Post by Sandra

During the last lesson before the Easter holidays we reviewed our design concepts so far and made firm decisions about the continued direction, and allocated the work to team members.

Clare felt that brown card could look a bit dull, but agreed to keep with the brown card packaging as long as we used the lightest one available. Patterns were discussed and we decided to use Leonie's "knitted" pattern, and two of Claire's designs.

We selected the design for the front of the box, and discussed how this would translate to the sides and back.

We decided that the body copy font would be Futura (or similar) and the typeface used for the slogan "made with pure maple syrup" (Swistbink) would be scrapped as, although we all liked it, a less stylised typeface was needed for body copy and two decorative fonts were already being used on the front of the pack.

Actions for Easter, in preparation to show Flourish on Wednesday 13 April are:

Add to/refine branding board - Sandra
Box backs design - Claire
Website home page and product page concepts - Leonie and Sandra

Post by Sandra

Post by Clare


I tried combining Leonie's design with Sandra's pattern.

Post by Leonie

These were concepts I came up with that attempted to include the elements we had discussed as a group. The spoon illustration came from trying to incorporate the ingredients, while also making a feature of the brand's symbol.


I wasn't happy with the window shape on these - it was a challenge to come up with a shape that would compliment the overall design. The top two are stronger in style; the third, didn't work so well.

Discussion amongst our team suggested that the top concept was strongest but needed to make more of a feature of the colour to stand out on the shelf. There were also thoughts that perhaps the intricacy of the illustration didn't fit the rest of the style, as well as the possible conflict with the hand drawn spoon on the logo. We spoke about the possibility of instead putting the window inside the bowl of the spoon.

After that, I experimented with some of the potential changes discussed.


I also experimented with a different shape window alongside the illustration. I think it looks better than the lozenge shape on the earlier concepts.

Post by Leonie

From my initial sketches, we chose this as our final logo. We felt it would give the product the strongest brand identity. I refined the letterforms in illustrator but kept the hand drawn feel to the spoon.

I was able to get my hands on some dried maple leaves and wondered if they could be useful for our project. One of the USPs of Spoon cereal is that it is made with pure maple syrup. I decided to scan the leaves into my computer to see whether they could be used in our design. These are my experiments.

Post by Sandra

We reviewed the work produced so far, and discussed the points raised at the meeting with Flourish.  We decided that the team will progress the following actions by next Wednesday:

Leonie - finish the logo and upload to Google Drive
Leonie - produce a concept of illustration design
Sandra - design retro-influenced patterns (one colour plus black and white) and box mock ups
Clare -  design retro-influenced patterns (one colour plus black and white) and box mock ups


On Wednesday the team will decide which of the design routes to go down and finalise the branding. Over Easter we will create draft final packaging designs and website mockup.

Additional concepts created by Sandra:

Post by Sandra

Post by Sandra

Following our meeting with Flourish and the feedback we received, we have decided to develop further concepts based on these criteria:

Brown card packaging
Small cut out on box
Patterns in black and white (and possibly one colour)
Small scale geometric pattern
Pattern in small area on front, extended around sides/back
Illustration (Leonie)

Colour palette:
Cinnamon & Pecan - red/organge
Apple & Peanut - green
Muesli & Granola - yellow

Leonie is going to refine the Spoon logo she developed, and work on some illustration ideas. Clare and Sandra (and Leonie if time allows) will concept the ideas discussed above.


These concepts will be shared with each other, together with some suggested typefaces on 23/03/16.


Next meeting with Flourish - 13/04/16

We need to have the following completed to discuss at our next meeting:

Branding completed (logo, typefaces, colour palette, supplementary illustrations, patterns)
Mockups of each flavour variant
Web mockups

Post by Sandra

Annie from Spoon very kindly agreed to talk to us over the phone to answer some of our questions. We were planning to go up to London to meet with Annie but unfortunately due to uni commitments we couldn't make it.

This is a summary of what Annie told us:

Q What are Spoon's brand values?
A Taste is the most important thing, with pure maple syrup and ingredients, reflected in the simple packaging design. Simplicity - a small number of high quality ingredients. It was a definite choice not to make health claims on the product packaging.

Q Who do you see as your target market?
A Young professionals and creatives who are fairly affluent, and are interested in exercise and nutrition as part of a fun balanced lifestyle and who want to look after themselves. Also young mums and other females. They are hoping to expand out of London more, throughout the UK.

Q Who are your main competitors?
A Dorset Cereals, Rude Health, Lizi's. Plus other high-end granolas and mueslis.

Q What led you to chose your current branding and packaging?
A Annie designed the packaging herself (she has a marketing background). Card was chosen as it is recycleable (pouches were originally used but were not recycleable in the UK). Colour was added because a potential stockist suggested the product would stand out better on the shelf. The boxes are robust whereas the pouches often look a bit crumpled.

Q What is the benefit of running your pop-up shops?
A Annie said she originally thought she might open a breakfast cafe/shop but decided her passion was really for granola. The pop ups were really testing the market for the cafe idea. They also work well for participating in lifestyle events with other like-minded brands (not just food companies).

Q What areas do you hope to expand into in the future?
A Spoon has a new product launching in June - a muesli with added granola which has less sugar and more raw ingredients than the granola. They would consider single serving products, porridge pots, yoghurts and compotes. Their passion is breakfast products.

We sent Annie a thank you email and a link to our blog.

It was reassuring to see that our research was confirmed by what Annie told us, particularly in relation to brand values, competition, and target markets.

Post by Leonie

I sketched out some possible logo concepts with a view to developing them further later on.

Early sketches

second stage drawing to be refined later

Sandra created the following mood board exploring concepts created with typography to show to Flourish.

A conference call has been arranged with Annie, one of the Directors of Spoon Cereals, for Friday at 10am.  The questions we plan to ask are:

1. What are Spoon Cereal's brand values?
2. Who do you see as your target market?
3. Is there another group of customers you hope to target in the future?
4. Who are your main competitors?
5. What led you to choose your current branding and packaging style?
6. What is the benefit of running your pop-up stores?
7. In what areas do you hope to expand into in the future? Hot cereals, breakfast bars?
8. Have you got any other ideas in the pipeline? New flavours?
9. What else can you tell us that might help us with our project?