Blurr Bureau

0:00Welcome to the Emerging Brands podcast. Sharing the stories behind brands you'll want to shop next. I'm your host, Kelly Bennett. I am a New York City-based brand strategist for CPG Food and Beverage Brands. In each episode, I'll take you behind the scenes of founders that are building better-for-you products and bringing them to market. it. Also, I talk to brand builders, retailers, industry experts, and tastemakers who help bring those cool products to your shopping cart. You will hear stories of real-life founders, their launch strategies, and practical advice you could use to grow your own brand or simply discover what's next on shelf.

0:42And the best part is you could shop all the brands featured on the show. This podcast is brought to you by Glimpse. Glimpse is an AI powered deduction management tool that disputes and recovers invalid deductions, winning brands, thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours back to founders so that they can focus on what really matters most. If you're a brand selling in retail, go to tryglimpse.com backslash trial for 30 days free and let them know I sent you. Now let's dive into the new episode. Hi everyone. Welcome back to a new episode of Emerging Brands Podcast with Kelly Bennett. As you know from listening to this show, I love featuring emerging brands, brands that are growing in the market.

1:34And I also love bringing in the people behind the scenes that really make a brand stand out. And you are now going to meet Jessica Dominski, founder and creative director of Flur Bureau, where Jessica's clients have been on the show. I've at least had two of Jessica's clients on the show. And I feel like this is a really cool way to understand more of the creative process of what happens behind the scenes to make a brand really stand out in a very competitive market that we know of, CPG, food and beverage, lifestyle. So Jessica, thank you so much for coming on the show and really taking us through your process of building brands.

2:19Jessica Dimcevski:Thank you for having me. I have listened to so many of your episodes, including the brands that we've created that have been featured on the show. So it feels like a pretty special moment to be here. I love hearing that. So for anyone not familiar yet with Blur Bureau. Can you walk us through the point of view of the agency and really what your niche is? Sure, sure. So Blur is a brand strategy and branding bureau, and we can also act as your internal brand arm for founders or marketers that we're working with. We build brands around the world. We help brands launch or relaunch their brands. And our point of view on the industry, I think really stems from our name.

3:04Jessica Dimcevski:So behind our name and the reason we actually ended up calling it Blur was after 15 years of being in the industry, I could see that the one through line between any great piece of creative or any great founder, it was this moment of tension or innate tension that's there when people realize that they're not exactly where they want to be. They're somewhere different than where they want to be. And that's usually a point of confusion or a moment of people realizing that a big change needs to happen. And that happens to us as humans, but also when brands realize that they need to show up in the world differently and do something different to actually reach their goal.

3:41Jessica Dimcevski:And that's usually the point that they come to us. And also, I like that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Very cool. So what was your background before Blur? Yeah. So I started as a graphic designer around 15 years ago now, and I worked across projects and with companies around the world. So New York, London, San Francisco, and in Melbourne, in Australia, hence the accent. And it was during that time where I realized that there was a bit of a gap in the market. There were a lot of one and two man creative bands out there that really focused on design, but didn't really have a strategic output or weren't necessarily looking at the strategy.

4:24Jessica Dimcevski:And then on the other end of the spectrum, you've got your pentagrams, Wolf Olans of the world. a huge agencies and they offer really in-depth strategy but also working at some of those agencies I realized that there was a lot of fluff and a lot of documents that would just live on servers and necessarily wouldn't necessarily see the light of day with the customers so I wanted to create an agency yes or a bureau a business model that sat in the middle where we have strategy that's just as strong as design and you're working with experts at every point of the way so the The bureau part of our name actually speaks to the 50 plus network, 50 plus individuals in our network where we curate custom teams with people like yourself, Kelly.

5:08Jessica Dimcevski:You know, if we get a CPG brand or a beauty brand, we will bring in the right strategist for that. Oh, very cool. Yeah. Who will work alongside our core teams in New York and Melbourne. So we're always curating the best team for the project, which is very different to how a traditional agency model works. When they're resourcing a team, they will just get whoever is free at the time, which isn't necessarily always in service of the creative or always that honest for the client because a client might come to you because they loved a particular project. And then you won't necessarily get the creatives that helped create that project.

