Brand Research task

Animal brand research. We had to gather all the items we could for our chosen brand. From choosing Animal, I went around my house and collected all my animal items, asked friends and family if they had anything with the animal brand. I gathered quite a large amount of stuff, with a wide range of animal merchandise and designs.

 I found Hoodies, t shirts, school bags

 Pencil cases, belts, scarves

 Wash up bags, Sunglasses, sleeves for ipods etc.

 A variety of hats, beanies and caps

From all the stuff I have gathered, i noticed a similarity, but yet also a difference. lots of the items are branded with simple straight forward text and clean logos, and some have the complete opposite, with hard to read text, random shapes and designs, and grunge effects on the logos and branding marks. I found This exercise very interesting, how a company uses such a variety of ways, designs and medium to promote their brand. Animal started as a watch company, because surfers were loosing countless watches while out in the sea, and now it has evolved into a mass clothing company for normal street wear, extreme sports wear and sports gear.

Brand Research task

 We were asked, over the next 2 weeks to pick a brand or company we were interested in research how they brand their company. Using packaging, media, labels, as much information as we could find on that one brand.

The brand I decided to research is Animal. Animal is a brand of clothing, surfing, snowboarding, biking and general outdoor activities.

I started by going onto their .co.uk website http://www.animal.co.uk/

instantly I was impressed by their intro to the website. the short animation along with the relaxing music playing in the background, instantly makes the customer feel comfortable and welcome.

The animations starts with a scene of the sea and the sun coming up, then a surfer paddles across the sea. A line begins to be drawn around the scene in a circular motion and a wave forms. The sun and an island are visible through the centre of the wave. the circle is then complete and fades into the animal logo, which rotates like the wave previously, and comes to rest at a slight angle. The music plays on loop, waiting for the user to pick their destination from the menu below the animation.

Once into the website, the style and creative skill doesn't change. With powerful photography and typography, the animal website looks professional, but at the same time, young, modern and appealing. Clearly to appeal to their younger generation of surfers, snowboarders and general active youth.

Each section of their website has unique headers, with strong photographs and very well used typography and style. Each with the header showing the animal logo and some drawn graphics and patterns to add a professional look

The Little touches

There are little things from the animal website that add to its graphic appeal and professionalism. For example when you click on a link and the page is loading, a little animation shows up again, to show you exactly what the website is doing and how long it is taking to load your desired page.

There is also an Audio player on the website. It plays relaxing music, if the user desires as they browse the website. It too is very well designed and looks like car radio, with all the play, stop, volume control, and even help if needed.

Overall Animal have a very impressive and well made website. It has great use of photography, typography, easily navigated through, and has animations and music that add a little bit extra and make it professional.