new product.
Synchronization: The Most Powerful Brand Tool
of All
The need for speed, efficiency, and predictability from initial
conception through production requires the development of a workflow
system that ensures the delivery of the right package, with the
right message, for the right product, to the right consumer, to
the shelf at the right time. In essence, synchronization becomes
the most powerful brand tool of all. From concept to shelf, every
step must be synchronized and present a seamless brand experience,
starting with the brand marketer and ultimately ending at the point
of sale with the consumer. “Consumers don’t buy strategy
and design, they buy the package—the expression of the brand’s
promise—when it fulfills their expectations,” notes
Ted Leonhardt, president of Anthem Worldwide. “It’s
a highly emotional transaction that’s successful only if all
the details are right.” From research and strategy through
production, every detail is critical, and every detail in the process
counts.
Culture: Honoring Shoppers From Idea to Aisle
Details, details, details. It’s about getting the details
right. And the focus on details requires a culture of designers
who understand the importance of technical, emotional, and strategic
issues that connect people to brands. It takes a culture of individuals
working in offices, homes, inside client organizations, and in manufacturing
and printing facilities around the world to ensure that no detail
is overlooked or marginalized. It demands a culture that prizes
cooperation and collaboration so that those new brands reach the
world at less cost, with higher quality, and greater predictability
than ever before. Essentially, it requires a design culture that
honors the shopper from initial idea to shopping aisle.
Balance: Innovation and Pragmatism
We all know that the big idea executed poorly is no longer the big
idea, especially in the world of brand packaging. Any brand that
does not embrace the importance of synchronization will lose on
price and lose on speed to market. When brand strategists start
analyzing research and articulating a strategy, they must do so
with the full knowledge of how the concept will manifest itself
on the retail shelf. When designers begin to sketch, they must do
so with a full awareness of the realities of global prepress and
printing. Faced with mounting pressure to meet the stringent demands
of retailers, packaged goods marketers are challenging design agencies
to produce better work, faster, at a lower cost. CPGs are tired
of tolerating often significant design adjustments during the production
stage simply because a design agency doesn’t understand the
real-world technical requirements of printing. This is no longer
acceptable. It adds cost and time to the packaging development process,
neither of which the brand owner can afford. The days of creating
great concept designs and then throwing the digital file over the
wall to the prepress house or printer are coming to an end. Synchronization
is the ability to close the loop between big brand ideas and big
brand expectations; the elegant balance between innovation and pragmatism.
Implementation: Predictability Makes The Difference
The effective implementation of this brand of innovation must be
based on the practical understanding of a consumer product company’s
core strengths and competencies, or else the process of innovation
and natural human curiosity can lead product-planning teams astray.
Speed to market and scheduling predictability makes a huge difference
in a world where predicting and hitting quarterly financial targets
is expected.
Today, successful branding is just as much about understanding
and dealing with the practical realities of the manufacturing process
as it is about brand strategy. “The more efficient the packaging
development system, the more effective the brand”, says Leonhardt.
“It can improve speed to market and global brand consistency
while taking costs out of the total workflow, permanently,
Synchronizing all the steps in the process is key to delivering
a return to the corporate bottom line.”
Janice Jaworski is currently Managing
Director and co-founder of the Anthem
Worldwide’s New York office, part of the global strategic
brand and packaging design consultancy owned by Schawk, Inc.
As a designer and a strategist, Janice has
a diverse and unique range of skills. Her experience in brand strategy,
graphic/identity design, and user-experience design has resulted
in a deep expertise in global brand development and consumer behavior.
Prior to joining Anthem, Ms. Jaworski was a Group Director at Interbrand
New York. From 2000-2002 Janice was a Creative Lead at Viant, a
global Internet consultancy. For the five years preceding her post
at Viant, Ms. Jaworski was the Creative Director and co-founder
of the New York office of Lipson Alport Glass & Associates (LAGA),
a strategic design consultancy specializing in brand and corporate
identity, and package design.
After receiving her BFA in Design at The University
of Rhode Island, Ms. Jaworski attended Parsons School of Design
and The New School of Social Research in New York City. A recipient
of over 35 awards of excellence in brand/package design, corporate
identity, and interactive design, Ms. Jaworski is a longstanding
member of the AIGA, The Design Management Institute, the ADPF, and
The New York New Media Association.
This article appeared in the December
2004 eBulletin.
Feedback on DMI Viewpoints and article proposals
are always welcome! Please email jtobin@dmi.org.
All articles reflect the opinion of the author and not the Design
Management Institute.
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