Bringing people back to the table
New Kind helps Vietri target greater opportunity in a changing market
Background
Since its founding in 1983, Vietri has become the largest importer of handcrafted Italian tableware and home decor products, working with family owned and operated factories throughout Italy. Vietri’s mission is to inspire the celebration of life with family and friends through the beauty of handcrafted Italian designs for the table, home and garden.
Vietri products are sophisticated and timeless—known both for their artistic beauty and everyday functionality. Each collection is unique, and all are artisan-crafted in Italy. Vietri built a luxury brand on a core idea: Everything they create is Irresistibly Italian. To expand their customer base in an ever-evolving market, they recently introduced a new product line called Viva, capturing the energy of the Italian exclamation, “Viva!” meaning, “Live!”
Creating Viva opened an opportunity to reach a new customer base. The challenge was to develop a brand for Viva that would build on Vietri’s legacy without competing with existing products or diluting the company brand. We partnered with the Vietri team to create a brand architecture, a messaging guide, and a refreshed visual system for Vietri and Viva. Our goal was to successfully position and launch the new Viva brand, while taking a fresh look at Vietri at the same time.
Industries: Retail + Consumer
Services: Brand experience, Campaigns, Company Messaging, Identity System, Positioning, Product Messaging
Seeing possibilities
Our first step was to dive deeply into customer interviews and brand audit research. We brought the Vietri team together for a workshop to dig into the data with us and began to define the elements that would be crucial for the Vietri story.
We started with the foundational idea of “Irresistibly Italian.” The Vietri team had always used this phrase to guide their decisions and knew it would be core to their future strategy.
We next identified some clear themes that characterize the mindset of Vietri, the company brand—the lifestyle that Vietri stands for and helps create for customers. These brand differentiators describe in detail what it means to be Irresistibly Italian. To live with passion and wonder. To celebrate life with friends and family. To appreciate beauty, art, and nature. To value heritage and tradition.
Next we codified two design principles that define how Vietri products are different. These principles address how the Vietri mindset informs the method for creating each piece.
Finally, we clarified the key attributes of each product line—the qualities that make Vietri and Viva products distinct from each other while allowing them both to live within the umbrella of the company brand.
Creating pathways
Armed with a clear framework that articulated how all the elements of the brand fit together, we crafted a narrative to modernize the Vietri story in a newly expressive way. Then we created a story and messaging guide—one document to capture the foundational story and messaging elements core to the Vietri company brand and two product brands.
Next, we developed a visual brand language meant to help bring the story and positioning to life. The challenge was to create a visual bridge between the Vietri and Viva product brands—to define the elements that make each product brand distinct and those that unite them under the Vietri company brand.
We chose the idea of gathering as a concept we could use internally to guide Vietri’s visual language. We worked with the Vietri team to create a rich variety of elements—Italian-inspired patterns, seasonal typefaces, color palette, textures, and photography—that can be used in different combinations. We also refreshed the Viva logo and stamp to reflect the brand’s updated story.
The internal design concept we chose for Viva was to gather with vibrance—like the Vietri product, but with the saturation turned up. We built the Viva brand system with a colorful variety of elements—textures and patterns, a display typeface, a bold color palette, and authentic photography—that can be used in different combinations. We also created a logo for Viva inspired by Vietri.
Bringing the brand to life, and the road ahead
A strong brand is only as good as its implementation, and Viva was no exception. The Vietri team looked to New Kind to help create a go-to-market campaign to introduce Viva to its customers. We helped develop the campaign theme and visual concepts. Then we worked together to design the Viva customer journey—the path to attracting, engaging, retaining, referring, and gaining revenue from new customers.
We used this framework to brainstorm, in a collaborative workshop with the Vietri team, the stories, symbols, and airwaves that will carry the Viva brand throughout its launch campaign. Finally, we took everything we’d created together and built out a comprehensive rollout calendar structure to help the team plan and coordinate their efforts week-by-week over the course of the campaign.
We’re thrilled to continue collaborating with the Vietri team on projects that help evolve this classic brand and build brand awareness for their newest product: Viva. And we’re honored to have played a role in creating the foundational elements that will help Vietri keep innovating, growing, and expanding in a clear and intentional way.