Brief 8 - Commiseration merch.

Brief 9 - Leeds Queer Film Festival Branding.

Brief 10 - Design Publication

Brief 5 - Sloemotion: Chocolate and Chutney Packaging. (collab with Hattie Windley)

I received this email via Tom Pollard the course administrator:

Hi there,

I hope you might be able to help us……

 We are a small family run business primarily producing handmade Sloe Gin and other hedgerow fruit based liqueurs. When we finish making the drinks we take out the alcohol soaked fruit to make the filling for our Sloe Gin Chocolates and also to make our Sloe Chutney, Sloe Jelly and Damson Chutney.

 We contracted a designer last year to re-design our bottle labels for us and I have attached a couple of  photos of our bottles with that new design. As I said we are a small company so couldn’t afford the designers any longer but still have the chocs and chutneys that need to be re-designed as well as our gift packaging for the miniature bottles (photos attached).

 We would obviously like the labels of the chocolates and chutneys to have some elements of that design so that it looks like a family however what we don’t want is just that bottle label applied to the boxes/jars. What we wouldn’t like to change is the brand so the “Sloemotion” and the bird in the hedge need to stay the same and not be separated.

 I have also attached a couple of images of our newly designed bottle gift box which you will see is in the same vein but different! Just to give you an idea of how the boxes (chocs and miniatures) could maybe look….. it would be good, having said we would like a different design for the chocolates and chutneys not to have too many vastly different things going on so that when they are displayed together they do look like a family…….

 As you will see from the pictures the way we differentiate products is by colour (so sloe gin is purple, sloe whisky is gold, damson is blue etc) so if those colours could go across the products as well it would help. (so sloe gin choc an element of purple, damson chutney have an element of blue etc)  Our current brand colours are pantone colour red 188 and silver (labels printed on silver pp and gift box printed on silver box)

 Our jars are 6.5cm wide, by 8.5cm tall and by my calculations that means that the circumference is 20.4cm…. Our choc box size and shape is yet to be determined although I think we are leaning towards a square box (our chocolates are quite high end so the label would need to reflect this) and our miniature bottle in the 4 set, the box is 24.5w x 10.7h x 7.4 deep.

 We are a national brand with around 400 stockist and would of course reference the name of the designer on our website and you would be able to use us as a piece for your portfolios of course. We are a Yorkshire based company and would like to use and find talent in Yorkshire and promote it.

 We are also looking to bring out a new range of products in the near future which will have a completely different label design, much more modern and fun so there is the possibility of working with us again in the future and for the right person to have a lot more freedom in the design of the bottle labels.

 Kind regards,

 Caroline Conroy

Attached were these images:

I was immediately interested in the brief so I created this brief plan:

I then quickly designed this so i had something to show when I first emailed her back and also something to work from:

I put this in the email:

Hi there,

I'm a third year student at Leeds College of art and I was forwarded an email about you needing designs for your chocolate boxes and chutney jars. I'm happy to help you with those if you would like.

I've just quickly made this mock up design so you can tell me whether this is the kind of thing you're looking for. The gradient is to represent the silver parts of the design.

I look forward to hearing from you,

Kirsty Shaw

BA (hons) Graphic Design

This is the email i got back:

Hi Kirsty, 

thanks for the email.

We like to avoid it looking too much like the bottle label and maybe more like to bottle gift box. 

Don't feel like you have to stick to the bottle label design.

I think we would like to see what other ideas you might have as the designs our printers came back with were very similar to the design you attached although in red with purple band. It would be good to get some more creative input....

Could you mock up something more in line with the bottle gift box I attached to my previous email. But along the same guidelines I spoke about but with some thoughts from you? Have a play...! 

Thanks for getting back to me so quickly. 

Caroline 

I designed these based on what she had said in the email:

Hi Caroline,

I have these as ideas that are a little bit more like the bottle gift box. The purple part would be a band around the actual box. 

I personally prefer the horizontal band but mocked up both anyway. 

If you would like me to try something else, just let me know.

Regards,

Kirsty.

I got back this:

Hi Kirsty, 

They're great, thank you.

There's some changes I would like to make but before I waste any more of your time I had better chat to my bosses, show them your work so far and see if we can persuade them to work with you instead of our printers! I will do my best.....

Thank you so much for your time so far. 

Caroline

It was then just a case of waiting it out until she got back to me.

