BXP - May 2018 - 33

YOU SEE A SMALL BUT
GROWING NUMBER OF
NATIONAL BRANDS TREATING
THEIR PACKAGING AS TRUE
BILLBOARD AD SPACE

WE'VE DEVELOPED A PARTICULARLY
UNIQUE SKILL SET AND DEEP
EXPERIENCE WITH CLUB STORES
practices that are essential to consumer engagement. Below
are to such examples that address the physical realities of the
club store environment: poor lighting, large pallet displays and
oversized aisles.
Packaging as advertising - Unlike most retail channels, club
stores generally do not allow for POP communication other
than packaging. However, the pallets themselves provide large
visual areas to tell your story, and sell your product. The most
cutting edge trend in club is to use these areas as advertising
and communication touchpoints, with one very unique selling
proposition, and you see a small but growing number of national brands treating their packaging as true billboard ad space.

Bacardi and Virgin Atlantic offered their customers at the upper class lounge the experience of having a drink at the world's
best bars. All they had to do was slip on a VR headset and
choose a destination and that particular bar's best cocktail.
The bar may be Virtual but the cocktail is real.
How are you making this knowledge
work on behalf of your agency?
We recognized that it wasn't enough to just be another design
agency. We're a fairly small group, but we serve some of the
biggest brands. In fact, on our new website, you'll see these
words on the home page...'We're a small agency doing big
things.' We work with brands like Campbell's, Hatfield Quality
Meats, Pier 1, PepsiCo and Hershey's. But to transform ourselves into a true partner, we've honed our skills as a thought
leader. Whether it's design or sharing industry trends, ideas
and a deep understanding of the marketplace are the source of
our passion.

Can you elaborate on that?
Yes, we recently launched a new blog called Branding Times. It
is the centerpiece of our new website and is designed to give
brand owners the intel they need to compete. With this effort,
we are trying to have a voice in the industry and shape the
conversation ... how we view the future of marketing, creative
services and branding, the newest technologies and e-books
we're developing. We created the blog specifically to appeal to
managers in the consumer packaged goods industry; this could
be C-suite, design, branding or technology professionals, and
we've committed time and talent to make sure that everything
we publish is current and relevant.
What do you see for Works Design
Group going forward?
Our goal is to be at the intersection of change. We want to
ensure that our clients' brands are fluent in the languages
spoken across today's evolving channels.

Pallets shoppable from all sides - Product placement is always
uncertain in a club store, so it's important to reinforce the
design elements on all sides of the pallet. Different club stores
merchandize with different sides of the pallet, so versatility
and communication on all sides of the pallet are key (including
the top).
What are some of the other
hot trends you're seeing?
We recently wrote an e-book titled Virtual & Augmented Reality:
What CPG firms and Retailers need to know. These technologies have the potential to make a huge - perhaps transformative - societal impact. And of course they can become a real
asset in the retail environment. A broad spectrum of brands
have already experimented with these tools, and we surveyed
the market and reported on our findings. VR and to some degree AR enable a type of storytelling that is three-dimensional.
Here are a couple of examples:
Toms Shoes is revered for its charitable work; providing
millions of children with shoes the world over. The original offer
was, for every pair of shoes a customer buys, a child in need
gets a free pair. Toms paired up with AT&T to bring this story
to life through VR. Now consumers can meet a child who had
benefited from the program.

Visit Works Design Group's new portfolio site:

Works new blog and free VR eBook download:

WORKSDESIGNGROUP.COM

BRANDINGTIMES.COM

http://www.WORKSDESIGNGROUP.COM http://www.BRANDINGTIMES.COM

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of BXP - May 2018