Shikatani Lacroix

BACKGROUND
VH is one of Canada’s leading brands of Asian sauces, and was an original pioneer of “fusion cuisine”, introducing flavours like honey-garlic to bring together the familiar and the unknown. It is perceived as “accessible exotic” – safe adventure, familiar with a twist. In 2007, VH’s parent company Conagra initiated a re-branding exercise to further leverage VH’s brand equity in a growing ethnic food segment. Shikatani Lacroix was retained to develop a new brand identity and package design that better connected with consumers, in the blink of an eye, at shelf level.

CHALLENGE
The Asian specialty food category has become extremely competitive with new varieties and brands competing for shelf space, leading to visual clutter and lack of differentiation. The VH brand is the market leader, but had not initiated a packaging revitalization in the past four years, leading to a dated image at store level. As part of a major repositioning program, Conagra had identified that the current package graphics did not reflect the brand’s new position.

SOLUTION
SL initiated an extensive package design process that explored a range of concepts that effectively communicated the brand position while providing strong shelf impact and differentiation at store level. The creative process explored brand architecture options that drove increased premium perception while increasing simplicity and clearly differentiating segments within the brand portfolio. The designs also explored a new enhanced VH wordmark that retained previous equities (yellow colour) while clearly reinforcing an updated premium image.

RESULTS
The new design was extended across all VH products and packaging formats. Sales and overall consumer perceptions were ahead of plan, and exceeded Conagra’s project objectives.