Retail brand identity

The problem

Halcyon opened four stores in three years and each one was signed, wrapped, and stocked by a different supplier. Nothing matched, and the own-label packaging looked cheaper than the produce inside it.

What we did

We started with the shopfront rather than the logo. A grocer is read at forty metres, in the dark, from a car, so the identity had to survive being reduced to one shape and one colour long before it needed to be charming up close.

The mark is a monogram cut from a circle, which holds at signage scale and still works stamped in one colour on a paper bag. Around it we set a type system with two weights and strict rules for which is used where, so a price card and a campaign poster look related without anyone having to make a judgement call.

The palette is one near-black, one accent, and a range of paper stocks. Own label uses the stock and the type; the accent is reserved for wayfinding and promotions. That restraint is what keeps a hundred and forty products on shelf from looking like a hundred and forty decisions.

Everything shipped as artwork set up for press, with a short set of rules the team can apply themselves — sizes, clear space, what the mark may sit on, and what it may not. The point was to hand over something the next four stores could be opened with, rather than something they would have to come back to us for.

Result

11 stores

Rolled out in fourteen months

Eleven stores were signed and stocked in fourteen months without the studio drawing a single new asset — the system covered every case that came up.