Cheryl Hunter (shelflife at marklives.com)’s weekly pick of all things new — product, packaging, design, insight, food, décor and more!
- Fresh Earth gets a fresh new look
- Retroviral’s origami lessons for Raisin.com [watch]
- Fine Group opens in the Cape
Labelling for today’s consumer
South Africa’s only independent, gluten-free speciality bakery, Fresh Earth Bake House, has launched a new range of cookies, shortbreads and granola bars, made from natural foods with clean ingredient labels on recyclable and sustainably sourced packaging that uses vegetable-based inks for informed, health-conscious consumers.
Owner and nutritional chef at Fresh Earth, Matthew Ballenden, says, “In an increasingly complicated world where informed consumers are seeking simplicity on food labels, we take pride in our ethical values and our philosophy to source and include only the finest, authentic, real food, quality ingredients in everything we make. Consumers have made their definition of clean labeling clear. They are informed and aware, and want to see ingredients that they are comfortable and familiar with: items they have in their homes and would use in recipes themselves.”
Ballenden’s motivation for the new packaging was the result of research that indicates that consumers believe that a product is healthier when it is labeled as “all natural”, and that products with clean labels are perceived as natural, pure or premium and may generally retail for a higher price than similar products without a clean label.
“One of our key consumer messages has always been that of mindfulness: mindfulness about what we eat, how we consume and how we treat the world around us. On that basis, we have always believed that our product packaging should reflect our ethical brand values,” he adds.
The Fresh Earth packaging, designed by freelancers Susan Aukema and Julie Russel alongside Sarah de Pina (photographer) and Leila Saffarian (stylist), is sourced from reputable, regulation-compliant suppliers. Food-grade-approved, 100% repulpable and Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) accredited Valkraft board (containing ±70–90% recovered fibre) is used for the boxes, while all graphics are printed with vegetable-based inks, extensively recognised as the environmentally friendly choice.
The range includes gluten-free cookies in choc chip, cranberry almond and peanut butter flavours, and gluten- and sugar-free cookies in Madagascan vanilla, ginger root and mocha chocolate. The sugar- and gluten-free shortbread includes traditional flavours such as vanilla, chocolate hazelnut, pecan and rooibos and the granola bars come in original, berry, chocolate and choc chia.
Keep a lookout for the social media campaign, developed by Blinkstefanus, that launches this week.
The new range may be found at Fresh Earth Food Store, 103 Komatie Road, Emmarentia, Johannesburg and online, and will be available from Dischem nationwide this month.
www.freshearth.co.za • Facebook • Twitter
Origami from Africa
Finance is always a difficult topic for companies to communicate to consumers, so European savings brand, Raisin.com, recently partnered with South African communications agency, Retroviral, and renowned SA origami artist, Ross Symons, in London to start a conversation about bystanders’ personal views on finance at a popup origami installation.
When asked “What are you saving for?”, answers varied from holidays and horses to Italian cars. Symons then briefly stepped away and created a tiny piece of magic by folding a bank note into a physical manifestation of each answer, which he then gave to his audience. The bank note was used as the catalyst for a discussion about what may be achieved by saving for your dreams.
Children from Origami for Africa, a non-profit organisation that teaches origami to children from the informal township of Khayelitsha, near Cape Town, made the origami cranes and, in exchange, were taught about earning pocket money and the value of savings. A thousand origami cranes were folded by Origami for Africa and flown to London’s South Bank, where they were used as the key feature of the popup installation.
retroviral.co.za • Facebook • Twitter | raisin.com • Facebook • Twitter
Fine in the Cape
Strategic marketing and communications company, Fine Group, will be setting up a new office in Cape Town to cater for the large number of multinationals operating out of the Western Cape and working across Africa.
Fine Group, which was born out of Fine Healthcare, will branch out to serve a number of technical industry sectors such as banking, insurance, business consulting and IT.
Company founder, Mandi Fine, says: “As the centre for innovation, Cape Town has become a hub for international business across the continent; we need to be able to offer Cape Town clients the Finest strategies like those offered to our clients in Johannesburg, London and the rest of the continent.”
The Cape Town office will be headed up by brand strategist, Melina Lewis.
finegroup.co.za • Facebook • Twitter
Shelf Life is MarkLives.com’s weekly column covering all things new. Notify us of yours at shelflife at marklives dot com. Want to sponsor Shelf Life? Contact us here.
Cheryl Hunter (@cherylhunter) has written for the South African media, marketing and advertising industries for more than 15 years. A former editor of M&M in Independent Newspapers and contributor to Bizcommunity, AdFocus, AdReview and the Ad Annual, she has also produced for various television networks and currently consults on communication strategy and media liaison.
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