Woodland Empire was Founded in 2012 by Keely and Rob Landerman, who spent a decade creating a brewery irreverent to the bearded hipster craft beer culture. In 2022, Progress Through Beer LLC acquired the brewery based on their respect for the previous owners' love of beer tradition and the level of quality ingredients they used in their recipes. The new owners, however, realized that they would need to establish a refreshed brand for Woodland Empire, as the company lacked messaging, a consistent logo, color palette and can design. With a whole new line in production and a push to grow the business, Progress Through Beer was not only looking for a way to stand out in the crowded Boise craft beer scene, but to reflect their commitment to being more than a brewery.
Our (Brooke Foster, & Nathan Warner) role was to establish the brands core values, messaging, visual identity system and packaging to create a new and improved Woodland Empire. Over the course of 6 months, we worked with the team at Progress Through Beer to bring their vision of a unique, recognizable and youthful brand to life.
Role:
Creative Direction, Identity Systems, Graphic Design, Packaging Design, Messaging/Tone, Copywriting
The Objective:
Internal Core Values should be put in place to encourage consistent decision making between members of Progress Through Beer. With equal importance, outward messaging is needed to reflect the personality of the owners and their collective desire to maintain beer traditions and locally sourced ingredients, as well as a shared belief that the brewery can be used as an outlet to do social good. Omission of the previous brands visual assets can be replaced with a new visual identity that feels unique in the market, while harnessing the fun and playful spirit of previous ownership. This visual identity includes easily recognizable and consistent packaging that differs from the competitors in the local market.
The Solution:
Our solution is a full re-brand of Woodland Empire in an effort to create internal and external consistency within the brand. Additionally, the emphasis on core values and the reflection of those beliefs in the beer can create brand equity through relating to folk who love doing social good and who love beer. Our audit of the current local beer market revealed a need for a visual identity and package design that felt fun and playful while still looking classic and approachable to a larger demographic. This re-brand includes all visual elements including Creative Direction, Identity Systems, Graphic Design, Packaging Design, Messaging/Tone, Copywriting and Social Media Presence.
I was personally tasked with creating illustrative elements for the brand including mascot "Big Sticky" and alternate King Squirrel Logo, as well as developing the typography for the word mark, "Woodland Empire."
Market Research:
An intensive and deliberate study of both local and national competitors was conducted. We analyzed the strengths and weaknesses of brands the clients admired and began understanding how our brand could function similarly, while having its own unique identity. Consideration of color, style, font and other design elements were compared against the competitors in the beer market.
Packaging:
When it came to package design, we wanted to establish a system that borrowed from older concepts while applying new conventional ideas to make it pop off the shelf. The oval is borrowed from heritage brands like heineken. The swoosh in every label was adopted from the classic can designs of pepsi and coca cola. Inspired by the silhouettes found in Wes Anderson’s films, we used it as a platform for story-telling, creating bold visual elements that tie the beer name to the artwork. The choice of highlighting the beer style first was to help consumers find what they liked before diving into the nuanced designs and information placed throughout the can. This design system took months of testing to find the easiest formula that can be repeated while still having a sophisticated yet familiar appeal to beer buyers.
Illustrative Intention:
The "swoosh" can be seen repeated consistently on each can, morphing into elements that make Boise unique. Each can aims to capture the essence of Idaho through addition of simple, clean and recognizable illustrations.
