How Tropicana lost $50 million when it switched it's branding

19:52Joel Dommett:What are you doing this week? What's on the cards? Where will you be going? Who will you be seeing? Have you got any gigs? Ben, could you just quickly say on video to me? I can't go anywhere. Thinking of my most famous friend. So we'll find out next week who we have managed to strong arm into shouting in the street. I can't go anywhere without Joel and Ben's full skin. Let's give it a go. Okay, let's turn our thoughts back to today's show because we've got really fabulous guests, haven't we? Sam Dumont is an executive creative director at Blue Marlin, has worked with huge brands like Unilever and to small startups.

20:31Joel Dommett:She's here, essentially, Joel, to take our brand with its core values and turn that into a visual identity. I'm very excited. I cannot wait. Let's get her in. Thank you for joining us on The Businessmen. You're most welcome. Delighted to be here. You are, by definition, the Executive Creative Director at Blue Marlin. That's right. Worked with some huge brands across the gamut. Yep. Massive ones. Massive. Unilever, like the biggest. But you've done startups too as well. So you've gone all right down to the small stuff. Yeah, absolutely. A real breadth. And that's been really good fun, actually, working in totally different types of branding projects.

21:05Joel Dommett:Have you got a preference? It's a really good question, actually, because I was thinking about that on the way here. I was thinking, what do I like? I like both for different reasons, but I like brands where I can make more of a difference. So the brands that I don't enjoy working on are the ones that are really big and really static and they don't want you to change much. I like startups because you've got a blank canvas but it can be incredibly hard to get cut through. Sorry, it can be. But I love working with brands that maybe have lost their way a bit, actually. And I can help them kind of get back on track.

21:37Like fix things. That's a really powerful, that's a really powerful brief. I love doing stuff like that. So essentially, Sam, you're sort of here to take sort of our core sort of brand values that we've established and turn them into like a sort of visual identity for us. Is that correct? Yes, absolutely. and hopefully give you some tips and your listeners some tips about design and how it's useful.

21:59Joel Dommett:Oh, my God, it's so useful. Yeah. Well, I mean, as you pointed out, how do you logo? I thought that was such a funny and great expression. He has a lot of them. To logo. Strap in for some of his funny expressions. But how do you logo? I mean, it's a great point, isn't it? If you haven't logoed before. Yeah. I don't know how to do that. How would you describe a logo? If I said to you, what do you think a logo is? I mean, everyone's got a point of view. I've always been saying, what is a logo? I would say it's a... Visual identity for a brand. Oh my God, Ben. It's exactly what I was going to say, but with worse words.

22:31No, but it's quite helpful to speak in almost very, very simple words. Yes. To help people understand. Because visual identity is still quite complicated language. So a lot of people, right? Yes, for sure. I understand it. I'm going to say it in the most simple way that my two and a half year old would say it. Okay, okay. But it's essentially the brand's picture. Yeah.

22:49Joel Dommett:Your two and a half year old would use that phrase. He's so advanced, Mark. By the way, just be ready for my old... Daddy, I think you'll find it's the brand's picture. It's the brand's picture. He would probably go, it's the visual identity. So it's the brand's picture. So if you were to draw a picture of what the brand represented, that would be the logo? That's a really nice way to put it, actually. And sometimes we do that with consumers. Sometimes we say, draw X. And we see what they draw to find out what's important. It happens a bit less these days. But when I first started, that was something we did a lot.

23:21It was really, really interesting. But I like to think of it as a kind of brand's calling card. And it's the thing that kind of people recognize. So I'll show you something and you'll go, oh, yeah, that's X. Even if you can't see the name. This is what I was going to ask you, which I think is really fascinating. What do you think is more important in the current sphere of the world? Is a name more important or a logo more important? That's a really good question as well. I think it's a combination of both. And I think that how you use design with the name can change its meaning or its feeling so much.

24:00Do you see what I mean? So they've kind of got to work hand in hand if they're going to be successful. Do you want me to show you some logos? Yes, please.

