Pet Marketing Insights The above list isn’t a sampler of pet industry trends. Rather, it’s a list of realities that we, as a brand growth firm and full-service marketing agency, treat as basic facts informing our pet marketing insight, strategy, and tactics. What really gets us excited are the deep cross-connections among trends and consumer behavior… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
Since our beginning as food industry consultants 15 years ago, we’ve remained focused on the food industry. We’ve done so partly because the food industry is where we started and what we love. But we’ve also done so because we place great importance on the value of focus. Effective food industry branding and marketing require… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
I’m a nerd. I grew up with a Nintendo controller in my hands; I’ll stay up until the small hours to catch Vincent Price or Hammer Films horror marathons; and my personal geography is dotted with mountains of unread books—on topics ranging from 17th century Dutch painting to the history of punctuation. I’m especially a… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
As a brand development agency, we handle a lot of visual identity projects for our partners—both consumer-facing and B2B. Those projects are often the first tangible deliverable of a well-rounded branding campaign. As a designer, I love taking on that responsibility, especially the work that goes into crafting a logo—that small graphic mark that our… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
(This is part of an ongoing series of posts we’re calling Brandcrumbs, which are bits and pieces of branding advice left over from our regular conversations about real-world brand positioning challenges.) Brands in food and beverage processing have the challenge—and the privilege—of talking with consumers about three issues that tend to conflict us: food, technology,… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
We regularly say that a company’s website, designed and developed correctly, is more than a marketing tool; rather, it’s a brand asset that benefits all marcomm efforts and increases profitability for years to come. Typically, we develop websites as a result of or in tandem with a brand identity project (logo, tagline, positioning, etc.), though, as… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
I can remember my first encounter with marketing materials from our local independent hardware shop. While still a student at the nearby university, I glanced at a campus bulletin board on the third floor of an anonymous campus office and saw, tacked among the posters for campus theatre productions, a black-and-white business card with a… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
We’re excited and proud to announce the launch of Hůga. Several months ago, we partnered with (the now-named) Hůga Foods to develop their brand. After an initial conversation about family recipes and gluten-free nutrition, we got to work on the following: • Market assessment• Brand positioning strategy• Brand narrative• Brand name• Product naming• Logo• Wrapper… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
We’re happy to announce that we recently began a partnership with Parker Products, an innovative ingredient producer with a wide range of products encompassing inclusions, flavor systems, and other value-added ingredients. Founded by the creator of the famous “Drumstick” ice cream novelty, Parker has been a source for creativity in the food industry since its inception.… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
A recent essay in the food magazine Lucky Peach points to one of the reasons that food marketing can be uniquely challenging: the hurdle of our deep-seated human tendency to give the word “food” a very specific definition, which we then endow with incredible emotional meaning. That’s a little abstract, so if you’ll excuse me… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
I was talking with a friend about a few lifestyle changes that I planned to make in light of the New Year. He said to me, “If you don’t make changes, you can expect more of the same.” While it sounded like great advice at the moment, something about it didn’t quite sit right with… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
With Christmas just a few days away, we’re thinking about gifts. As the new year approaches, we’re thinking about what’s in store for 2015. As marketers, we’re thinking about lists. So we figured that since we’re doing all this thinking about gifts and other good things, we’d share our lists of 2015 food marketing trends… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
Here at MarketPlace, we often beat the drum in favor of greater transparency on the part of food companies. New York chef and restaurateur Frank Prisinzano is taking the principle as far as about anyone we’ve seen by posting critical reviews of his own restaurants to Instagram. Prisinzano’s reviews are relatively mild, but they do… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
Much like healthy foods for humans, healthy pet foods are booming. As increasing numbers of people view their pets as members of the family, they understandably seek out foods meant to support their health rather than simply buying the cheapest or most convenient food. Popular health features range from the generic “natural” to the inclusion… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>
With the support of the Obama White House, the FDA has proposed changes to the nutritional panel on food labels. The update will be the first to nutrition labeling since such labels were first required more than 20 years ago. The change comes as one of many new regulations designed to give consumers more education… Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>