5:41Jessica Dimcevski:Yes. Or someone else did a part of it and they really loved that part, but the team that you're reaching out to didn't have a hand in that. I see that often. Exactly. Yes. Very cool. So what made you come up with this business model? I know you said you were a graphic designer, you worked at these larger agencies. What was the starting point of creating something new? Because even what you're describing is still a relatively newer business model in the context of a service-based business. So what helped you start taking those steps of just developing that style of business? Yeah, I think after my 15 years or at that point, it was almost 10 years in the industry or just under.

6:28Jessica Dimcevski:I realized that, yeah, the traditional agency model wasn't in service of the creative or the creatives. And I wanted to create a business model that challenged that. So with us, you do get the team. You know, if you love our work on Flings, the toaster pastry brand that's a competitor to Pop-Tarts. It's so cute. Thank you. Thank you. So cute. I was just at Expo West with the guys and it's, yeah, it's being received really well. Still now, three years later, there are huge opportunities in the works for them. So, yeah, if you come to us because you love Flings as a project, you will get the same team that worked on Flings or at least the leaders on that team who can help share the insights.

7:05Jessica Dimcevski:But also from a process standpoint, I could see how the larger traditional agency model didn't service the creatives. So for instance, I feel really privileged. I got to work at an agency in New York where designers were embedded in the process, the creative process from the very beginning. So I actually don't know anywhere else that did this to the level that Red Scout, the company that I worked at did. But as a designer, I got to attend ethnographies, early research. Even before we started on a brand strategy, I could help curate the discussion guide and bring design thinking really early in the process.

7:39Jessica Dimcevski:And then I was there as the thought partner with the strategist right up until the launch of that brand. So, and the insights and the brand is so much richer for that. You know, the more brains you can get on a project, the better. But also being part of that early on allowed for, yeah, a richer brand at the end of it. So at Blur, creatives are a part of the process from the very beginning, wherever we can do that. You know, sometimes we get a strategy handed over to us. So for instance, if somebody worked with you and then you would recommend us as a design studio, we would still love for you to be a part of that design process and you where possible and our designers where possible in that process as well.

8:18I always find that the designers who are collaborative with my brand strategy, the output is always so much better.

8:28Jessica Dimcevski:It really, really is. Totally, because you get to think about where you want the brand to go or test those gut hunches of where you think the brand can go early on. Absolutely. So you mentioned Flings, which I believe you did the branding from the very early beginning, right? Yes. And on the other side, Yes Apples, who's been on the podcast, obsessed with their now rebrand. So can you walk us through those two sides of the business of building a brand from the ground up and then also brands who are in market, who are now feeling, OK, I'm ready to level up. I want to expand. Maybe it's to retailers.

9:12Maybe it's D2C, whatever the case may be. they really need to refresh and rebrand their business. So can you walk us through how those two sides of the spectrum work, Epler? Sure.

9:25Jessica Dimcevski:So working with a brand from the ground up is, and actually there are a few different ways people can work with us. Even before that, if people are pre-revenue, we also do what's called a minimum viable brand. So I can also chat about that, but yeah. Yeah. So let's talk about it. Yeah. That sounds good because the The people who listen to this are usually very, very early on. So any insight you have for that pre-launch, pre-revenue, please share because that is what always piques people's interest for this show. Amazing. Okay, I'll start there. That's really the first place. Yeah, if people are very early on in their brand, pre-revenue, pre-funding, we do what's called a minimum viable brand.

10:06Jessica Dimcevski:And so we will work closely with you in defining the strategy or if you're a really strategic founder, you can hand over that strategy or working with someone like yourself, Kelly, and then we'll focus on the visual identity and the verbal identity for the brand. But the real goal for that package is to give founders everything that they need to be able to put into a pitch deck so they can go out, speak to retailers, get funding. So we make the brand look and feel real. And we can even go to the extent of helping them create the narrative for that pitch deck as well. Oh, very cool. Yeah. Because we are also investors in brands, So we are a design and venture bureau.

