Page 48 - Packaging News Magazine July-Aug 2020

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DIGITAL PRINTING | SPONSORED www.packagingnews.com.au | July-August 2020
Driving brand advantage
The boutique food and beverage market is growing fast, with opportunities, and competition, abounding. Innovative digital labels and packaging can create the consumer engagement brands crave, deliver product authentication, and help drive strong sales.
THE rapid growth of boutique food and beverage producers, and the onset of multiple SKUs from single products by the big brands, mean competition for consumer engage- ment is at an all-time high.
The challenge for all brands is to achieve cut-through, connect with their target, and make their product the preferred choice, and not just once but on a continual basis. The market- ing mix contains many elements, but key among them is the packaging and label on the product itself.
Today new printing technology from HP Indigo, is enabling the cre- ative and marketing teams at brands large and small to leverage their insights, analysis and expertise into that product label and packaging, to deliver the results they seek.
A SEASON FOR INNOVATION
Typical of the new approach imple- menting HP Indigo technology is the award-winning Archie Rose gin dis- tillery. Operating in a crowded field
of 150 similar businesses, the com- pany has seen tremendous success. Its Four Seasons project exemplified the innovative approach to market.
In this case rather than create a gin, then the packaging, the company took the opposite tack, it approached renowned tattoo artist Horisumi to create artwork for gins, based on the four Japanese seasons, then created the gins based on his designs.
As a young company, Archie Rose wanted to increase brand awareness and support its ongoing consumer engage- ment drive. Crucially, it also wanted to explore what new opportunities can be opened with limited editions.
Horisumi provided the artwork for all four seasons upfront, to give Archie Rose time to bring his illus- trations to life through the flavour of each gin. Once each season’s unique gin formulation was set, the distillery worked with Multi-Color Corporation (MCC), a leading Australian wine label printing com- pany, and the Squad Ink design
agency, to turn Horisumi’s artwork into gorgeous gin bottle labels.
The labels were printed on the HP Indigo 6600 Digital Press at MCC, on uncoated paper specially selected for its texture, which is akin to the water- colour paper Horisumi used for his artwork. Gold foil embellishments were added to bring the concept together, locked up with the Archie Rose brand. The labels later went on to win the design agency a Gold FAB Award for packaging design – a pres- tigious win that echoes Archie Rose’s many awards for its products.
“Thanks to Horisumi’s artwork and the packaging, it’s a product that really stands out on shelf. The label design, paper stock, and printing all contributed to a really beautiful pack- aging result,” says Victoria Tulloch, head of marketing at Archie Rose.
Mark Daws, director Labels and Packaging at HP Indigo supplier Currie Group said, “The HP Indigo seven colour print technology stands on its own, there is no other liquid ink digital print system. Seven colour liq- uid ink digital technology means that brands will enjoy outstanding graph- ics – the award winning Archie Rose packaging is testament to that – along with the production benefits of digital print, with its agility, flexibility, speed to market and consistency.”
As Archie Rose’s first limited edi- tion, the collection achieved phenom- enal sales results. The first set of 3000 numbered bottles – for Autumn – sold out in four months. The Winter release sold in 3.5 months, Spring in just two
weeks, and the final release, Summer, sold out within just six hours.
MAXIMISING CREATIVITY
“Competition in any field is intense. Whether the prod- uct is on a supermarket
shelf, in an organic food store, or an image in a cata- logue or website, the labels and packaging need to be outstanding. And beyond
that product authentication is crucial,” Daws says. “Today, though, brands can access print technology, and