Prompt:
Create your own brand. It can be anything, but try to make it a tangible product. It doesn’t have to be something that doesn’t exist, it could be your take on sparkling water or skateboards or cardboard boxes or anything.
Come up with a name, write a paragraph description (what is this thing, why is it good, what problem does it solve, why should people care about it) and try out a few tag lines or slogans, which sounds cheesy, but the art of a great tag line is a worthy pursuit, they can be iconic (apple: Think Different) or iconoclastic (Taco Bell: Think Outside the Bun).
Finally, imagine how you would bring this product to market—how would you launch it, what would you do to get people’s attention and convert their attention to sales?
The brand: Syrah
What it is:
A wine bar that has its own wine subscription service.
Syrah’s target market: ages 19-35. Some people ask why our target market includes people underage at 19 and 20. Syrah knows college kids who are already over the party scene want somewhere to hang out with their friends - they’re already looking for something classier. We have done numerous focus groups to confirm this observation. To keep the restaurant up to the legal code, we offer a number of non-alcoholic wines that imitate the taste and experience of drinking a real glass of wine! These drinks are served in specific glasses to designate an underage customer with a non-alcoholic beverage. We know that if we grab customers at 19 or 20, they will keep coming back long after they are 21. We sell curated local wines, season options, and we cater small events. We also are a part of the Small Business Organization in town, so we always have a booth at the annual local business street fair.
What are they launching:
Customers can now create their own custom wine flavors!
Tag line: Wine by (your name here)
I chose this tag line because I know that customers like to interact with brands. Co-production makes people feel like they are contributing to what they get out of their experience. This was the most pivotal point in my personal marketing education.
The details:
Customers love our unique wine assortment, and they love that we specifically offer local flavors. It makes them feel like they are connected to their community. We have come up with a way to elevate the connection between us and our customers. We want them to be able to create their own wine flavors that they will be able to order in the restaurant, as well as have shipped to their home (this is not new to the company). This launch will be branded as a way to drink with your friends even when you’re drinking home alone. To create their own flavor, each customer will have to subscribe to our email list, which will keep them up to date on seasonal flavor rotations, specials, etc. In their confirmation email, they will receive a code that allows them to start creating their own wine flavor on our website or app. They will be able to order their unique flavor while they dine in the restaurant, as well as have their wine delivered right to their door! Every individually created wine flavor will come with its own personal label. A customer can have two flavors “on menu” at a time. As an incentive to use this, customers will receive points each time they order their own personal flavor. It comes by the bottle, and you can take it home with you.
As far as the subscription service goes, I think we want people to be able to have their order recurring at a time frame of their choosing and they can change the flavors they get whenever they like, or stop it at any time. This can be done online, on the app, or when you visit the restaurant. We don’t want to allow it to be too frequent though because we still want people to come into the restaurant. The thought process here is because our wines are local, and because of that our menu changes frequently, people won’t want to order a new personal wine flavor based on current selections they haven’t tried yet.
The points will earn them unique perks and special discounts! Some examples include a Birthday bottle – we will create a new flavor for you if you dine with us on your birthday based on the seasonal flavors we have at that time!
We also want them to follow us on social media, specifically Instagram. To move that forward we designed our restaurant around being photo-friendly at every table. The layout has seating options for having a drink alone or coming to meet with friends. Your wine photos will be perfectly lit and ethereal at every seat in the house! Tagging us on social is another way to earn points. I had the thought of creating a YouTube page, but I think IGTV’s will be better optimized for this market. Some video ideas for the page might include:
1. The Syrah Team Shares Their Wine Creations
a) In this video, employees and business owners of the brand would take videos from their home or in the restaurant with their personal bottles and talk about what’s in their perfect bottle!
2. Tour the Creation Room
a) this will be aimed towards those who would like to see the more logistic side of things. You’ll see how the wine is mixed, where it comes from. When I think of how this video is produced, I think Bon Appetit youtube videos. There is a lot to be learned from the way Bon Appetit makes content and I think if we are inspired by that and incorporate the best of what they do in our style we can come up with something with longevity.
3. Drink with Friends, Ep1
a) This might be an installment series where we have episodes of this idea but done from different points of view. Maybe there’s a drinking game involved? Or maybe it’s just the personality for each video trying to do something while drinking wine and as they get more into the video, they get tipsy and the simple task becomes more and more daunting. This is the most casual of the video ideas. Something which has the sole purpose of being a good laugh and being “relatable”. The way people know the image of going to a bar alone and drinking and talking to the bartender for the company, we want to normalize drinking a glass of wine alone and casually, specifically at our bar.
4. Blind Taste Test
a) This one is pretty self-explanatory. Our team will blindly guess what is in personal bottles. Maybe we use customers’ wine flavors too just to keep them intertwined with the brand and the experience.
5. Pairing Your Wine with Food
a) Individual members of our team make videos from their home kitchen showing what they make for dinner to pair with their favorite wine.
6. Making Sangria! (5 ways)
a) It’s summer now and a good summer staple is sangria. Different employees show what is in their perfect sangria recipe.
To get customers excited about this launch, we will have a template available on our Instagram page where users can create their own wine label (see below) that they will be able to see on their wine once it is available. They can name their wine, give it an identity, make it real before it even is. We will ask customers to post their labels to their stories so we can repost them.
Let’s say this business is real, and let’s say this was launched pre-pandemic. Now we’re in quarantine, sales are dropping out because customers can’t come into the store to drink the wine and tag photos. We retarget and push this feature as a way to social drink your favorite wine with your friends from the comfort of your home. “Drinking with friends”. I think this could not only reinforce our current brand but give those who maybe don’t utilize the subscription feature an opportunity to try it and then hopefully stick with it after this is all over.
Points (just a rough brainstorm)
5 points per glass
10 points for an Instagram post
20 points per bottle purchase
200 points: 50% off a set of subscription bottles
500 points: choice of a free seasonal bottle of wine
Brand Identity
(for use of the company): personalized, accessible, communal. Elegant imaging without ever feeling intimidating. Our waiters/waitresses will be trained to be knowledgeable about the process, but we never want to perpetuate a “wine snob” identity.
.png)