24:09Joel Dommett:We like games. Okay. One of them will be that one. Any chance we get to gamify. Without any words. The body shop. Yeah, exactly. So it's got really distinctive. They just brought back Jubilee as well, by the way. We had a thing on the show. After 30 years of campaigning, because we only talked about body shop as, like you say, an amazing logo, an amazing brand, but sort of people's described. Lost its way. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But still incredibly powerful. Yeah. That's been around forever and a day. Okay. There we go. Yes. The green crocodile. You don't need to see the words. No. You know, straight away.

24:45Now, fashion brands, it's a little bit easier, I think, because they show up quite a lot on clothing. And things like Chanel with the C's, you see it on handbags. So they have a slightly different advantage because people wear them, but still really powerful. What's interesting about that? We know that's Lacoste. That's the green crocodile. It's not even a good crocodile. No, I was just thinking exactly the same. I've got another one that I've made up for you. Just to show how you could use very simple shapes. I hope this works. Yes. Very simple shapes like squares and very simple typography. but I've taken out the real letters and I've put some others in.

25:18Okay? Okay. So let's see if you know what that is supposed to be.

25:21Joel Dommett:So just in case, if people are listening rather than watching on YouTube, what Sam's holding up is a black oblong with three white squares in the middle. The first square's got an X, the second square's got an X, and the third square's got a Y. Yeah. And they're in black letters. And you've changed. I know where it is now. I'm in. Okay, you're in. So I have changed the letters because I think this is a very powerful mark, but it's incredibly simple. It's squares and letters. So simple. But it's the way they put the three squares together. Yeah. They have a double letter at the beginning. So do you want to tell everybody what it is?

25:53It's BBC. Absolutely.

25:55Joel Dommett:Oh, wow. God, of course it is. Isn't it interesting? You're so ITV, Ben, that you can't even see the logo. That's so true. Oh, show me that again. So what Sam's holding up, in case you're not watching this, essentially it's the BBC logo, black, with the white letters, but the X, X, Y. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's fascinating, isn't it? The sort of memory recall. Yeah. Things like this is incredibly powerful. And the BBC is so synonymous with that. And I think that's one of the points about working with big established brands. You need to be really careful that you don't change too much because you lose consumers and you lose sales.

26:30There's this fantastic, well, it's not a fantastic case. It's a good example of a brand doing a really bad job when they redesigned. You may know this. It was Tropicana. So it was in the late 1990s and they took away everything that the pack had on previously. You could barely see the logo. They didn't have the refreshing juice. They had this glass that was quite kind of sterile. And I think from memory, they lost something like a hundred million dollars because consumers couldn't find it. They didn't get it. They thought it was a different brand. And it was just so far away from what they were.

27:04Yeah. A very, very established brand. And so you've got to be incredibly careful and sensitive with brands that are established because, you know, they're second nature to people. They see them, they find them, they buy them, you know, very instantaneously.

27:16Joel Dommett:That brand loyalty is huge, isn't it? Absolutely. So interesting. Yeah. Our brand name has been selected. Yeah. We distilled it down to three and it has been selected by the people that are listening to the podcast. And, you know, all of us as well are very into that as an idea. And I think Joel and Ben for Skin is disruptive. It's a bit anarchic. It's fun. It's humorous. But equally, it feels like now is the right time for us to be thinking about visually the importance of it. Because the visual of it can perhaps balance out the irreverence and the anarchy of it. If that makes sense. No, that makes total sense.

27:54And it's a really good, now is a really good time to do that name on name. It's really difficult. I mean, I have been involved in projects where I was like, we're not sure of the name. Can you go and design a logo? And it's kind of hard because you need a foundation. And also when you're looking at things like typography, so the lettering style, you know, that has a big impact on how things feel to people. So you need the word to start putting, you know, the personality, your brand values as best as you can, you know, into that. So, yeah, now's a really good time to kind of do that. So that's good.

28:23Do you see, just quickly before we, do you see fashions that happen in your job? Like I know at the moment. Trends and stuff. It's very, it's gone from quite blocky lettering. It's very samey. Everyone's going for that same sort of BBC sort of logo Burberry has gone. And now it's starting to go back maybe to that sort of older style, more traditional logos. Yeah, heritage stuff. Yeah, I think that's really interesting. And I think that, you know, it starts off with a few brands doing something different. And then everybody tries to follow. And then it becomes ubiquitous. And then it becomes boring.