10:43Jessica Dimcevski:So I'd say on average, once a year, we invest in a brand. And so we understand what investors are looking for and we can help shape that narrative as well. That's awesome. That's kind of the first touch point, or if someone's really early on in their brand, we could work with them on a minimum viable brand. The next step from there, if they already have funding, if they already have a clear idea of what a product is, sometimes they don't even have a clear idea of what a product is, but they have seen a white space opportunity or a gap in a market. And then we can also help them figure out what product will serve the needs of that audience and to help with the problem that they see in a category.

11:23Jessica Dimcevski:So we can work with brands and founders really early stage in helping them shape what that product is and then building the brand from there. In the instance of Flings, they did see a gap in the market for a better for you toaster pastry brand that was an alternative to pop tarts there was only one competitor or a couple of competitors in the market none that tasted really that great at the time and they saw that they wanted to be a challenger brand in this in this category they didn't necessarily know like how much frosting was going to be on the toaster pastry what were the sprinkles or the bits on top going to look like right we helped them really early on.

12:04Jessica Dimcevski:And like, for instance, there was a point where we were like, oh, do you actually put salt on top of the chocolate toaster pastry as a more like adult way of expressing that product and to appeal to adults versus children? So, you know, we do get in really early in helping people shape what that product experience looks like. From a brand standpoint, we always start with research that then leads to insights to inform a brand strategy. So for Flings, we interviewed a few experts. We interviewed the creative director at the time behind Milk Bar, as well as Supermoon here in New York and other industry experts to get their take on what's happening in the industry and what they're seeing with customers.

12:45Jessica Dimcevski:We also look at sales reports where possible and also speak to potential customers. We spoke to a few Gen Zers and it was actually through speaking to one of the Gen Z is where we got a major insight. The guys knew that they were launching a product that felt nostalgic, uh, just in a format, but there were a lot of brands leaning into nostalgia at that point in time. And so if we were going to lean into nostalgia, we had to come up with a really unique take on it and a way that we would own nostalgia. And a huge unlock came from our research of speaking to this girl, uh, yeah, the Gen Z and she, we asked her what nostalgia meant to her and she said nostalgia is this time that she hasn't necessarily lived but it's a time pre-internet where life was much simpler and oh interesting yes whereas nostalgia to us was a time you had to have lived it's a memory that you have right gen z and to this girl no nostalgia was just a feeling that was evoked about this time pre-internet that she yearns for because life is so complicated now and so that that's interesting that was a huge unlock because that's where we could start to build that into our brand territories and how we show up as a brand was this pre-internet analog time and that influenced identity but then on the flip side We also spoke to people who nostalgia to them was, yeah, it was a time that took them back to their childhood.

14:19Jessica Dimcevski:But when they were eating snacks or sweet treats, they didn't want to feel guilty. And that's the more like adult side coming out in us, right? Right. We had to build a brand that spoke to both sides. This time before the internet that felt really simple. And that comes across in our tone of voice for the brand. We speak simply. We're pretty straightforward. but also this time where as adults, we want to be eating sweet treats and not feeling guilty about it based on the ingredients or the macros or the protein or what it's actually going to, the benefits that we're going to get from that. So very cool.

14:53Jessica Dimcevski:That's, you can see how the visual identity and tone of voice was really unlocked from those early research stages that fed into the strategy. And then that all fed into the name, the name flings, which speaks to both, you know, being able to just toss it into a toaster or the toaster oven, but then also that sweet rendezvous that we want to have without guilt as adults. Right, right, right. But then balancing that out on pack and through design in this fun tongue-in-cheek way that's not too cheeky, but it's still fun. And yeah, it speaks to both the adult side as well as that nostalgia. So does Blur also help with naming brands?

15:33Yes, yes. Okay, that's good to know.

