Tag Archives: ice cream

How to market Mochi ice cream to consumers.

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Bubbies Hawaii got its start over 30 years ago making slow-churned premium ice cream in the Hawaiian Islands. After becoming one of the most popular regional ice creams, it introduced mochi ice cream: a partially flattened sweet rice dough ball wrapped around an ice cream core. Sales took off. To expand their nationwide sales, Bubbies needed to re-design their branding and packaging.

The team at MOI (Mark Oliver, Inc.) found that no brand was doing a decent job of presenting mochi ice cream to the buying public and that a good opportunity existed to stand apart from the crowd. For example, photos or illustrations failed to give the product of any manufacturer appetite appeal. And none showed product or explained what they were in such a way that to a consumer unfamiliar with mochi ice cream would want to try them—unless they were already buying them. That approach does not grow sales.

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MOI focused on creating appealing visual images of the 20+ SKUs: various exotic fruits and ingredients made enticing flavor cues. We made a new wordmark that was easily read yet referenced the old. The team used classic type faces, an easy-to-understand explanation of what a mochi was, and added plenty of white space to focus attention on the hero shot, completing the identity lockup for Bubbies. The new design re-positioned Bubbies mochi ice cream as visually appealing and a decidedly upscale dessert and treat.

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Old packaging

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McConnell’s ice cream, pure and simplified.

We are inevitably surprised and pleased when a client shows up in our own backyard, in this case neighboring Santa Barbara. Our clients are usually based elsewhere in the country. So we looked forward to working with the former king of ice cream in the southland.

The overall company objective was to rebuild the venerable 60 year-old brand after years of declining sales. This was a company-wide activity but an emphasis was placed on new packaging. Among other things, our research showed that consumers of super-premium ice creams owned a growing preference for products with pure, simple, identifiable ingredients. And as we discovered, McConnell’s was in the enviable position of being able to capitalize on the desire of consumers for simpler and healthier food without having to do anything differently in how its products were manufactured.

This was an exceptional opportunity and we pitched the client on taking advantage of this new information. As differentiation of a product from its competitors at many levels is a key to success, we proposed completely new product positioning, branding, and packaging. The client agreed and the result you can see here.

old packaging