After 2 days she sent me this:

Hi Kirsty,

We have been given the go ahead for you guys to compete with our printers and we have a deadline for designs of next Friday for both you and them. There is another student that has shown an interest and she has shown much more enthusiasm for the chutneys and you the chocolates so there may be a possibility you could work together?

I think the next step would be to get you both down here to show you the products in real life and also to talk a bit more through the designs you have both done already and give you a bit more of an idea where to take the design so that we can get to a really great final design that will beat the printers! (not that  I am biased at all! ;-)  )

 The only day I really have free next week is Monday and I know you are both at Uni so I don’t know if it  is even possible to get you down here but I really think it would help with the design if you came and met us, saw the products and how we make them……

 I realise this is really short notice and its quite a way for you to come but we have such a short time frame and would really love to work with you on this.

 Let me know if you think this is possible – we can do it in the evening if its easier…..

 Caroline Conroy

I was initially a little annoyed because I thought if they liked the work then i'd definately be getting the job. 

After a while i realised it was a opportunity to do some collaborative work.

Hi Caroline,

This sounds good to me.

Who is the other student? There's a possibility they're on my course and if that's the case I can easily message them about working together on this.

I can do monday after 12, but I guess it depends on the other person. I can get to York no problem by train but I'm not sure exactly where you're based. Is it near the centre?

Kirsty x

Hi Kirsty,

Thank you for getting back to me so quickly. Her name is Hattie Windley and I have given her your email address to get in touch about trains. Hatties is hw257270@students.leeds-art.ac.uk.

Hattie is free after 3.30pm on Monday.

 Malton is actually our nearest train station – there is a direct train from leeds  and I have said to Hattie that I will be able to pick you both up from the station if you just let me know what time.

 I am looking forward to meeting you.

 Thanks,

 Caroline Conroy

We then arranged a meeting at their offices which happened to be right next to where they made their products too! 

Prior to this I arranged to meet with Hattie to see some of the chutney designs she'd been working on and to try to make my chocolate box designs and her chutney designs more consistent.

These were the initial designs Hattie had done:

When we got there they discussed what they liked and changes they wanted making.

We asked about things we needed to know such as pantone colours for packaging, typeface, net templates etc... They were able to provide us with most of this although they still didn't know what size the chocolate boxes were going to be and so just asked me to mock designs up on any sized square for now.

We got to try their products and look around the place to get a feel for what the company is like.

We weren't allowed to take photos where the products are made but i took some of their bottles and bottle packaging so i could refer to them to keep design consistent.

We did some more designs based on what was discussed in the meeting.

Got this email:

Hi Guys,

Firstly, thank you both so much for coming over yesterday evening to talk with us. I hope it was useful……

 We are all very excited to see what you produce! I just wondered if, when we decide on some designs to show at the meeting on Friday if there was a way that you could print them out there and send them to us in the post (on Thursday latest….) Just that from seeing you print out yesterday, Hattie, it was very clear that your printer there is miles better than our and of course we want to show your work in the best possible way! We will of course pay for the postage so if you just keep the receipt and then scan it & send it to us via email or send it along with the designs then we will pay you back……

 We should hopefully be able to send you the pantone colours and everything else shortly…… Good luck guys and please shout if there is anything else you need.

 Thanks again,

 Caroline Conroy

Again was a bit annoyed as we had already gone through to see them and not the other way around and now we were having to do more. Also even after all of this even though they wanted us to do the designs for them, they were still possibly going to go with their printers as their stockists thought they would do a more professional job (HA! They hadn't seen our work yet and do they know designing isn't really in a printers job description... umm..)

Anyway, finally (after about a month and a half) we got the job over the printers.

Hi guys,

 Finally have some good news for you both! We are fed up waiting for the printers and I think we have waited long enough (too long!) in order to be courteous! So we are gonna officially go  with you both.

 We are having a meeting between us on Monday to go through your designs (again!) as its been so long since we did…. And then we will come back to you with tweeks etc. In the meantime I am going to speak to our printers to find out if they can print silver on the no-look lables.

 I will be in touch after the meeting on Monday afternoon and arrange a time to come to see you in Leeds.

 Best wishes,

 Caroline Conroy

then this:

Right! We finally have some feedback on your designs and some things we would like to alter or see different versions of….

 Firstly the Chutneys

I think we are really almost there with them and the biggest decision needs to come from us – the no look label or the Silver pp. I have spoken to our label printers (a different printers than the ones that were supposed to be doing the designs!) and we can get silver on to no look labels but it would have to be done as a foil (either hot or cold) so it would be quite a bit more expensive to do…. We are looking in to how much more though as we much prefer the no look design wise. So for now we would like to progress both the no look and the silver pp just in case we cant afford to do what we what on the no look label! Hope that makes sense!

