Decide a Design Direction – Here’s What to Consider

A good design tells a story, but Studio Morris’ Jeffrey Morris explains why there are so many more considerations, unique to every brand.

By Jeffrey Morris, Studio Morris

We buy skincare and beauty products for many reasons. They make us feel good about ourselves, they give us confidence – and help us make a good first impression.

Beauty products, especially, must make a great impression on consumers, not just at point of sale, but after the sale as well. Packaging and design are clearly integral to achieving that goal.

Good Design Tells a Story

Fragrance and beauty is about storytelling. Either you’re extending the story of a well-known fashion brand or personality, or telling an original story. It’s about how well you tell the story and whether the audience believes it or not. The packaging is a key touch-point and primary expression of that story.

When Skincare products have proven results, a proprietary ingredient, or process, it makes a designer’s job easier, because evaluating a design direction doesn’t become a beauty contest.

I’m not interested in what your significant other or partner or gardener thinks of our design (unless he or she is qualified). With similar products that have no apparent advantage, it’s really how well you tell the story and follow through consistently with every detail.

The best design advice I can give to a client is to keep it simple, clear and intelligent. The beauty and skincare aisles of a store can be the most confusing place, with every brand shouting at you claiming this and claiming that.

Tell a compelling story well and clearly, that differentiates your brand, and only make promises that you can keep.

What Works for One Brand Won’t Work for Another

Trends are important in fashion and in beauty products, but not as much in packaging design. A package needs to have staying power and that means the design should be timeless. That’s how you build valuable brand equity.

To use the old quote, “Nothing dulls faster than the cutting edge.”

Every brand has its own strategy, which must be developed before the design process can begin. Many things will influence strategy, including: a brand’s competition, the store environment, demographics – and even human attitudes at the moment.

When we recommend that a brand take a design approach that isn’t already being done in the category, it can be a huge challenge.

Some clients can be like lemmings – they want to follow the pack. It’s understandable, in certain situations like a retail space without sales help. Consumers need to be able to find the product they’ve been buying, and have a relationship with. To change that is not an easy decision.

There are times when you must make a big change. When that happens, the way to stand out is to Zig when others Zag. This takes confidence in the relationship a client has with its design consultant.

Years ago when Minute Maid Orange Juice introduced a black package, people thought they were crazy beyond belief. They had the last laugh as sales went through the roof as consumers thought it was a premium product.

Consider the Retail Environment to Stand Apart from the Competition

Products have target audiences, retailers have target audiences. Ideally they should be in alignment. Sometimes, depending on whose brand is stronger, one may influence the other.

If I sell Godiva chocolates in my local deli, does that make my deli appear more “high end?” If Burt’s Bees are sold in Barneys’ New York, what does that say about Burt’s Bees (or Barneys for that matter)?

A brand’s store environment is a critical consideration when designing.

What do the competing brands look like? How does each retailer present your products? What is the lighting in the store like? What is the shopping experience like? Obviously, everything plays a role.

We always show our proposed designs in the context of a brand’s competitive environment. Then we can understand how well the packaging separates (or doesn’t) a brand from its competition. In a competitive environment, like Whole Foods, for instance, you want customers to be able to find your package. Very simple.

With online, it’s a different. That is why the brand story is so important. Consumers need to know what the brand is about before they go on to Amazon.

Build, Maintain and Leverage Brand Equity

A brand should strive to create a design that will evolve over time, building valuable equity. Murad is an example of this.

When we first redesigned Murad’s packaging 9 years ago, we created a completely new look for them. Our packaging worked wonders sales wise, and the company still maintains the same basic ‘big ideas’ – the use of metallic gray, the pharmaceutical label that resembles a prescription, and the clean, organized sans serif typography. We used all of these elements to communicate the idea of a Doctor-developed, efficacious and premium product.

Murad recently redesigned its packaging again, but the design was subtlety tweaked, so the consumer will hardly notice a difference.

Way back when we were working on the project, the original package looked like more like Motor Oil. It wasn’t a tough decision to throw out the design completely.

At the time, we did keep the Murad ‘M’ and we made sure the name was prominently featured. Now, Murad is slowly making the script ‘m’ a less important by using it more as a violator (which I personally disagree with).

But these subtle changes show that more likely than not, you always want to maintain as much visual equity so that consumers can recognize their product.

For designers, it’s a subtle dance– especially when a package has a terrible design that is well known. How do you increase the quality of an ugly design while still maintaining enough visual equity?

Is it even important that it be well-designed? Fortunately in beauty, the answer is yes, which is why we enjoy the industry so much.

With Derma e, we took an educated risk in where we tried very hard to keep the brand’s visual equity, which was white and some primary colors. Unfortunately, the old layout was so weak that the products were getting lost on the shelf.

Whether its our work or someone else’s, it’s always amazing what great design can accomplish. Just remember, deciding on a design direction is often equal parts science and intuition.

READ MORE:

5 Design Don’ts, by Jeffrey Morris

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Jeffrey Morris is the founder of Studio Morris, and believes strongest brands are built through the synergy of intelligent strategy and meaningful design.

An internationally award winning designer, Jeff’s beauty have included Origins, Prescriptives, Estee Lauder, Aramis, Avalon Organics, Jason Natural products, and Derma e. The firm has also worked on fashion-related projects with Ralph Lauren, Christian Dior, Joico, and L’Oreal. Most recently, the company completed a large project for Jafra Cosmetics.