Blackberry Market
Thoughtful Food, Delicious Brand
Blackberry Market gave us the opportunity to help craft the brand experience from the ground up and as they continue to grow. People buy with their eyes, and we wanted everything about the Blackberry Market experience to be thoughtfully and deliciously presented. We also wanted the brand to feel established right from the beginning.
Capabilities
- Research and Strategy
- Brand, Logo, and Identity
- Website Development
- Video and Animation
- Digital and Social Media
- Advertising and Marketing
- Infographics and Illustration
- Print and Annual Reports
- Packaging and Retail
- Events and Promotion
- Environments and Signage
The Challenge
Blackberry Market is located in charming downtown Glen Ellyn, Illinois. As a new business in town, they were building their brand from scratch, but they wanted to be seen from the beginning as an approachable, established business. They came to Rule29 for help in presenting their brand as elegantly and tastefully as they presented their food and beverage offerings.
And then, when they were ready to open new locations, they turned to Rule29 again to help them expand and update their brand. In addition, they looked to us to help design product packaging for new products in development so that going forward their brand would be memorable and continuously extendable.
Research
Rule29 began the brand development process by asking thoughtful questions. What “feeling” did Blackberry Market want their patrons to encounter? Beyond the basics (logo, packaging, signage, print), what music should be playing in the background? What imagery should be visible? What temperature should the light bulbs be? Additionally, we did a competitive analysis and field research of other restaurants both locally and in other states to help round out the brand exploration and ideation process.
The Solution
From colors to table number signage, we made it our goal to bring consistency, warmth, and playfulness to all aspects of the Blackberry Market brand experience.
Old Logo
Old Logo
New Logo
New Logo
When Blackberry Market was ready to expand, we gave the brand a fresh update, making it more digital-friendly, flexible, and applicable. We improved the web experience and redesigned it to be more mobile-friendly and able to easily work with multiple locations. Using key elements of the original brand—such as color, voice, friendliness, and aesthetic—we made the brand more robust and ready for future expansion. From the logo, website, and social to icons, packaging, and social, we created a fresh, distinctive feel. We also worked on the design and packaging for upcoming new proprietary products such as cold brew and gluten-free crackers. We learned that due to the volume the market bakery does, flexible packaging options were essential.
“We are not going to lie… we count the amount of Blackberry coffee cups we see out on the streets on any given day as compared to other-large-chain options and are thrilled our packaging can stand up against the options.”
We believe that providing beautiful food images allows both the products and brand to speak for themselves. We teamed up with our photography partner, Wonderkind Studios, and have provided well over one thousand food images for the Blackberry team to utilize across social media channels and advertising opportunities.
A website with all the right ingredients
Blackberry Market brings people together through thoughtful and healthful food and we wanted to bring that online as much as we could. We designed and developed their website to showcase their dine-in and to-go meals, promote event catering, and evoke a sense of belonging. With 97% of Blackberry Market’s website traffic being mobile, we knew main elements such as images of the food, menu, directions, and the ability to place orders needed to be front and center.
By the Numbers
Fully Branded Locations
(So Far)
Fans on Instagram
and Growing
Percent of Website Traffic is on Mobile Devices
“One of our favorite things to do is post a picture early in the morning and watch how it can convert into actual customers within hours. For example, if we posted a picture of our steel cut oatmeal at 7am, we would likely see an uptick in oatmeal orders by 9!”
We partnered with Blackberry’s interior design partner, Two Hands Interiors, to decide how to bring both warmth and a casual, playful atmosphere to the market itself. We talked extensively to the Blackberry Market team, and we used the quote “The table is the place where you connect and belong” to inspire the approach our team would take to create an inviting brand experience.
For the second location in historic La Grange, Illinois, we researched ways the brand could influence and support the open concept interior with its abundance of natural light and exposed brick. We wanted to make sure the brand could continue to expand as new offerings were unveiled and future locations were developed.
“While we understand how to present food, we leaned on Rule29 to help us present anything the brand needed to lead and influence like the environment, packaging, and more.”