Abstract
Rong Chyuan Factory Soda Water Factory is facing a challenge – the brand lacks awareness among the younger generation. The goal of this project is to rebrand the business and communicate with generation Z. Our team developed the core message based on the idea of “accompaniment” and constructed the idea with the story marketing framework, and created an Instagram account, redesigned the package and held an online event. Finally, the brand has successfully started a way to communicate with the younger generation and the team won the top prize in the rebranding competition.
Duration
April – Oct 2021
My Responsibilities
Team Leader,
Market Research,
Marketing Strategy and execution
Team
Esther Pan: Graphic Designer
Christine Su: Project manager, content writer
What we've Achieved
Selected out of 70+ candidates, we successfully won the highest prize of rebranding competition held by Kaohsiung City Government.
Rebranded the local business – Rong Chyuan Factory Soda Water Factory for generation Z as a refreshed brand.
Redesigned the package and held an online prize draw event on Instagram for one of the most important holiday – the Moon Festival
The brand's challenges
Hard to change
the brand's tone of voice
Ramune soda used to be popular in the 1960-70s. and the business has been communicating with consumers with “retro-style” ads. However, the business owner realised the effect is diminishing as the new generation did not even live duringthe time that ramunewas popular.
lacking awareness
among the young people
As more alternatives appeared in the market, the younger generation tended to choose other beverages. Moreover, the business also lacks the experience to communicate with them. For instance, the only way to contact the business is by phone, which does not fit generation Z’s user behaviour.
So, we decided to communicate with "emotion"
To solve the challenges that businesses face, we decided to communicate with gen Z with “emotion” rather than the product itself. This group tend to support brands that fit their values, have a sense of humour, care about unfairness, and understand their difficulties. After the main direction was defined, we moved on to the second step – creating stories for the brand.
Forming the idea
Brainstorming is an essential process for branding.
Based on the core message – “accompaniment”, we created a related keyword map. We created the main slogan for this marketing project – “Life is hard, yet an accompaniment makes it easier”. Then, based on the keywords, we started to create the design and story content to deliver our concept comprehensively.
The core message
“Life is hard, yet an accompaniment makes it easier”
Why Story Marketing?
I believe that “stories” are a big part of human relations, and it is the easiest way to communicate emotionally. Therefore, we decided to start the story with a core idea of “accompaniment”. The themes are the moments that people need or accompany the other. The stories we created include unrewarded relationships, homesickness, or someone from the LGBT+ group struggling with coming out to their family. These topics are the life gen Z might face, and the thing we care about.
The Visuals
Instagram Layout
After creating the content, we created an Instagram account for the business and post frequently. The posts with a white background are the stories described above, and the colourful ones are about fun facts or entertaining content.
The Cocktail Map
What attracts young people more than alcohol? We designed a map for an upcoming event – a cocktail tour! The business will develop 10 different types of cocktails with the local bars – of course, the ramune soda is the base! Ten bars on the map represent different types of cocktails.
limited package
Based on our message“life is hard, yet an accompaniment makes it easier”, we designed the new package and produced 300 bottles. Some of the elements in this design are explained below.
The Moon: the limited packaged ramune soda was produced in September – which is exactly around the Moon Festival, one of the most important dates in Chinese culture. On this day, family and friends get together and celebrate. However, due to the COVID outbreak, the simple reunion seems difficult in 2021. So we designed the package and delivered the message: even when you are alone, you are accompanied
The Cat: Accompaniment does not have to be between people. It could be people and animals, people and their possessions…and so on. We want to remind people – everything surrounding you is your companion, you are not alone!
The Message: The message is:“life is hard, yet an accompaniment makes it easier”. There is also a blank space for users to write the names of those who accompany them as a present.
online prize draw event
Instagram Filter and the prize
We designed a filter for the brand and encourage our consumers to use it and be a part of our prize draw. Both filter and prize draw are great ways to reach out to new consumers. The prize is our limited package ramune soda, and we successfully received participants’ replies and gained traffic to the account.
achievement
Customer engagement on instagram
Within two weeks, the number of followers increased by 400+ on Instagram, and the single post (the announcement of the prize draw event) received 900+ likes. We have not only created a new brand identity but also helped the brand reach customers in such a short time.
Winning the Highest Prizeof rebranding compitition
we successfully won the highest prize of rebranding competition held by the Kaohsiung City Government and were selected out of 70+ candidates.The judges said:
“Well-designed and well-presented.It drives the traffic and reaches out to the real users. This project truly represents the nature of marketing and rebranding.”
