Click to download the brief as a PDF.
Microbrands
This brief is about colonising a little bit of culture and letting people know that its yours.
Create a brand (without a product)
By choosing a brand-name and designing a visual treatment of that name, create a brand that has an aura of desirability, intrigue and appeal without specifying what your brand is trying to sell.
Without a product to sell, your brand won’t survive very long. Your audience will lose interest when they realise there is nothing to buy. But that’s OK. Your brand need only last for a few micro-seconds: the moment when people first see it and think to themselves: I like it, before wondering: what is it?
Within the constraints of this brief, your brand will be a success if it can elicit a pleasurable first response from your target audience: a moment of resonance.
How?
- Values: What are the values of your brand? Is it high-brow or low-brow? Weighty or throwaway? Open or exclusive? Traditional or new? Is your brand eco-friendly? Religious? Political? How do you express this?
- Audience: Who will identify with the values of your brand? Sun readers? Jet-setters? Dog walkers? Commuters? Socialists? Designers? Mums? Dads? Polish immigrants? Children under 5?
- Culture: You will need to position your brand through visual references to other things in culture. Things like lottery tickets, cigarette packets, Las Vegas, documentary photographs from the 1930s and washing powder. You can pick and choose from any number of different things, so approach this part of the brief with gusto and some cultural savvy. You will want to bring along a visual collection of ‘cultural stuff’ to the interim crit.
- Naming: The name of your brand is probably the most important aspect of this brief so you should give it a lot of consideration. Your choice of name should be informed by your chosen cultural references and values. Is the name made up? Is it a noun, verb or adjective? Is it someone’s name? How long is it? How does it sound? Is it difficult to pronounce? What language is it in?
- Tone of voice & typographic character: How do you address your audience? Do you shout? Whisper? Command? Seduce? Challenge? How do you express this voice through type and lettering?
- Media and expression: How will your brand be expressed? Is your brand-logo printed on a paper cup? Flashed onto a tv screen? Painted on a wall? Does it come with a free pencil sharpener? Does it appear in a magazine? Which magazine? Is it handed out on the street by a man dressed as a crocodile? Be sure to frame your brand within the media. Where and how people experience it will affect how your brand is perceived.
References
- Everything in culture since the Industrial Revolution. Be selective.
- A microbrand
- An enormous brand in the making
- A branding agency
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