29:00And then other people, some of the sort of forefront leaders or people that are a bit more visionary will do something different. I saw something on the day, actually, just spontaneously from Hermes. And they've done a new campaign, which is all about illustration and craft. And they've moved away from sort of photography and AI, which I thought was really interesting. I mean, it fits with their brand values, though, about craftsmanship and quality. So, you know, there's a reason for it. And that's really, really important. Whatever your design, whatever you do with your design, it's got to fit with your brand values because otherwise you can kind of confuse the consumer.

29:32But yeah, there are always big shifts and trends in design. And it's quite nice if you're lucky enough to work with a brand that's got the foresight to be a little bit progressive.

29:43Joel Dommett:Yes, that's more fun, I assume. Yeah, it is actually. It's much more fun. Because they'll let you try more crazy ideas. Yeah, exactly. Because you've got to start with a load of ideas to sort of hone it down, which is exactly what we did with the name, really. We had a whole range of ideas for the name, which we slowly but surely whittled down and whittled down. And then thanks to the great British listener of this podcast and some abroad, they've given it to us. Yeah. Yeah. It's on them. It's on them. I think now about making it appeal to the right people in the right places, I think is really where the logo comes in, the branding comes in.

30:17And I think I'm really excited. I feel really excited. I feel like creative. I feel that's good.

30:23Joel Dommett:And that's why that's why it's brilliant that you're here with us today, because it's the creative brief is the point. Now, just describe. Can you explain essentially from your experience what a creative brief is and why it's so important? Yeah. OK, I'll go back a little bit. I think it might be helpful. So I suppose I get involved right at the beginning, speaking to the client and I'll get involved with a strategist and maybe an account director. and we will all meet with a client and the client communicates to us everything about their brand. And there's normally quite a lot of information if it's an established brand.

30:52If it's a startup, what you're actually trying to draw out of people is something different. And actually, in your case, it's you too. And what you know what you're becoming as a brand, which is hugely interesting. Once we've got all that information, that needs to be translated in a really simple way to a designer or design team. So we work with a creative brief and the purpose of that creative brief, It's kind of, I suppose, the blueprints of what the designer will build from. So it's all the kind of foundational stuff about your brand. So I have your brand values in. I know that's something you've been looking at.

31:23It should have your brand personality in. You can obviously embellish on your own views and points of view or how you feel about that as well. But she or he needs that information really succinctly so that she can kind of get it. And creative briefs are so important that when they're bad, they can be incredibly detrimental because people get confused, we lose way, you know, design is off brand. So it's really, really worth taking time to get the right words, to make the brief good. I really believe in the kind of power of a creative brief. And if I get a rubbish one and I'm not involved with it and I think I can't, I look at it and I'm like, I don't know what to do here.

32:03Most designers sitting in a meeting and getting a good brief will straight away start to think of ideas. It's really exciting. That's the bit of my job that I love. I was like, oh, I can think of things. I'm thinking of things already. So, yeah, that brief document, whatever you want to call it, is kind of really key to communicate what your brand is to the creative team.

32:25Joel Dommett:Sam has got more invaluable insights on approaching creative briefs over on our free Patreon. I know that you're going to help us there, aren't you? Yes, yes. She's even put together, Joel, a template which anybody who joins our Patreon can access. So if you're looking to do something, you want some advice, some guidance, I mean, she is the expert in this area. Just go to the Patreon. We're going to put it there. And it is, in fact, the very same template that we'll be using to brief our designer, Ella. Ella. I'm so sorry, Ella, for what we're about to give you. But hopefully it'll be good and succinct.

32:57Joel Dommett:We're going to draw on as much expertise from Sam to make sure that the brief is as clear and it feels bubbly and creative and exciting, not really vague and odd. No blemange. Yeah, vague is hard. That's the problem, right? Vague or confusing or abstract. This might be a nice thing to think about. At the Agency Network at the moment, we talk about, for the designer, words that you can draw. Because if someone says a word to you, you can see it in your mind's eye. That's incredibly helpful. Now, some words are very obvious. Like if I said performance, I'm sure that will spring up a load of kind of ideas in your mind.

