Bringing new editions to a core spirit without unsettling its drinkers

The question

A spirits brand was building a series of new editions on its core spirit, the one its drinkers know best and would notice any change to.

The idea had already been developed and its concept tested. What the brand team wanted now was a way of presenting the series that would bring drinkers into it and work in more than one market. A careless introduction could unsettle the very drinkers the brand most wanted to keep.

Our approach

We worked one market at a time, so each was read on its own terms and the second could build on what the first had settled.

In the first market, drinkers saw routes into the series ranging from close to the category’s familiar codes to well beyond them, and the concepts were rewritten with the brand team as the work went.

Groups mixed the brand’s own drinkers with drinkers of competing brands, so the series was judged by the people it had to keep and the people it hoped to attract.

What the team came away with

A report for each market gave the brand team its working material.

From the first came rewritten concepts, a read on the first edition and its pack beside a competitor on shelf, and principles for presenting the series. From the second came an evaluation of candidate editions, packs and names for the range, judged against those same principles. Pack guidance came with each, so design work had a brief to start from.

The series now had one set of principles for how to present it, with evidence from two regions behind them, ready to frame each new edition as it came.