Stroll down any grocery store bread aisle, and you may see the identical three issues time and again: a subject of wheat (fortunately with out Theresa Might), a sliced loaf, and a solar developing over each of them. It is the visible shorthand of British bread, and it has been doing the rounds since roughly without end.
So it is quite refreshing that when BrandOpus was requested to construct a model for the nation’s largest bakery enterprise, it binned the lot.
Allied Bakeries has accomplished its acquisition of Hovis Group, and from this week, the 2 function as one firm: Hovis Bakeries. BrandOpus was appointed to develop the positioning, id and launch line – ‘Nourishing the Nation’ – for the mixed enterprise, which brings Hovis, Kingsmill, Allinson’s and Sunblest underneath one roof.
Why this can be a larger deal than it seems
This wasn’t an easy merger. Related British Meals introduced its plan to purchase Hovis from personal fairness agency Infinite final August, and the Competitors and Markets Authority fast-tracked it straight to a part two investigation in January. 9 months later, the regulator cleared it on the reasoning that if the deal did not occur, Allied Bakeries would most probably have exited the bread market completely, in each Nice Britain and Northern Eire.
So what is going on on right here? Apparently, wrapped bread has been in decline for greater than a decade, and Kingsmill gross sales dropped by 31.5% within the 52 weeks to final September, shedding its third-place rating to Jason’s Sourdough. The mixed enterprise is now estimated to be the UK’s largest bread producer, with one thing like 35% of the market.
That is fairly the transient to land in your desk… Make the newly merged large of a shrinking class appear like it has a future. Ooph.
No wheat, no dawn
“The id was designed to hold the authority of a enterprise that exists to steer the class,” says Leo Hadden, head of technique at BrandOpus. “That meant resisting the acquainted visible language of bakery – the wheat, the loaf, the dawn – and conceiving one thing with real stature as a substitute.”
As an alternative, the studio landed on nourishment because the model concept, with an “Elemental Energy” idea constructed across the 4 pure parts coming collectively in baking to create one thing very important. It is a metaphor for 2 organisations converging, clearly. But it surely additionally occurs to be true, which is greater than you may say for many model platforms: bread actually is simply earth, water, air and hearth. Flour from the bottom, water within the dough, air within the rise, warmth within the oven. Nothing else. That is the fantastic thing about it.
Hadden says the company id is designed to take a seat alongside the Hovis and Kingsmill shopper manufacturers quite than compete with them – “re-establishing bakery because the meals of life”.
An extended relationship
BrandOpus isn’t any stranger to the shopper. The company has labored with ABF for the previous 15 years throughout Blue Dragon, Twinings, Kingsmill and SilverSpoon, so it was in a great place to assist.
“This acquisition brings collectively two nationwide baking establishments,” says Sarah Arrowsmith, chief govt of Hovis Bakeries. “The creation of Hovis Bakeries is a big alternative to create a sustainable bakery enterprise that may lead and reshape the bakery class. Partnering with BrandOpus has allowed us to translate our imaginative and prescient for the enterprise into a visible id that powerfully unites each companies.”
The id has launched alongside a brand new web site and can roll out additional as the 2 corporations combine over the approaching months. Whether or not it might probably discuss the nation again into the wrapped loaf is a for much longer proof – however as opening statements go, strolling away from the wheat subject is an efficient one.
You may see extra of the studio’s work on the BrandOpus web site.