 A few points will be the same across both designs….

·         Life on the hedge on top to be printed on no look label but to have the words as the clear part and the rest colour (so when put on the lid the words looks silver…)

·         Could we see the tamper seal with just one sloe on, or one sloe and a leaf or something instead of two sloes (we thought they looked a bit like cherries)

·         We need to take in to consideration nutritional values which we now have to put on everything (annoying!!) and need to make sure we leave enough space at the back to fit them in or at least make sure we keep that in mind when designing the back label. We will find out how much space we will need and what needs to go on there – unless you have any contacts you could use at uni for this new legislation?!

 So the design we would like to work from on the chutneys with the no look label is the top right, so the one with the straight band.

·         Could you do a silver effect with the printing on the words do you? So that it wasn’t actually silver but gives the impression at least an idea of being! I don’t know how easy this would be to do with print colours…. Different shades of grey I suppose?

·         The dots and the sloe on the tamper seal – could they be in the same colour as the band colour

·         We would like to see the design as it is but with the Handmade and dots curved above the logo…. Just to see what it looks like and if it would look weird being the only thing that’s curved on there…..

·         And finally – could you come up with some different shades of purple to use for the Jelly – we like the colour that you have tried we just worry what it would look like against the jelly itself but also it I quite close to the red we use for our bottles….

 And for the Silver pp design….

·         I think we would like to look at doing two separate labels (so not a wrap around…) We think a circular (or oval) shaped label would look quite nice with the curved writing design and then a square or rectangular back label. We would like to see the back label in both silver pp design and also as no look as well. We are worried that there needs to be so much information on the back that it might start to invade on the front of the jar in which case no look might be better but then we are worried whether having a coloured front label and clear back would just look too weird! The writing would have to be in a grey colour I think on the no look design.

·         The weight needs to be on the front of these….

 The chocolates….

·         We like the back of design 3 except we would like to remove the top prong thing and just have the lower one and we prefer the smaller dots around the border.

·         We would like to look at both design 2 and 3 fronts with the following changes please….

·         Am I right in saying that the lighter colour of the words on the front means they are done as a watermark type design like the bottle gift boxes? Could we maybe see a design with the writing (handmade, crafted etc) in silver leaving the brand as a watermark…? Just to see what it would look like. I think we prefer it all as a watermark but just for comparison…..

·         We think that the product name (sloe gin chocolates etc) should be in silver writing (so the silver board showing through) and we would like to see it with no band as such, just the lines from the band on the bottles above and below the product name (does that makes sense?!) so that it creates a bit of a band but in the same colour as the rest of the box

·         We love the idea of the tamper seal as a life on the hedge sticker

·         Could we see a 3D verson of the box (like design 1) and the “band” continuing around the side of the box (the lid)

·         I think we would like to put a short descriptor on the front, underneath the product name – something like “Gin soaked sloes smothered in rich Belgian dark chocolate” or something.

·         Jonathan would like to see what it would look like with the watermarked logo a bit smaller, or if it would just look silly….

·         And finally we would need all that nutritional rubbish on the back of these too so just to remember to keep a space for that….. although that would be as big a deal as the chutneys as we have more space to play with here…

 Gift Boxes

·         We love the top left one (the one with the giant watermark design and the cut out at the back of the box)

·         Could we see what it looks like with the silver Sloemotion Logo on the bottom left of the box (so that it doesn’t clash with the watermark)

·         It looks like the design on the back of the box is lighter in colour (so less of a water mark and more of a difference in colour) is that correct? I think we quite like the idea of it being a bit lighter……

·         Could you do a mock up of the inside insert (the bit the bottles sit in) as a kind of brushed silver look, just to try to make the inside of the box a bit lighter…. I am not sure that this will look right…..

·         We will need to design the back of the box as well and I will try to get some words out of Jonathan to put on the back.

 I hope that’s not too much to take in at once! Looking forward to the next stage J Oh and there is no deadline on this one!! So just as soon as you can please but no real hurry

 Best wishes,

 Caroline Conroy

We did more designs:

We arranged another meeting in Leeds where they said they were happy with our designs. They also said they were still waiting on chocolate box dimensions, nutritional into, etc still and that it may be a while.

This is as far as we managed to get with this brief.