How a culture of innovation helps brands defend and build

In a world where the latest technology is out of date within hours of its release and where consumers have more choice than ever before, businesses must be prepared to shift with the changing technological and consumer landscape.

Standing still isn’t an option; brands need to be continuously re-grouping, appraising, adapting, evolving, defending and building on a secure brand foundation if they are to survive and thrive.

But how do you innovate strategically? How can you anticipate and respond to what matters most to your customer without scuppering your long-term vision with short-term actions? In the past brands have either been proactive or reactive when it comes to innovation. Now, you need to be both.

What is innovation and why does it matter?There was a time where it was enough to do one thing and do it well. When simply providing a solid product and service would support your business model for many years, if not decades. But the world has changed and continues to change… fast. Brands need to be planning ahead, but also ready to react when the competition start to encroach on their territory.

Innovation is central to developing, building and defending your USP, and businesses that fail to innovate will inevitably suffer the consequences. Brands that stand still soon lose the space they once held in consumers’ hearts, minds and trolleys, by failing to protect or build on what once made them great.

Consumers want great products, seamless service, life-enhancing experiences and brands that make them a better version of themselves. A global market enabled by ever-changing tech lets them have what they want, when and how they want it, opening the playing field to start-ups and new-comers with the agility to put the big players on the back foot.

Take, for example, Kodak. For decades, they’d been the leader

in the film business, with their brand intrinsically linked with capturing happy memories – that ‘Kodak moment’. But as digital photography began to gather pace in the 1990s, the business failed to innovate, choosing instead to focus on its historic prestige in its market – despite the fact that the market was slowly dying.

It did buy an online photo sharing site Ofoto before Facebook was a glint in Mark Zuckerberg’s eye, but instead of using the warmth people felt for its brand to focus on sharing images with friends and family online, it instead used Ofoto for people to buy prints of their images. It sold the site as part of its bankruptcy plan in 2012, the same year that Facebook acquired Instagrami.

Kodak’s downfall was relying on past glories to secure its future, which in the 1990s, before the rise of the disruptor, was standard practice. Businesses had survived that way in the past - in 1958 the average lifespan of a business was 61 years. Today it’s about 20ii and failure to move forward means your competitors passing you by before you’ve even seen them coming.

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Its focus on innovation is wide, with last year’s highlights including a breathable, anti-slip sports hijab and an augmented reality app which, when focused on particular brand imagery, unlocked limited edition trainer designs for the useriii.

But how do FMCG brands adopt Nike’s continuous innovation model? P&G are masters of continuous innovation, and regularly appear on the IRI Pacesetters listiv, which monitors the most successful product launches each year. Innovation is central to their culture and instead of feeling secure in their number one status, they act like a challenger brand and aren’t afraid to try something new. For example, in early 2018, they launched a ‘naturals’ range across a wide product portfolio; a formulation tweak in most cases, but a change that adds real value for the consumer who wants to make a difference for themselves and the environment.

It’s important to innovate with care, however; any innovation must fulfil a genuine need. At a time when technology offers endless possibilities, it’s too easy to innovate simply to show what can be done, rather than to deliver what customers genuinely need. And never forget to keep your brand story at the heart; build on, don’t disrupt, the values your customers have historically aligned themselves with.

“There are brands that are bucking that trend however – Nike has been around for 54 years and is still blazing a trail, thanks to a culture focused on continuous, relevant and boundary-pushing innovation.”

Wearable tech like Google Glass was heralded as the next big thing back in 2013, but what developers failed to consider was the public’s fear of looking stupid. Not many people were willing to walk down the local High Street wearing augmented reality glasses, and smartphone functionality covered all the essentials Average Joe needed, such as maps, web browsing and social media. It simply wasn’t what the consumer wanted at that moment in time, despite it being possible and a source of great tech bragging rights for Google’s developers.

However, had Google focused its development attention on industry, as Microsoft has with its HoloLens tech, the outcome may have been very differentv. The digital team at Sun Branding is currently working with HoloLens to develop product and packaging visualisations which allow brands to create a new product or pack format in 3D hologram form, then view it on shelf next to the competition without having to create costly mock-ups. The tech is focused on fulfilling genuine needs, and it looks likely that industry use, plus gamers, will shape the future development of wearable tech.

“The immersive experiences brought to consumers through virtual reality (VR) technology have turned what was effectively a figment of science fiction imagination into a reality in the space of a few years. But why stop there. Deeper layers of interaction with the real world are now achievable through mixed reality technologies such as the Microsoft HoloLens. Savvy companies are now dreaming up brilliant new applications for augmented reality (AR), a technology which expands the parameters of real-world environments, enhances objects and brings to life physical spaces through the presentation of interactive digital content, and can be used for everything from medical diagnoses to virtual teachers. The ability to produce 3D packaging models has been around for some time, but AR provides a breadth of new capabilities that allows creative designers to truly visualise how their ideas will be realised in the ‘real world’ before a single bit of tooling has taken place or the first print run has started.”Robert Quigley, Sun Digital at Sun Branding Solutions

Guy Douglass, strategy director at Parker Williams, the design arm of Sun Branding Solutions explains, “innovation is very much about the big ideas, but small and perfectly formed is just as important. Innovation is as much about evolution as revolution, and to know which is best for you, you need to be ready, willing and able to spot an opportunity and make the most of it. Design and innovation are founded on restlessness, engagement, immersion and being thoughtful.”

