There are many ‘kitchen table entrepreneurs’ that have broken the barrier between small artisan producer to established supermarket brand. Starting small and branching out whether that is adding new ranges to your traditional farm produce, a favourite family recipe, or a gap you have seen in the market -  hats off to you; you enrich our lives on many levels.

Starting small at farmers markets, local shops and in the ‘local range at supermarkets such as Co-op or Waitrose is an achievement in itself, and to get that far you have needed to have a logo, packaging, and, I expect, a lot of early mornings and hard work.

So, you have built a brand that is small batch, high quality, well loved by the locals and probably sold in cafes and restaurants in the area. You may have a website but the next step is to sell online -  maybe coinciding with a move to an industrial kitchen and excellent customer feedback.

There is a subtle change when moving online

No longer local

Perhaps your logo is very artisan, an illustration or clip art, lots of words in a serif typeface and simple packaging with a single colour stamp and handwritten product name. This works when local, customers know where you are from and what has gone into the product to be worth the purchase, but once online you are no longer ‘local’. 

Handmade not homemade

Strangely handcrafted style packaging, that works well in a local shop, buyers understanding the quality and provenance, does not translate well online. Instead giving the impression of ‘homemade’ not ‘handmade', more of a ‘value’ item than a ‘quality’ item, thus your price that is right for your product suddenly seems expensive. 

A professionally designed visual identity; logo, packaging and website, carried out from a deep dive into what you stand for, can still promote a handcrafted or artisan style and will reflect everything you have worked so hard to do to create a great product or range and loyal customer base off line, but in a way that will engage your customers online. This outlay will be worth the return on investment.. 

Key points to check your brand will translate

• Is it hand drawn or hand written?

• If you removed the product name, is it obvious what it is?

• Does it reflect on the outside what is inside?

• Does it differentiate from other brands with similar products?

• Is your logo decipherable at a small size?

• Is it eye catching / memorable

A brand is all the senses

A brand isn’t just your logo it is the 360° ‘feel’ a customer gets when they come in contact with your company or product.  Whether it entices them to notice, buy, re-buy, how they feel about the price, taste, provenance and customer service.

In a farmer’s market there is an opportunity to meet you the producer, ask you questions, learn about your passion, support a local business, see and taste the product before buying. In a local shop there is the overall atmospheric commitment of the shop that by selling this product they vouch for it, and the reason ‘taste stands’ are set up similar to the market experience. The shopper may have time to browse and get a positive feeling using all their senses; touch, taste, smell, not to mention great customer service and possibly not so much choice.

ALL of that is removed online, your ‘brand’ has to do all the talking passively and silently. This is why a stronger visual identity (the visual aspect of your company that your customers come into contact with) is needed online than it is in real life -  a little more inline with fighting on a supermarket shelf, but more so as touch and smell senses are still available there!

Getting your story across

Online we need to recreate that in person experience, which is why good food producer websites use photos, video and written word to ‘tell their story’ that comes across as you meet customers face to face. 

Social media also has a hand in that as it has become a platform where you show ‘work in progress’ as it were, the real workings of the farm, process or sheer hard work and reward that go into the everyday routine behind the delicious product you deliver.

Luxury but not too luxury

By the nature of specialty food, the price tag is often higher because, well quite frankly it is better, but in the cutthroat world of Amazon, it is very important to ‘position’ you brand to reflect the quality, provenance and credentials so that the price ‘seems right’. We need to spell these out rather than ask our prospective customer to take a leap of faith as the supportive external shopping environment we find in the real (offline) world is not in play here. So deciding whether you are a luxury (occasional) buy, a better alternative to a staple, a ‘disruptor’ needing to be tried, a modern take on a traditional fayre, and so on, is important to get right, this can be envisioned by a good designer. 

It's all in the taste

My clients sometimes tell me ‘well it’s all in the taste’, which I completely agree with, but online you need to persuade me to part with my money on something I know very little about and certainly have not tasted as yet. Once you have done that, then yes the product should speak for itself and turn me into a loyal customer.... and if you are not getting repeat business then again, we need to look at the positioning of your brand online, what touch point is just not quite right to make me come back for more?

Don’t forget delivery

Creating a relationship with your customers does not lapse during delivery. If I have put my trust in what you have shown me to give your product a try, then the way it arrives is very much part of the process, and ‘delightful’, eco and educational packaging goes a long way to encourage customer loyalty.

Size matters

Logos created offline have the luxury of being bigger, a website logo is much smaller and often loses the hook that made it work at a larger size. This is even more apparent for social media profiles, and worth checking that your logo can be read and understood at small sizes. You will notice logos online are simpler and bolder, and variants depicted with colour or pattern.

And finally... 

This may sound daunting when there are a million and one other things to think about when scaling your business, but a designer worth their salt, can lead you through a brainstorm style discovery process to encapsulate what makes you, you. And reflect this in a visually engaging brand identity; logo, packaging and website design as you open your new global shop doors.

Author

Abi Fawcus takes pride in helping many specialty food producers transition grow their business online, for an informal chat visit  www.byabi.co.uk/speciality-food