a branding guide cristina millan
CRISTINA MILLÁN DE NUEVO | APRIL 10TH , 2020
CRISTINA MILLAN’S SENIOR PROJECT BOOK Bachelor of Technology in Visual Communications Visual Communications: Art & Graphic Design Farmingdale State College, State University of New York
10 INTRODUCTION 14 UNIQUE VALUE PRODUCT DESCRIPTION 12 COMPETITION 18 TABLE OF
20 PERSONAS 34 VISUAL STRATEGY CULTURAL RELEVANCE 28 MARKETING STRATEGY 40
Cristina has always been very interested in sewing. When she was a kid she would sit at her grandmas house with an embroidery hoop and scrap fabric and practice stitches and stitch pictures of flowers until they came out just right. Her grandma was also the first person to teach her the importance of reusing and recycling. There was never a scrap too oddly shaped or a button that could not be reused somewhere else. Oil stain? Stitch a flower on it. Nothing was beyond saving. She got her first sewing machine in college, and started doing odd projects like an iPad cover for her mom or a tote bag for a friend who got aggravated with fabric glue. Slowly she got better and took on her first big sewing project, a t-shirt quilt. It started when she was helping her college friend go through her clothes one summer while they were moving home from school. The collection of t-shirts her friend had was absolutely enormous, but she refused to get rid of any of them because they all had sentimental value to her. Cristina promised her that if she purged her collection, she would take those shirts and make them into a quilt for her. This was her first big project - a king size quilt - and also her first foray into reuse. Half of those t-shirts would have gone directly into the garbage because a lot of them were too old or cut up to donate anywhere. When she was not working on the quilt, which took the better part of a semester to finish, she was fixing her friends’ clothes or making baby blankets for her boyfriends’ friends who were having babies. INTRODUCTION
PRODUCT DESCRIPTION
What started as mindless scrolling turned into hours of (pinterest) research, pattern saving and googling. There were a lot of different avenues Cristina researched before landing on what would eventually be her final project. At first she wanted to start a company that would take existing clothes and turn them into keepsakes - dad’s shirts made into baby girls dresses, grandmas sweater turned into a teddy bear, t-shirt quilts, etc. However this brought up too many variables - pricing, things possibly getting lost in the mail, items getting damaged, and human error, especially dealing with such sentimental items. As Cristina looked more into this, she found a company called Fabscrap. This is a company based in Brooklyn that takes in fabric waste from other companies, sorts through it and recycles or resells that fabric. What most sites were not explaining was that when fashion companies talk about ‘scrap’ fabric, this could mean a small corner or entire rolls. Although there are rules on recycling and how these companies are supposed to get rid of their scraps, there are so many companies and so few entities who can really enforce these rules, none of them were being followed. Fabscrap makes deals with these companies to accept all their scrap and extra fabric under the agreement that no one is ever told that they work with them. That way it never gets out that anyone can go to some warehouse in Brooklyn and buy Chanel’s fabric for five dollars a pound, but it never ends up in a landfill. The more research Cristina did into Fabscrap, the more she realized how easy it would be to really create something out of this old fabric.
UNIQUE VALUE
My company is working to try and undo the damage that this industry is creating. De Nuevo is made exclusively of fabric that was destined for a landfill. By working with a company called FabScrap, based in Brooklyn, much of the material is sourced in New York, is sorted and classified by hand, and then sold to us at a much lower price point than it would be if it were new. One would think this is not a unique idea; reusing material is pretty commonplace in almost every industry, but in the fashion world there really are not any companies doing this. My price point is much lower than the competition because I look for bolts (large rolls) of fabric or pieces large enough to make the garment with as little patching as possible. My designs are based on a capsule wardrobe, meaning just basics that everyone should have. Because of this, my patterns are not only simple, but concise. I know the Lealia tunic needs two yards of fabric, so whatever fabric I can find in two yard chunks becomes a Lealia tunic. I don’t go searching for fabric and figure out what I’m going to do with it later, so that also keeps my costs down because I’m not buying “maybe” fabric. It’s very clear that De Nuevo will not always have every style available in every size and color - our clothing tags help alleviate that question by listing only up to what size the garment is available in. Fabric that does not get purchased in a bolt is obviously not going to be able to create too many garments, but maybe I was able to find 20 yards of different shades of purple fabric; yes, maybe the shades will be off, but they will still be purple and still be uniform.