Innovation doesn’t stop when your big idea lands, however. The world is ever-changing and to succeed in the long term, you have to be ready to change with it, adopting a cyclical model rather than a linear one. For example, over the years, we’ve been conditioned by the ‘reduce, reuse, recycle’ model, when, says Sun Branding packaging technology director Gillian Garside-Wight, we should be thinking ‘relevance, responsibility and rediscovery’.

“The 3Rs we’ve all become familiar with have served us well in relation to reducing the amount of waste being sent to landfill,” she says. “But it’s a linear process that eventually expires, and to responsibly innovate – particularly from a packaging point of view – we need to be closing the loop.Reduce, reuse, recycle is very functional and ends when the product’s useful lifespan expires. But by replacing those 3Rs with ‘relevance, responsibility and rediscovery’, we broaden our scope and the focus, to deliver not only higher recycling rates but products and packaging that deliver innovation and sustainability on so many levels.”Gillian Garside-Wight, packaging technology director at Sun Branding Solutions

However willing you and your business are to make a change, it’s also vital to consider consumer mindset and their willingness to change. Take recycling for example. In the last 20 years, separating recyclable waste has become more the norm, but it’s not a behaviour we learned and accepted overnight. Research by Unilever with Axe (Lynx) customers in Germany generated a soundbite that summed up how the general public felt about recycling back in 2000.

So, always keep in mind how much you’reexpecting the consumer to change ingrainedbehaviour when you innovate, as it may takelonger to change the channel than you imagined.

“When recyclingbecomes as easyas watching TV,I’ll do it.”

Early adoption of consumer health shift drives new concept creationHigh-end non-alcoholic spirits company Seedlip has carved a new niche, offering an alternative to gin with its copper pot distilled botanical inspired tipples to serve with tonic, but with no alcohol, no sugar and no sweeteners.

Despite being a completely new concept (albeit based on age-old methods), Seedlip sold out within two days of its launch at Selfridgesvi. It’s since been backed by Diageo, is sold in 17 countries and has spawned pop-up bars, cocktail books and further varieties and flavours are rumoured to be imminent.

Its success has been in targeting a generational shift towards balance, flexitarianism and even abstinence – or at least abstinence some of the time. It’s a trend that’s set to grow, with even established alcohol brands launching new products to appeal to the more health-conscious drinker - big name gin producer Gordon’s recently launched Ultra Low G&T bottles, with less than 0.5% alcohol.

Small producers continue to lead the way in the craft beer market: Bermondsey-based brewery Small Beer Brew Co has produced a 1 per cent craft beer based on an 18th century recipe that has all the flavour of the ale, but around a sixth of the ABV, while Danish brewer Mikkeller makes a 0 per cent Energibajer and the 0.3% Drink’in the Sun, which also comes in at under 50 calories a bottlevii.

Sources

i - https://hbr.org/2016/07/kodaks-downfall-wasnt-about-technology

ii - Elastic: Flexible thinking in a constantly changing world, Leonard Mlodinow, Penguin Random House, 2018.

iii - hhttps://news.nike.com/news/nike-inc-innovation-2017

iv - https://us.pg.com/who-we-are/our-approach/ourapproach-innovation/recent-innovations

v - https://mashable.com/2015/10/06/uniqlo-neuroscienceaustralia-tshirts/#Y8PN4J2YzGqU

vi - https://www.ft.com/content/09271178-6f29-11e8-92d3-6c13e5c92914

vii - https://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/esmagazine/why-youshould-switch-to-low-alcohol-booze-a3872526.html

Get in touch

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At the heart of Sun Branding Solutions is a team of brand, innovation and packaging experts, drawn from five different specialisms but with one shared focus; creating the very brightest ideas for brands.

Each team, whether it’s strategic design, pack science, graphics, legal or digital, is brilliant in its own right, and you can work with one, two, or as many as you need to get your big idea off the drawing board and into your customer’s shopping basket. But it’s when the teams come together that we’re at our very brightest.

Our experts’ combined experience and insight, gathered from many years working with big name brands and retailers, is what shapes the way we work - with our clients and with each other.

Because even if one specialism isn’t directly working on your project, their insight and knowledge of your market has gone in to shaping what we deliver, and how. That means more creativity, more innovation and more for your money.

Our experts are brighter together, and with them on your side, your brand will shine brighter too.

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