15:35Jessica Dimcevski:That is a huge part of what we do. And I think, and I can speak more to how I think that is something that founders in their early stages. They really struggle with. Yeah. Yep. And there's, there's so much that can be unlocked in a name, but yeah, for us, naming really is the start of your brand world, your visual and verbal identity, because the name that you choose gives you a right to play and say in certain worlds. And so flings as a name, it gave us a right to be cheeky, to be witty, and to speak to, you know, the momentum of our daily lives. You're able to fling this thing into your bag.

16:15Jessica Dimcevski:You're able to fling it into your pastry. It can move with you in your life. You can have it before the gym as a midnight snack. But it also, yeah, it opened up a tone of voice that allowed us to resonate with our customers in a fun way. So fun. And then can you walk us through the rebrand of Yes Apples? Yes, yes, yes. That was a dream project because it's in a category that doesn't really have that many brands in it, which is very rare. I feel like Apples are almost like one of the last front, last frontiers where brand hasn't completely dominated or saturated the category. And I did listen to your podcast with Tenley, which was amazing.

16:56Jessica Dimcevski:And she spoke a lot to the brands in the category and how the Apple category kind of is really at the start of, yeah, utilizing brand as a strength to speak to consumers. So I'll let people listen to that. I won't dive into that. But it was a dream project in the sense that we got to really set the benchmark for how brand shows up in the world of apples and in the Apple category. Apples are really, yeah, it's a sleepy category. We've all grown up with them. Everybody loves apples, but also we forget about them because they've been there the whole time. We hear of, you know, blueberries being a super fruit.

17:32Jessica Dimcevski:Lots of other fruits have had their moment of glory. And we believe that it was time for apples to have their moment of glory. So we very much started with, again, research. So we spoke to buyers at Sprouts, other major retailers. We were like, what are you seeing in the category? What would help you shift apples and help make your job easier? And then we also spoke to consumers and repeat buyers, repeat customers of the brand as well to see what we could do better and what we could improve in the category. And there were really two things that we saw. Well, there was a lot that we saw on the retailer side.

18:11Jessica Dimcevski:Apples are often private labeled or white labeled. and we had to create a brand that felt exciting enough for them to not white label it and for them to be confident that the brand that's showing up at shelf or in the produce section is actually going to drive traffic and drive purchase. So we knew we had to create a brand that felt exciting and looked great at shelf that would get people to the supermarket and actually asking for and looking for yes apples. And then from a D2C standpoint, we needed to make sure that, or what we heard was people have their go-to apple you're either a pink pink lady gal or you love your your granny smith people know who what their favorites are and they're usually just looking for that variety and they're hesitant to try another variety because they may not necessarily know the difference between the apple that they love absolutely and that was something that i got when i received my pr box from yes apples this was last year all the different varieties in the box and I think I'm pretty hip of like fruits and vegetables.

19:16And I was even stunned with the variety that was in that box.

19:22Jessica Dimcevski:There are so many different apple options just when it comes to, yeah, the variety, but people don't necessarily know the difference or how to pick what's right for them. So there was that educational piece on flavor profiles and how each apple tastes that needed to happen on pack. pack so during the rebrand we brought those flavor profiles on the front of pack so evergreen the evergreen flavor profiles would be right front and center on the package that you're purchasing and then also there was an education moment on what apple to buy when um you know do you do you need this do you want this apple to be crispy and are you going to be cooking it for a savory dish or are you going to be cooking with it in a in a sweet dish or is this something that you're not going to be cooking at all.

20:07Jessica Dimcevski:You're going to be having it fresh in a salad. So there are different applications you choose for each of those different occasions. And there was that education moment on the back of pack, which we introduced as well and throughout the website as well to help make, reduce that friction of people wanting to purchase other varieties, but maybe not feeling confident too. And something that also I took notice of is the actual visuals. It feels fresh and cool. it does have like the stickers or like something that's inspired by the stickers on apples. But I really like how the visuals also expanded on what you can perceive as an Apple brand.

20:49I think it definitely helped push the envelope and it wasn't so literal, which I really appreciated. So can you walk us through just some of the inspo on the visual elements? Yeah.