Fabscrap Warehouse Brooklyn Army Terminal, New York Fabric for De Nuevo is sourced through Fabscrap. Companies bag their scrap fabric and they are brought to the warehouse and numbered according to the company that donated it. Volunteers come every day to sort the material, and Fabscrap uses the numbers to keep track of what companies are donating what, without making it public who they are. This way, higher end companies can stay anonymous while still being able to donate their material and keep it out of the landfill.
COMPETITION
The only other company besides mine that exclusively uses scrap material is Zero Waste Daniel. He was the inspiration for my project, but I have taken his idea and changed it to something that is more marketable and accessible. One of the first things I noticed about ZWD was his price point. They are very much on the high side - $80 for a sweatshirt, $90 for joggers. One of the main reasons I see for this is the way he puts his clothing together. He takes small pieces and patches them together to create a patched shoulder, or knee, and then puts the rest of the garment together. This piecing together makes for very labor-intensive work and drives his prices up. Having mentioned the patching, this is also something that seems to be very hit or miss as far as tastes go. Some people are going to love that look, but there are definitely people who do not. One thing De Nuevo and ZWD differ on completely is that ZWD is a unisex clothing line, while De Nuevo is for women. Some people might find this limiting, but in reality there are many consumers who don’t want unisex. For one thing, some women are curvier than men; this can cause some items to look very boxy and ill fitted on curvier women. Focusing on only women’s designs assures that women’s curves are taken into account and they can assure they are going to get the most flattering fit. Lastly, ZWD has a very limited selection. Any time I have ever gone on their website, they never have the same items up, and not everything is always available. This is the ‘nature of the beast’ so-to-speak when dealing with scrap fabric - there will not always be enough to go around, and that is expected. However, when all the store offers is basic sweatshirts, t-shirts, joggers, and the occasional jacket, this seems a little bit strange.
PERSONAS
The first personas that were created for the project were Jonathan and Bethany. Jonathan was an AmeriCorps coordinator married with a wife and a dog. He loved his job because it allowed him to be outside, while also being able to help those that needed it. He cared deeply about the environment and was willing to go out of his way to purchase things that will have the least environmental impact. Bethany was a young professional web designer that was looking to change the world she was living in. She attended protests when she could, and went out of her way to design websites specifically for eco friendly companies and for causes that might otherwise have gone unnoticed. Both of these personas were created before the real research was done for the project, so they have gone through some changes,
THE PROVIDER Denise
Married with a husband, 2 dogs and two teenage girls. She works in a suburban high school, and sees kids from all walks of life. As a science teacher she understands that the environment is a delicate eco system that needs to be protected. As far as her fashion, she opts for a capsule wardrobe with classic and quality key pieces, and rotates accessories to keep things interesting.
THE CAREGIVER Amie
Young professional that cares deeply about the Earth and the environment. Enjoys being outdoors, and thoroughly enjoys her job because it allows her to help people that need it and be outside in nature. She is willing to go out of her way to do and purchase things that will make the least environmental impact as possible.
THE ACTIVIST Bethany
Young professional that looks to change the world she’s living in, in any way shek nows how. Attending protests, designing websites for eco-friendly companies, and supporting causes that might otherwise go unnotcied.
