The Overview
Mouse Tail Coffee’s owners and senior stakeholders wanted to refresh the brand to celebrate their tenth year in business and reflect their plans for growth.
My objective was to create an updated identity for Mouse Tail Coffee that aligned with their values and strengths, as perceived by the business and its customers. Additionally, Mouse Tail launched their own bakery in the previous year and required branding to improve awareness of their expanding operations.
The Impact
Monthly profit margins increased by 12% one month after new branding was introduced.
Sales increased for less popular items due to improved product visibility after prioritising accessibility for customers.
My research and brand strategy guided Mouse Tail Coffee into their most profitable year to date, landing me a permanent position leading their brand design.
The Project
Discovery:
I strategically led comprehensive research to address the disconnect between brand perception and market positioning, undertaking a brand evaluation process. I conducted workshops with stakeholders, internal and external surveys, interviews and analysed sales to refine their brand identity.
Insights:
After honing in on Mouse Tail's business goals and brand perception through stakeholder workshops, I used these findings to guide the next phase of discovery. Conducting internal and external surveys and analysing these findings through affinity maps, I identified key areas of improvement that the new branding could address. The outcome successfully rebranded Mouse Tail Coffee, resonating with their customers and business goals.
Acknowledging the limited attention and motivations of busy customers, I restricted the first survey to 4 questions:
How would you describe MTC in three traits?
• Customer perceptions of MTC's values and strengths
What are your first impressions when you enter our shops?
• Immediate customer perceptions
What do you appreciate about your experience and/or our products?
• Identifying MTC's competitive edge as perceived by customers
What could we do differently to improve your experience?
• Identifying customer goals and pain points
I repeated a similar internal survey which you can view here.
The Project
Branding:
The rebrand embraced Mouse Tail Coffee's existing image, drawing on the strengths of its colour and character to increase its presence, impact and alignment with its mission. I created scalable wordmark logos, multi-purpose visual assets, a comprehensive asset library and marketing templates for use across social, digital and physical touchpoints.
Accessibility:
To reflect Mouse Tail Coffee's uniquely inclusive character whilst optimising the flow of service in shops, I prioritised accessibility in both the design and copy of menus, product labels and other marketing materials. By providing access to product information through noticeable descriptions and personable copy, MTC's customers could order more easily and be invited to learn more about specialty coffee rather than be intimidated by a lack of knowledge.
The Reflection
The Case Study
Successes:
Strategic Rebranding: Strategically lead the Mouse Tail re-brand, achieving widespread positive sentiment and alignment with internal stakeholders' vision. This significantly enhanced the product's market positioning and altered the course of their business strategy.
Customer-centric Branding: Spearheaded sourcing real customers and tailored the branding to meet their expectations and needs, enhancing the functionality of the final branding output.
Efficiency Optimization Initiatives: Lead initiatives to identify efficiency gaps and implement access to information that not only improved overall sales, but also optimised customer ordering, reducing wait times.
Challenges:
Addressing Diverse Stakeholder Needs: Conducting organisation-wide surveys and interviews revealed gaps and frustrations, requiring adaptability in understanding and addressing diverse needs.
Overcoming Product-Price Disparity: Product-price desparity was one of the main criticisms of the business. The initial negative connotations posed a significant challenge when being asked to build off of the existing brand image.
Navigating Research Constraints: Limited time and budgets for both internal and external research meant a limited research participant pool, which was a hurdle. Despite emphasising the operational and revenue benefits of deeper user insights, stakeholders were fixed on producing immediate marketing assets.
If I were to approach this again, I would stress the importance of user behaviour insights and existing positive feedback. Establishing broad design principles from the start would have streamlined developments and helped in aligning suggestions with our goals whilst maintaining a user-centric approach.
Skills Acquired:
Strategic Brand Development: Conducted comprehensive research to address the disconnect between brand perception and market positioning, including stakeholder workshops, internal and external surveys, and sales analysis to refine the brand's identity. Developed a strategic approach to branding and product development, leveraging insights and data to align with organizational goals and drive business success.
Stakeholder Management: Engaged with various stakeholders to understand and align with their vision and business goals, facilitating workshops and interviews to gather diverse insights and ensure cohesive branding strategies.
Insight Generation: Utilized stakeholder workshops and surveys to gather and analyze data through affinity maps, identifying key areas of improvement and guiding the rebranding process to resonate with customers and business objectives.
User-centric Design: Led the rebranding process, embracing and enhancing Mouse Tail Coffee's existing image whilst tailoring the branding to meet customer expectations and needs. Created scalable wordmark logos, multi-purpose visual assets, a comprehensive asset library, and marketing templates for use across social, digital, and physical touchpoints.
Adaptability: Navigated challenges such as diverse stakeholder needs, product-price disparity, and research constraints, demonstrating flexibility and innovative problem-solving in addressing these issues.
Read the full case study below:
