Project description:
Fonterra’s Global Brand Visualisation
This brief was delivered to me as a ‘photographic brief’. ‘Let’s develop some on-brand images, which Fonterra can use at top-level around the world.’ This brief is almost nothing to do with photography. It is 80% brand work.
So I started by working backwards.
What format should the images take?
Portrait, square, widescreen, landscape?
How will the images be used, can we still crop an image and achieve the desired end-result?
What do the images need to represent?
Image one: Needs to represent the phrase ‘First up, best dressed’
Image two: Needs to represent the phrase ‘Pass it on’ etc..(there are 6 in total.)
What are these phrases, why are they important to Fonterra?
The phrases are brand propositions. Fonterra call them ‘truths’. To understand the source of these brand propositions – and know you can head-off in the right direction – you need to understand Fonterra’s brand architecture.
So I set about familiarising myself with their brand architecture.
This immersion allowed me to find a different vocabulary from within the brand core. This meant that I could free my thinking from a prescriptive framework and could now think ‘around’ other concepts which would still be true to the brand and therefore true to the propositions.
It was at this point that I was handed the ‘rejected’ brand visualisation document from Saatchi & Saatchi. I felt I had really achieved something…I mean, You don’t get to beat those guys…not ever. But I just had. So I got paid. Many weeks were spent discussing these new threads and how they fitted into the architecture. In many ways, this is what ‘cracked’ the brief for me. New threads and a new way of approaching these propositions.
Here’s a couple of my favourite images from the series, which were beautifully crafted, shot and managed by Paul Sutherland.
You can see the entire suite of images anywhere Fonterra operate throughout the world.
Yes, This was a real ‘big hitter’ brief and I am rightfully very proud of it. Again it takes a great team and an equally great client who is willing to step outside the framework to the benefit of the brand.
Team:
Donna Harding: Global Brand Manager, Fonterra project Essence
Paul Sutherland: Photographer and creative bouncing board
Marnie Sutherland: Client manager and producer
Rob Munday: Strategic Creative / Art Director