21:01Jessica Dimcevski:Yeah. A lot of the time with an apple, there isn't much marketing or advertising that goes behind it at shelf. It's just the PLU sticker that you see in the apple itself. And so if there was one thing that an apple or a fruit brand could own, it is these stickers that we think of when we purchase the fruits and we have to actively peel it off before we eat it. So we really lent into those stickers and use those as moments for us to hero the different messaging across the brand they used yes for the flavor profiles but also for the health benefits so their brain uh apples are brain boosting they are high in fiber they have almost the same level of hydration and water in them than a glass of water so all of these fun i know that was i have to thank ten when she told me that i was like oh my gosh she's like yeah we are going to be handing them out at the new york marathon it's almost like having a glass of water and i was like we need to spread this yes people don't know this so it's those little tidbits that we want to call out in the brand and stickers seem like the best format for it given given it's an apple brand and it's what we already associate with the category right for people who and i know we've touched upon it but the people that are super early on maybe they are working on something in their kitchen and their friends or family are like, oh, you're onto something like this could be a product.

22:29This could be something people would want to shop. What are some things that you would really emphasize to someone in the very, very early days to put on their radar as they start moving to the next steps of maybe starting to develop the product or to start conceptualizing the brand around the product, any advice you would share with them in those very early days to have a more solid foundation to go to market? Yeah. Gosh.

23:02Jessica Dimcevski:I'm sure that could be a whole other episode. Exactly. There are probably, okay. The very first one is make sure you do your research, but I think a lot of founders, you know, are doing that at the moment. They'll get people's opinions, knowing whose opinions to listen to, who not to listen to is a whole other kettle of fish. Definitely do your research, get feedback, iterate based on that. That's the base, right, are the basics to get a product that actually meets a need and is solving a problem. The next part, once you are confident that you are solving a problem and you have a unique product, is then working on your strategy.

23:42Jessica Dimcevski:So getting someone like yourself, Kelly, or hiring experts who know a great strategy from an average strategy. And yes, ChatGPT can give you a very basic strategy, but it's not going to give you anything new or anything that's actually usable because it's based off everything that's happened before your brand or before your product. So you really do need a human to help filter that and help guide you through that process. And not skipping that. I think it's really hard for founders. And I've heard you speak to other agencies and I feel like strategy always comes up in this part of the conversation.

24:22Jessica Dimcevski:Don't skip it. Think of the long run. And I know that that's really hard to do when you need to balance the books and funding and there are a million different priorities as a founder to be juggling at the time. But in the end, it will pay off. So, for instance, with flings during the strategy process, we have what we call plotting the enemy or mapping the enemy. and that is where we literally look at if a brand that has a head start on us launches a very similar product to ours if not the same product how will we still win why will i like that i like thinking about that even in the very very early days exactly and then and now the fun thing with flings is literally it's playing out in real life now the enemy that we plotted at the time was Magic Spoon.

25:13Jessica Dimcevski:They had a huge head start on the category. They're also in breakfast. They have a sense of nostalgia, very different to the nostalgia that we're playing in. But if they were to launch a toaster pastry, why would people still pick Flings? And at the time we decided that that was going to be based on flavor. We are toaster pastries first and foremost. So we will be the best tasting toaster pastry on the market. And our sense of nostalgia will also speak to people's, the adult side where they're currently at right now, not just this childlike side, which Magic Spoon does a great job at speaking at.

25:45Jessica Dimcevski:They live in this fantastical, magical world. We're less fantastical. We're a bit more practical and functional as a brand, but still fun. So literally it was a few weeks ago, Magic Spoon, I don't know if you've seen, but they launched a toaster pastry brand. It happened. Yes, it's happened. And it was only a few weeks ago. So time will tell how this pans out, but a really quick Google search on TikTok can show you that the flavor profile needs quite a fair bit of improvement. They're not compared yet at shelves. It's too early to tell. Magic Spoon is not sitting directly next to Flings, but that will be the next stage.