33:34If I said simple, that will spring up ideas. if I said it's kind of effervescent or joyful, you know, you might have something that feels quite uplifting. So words are key.

33:46Joel Dommett:Evocative, emotive words that really reflect where we are. I want to tell you guys about a podcast that is near and dear to my heart and I cannot believe it already came out a year ago. And you can all go listen to it ad-free by subscribing to the Binge Podcast channel. What podcast, Corinne? Tell us. Oh, it's called Blink, Jake Handel's Story. I created it about a man named Jake, who I met, who is the only survivor of a terminal brain illness brought on by heroin use. But there is a lot of mystery and medical malpractice and true crime elements that are very shocking and surprising and even some supernatural elements.

34:25So this is definitely an amazing story. It's very unique. And you did such an incredible job telling the story and sharing it with the world. So if you have not listened to it yet, my goodness, where have you been? Because Blink is so freaking good. Thank you. Search for Blink wherever you listen, and subscribers to The Binge will get the entire season ad-free. Plus, you'll get exclusive access to the over 60 other true crime stories on The Binge podcast channel. Hit subscribe on Apple Podcasts or head to getthebinge.com. Sabrina. Corinne. I have been listening to a new show from The Binge called Fatal Fantasy.

35:02I am obsessed. Wait, I need to know more. Tell me. Tell me everything. I will. It's very shocking. It's this like ultra weird crime story of a murder for hire plot that. What? Yeah, wait for it. Leverage the dynamics of the underworld and underworld being a medieval fantasy game. Wait, so it's live action role playing gone wrong? Horribly wrong. And you can binge all episodes now. Oh my God, that sounds so good. I know what I'm doing on my drive home today. Search for Fatal Fantasy and subscribe to the Binge Podcast channel on Apple Podcasts or at GetTheBinge.com. And then once you're done, you can listen to one of the over 60 true crime and investigative podcasts a part of the channel while you wait for the next month's drop.

35:44I really need to know what happens. Selfishly, you do so that we can talk about it. So whenever you listen, search for Fatal Fantasy and hit subscribe to the Binge to get all episodes all at once ad free. If you could help us sort of lead us down a path of what is the sort of process from start to finish of creating a logo and sort of where the packaging comes into that. Yeah. And how that obviously goes hand in hand. How does that work? Okay. So I like to start a level above that really, which is to think about what the idea is for the brand and how that idea is going to work through all of the different design elements that the brand will use.

36:24but obviously the logo is the right place to start because it's kind of your foundation, it's your name so that is the very best place to start quite quickly if it's a package good as yours will be you need to see it in context, you want to see it on a pack now skincare packaging isn't big so actually something that cuts through and is simple but still got character I would suggest is really important so that's something I think that designers will be doing you know some other things that might be helpful just to think about is kind of the power of color and um i thought it was really interesting even for this podcast that you'd used orange because that wasn't a normal business color but mixed with the gray it was a really powerful message to me it's like okay this is really cool i love that i love that orange but but and if we

37:14Joel Dommett:go back to the launch of the podcast and the businessman and the logo and what it looks like in the colors we had a lot there were lots of discussions there were different versions of Different coloured versions. I mean, we went through all of that even just to launch the logo for the podcast. Sort of subconsciously, we're doing what you're doing. Exactly. You're reacting. And think about, maybe think about national airline carriers or banks like 20 years ago. Most of them were dark blue. Yes. Because that's a colour of trust and quality. Right. And then think about when EasyJet launched and it was orange and it had this crazy logo.

37:48I mean, you wouldn't have been able to do that with a national carrier. Bubble writing. Exactly. Yeah. But it was a different type of beast. It was a different offer. And the design and the colour and the typography of that help set out that positioning, help communicate to people fairly instinctively. That's so interesting. We're different. So there's a lot of power in colour. Again, I've said this so many times on this journey, Sam. And I really, it's, again, another example where I'm like, I did not even think about the thought that they thought about that. Yeah. But why should you? Most people won't.

38:23But you react to it. We all react to it. We all react to colours and shapes and signs. We take meaning out of so much. It's so interesting. And typography is really critical. As we talked about, the EasyJet font was very different. I was even thinking about one of your brands that you didn't go with, one of your names, say Mug. And I thought, imagine, because this might just be helpful to think about this. Imagine if that was written in script, like beautiful scripts. And then imagine if that's written in sort of block caps, condensed. I mean, the word's the same, but what people take out of that visually.

