Our creative team on behalf of Olena Valkovska tells about the difference between the rebranding of a local and a foreign product, the intricacies of working with an unfamiliar market, and the case of the Uzbek dairy brand Musaffo.

We were addressed as experts in the dairy market of Ukraine by the Uzbek dairy brand Musaffo with the desire to restyle the entire line of traditional dairy products.* The agency team has been managing dairy brands in Ukraine for over 3 years, which in total make up about 40% of the country's entire dairy category, so it was interesting to try our hand at the foreign market as well.

*Nota Bene: the dairy market is divided into traditional (milk, kefir, sour cream, sour milk cheese) and other dairy products that are traditionally produced on the territory of the brand (ayran, katyk) and modern (drinking yogurts, sweet curds, and other products that have entered our lives relatively recently.

The task

According to the results of the research carried out in the Uzbekistan market, there were identified and determined the brand`s image (as perceived by the consumer) and the key elements that the consumer likes, should be preserved and used in the design. Such elements as "sky", "jug", and "field" which are the codes of nature and naturalness, received a new life on the packaging.

Challenge

It was a deep and interesting immersion in another mentality, another culture. It was useful and unusual for us to look at the product we are creating through the eyes of another culture. We studied the market, studied the consumer, the way of thinking, cultural values, and behavioral habits.

And at the same time, the task was to make a modern design taking into account mental characteristics. Therefore, the work in the additional study of world trends and directions in dairy categories on world markets was going on in parallel.

By the way, here is an interesting insight about the codes of naturalness: they are absolutely identical in both Western and Eastern cultures since we are talking about nature and traditional household items. But despite the identity, each market of each country has a localization of these codes.

In marketing, there is such an approach as glocal. It reads as follows: "Think globally - adapt locally." This was our direction for solving a specific task.

Solution and result

The agency went in search of evolutionary solutions, and as it turns out, even the task of transforming a "jug" can have dozens of different options.

In fruitful cooperation with the Musaffo brand team, an evolutionary direction of development crystallized. It was possible to achieve a solution to the task by changing the design so that the product looks more modern, but at the same time leave the CA feeling that nothing has changed. That is, the complete continuity and recognizability of the product on the shelf were preserved, as well as the same naturalness was emphasized.

Looking back at the entire pool of work carried out, we can confidently summarize a couple of important points:

1.Subconscious motives that drive consumers of dairy products in the world are identical, despite national peculiarities, faith, the culture of consumption, etc.

2.For a local brand that wants to provide an effective response to corporate machines, it is best to work with those who know how to think locally.

To think glocal, there are a number of agencies that know how to do it, that is, they have global expertise and know how to localize it in any market. They have the experience, research, and practice of implementing global trends that international giants think about, bringing these trends to the territory of the local brand and painting them in their "colors", while observing the conditions of localization. Simply put, they superimpose global experience on local and get the desired picture. So that these trends in the domestic market are not perceived as something completely foreign.

In our case with Musaffo, it turned out exactly like this. After all, having global expertise and knowledge of deep nuances in the category, it is possible to successfully implement projects in any territory, no matter in Ukraine or the world.

All this, by the way, also works in the opposite direction. If a brand grows and wants to extend to other markets of the world, that is, becomes international, and wants to be localized in the market of a specific country, all it needs to do is to turn to those who think glocal.