Organising the Team - Jennie Clark

Last group meeting we decided to organise ourselves and produce a task list for each individual. This was to ensure we know exactly what each other will be doing and what we need to be working towards individually. The list shows a brief outline of what each team member is doing. We have kept more detailed descriptions ourselves so that we are clear on what we are doing on our own. 

Planning is essential for group work and to keep everyone on the same page, especially on a project like this where we are creating a whole brand. We must ensure the brand that we create is cohesive and professional. We plan to have 2 - 3 group meetings a week to bring our individual work back together for reviewing, we will then make alterations according to group opinions and to ensure our individual work is moving in the right direction.

 


My individual tasks include - 

•  Team leader - Organising meeting with the group, Scott Dennington, and liasing with the lead tutor for our group.
  

• Logo design - My first task will be to design a suitable logo for the Dece brand.  

• Brochure design - I will be designing a catalogue/brochure which will display the Dece story as well as a catalogue of Dece products and maybe an ordering system. This brochure would be freely available to pick up from inside stores which sell Dece products and aso available to order from the Dece website. Designing the brochure will involve designing a range of example pages; enough to suggest the entire layout and design of the full version.

• Typography - After the logo design has been decided on by the group, i will be choosing the typeface(s) that will be used throughout the brand on every application. I will be producing samples of a variety of typefaces to show the team and we will decide on one to compliment the chosen logo and brand concept. I will also be overseeing the typography that is used on other team members' designs. I must check that the typography is neat, tidy, and cohesive throughout our brand. 

Competitor research - Chris

We identified the shoe brand TOMS and US web-based clothing company Threadless as competing brands with a similar ethos and similar ideas as DECE.

I looked into these two companies, in detail, to ascertain what sort of design ideas and strategies they employ in order to be successful. Understanding these things will help us to see what sort of things we should be aiming to do, as well as how we can differentiate ourselves from other brands.

TOMS is a shoe brand with a similar ethos to that of DECE - they provide a fashion product and for each pair of shoes sold they donate a pair of shoes to people in Argentina (and now other under-developed areas) who are in need of such things. They call this 'One For One' and it is something that their market is fairly aware of because of the way TOMS promote it. Their logo has a strong link to Argentina, with it being a recreation of the Argentinian national flag with 'TOMS' text.

An example of some of their current web banners - using organic and neutral/washed out colours, as well as combining inky/painty/hand drawn type and illustration combined with relevant photography which gives an honest feel. They also use the canvas texture throughout their branding - this builds a theme, relating to the material of the shoes and, again, holding an earthy and organic feel.

A few examples of how they use Illustration and photography within their advertising, as well as how they portray their audience within their design. 

The company also has campaigns aimed at involving the community. Shown above is their 'How We Wear Them' campaign, displaying community submitted images of themselves wearing TOMS. 

Threadless is a US Web-based company with a similar business model to the 'DECE Inspired' part of the DECE brand. Users of the company's website can submit designs with a view to them being printed as t shirts. The community also votes on which shirts they like the best, and the most popular designs are realised as t shirts which are available to be bought on the website. The designer and Threadless then make money from these sales. 

Threadless seems to aim itself at a similar target audience to that of DECE's, but does so in a more edgy way that probably would not be suitable to portray a charitable, positive brand. We should look at how we can differentiate DECE from this brand, whilst also taking on board what it does in order to achieve success. 

 I came up with a couple of quick initial ideas based on the idea of using earthy and organic tones and textures as well as tying in the theme of the Romanian connection.

A day in the life & Primary Research - Jade Chadwick

When researching for our target audience, I realised that my brother is the ideal boy to look into and ask questions.

Brendan, 17
Student


My brother is a very energetic 17 year old, who enjoys sport and was a national swimmer. He has been on a lot of family holidays throughout his years and had the chance to try out extreme sports. He picks the skills up so easily. He now owns a professional mountain bike, a snowboard and all the right gear, a set of blades to ski on and a bodyboard. He is fashionable and his wardrobe is a sea of printed T-shirts.


 I have been keeping a diary on my brother and here is one of his Saturdays.


-Brendan wakes up at 7am.
-He has 3 weetabix for breakfast and then brushes his teeth, listening to his iphone on speaker, playing kasabian in the bathroom.
-8am drives himself to the local swimming pool where his swimming club trains and coaches younger swimmers voluntarily.
-He returns home at 10am.
-Brendan then has a shower, chills out and does some Alevel further maths course work as he is a 6th form student.
-Next he looks online to send his CV to local gyms and pools as he has just passed his life guarding exam. He has a sneaky peek on facebook whilst searching.
-Then Brendan returns to being a normal lad and starts to play FIFA on his xbox, talking to his friends over xbox live. 1pm
-Next Brendan drives to Fosse Park (our local retail park) listening to radio 1. 
-Arriving at Fosse Park Brendan goes into jjb looking for sport wear for his football game tonight.
-He then looks in Burton and River Island when he knows he shouldn't be spending any extra cash. He is looking for his top for a party after football tonight.
-He drives back home and drops off the shampoo he got for me and then gets changed for football 4pm.
-5pm. Brendan drives to 'Goals' to play 5 a side with his friends and wins 4-3.
-Straight after football he grabs a shower there and drives him and his mates to their friends 18th birthday houseparty. Again listening to radio 1.


Big Advertisement for brendan is APPS. Facebook ads & The Radio. Also Friends influences are a big thing for him.


As Brendan is really into sport and outdoor activities I have been lucky enough to capture his experiences. Below are my personal relevant images that I feel relate to Dece.

Packaging Mood Board- Lauren Parkin

This is a quick mood board that I've done, looking at packaging that's made of environmentally friendly materials aswell as neutral, earthy colours. I have done this as this is the kind of thing we want to for Dece.

Competitor Research- Lauren Parkin

After doing some research we found that O'neill and Fat face are some of the main competitors of Dece. After this I decided to go and have a look around the stores in Meadowhall to see how they advertise their clothing and the atmosphere in the stores.

O'neill specialise in extreme sports clothing although they do sell everyday clothing aswell. I noticed that in the store they had a TV which obviously shows that they like to show their products in use. I also found a brochure in the store and I found this quite useful as it shows what types of layouts, photography and typography they use to get across to the correct target market.

I also did the same for Fat face and found that their clothes are more summery. I also found that inside and outside the store they use this wood effect on the walls to make the brand look quite earthy because they've stuck to neutral colours similar to Dece.The image from their website also shows how they use photography, typography and layouts. 

There are also other brands that do similar things such as Howies, Vans and Quicksilver. 

After looking at the 2 main competitors we can now see why their brands are so successful and we can use this knowledge to do the same for Dece.