Who’s Who?

What do BBDO, New York; Disney, Paris; Greenpeace; the BBC; and Brainstorm all have in common? Each won a Best in Show Award from the 2008 W3 Awards, a global competition for website and online content designers, creators, and promoters, judged by the International Academy of Visual Arts.

“In a competition pitting over 3,000 competitors, including Fortune 500 companies and international marketing agencies, we’re pleased to finish in the top 1 percent,” said Brainstorm’s president, Bob Blass.

What’s What?

Brainstorm also won a Gold Award for Visual Appeal for the site, Camino a la Universidad (The Road to College). The site brings interactive life to a research report on Latino’s post-secondary access and success by University of Texas at San Antonio professor Dr. Raymond Padilla.

“Brainstorm created a beautiful, culturally relevant, sharable way to interact with decades of research data without diminishing its depth and substance,” said Teresa Detrich of the Lumina Foundation, sponsor of the research and website.

This is Brainstorm’s third W3 Award, including a Silver Award in 2007 for a website promoting Community Health Network’s North Hospital.

“Enter zip code.”

First Impressions

Low on fuel and on a tight schedule, I pulled into a BP-fueled truck stop. Grimy housings, hand-scrawled, duct-taped instructions, greasy LCD screens and several “out of order” signs indicated that this wasn’t your typical BP.

My instincts told me to take my business elsewhere but my fuel gauge and my watch spurred me on.

Imposing Impressions

I inserted my credit card into the slot and after a long delay—as if awakened from a deep, sleepy dial-up—the screen queried, “Credit or Debit?” I punched “Credit” and, after another delay, got “Car Wash Y/N?” I scanned the keypad and hit “N.” At last the computer processed my input and responded “Enter zip code.”

Zip code? This zip code? Certainly not. My business zip code? My home zip code? And why? ID verification? Demographic purposes? Requiring personal data mid-transaction calls for a friendly explanation. Something beyond “Enter zip code.”

Perturbed, I punched in my home zip code. Time passed, “Authorizing…” At long last the pump offered up its final decree: “Card error.” Now invested and thinking I’d erred in supplying my home zip code, I repeated the entire process, entering my business zip code—to no avail, “Card error” again.

Lasting Impressions

I returned to my car, cold, irritated, and still in need of fuel, wondering exactly what “Card error” meant. And why zip code was the last query in my customer experience, not the first. Several exits later I filled my tank at a competitor’s pump using the same credit card.

So what did BP gain from this customer interaction? They realized no sale, no add-on sale and, by association with the truck stop, a less than positive brand impression with a potential customer.

Acquiring customer data and positioning yourself for additional sales opportunities is smart business, but never at the expense of your customers’ experience. In today’s convenience-oriented, competitive business climate, place a premium on your customers’ time and expectations. From housekeeping to user interface design, put customer needs and desires ahead of your own. That’s front line branding.

[ image: ifranz ]

The Spork of Tomorrow,
Here Today

The Forgotten Spoon

A recent visit to the deli counter at Target yielded an interesting consumer experience brand extension. It’s a small detail, yet answers a very basic quandary.

Ever leave a deli or carry out without a utensil with which to eat? Enter this little innovation.

Forget Finger Food

The lid of the food container has a small thermoformed cavity that’s roughly the shape of the head of a spoon. In this cavity is a “folded” spoon with a living hinge and a snap-fit tab that transforms it into a fully functional utensil roughly 2/3 the length of a normal plasticware spoon.

Putting a Finger on Innovation

A need was identified and with some simple ingenuity a smart solution was borne. While it won’t change the world, it is genius.

[ image: illig ]

Here’s a Little Teapot,
Short and Stout

Unpacking a Fluid Design

The Sorapot teapot and its package design are a juxtaposition of contrasting design elements and sustainable sensitivity.

From recycled and recyclable packing materials to the Sorapot’s stainless steel and cylindrical glass form, every detail is steeped in considered appropriateness.

Timeless Impermanence

The Sorapot package benefits aesthetically from naturally imperfect corrugate patterns and earthen hues. Natural materials such as jute and recycled paper ensure its biodegradable impermanence. The molded pulp composition of the package provides a sturdy yet forgiving structure that is stout enough to function as a nested shipper and attractive enough to present well at retail.

Steely Style; Sensual Steep

Edgy enough for a metropolitan home, soothing enough for a meditative retreat, the Sorapot delivers a more responsible and experiential design than its competition.

For more, visit the Sorapot site.

With this week’s Sirius-XM
merger approval, we take a nostalgic look back at our XM packaging experience.

About the Project

Packaging is a part of modern life. This article, an insight into the design of a consumer package for satellite radio provider XM, includes many aspects of a typical package development process. In the interest of time, we’ll skip research, diagnostic and technical methodology phases and concentrate on the basic iterative process steps in this article.

Contracted as a co-branded piece with equipment manufacturer, Delphi, the XM package is designed to contain a variety of product configurations while meeting the requirements of multiple retailers.

Thumbnails
(above: click for larger view)

The first stage of the package design process is broad idea generation with an eye toward reasonable possibility through the use of quick sketches called thumbnails—essentially a Brainstorm session on paper.

Even in this early ideation phase, function and manufacturing objectives established in earlier logistic explorations are at the forefront of the design rationale.

A plump and friendly ovate design—suitable for both pegged and stand-alone shelf display—captured the team’s attention. It features an interchangeable outer shroud designed to accommodate variable messaging and XM product differentiation.

Rough Refinements
(above: click for larger view)

Of the 32 initial thumbnails, five are selected for tighter “rough�? conceptual sketches. The rough design stage serves several purposes. Roughs allow the customer to collaborate in a conceptual dialog with both Brainstorm and their own internal team.

In addition, roughs allow the design team to further reconcile a host of issues—from substrate selection to detail and aesthetic considerations. Increasingly the form is discussed with a heightened sensitivity to relative manufacturing requirements and capabilities.

Although computer-generated designs are great for visualization, introducing them too early in the development process can consume allotted resources and generate fewer options. Furthermore, their finished look can ignite concerns about exhausting budgets without the benefit of conceptual buy-in.

Design Control Drawings (DCD)
(above: click for larger view)

DCD drawings are to final fit and finish what roughs are to concepts. In this case, the forms are expressed as orthographic projections, i.e., front, right side and plan (top) views.

The primary intent of this phase is to convey relative proportions and relationships between forms within the package, i.e., to “control�? the design. A rough and wispy hand drawn line could mean anything to a packaging engineer. Conversely, detailed and dimensioned schematics begin to define a working reality.

Of course, many issues were addressed during the XM DCD phase: Drop test considerations, proper cavity allowance for nested accessories, marrying the outer shroud with the stand-alone clamshell, substrate selection and opacity levels, inherent multi-part clamshell tooling considerations, etc.

Rapid Prototyped 3D Model
(above)

Project participants hailed from several continents. So, to help bridge geographic and language-based barriers, we produced a quick 3D model based on data and dimensioning extrapolated from the vector-based DCD drawings. The model proved a useful discussion tool in describing general functions of the package.

Aesthetic and Messaging
(above: click for more initial design examples)

Although this article primarily explores the physical form development of a package, the aesthetic process is important enough to warrant an article of its own.

Some aspects of messaging development begin as early as the thumbnail stage. However, on many levels, full graphic exploration doesn’t begin until a form factor direction is set. At retail, messaging and brand continuity are crucial.

A Finished Package
(above: click for larger view)

Although concessions were made along the way, the completed two-part package is remarkably similar to the original concept design in form and function.

Click here for more about Brainstorm.