CULTURAL RELEVANCE
The goal of these interview questions was less about getting definitive answers, and more about getting a sense of what peoples general feelings were toward eco friendly fashion. There was a fairly good mix of men and women, since at the time the brand was going to be for both men and women, but later on it was changed to be only women. The questions about their favorite and least favorite brands were about finding out the qualities people looked for in their clothing, which was obviously quality but style was a close second, followed by sizing and convenience. Out of the twenty two interviews, the most important information for this project was that sixteen of them considered themselves to be ecofriendly, and thirteen of them would be willing to pay more for clothing they knew was made with eco-friendly practices. Essentially, this means that significantly more than half of the people interviewed were concerned aboutbeing eco-friendly.
phone in person google form interviewees
16 of 22 consider themselves to be eco-friendly
Over 200 thousand tons of clothing, shoes, accessories & linens are thrown out every year in New York City alone. There is only 80 thousand tons of municipal waste produced in New York City. = 20k tons
13 of 22 would pay more for clothing they knew was made with eco-friendly practices
VISUAL STRATEGY
Visually, the goal was to keep things very simple for the image of the company - the clothes would speak for themselves. After the initial pitch, it was suggested to work on the logo and branding a bit as it seemed ‘sterile’; definitely not the look Cristina was going for. Tweking the logo turned out to be more difficult than Cristina initially thought. In the second logo the ‘d’ in de was supposed to look like a needle, but the feedback was that no one really got it until it was explained, which just made it look like a wonky letter. The third iteration got really close, but the stitched circle on the outside became very hard to see the smaller it became, which wasn’t ideal for labels. After tweaking the logo, the color scheme went through an edit as well. Initially, the colors were very earthy, but they were leaning much more toward the darker side than initially intended, and it became a little dreary. Taking the same general colors and turning up the brightness on each kept the earthy feel but brightened everything across the board, keeping more in tune with the original feeling Cristina wanted.
LOGO PROCESS 1 2 3
FINAL LOGO LOGO MARK
TYPOGRAPHY Aa ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ COMO REGULAR abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz 1234567890 !@#$%^&*() Aa COMO BOLD ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz 1234567890 !@#$%^&*()
COLOR SCHEME C: 33% M: 0% Y: 10% K: 0% #: a6dde6 C: 0% M: 47% Y: 98% K: 0% #: f89921 C: 0% M: 20% Y: 83% K: 0% #: ffcc46 C: 70% M: 24% Y: 100% K: 8% #: 598e3f C: 83% M: 43% Y: 100% K: 46% #: 214c25
MARKETING STRATEGY
Where marketing is concerned, ideally of course a company would like their product to reach everyone, but realistically some people aren’t going to be looking for this specific of a product. The target audience for De Nuevo would be women who are possibly a bit more established - not Forever 21 clients, for example - that are willing to possibly pay a little bit more for good quality clothing, that are concerned with their footprint and want to make a difference in any way that they can. Marketing strategy for this type of niche market is very important. In a sea of millions of clothing lines, De Nuevo stands nearly alone in the way that it is produced exclusively with recycled materials; this sets us apart from everyone and is something that needs to be focused on in all marketing. Social media in this time is the most effective way to get a message out there. Sponsored posts on Instagram and Facebook are an effective use of money while reaching the widest range of people. It is also an effective way to see who is actually receiving your ads and interacting in some way with the feedback that the platforms give you. The company will also use ‘bounce back’ coupons; coupons that are given out with purchases or at pop-up stores that are specific to where they came from to see how many return clients the company gets from each place respectively. There’s also a possibility to put coupon codes on social media posts to see how many of those codes are used, to help the company determine how effective the marketing is. Going along with that, having those bounce back coupons that customers can only get at the pop-up locations give the company a good idea of how much foot traffic they are getting at each location. Ideally, we would put out specific codes that people would have to show at the register that come off ads to really asses how well the promotions and marketing is doing. This is not something we would want to do long term, as constantly giving out coupons tends to cheapen a brand and the company obviously loses profit, but to start off and get the name out it can be very effective.
PRINT reward card
PRINT bounce back coupon
PRINT poster / billboard
SOCIAL MEDIA instagram DeNuevo Sponsored pop-up 20.451 views DeNuevo Join us at our next pop-up location! Show us this ad for a special gift :) • Brooklyn Army Terminal, Brooklyn NY #ecofriendly #trashion #recycled #shopsmall 2 DAYS AGO
PRINT stationery
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