39:00The feel changes, doesn't it? Exactly. So your question before, what's more important? It's kind of hard to pull it apart. Because we discussed this a lot when we were giving the three names. It was quite hard because we had to give the names and we sort of just quickly just put up a branding for each of those three. But then the problem was people were also consciously reacting to the branding instead of the name. And what we, in hindsight, probably what we should have done is we should have put in three exactly the same. And then they would have, you know, hopefully there wouldn't be a bias towards it.

39:30And this is a really important tip. I would say you must design for your customer. Yeah. and know what they want. This is exactly what Sarah Davis is saying. That's really, really important. You know, whatever you like, you've got to put yourself in the shoes of the customer and you design for them and then you should be successful.

39:47Joel Dommett:I think one of the statistics that's out there, we're not sort of drilled down to how accurate it is, but 80 % of men's skincare is bought by women. I would believe it. And her point was, don't get caught up thinking you are trying to sell to men. Yeah. If 80 % of it's going to be bought by women, you've got to make sure the brand has to appeal to the women that are going to buy it for their sons, their partners, their brothers, their uncles, the men in their lives. And that's something that I think, you know, she was quite, this is in a future podcast, we're looking into the future. How amazing is this?

40:19Joel Dommett:But it was really, really, it's a really important part of it because I think we can go, oh, I really like it looking like that. I really like it looking like that. And I think we are part of the customer base. we would be sort of slap bang in the age range, certainly of the clients that we're looking for, the demographic, the geographic location, all those sorts of things. But it is not just, unfortunately, for the first time, it's not about us, Josh. It's not about us. And I'm struggling with us quite a lot, Ben. Not comfortable with this issue. But you asked about our customer. Yeah. I think from what we've collated from the skincare survey that we're still, which has been absolutely incredible, sort of invaluable just in terms of being able to get real-time feedback from the listeners to the podcast, people who engage with this journey that we're on are really keen to find out a little bit more.

41:08Joel Dommett:This is what we've been able to distill down, some of the interesting sort of information from them that sort of is painting a picture for us of the customer. That's really helpful. Brilliant. Our customer, the practical skincare shopper. Everyday Alex or straightforward Steve. He's 35 to 54, living down south, London, the southeast, maybe southwest. The family man running a tight weekly orbit of work, school runs, sports on Sundays, and a proper shop at Tesco's or Sainsbury's. Life's busy. Decisions need to be quick. Skincare happens by osmosis. He tops up while doing the weekly food shop, swings through Brutes or Superdrug if he's in town, and orders refills from Amazon when he remembers.

41:51he's loyal to brands that have never let him down the friction he's surrounded by noise serums acids toners actives it feels like a revision for a chemistry exam 40 pound moisturizers sound like a wind-up what he actually wants simple affordable proven one or two products that work fit into his routine don't ask questions back he wants to feel sharp at work decent in his clothes and have an energy left for family, friends and the odd pint. Skincare to him is maintenance, like stretching, like protein, useful if it's straightforward, ignored if it isn't. I think that's brilliant. And I think actually what's impressive is you're already a step ahead of quite a lot of people because people can be a bit too generalist.

42:41So even some of our clients sometimes we say, oh, their males, like you started, you know, 35 to 54, and you don't get much more than that but writing about a real person is so helpful there's so many clues in there that I think the designer will like as well you know you don't want it to be fussy or complex or too highbrow you know just that sort of instinctive make it easy make it work make me love it as well yes but I think that's great well done high performance low effort very good high performance low effort hopefully just make you smile a bit too yeah and I think that's what That's what we're sort of trying to do all in one package.

43:23It seems to me that there's not enough. It's a very serious industry, understandably so, and hopefully bring a bit of fun, but also something that's really, really works. Like it says, we want something proven, something that works.

