Retail Branding for an Acclaimed Paint Manufacturer
A Brand in Need of Sprucing Up
One of the world’s leading global paint manufacturers approached Vivaldi Fifth Season to develop and oversee a revision of the retail branding of their 600+ stores across the US. This rebrand would not only unify store locations in look and feel, but it would create a new brand and visual identity for the professional paint business, rally employees and create a consistent brand message across all brand touch points, including for internal and external launch events.
Our client took a pragmatic approach to building its retail brand in the highly competitive professional paint market. It’s exciting to work with those who defy their challenger position to take a leadership stance.
Agathe Blanchon-Ehrsam, CMO, Vivaldi
New Look, New Brand
We worked with the team to develop a specific process for developing the new brand strategy starting with business reviews, Vivaldi proprietary Customer First interviews, and visual audits all in service of a new creative strategy that led design, communications plan and the creation of campaign and design standards.
By understanding customer brand perceptions, preferences, needs and expectations as well as existing equities of the many legacy product brands, our team was able to identify the professional paint division’s competitive advantage and the differentiating elements that would reinforce the new positioning of the brand. The Vivaldi Fifth Season design team worked to convey the new brand strategy visually through a new logo and visual identity, while respecting the corporate guidelines of the established corporate identity.
To understand how the brand could come to life in the retail setting, we developed a mobile app that allowed store employees to contribute to a comprehensive store audit of the 600+ retail locations across the US. Understanding in record time the different layouts, signage, and materials needed helped us create a pragmatic, modular approach to rolling out and installing the new look & feel. Our responsibility included overseeing the fabrication and delivery of the signage that was dispatched and installed in all 600+ stores.
To get the word out about the new brand, we developed a regional and local-market launch strategy and created multiple trade press ads to run in sequence with the external brand launch as well as launch concepts executed by the stores themselves. Finally, we created a brand video for the external brand education effort to educate customers on the changes in the brand and what it meant to them.
Results
The roll-out of the new store design was a success, with a reinvigorated sales force, and an improved customer experience, including expanded store footprints, customer-friendly service counters and advanced color selection tools.
Meet The Expert
Private: Agathe Blanchon-Ehrsam
Chief Marketing Officer
Agathe is the Global Chief Marketing Officer of Vivaldi and brings over 18 years of strategic consulting experience. She has helped companies produce innovative, engaging interactions that help them connect with their audiences, build their brands and create entire new businesses.