Caf­feine Hits #2

Q+A with Andy Wil­li­ams from Resn, in Wel­ling­ton. From ProDesign 106 with addi­tional images.

Supreme Cof­fee cards.

Resn’s work for Cof­fee Supreme has encom­passed illus­tra­tion, print ads, brand­ing, web design, e-commerce, online game devel­op­ment, brand strategy and advert­ising cre­at­ive. Some of its recent work has been on the Café Blends range (above), not­able for it’s strong typo­graphy and use of col­our. These designs make the range “func­tion as indi­vidual brands within a col­lec­tion”. The design firm, which is prob­ably bet­ter known for its digital media work, has also made cups with applied art­work a talk­ing point at point of sale. For more examples of Resn’s cof­fee work check out its great web­site:

Supreme cof­fee illus­tra­tion and cups.

ProDesign \\ How long have you worked with Supreme?
Andy Wil­li­ams \\ Steve Le Mar­quand our cre­at­ive dir­ector had his first agency called Boy­girl­boy which first star­ted work­ing with Cof­fee Supreme back in 2000. Boy­girl­boy wrapped up and Resn formed in 2004, tak­ing over the account. The scope of work for Supreme has been broad: illus­tra­tion, print ads, brand­ing, web design, eco­m­merce, online game devel­op­ment, brand strategy and advert­ising creative.

ProDesign \\ The cof­fee mar­ket is pretty busy. How do you main­tain Supreme’s loyal fol­low­ing?
Andy Wil­li­ams \\ We try to infuse life and some humour into the brand to help dif­fer­en­ti­ate it within a mar­ket of ser­i­ous and high­brow cof­fee brands. Supreme has developed a loyal fol­low­ing by excit­ing its cafés with the visual appeal of illus­trat­ive brand collateral.

ProDesign \\ Your col­ou­ful cards and takeaway cups are quite col­lect­ible. Was that planned?
Andy Wil­li­ams \\ We first intro­duced bold col­ours in the illus­tra­tions on the col­lect­able cards. The more we used these col­ours the more we real­ised that this appro­pri­ately com­mu­nic­ated the pas­sion and energy that went into pro­du­cing a cup of Supreme cof­fee. Cof­fee is a very per­sonal thing for the soph­ist­ic­ated New Zea­l­and cof­fee mar­ket. Whether it’s a slim flat white, a soy latte or short black with lots of sugar, every­one likes cof­fee “their” way. Hope­fully Supreme can make this per­sonal exper­i­ence even more mem­or­able with some­thing that can be can taken away from the café, maybe some­thing the cof­fee drinker didn’t expect. The cafés that use Cof­fee Supreme often proudly dis­play the illus­trated cups and col­our­ful Café Blend bags, or stick the cards to the cof­fee machine. The art­work is a great talk­ing point at the cof­fee counter.

ProDesign \\ What’s the design rationale behind Café Blends?
Andy Wil­li­ams \\ Many cof­fee brands retire to the safety of earthy tones across the entirety of their col­lat­eral. Café Blends was designed to stand out in the cafés Supreme sup­plies. Supreme wanted each sup­plied café to be able to fur­ther dif­fer­en­ti­ate its choice of cof­fee from the next Supreme café. The Café Blend brands bring col­our. They can either func­tion as indi­vidual brands within a col­lec­tion. they can exist on the shelf side-by-side or alone.

Supreme cups and illustration.

Supreme Cof­fee cards.

Supreme Cof­fee cards.

Supreme Cof­fee card series.

Supreme trad­ing cards.

Supreme Cof­fee illustration.

Café blends packaging.

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