43:38Joel Dommett:Because I think both of us, and then this is something that I've learned as I've in my career, is we take our job really seriously, but we don't take ourselves seriously. And I think that's the point. Yes. Yeah, that's a really nice angle. products really seriously. But we don't want to take the whole thing. We want to be able to enjoy it. The only thing I'm, I'd like to think, and maybe this is by, and I know this has been distilled down by our surveys. We need more surveys from up north. Because I think straightforward, Steve, I've got lots of friends up in the Midlands, Manchester, northeast, northwest, that some of my friends in up that way are really into skincare and look after themselves.

44:11Joel Dommett:So I think we need to - It's cold at the, they need it more than ever. They need. They need a barrier. So that's quite interesting for me is that actually from the collation of the information is we've had much wider response from down south. Yeah. I don't know what that, I don't know why necessarily. I don't know what that says. You're just not very big up north. I think there's plenty of places I'm not very big. We've got to work on that. Yeah, I've got to work on that. Most kind of trends that happen tend to happen in the south and southeast though. Right. I think the sort of, you know, burgeoning male skincare category, I don't know this for a fact, but my hypothesis would be that the sales are greatest in this region.

44:52But I think you're right. It's really important to get an average, you know, across the country of everybody and really understand what it is they're looking for. But yeah, I think that's really clear. It's exciting. Maybe I can talk my husband into using it and keep nagging him to use products.

45:07Joel Dommett:So look, what's going to happen next is Joel and I are going to try and brief our amazing designer, Ella Williams-Brown, separately. I'm usually, I don't like doing things without you. I love this. Because you go rogue. Me or Kat Dealey, you have to be together. We're going to do it separately. So Ella is going to come up with two logos based on our briefs, which you guys, the community, will then vote on. to decide which one becomes the logo for Joel and Ben for Skin. I'm very excited. Yes. I'm also really excited to see how different they are. Or, I mean, maybe we're so aligned that they turn up and they're both exactly the same, and then they were destined to be together as partners for the rest of our lives.

45:57You were saying that a good brand, when you sat and you told to a good brand, you start to visualize things immediately. When we've given you who our customer is, we've given you a name of our brand. Would you say things are bubbling or is there no bubbles? No, definitely. And also, this is quite important. I can see what it isn't. So it's really important to understand what it isn't, what you don't want to be. That's almost as important as what you do. But yeah, there's some stuff bubbling for sure. It's exciting. It's hugely exciting.

46:30Joel Dommett:Thank you so much for joining us, Sam. Really appreciate you taking the time and sharing a little bit of expertise. As I said earlier, if you go to the Patreon, then Sam has offered some amazing, invaluable insights for all of you. The creative brief and the template that you're putting together, which we're going to use to brief our LRA designer, we're going to put on there. So if you have your own business or you are looking for some guidance or some help, you can go to the Patreon and they'll be able to use that template as well. We'd love to get your feedback on what you think about it and how it's helped you.

47:01Joel Dommett:how it's helped you because this is sort of a communal experience we're going through, isn't it? Absolutely. It's all free as well. So go on there and enjoy yourselves. Go for it. Thank you, Sam. You're most welcome. Thank you so much for having me. Really useful and really, really amazing. Thank you. Thank you. The Businessmen sponsored by BT Business. That's all we have time for this week, people. Remember to subscribe on YouTube and follow wherever you get your podcasts. Really loved Sam. That was fantastic. She was absolutely brilliant. I feel like I learned a lot and it sort of made me quite excited for the next step.

47:35Joel Dommett:And do you know what she was saying when the designer gets all those really brilliant briefs and they start fizzing with ideas? I kind of feel a little bit more fizzy when we met Sam about, you know, we've got to pitch to brief Ella for our designs. What are they going to look like? Oh, God. What will your logo be, dumbass? I don't know yet. I don't know. Before we all find those crazy little things out, Next week, very excited because we have an incredible former dragon, former youngest ever dragon in the den, Sarah Davies, a good friend of both of ours and an amazing woman in so many different ways.

48:10Joel Dommett:She's so, so brilliant. What she created with Crafters Companion, her experience of being on the den, she's now moved into broadcasting, is a font of incredible knowledge. Backs lots of startups now, of course. Can't wait to get her thoughts on our brand, Joel and Ben Forsky. Very exciting. Thanks for joining us, guys. This has been The Businessman. We'll see you next week. Bye.