Brian Eller

The assignment: Create a branding and advertising campaign for a fictitious coffee company. What follows is an abbreviated version of my process of completing this assignment. Step 1: Create the logo. -- This logo needed to be something simple, yet appropriate. It had to set a proper "mood" for the product itself, as well as cooperating with the mood of the advertisements it would be used in.

Step 2: Create a product label. I figured that any coffee today has a variety of types. Regular, Decaf, not to mention a variety of blends. I created three varieties of the client's coffee. A first thing in the morning, "Wake you up" blend, a regular blend for drinking through the day, and a decaf, when you wanted something warm to help you unwind at the end of the day. Kick in the A** Coffee: This is the morning wakeup blend. I picked the "grumpy faced" bulldog, as I felt he exemplified that feeling we can all relate to first thing in the morning. I chose to go with 'A**' rather than just using the word, to be a little less crude. The coffee bean background was selected as it obviously goes with the product, yet created a simple enough background that it didn't distract from the title elements.

Skate through the day Coffee: The flavorful mid-day coffee. The skateboarding bulldog was used to convey the idea that this was the blend for when you're already rolling. A blend that won't give you the jitters, yet delivers the satisfaction of a good cup of joe. A mild blur was added to the dog to give the illusion of motion. Colors were chosen to compliment those used in the "Kick" label, yet a slight variety, as well as a change in typography give "Skate" it's own unique identity.

Doghouse Delight/Bedtime Blend: This blend was given two names, so as to keep with the theme, yet set it off from any undesired "In the doghouse" connections it may have given, as well as solidifying the purpose of this blend. A color change to a blue pallet gives a clear separation to this decaf blend from the others in the line. The nightcap was added to further tie the theme together.

Step 3: Apply the label -- Once the labels were created for each blend, the next step was to apply them to appropriate containers. I started out applying the label to a traditional coffee canister. The container plays a major role in the branding process. In the case of "Kick", The color of the canister was changed to a "nuclear green" to further convey the morning wakeup concept.

I realized that coffee comes in a variety of sizes as well, so a variety of canister sizes were used. Here we have the mid-size canister.

Continuing with the sizing, we also added a Large size.

While developing the concept of the sizes, I felt we should add a Jumbo size for the extreme coffee hound. Thus the idea for the 55 gallon drum. I kept the "Nuclear Green" color, and added a few "warning" labels for effect.

Examples were also created for the other blends; here is an example of the packaging for "Skate". As I'd already shown the range of sizes, I felt that only an example of the blend's packaging was needed. For each blend, a unique canister color was chosen to set the brand off from others on the store shelf. In the case of "Skate" I selected a burnt orange.

For "Doghouse", I chose an electric purple, again to set it apart on the shelf from the typical greens and blues. I felt this color did tie in with the labeling, yet also connected with the branding of the line as a whole.

It seems that many brands today offer whole bean packaging, for those who wish to grind their own fresh each day. Bulldog Beans is no different. Here are examples of the bags for the whole bean packaging.

Another new method of delivery is the "K-Cup". Bulldog Beans has this covered as well.

Want a bit of variety from your Coffee? Bulldog Beans also offers a tasty Hot Cocoa. (Shown here in K-Cups).

Step 4: Advertising -- Once the product is created, it of course has to be presented to the public. Two examples of magazine ads were created; both including the complete product line.

As the old saying goes, "Nothing lasts forever". Things always need to be replaced, or updated. The Bulldog Beans campaign was no exception. While it had served its purpose at the time, as I revisited it, I found it in need of some freshening up.

I started off with the labels. The three main labels, while good in concept, seemed to have some short-comings. i started off with the first label, the "Kick in the A** coffee". While "Kick" was an early-morning, get you going coffee, re-examination made me question the use of the sleepy/grumpy faced bulldog. Additionally, I questioned the semi-crude terminology used in the "Kick" name, and decided the project would be better served if I did a name-change. After some thought, "Kick" became "Jumpstart Coffee", and the grumpy faced English Bulldog was replaced with a peppy younger French Bulldog. Further, the colored rectangles that I'd used in the titles seemed rather dated in appearance, and were replaced with some enlarged and updated typography. The description line was kept, an opacity layer was added behind the main logo, and a drop shadow was added to the subtitle line. These additions seemed to both make the logo more legible and make it "pop" a bit more.

Next up was the mid-day, "Skate through the day coffee". This update was actually one of the toughest of the three, as the majority of it still worked. I examined several other photos of Tillman, the skateboarding bulldog, but came back to the conclusion that the one I was using served the desired purpose best. Again, the rectangular title box was removed, however this time the existing typography was kept. The name, "Skate through the day coffee" seemed to call for an update, but it took quite a bit of thinking to find a suitable replacement. Eventually, "Skate" was replaced by a simple one word title, "Freewheelin' " which I felt conveyed the same idea, but wasn't quite as verbose. The type was enlarged, and an additional blur-layer was added in the yellow of this flavor's color scheme. I also added a burlap background layer to each label, to break up the coffee bean background, and to give the illusion of beans pouring out of a bag of coffee, rather than just laying there.

Bedtime Blend, on examination, was probably the label most in need of an update. I'd never been pleased with the way the nightcap fit on the dog's head, and a colleague also pointed out, that while the image did indeed convey the intended "sleepy" image, the tongue sticking out didn't really present the most appetizing image. The single dog was replaced with the sleeping puppies. While there is still a tongue showing, the yawning puppy conveys a whole different image than does the older dog with his tongue sticking out. Again the title rectangle was replaced with some updated typography, the burlap layer was added, and the main logo was updated.

In revisiting the campaign, I felt that in today's market, the line as it was, would be rather incomplete. Iced Coffee was added to the lineup. I'd seen the image of the bulldog in the ice many times before, and it just seemed the perfect fit for this label. While I'd started out with the same general template as the others, the Iced Coffee seemed to have a different personality that needed to be conveyed. I kept the whole beans at the bottom, but replaced the upper portion with ice cubes. The updated Logo was used, and some appropriate typography in the title.

As this wasn't an actual working campaign, I chose to update, rather than completely replace the two existing ads. The labels were updated to reflect the new labels, also the copy text was updated. Aside from that, about the only change that was made to this piece was the "Dog Tired?" line was centered, rather than being left justified, and was lowered slightly.

Again on this piece, it received only slight modifications. The text was updated to reflect the updated names, the headline was changed to use the same font as its sister ad, and again the labels were replaced with the new versions. Probably the biggest change was that I added a white to black gradient opacity layer to help bring out the text in the lower portion of the ad. The fact that it is almost unnoticeable until it's mentioned was, to me, the proof that it was serving its purpose.

Since I'd introduced an entire new type of coffee to the product line, I felt that a new ad was in order. Simply adding "Iced" to the existing ads just didn't seem like it would do the job properly. Labels were applied to containers, and a snowy background was used. This alone didn't seem to adequately do the job. I found an image of a pile of ice cubes, and in Photoshop, I used the selection tool and picked out several groups of cubes, in different shapes, and then piled them randomly together, around the containers. I felt that using the varied shapes would give a more realistic appearance than simply using several copies of a single group of ice. I added a full-image opacity layer between the background/ice/containers, and the text and logo, for one, to bring out the text, and secondly, I felt it added to the "cold, frosty" feel of the piece.