Nick Riedl (Creative Manager @ Packaging School):
Little Big Brands is an award-winning independent brand consultancy based out of New York, who over the last few years has assisted in creating some of the most captivating redesigns in the packaging world.
Our very own Dr. Julie Rice Suggs had the opportunity to sit down with Creative Director Richard Palmer, to discuss some of these projects, as well as hear some insights from Richard's expertise in the field.
Dr. Julie Rice Suggs (Academic Director @ Packaging School):
So Richard, thank you so much for being here with us today. It is such an honor to have you representing Little Big Brands.
Anything exciting that you guys have recently done that you can just give us a little highlight about?
Richard Palmer (Creative Director @ Little Big Brands):
Yeah, I mean the biggest one probably is the Jolly Rancher redesign. I know you guys are aware of that. That was with Hershey's.
The impetus for that redesign was really around the boom of the gummy category and them seeing an opportunity to really sort of take a step back from the brand, look at the entire brand portfolio, and really make an effort to not be just synonymous with hard candy, but also to the consumer, think about Jolly Ranchers as gummies, as well moving forward.
Dr. Julie Rice Suggs:
We actually just launched a course called reDesign Your Package. And within that course, you know, we focus on using a lot of human factors such as perception, cognition, decision making, and visual appeal to inform different types of packaging decisions.
Can you just share an example of a time when you applied any of these insights to, you know, influence branding or design choices?
Richard Palmer:
Aside from everything you said, one of the other things that's really, really fundamentally important to understand is if the brand that you are redesigning actually has fundamental equities. And what I mean by that is visual equities.
So, there may be a color, you know, if I was to put certain 10 swatches of color on a piece of paper and you are talking to a consumer that's a loyal consumer of that particular brand, and you say to them, which of these colors (this is an unaided situation, there wouldn't be a logo there at all), which of these colors do you think your brand is? And they select, let's just say it's blue, and the brand happens to be blue and they select it without hesitation, you know that that's an equity for that brand.
Those things are really, really important to understand. The reason for that is, if you walk away from those equities, you're completely alienating that consumer from potentially finding it, buying it, or associating that product with that brand moving forward.
So, a lot of these things, if you don't have the ability to get research and actual data back from the consumer, are things that you could do on your own. So, talk to friends, talk to family. Ask a random person, you know, what they associate with that brand without showing them a picture of.
It doesn't necessarily mean it's just about color. It could be typography. It could be shape. It could be a mascot that they may have associated with the brand. But I think that's really, really important. We did that, we do that with most of the brands we work on actually, because it is so important.
But one brand we did do that on, I would say is a good example, is Dr. Scholl’s. So, Dr. Scholl’s is another very, sort of, pioneering brand in that particular category. And it's very well known, not only in the US but globally too.
So, something like that is really, really important to understand what the equities of the brand are. And by doing that, we knew we couldn't walk away, no pun intended, from blue, yellow, and the actual oval shape of the identity.
But when you think about that, it sounds quite limiting from a designer standpoint. Like, “Oh, I can't change the blue, I can't change the yellow, I can't change the oval.” That's a very literal way of thinking about it. What it's just telling you is you need to have some association back to those things.
So you could change the hue of the blue, the hue of the yellow, the detail within the oval, the slight nuances of that oval shape. It doesn't have to be exactly the same, but it just has to visually sort of trigger that recognition.
Dr. Julie Rice Suggs:
And you guys were also responsible for like the blister pack going to the paperboard for that Dr. Scholl’s redesign.
Richard Palmer:
Yeah, so that was an initiative actually from Dr. Scholl’s themselves. So, they wanted to actually minimize from a cost efficiency standpoint the amount of packages that they were in. Because they were in cardboard structure, clam shells, plastic blister cards, you know, they had lots and lots of different inventory from a structural standpoint—so just streamlining that.
But also then thinking about sustainability push was, was their doing. We helped them figure that out across all the different pillars of products within their portfolio.
Dr. Julie Rice Suggs:
Question for you along those same lines—you know, what advice would you give your students or future students on developing a comprehensive packaging design strategy?
Richard Palmer:
Have a hard talk with yourself and say, “I don't know everything. I may think I know everything, but I don't.”
So, get rid of that and actually do some research and go and find out who are you selling this product to? Who is that consumer? Why do they shop this category? Why do they need that product? You can do this quite easily online.
You can go and do some walk-alongs in store and ask some random strangers if they don't mind chatting to you for five minutes or less, just to get some valuable insights that could really inform the “whys” as to why you've done what you've done.
Understanding the retail realities of how that brand shows up in the store is really important. And I say that because sometimes a brand is more commonly shown at eye level on an aisle. Some are right at the bottom. So, then you have to, you are informed about, okay, how am I going to get the consumer to see it and want to be intrigued by it, want to go and pick it up.
And we call that the 10-5-1 rule—sort of, 10 foot away, I notice it; 5 foot, I get a bit closer. I can see that there's not only one product, there's three products, four products, however many, and I can see the differences between. And the 1 is, you've got my attention, I've picked it up.
So how can you get there? It is so important when you're designing a brand that is gonna live on a shelf in a supermarket or a store, that you go to the store and you figure out how it shows up in the store.
It might be that you are not doing something for a retail environment and it's DTC, it's the same thing. Go to multiple DTC sites. Look at how those assets are created to appeal to the consumer in that brand. What's the visual hierarchy? You know, what are the semiotics, like I spoke about before.
Do your homework and don't just assume that you know everything going into it.
Dr. Julie Rice Suggs:
So, you know, from your experience, Richard, like what are some of the biggest pitfalls brands face during these redesigns and how can creative teams, you know, ensure their work strengthens rather than dilutes the brand?
Richard Palmer:
Yeah, I, just going back to what I was saying previously and I think that this kind of answers this question too, is the great thing about going to the store is you discover other things.
So, one of the things we always talk to our design teams about is don't just focus on the one category that you are working on.
Be aware of other categories, trends that are going on in other categories, because there may be some things that you can borrow, whether it's structural or whether it's two-dimensional graphics or whether it's a typeface, a color, some other trend that's going on that's attracting consumers that you can bring into your project and make it relevant, but also disrupt and make a different engagement point with that consumer than all the other brands in that category.
Dr. Julie Rice Suggs:
Richard, I love it. You have been such a wealth of knowledge and for anyone out there listening, you know, what are some ways to get in contact with you and the folks at Little Big Brands?
Richard Palmer:
Yeah, so, absolutely welcome anyone to get in contact with me. My email at Little Big Brands is richard@littlebigbrands.com.
I'd be happy to answer any questions that you have. And our website is LittleBigBrands.com, so you can have a look at all of our work on there. We're on all the socials as well, so. And if anyone wants to connect with me on LinkedIn, I'd be more than happy to connect with them.
Nick Riedl:
We'd like to thank Richard and Little Big Brands for taking the time to speak with us. If you'd like to see more interviews and educational content like this, be sure to subscribe to the Packaging School on YouTube.
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As Dr. Julie Rice Suggs mentioned above, our newest program—reDesign Your Package—is a 60-hour online course designed to help your team navigate the nuances of packaging redesign projects.
Through access to design software, case studies, and the exploration of 70+ human and ergonomic factors, this course will help you create a packaging redesign process to carry into your biggest design and branding projects.
Learn more about the program here!
