CASE STUDY
Handcrafted experience,
designed by you.
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Roots is a premium outdoor lifestyle brand that embodies a comfortable cabin meets city style, made for everyday adventures no matter where you're headed next.
Born in Canada, Loved Worldwide - Roots has over 150 stores internationally along with a world class e-commerce platform. Original leather goods have been at the heart of Roots since 1973, and to this day, their leather products remain largely a creation of human hands.
Root’s Toronto leather factory has been operated by generations of family craftspeople. Skilled teams of leather artisans are the backbone of their leather products, proud of the genuine handcrafted leather goods they make.
Roots can be found everywhere, everyone has roots - beliefs in the importance of where you come from and what you stand for.
Your origins, your history, your story all of which are all distinctly your own - Roots x You celebrates what makes us all unique.
CHALLENGE
Provide an experience for customers to design their very own one-of-a-kind leather bag alongside a team of expert craftsmen.
OUTCOME
Increased brand positioning on leather products and product customization services at flagship locations. The event resulted in $250,000+ of custom orders, generating additional sales for the upcoming holiday season with a voucher program from the event.
SCOPE OF PROJECT
Brand Strategy
Art Direction
Digital & Printed Marketing Assets
Graphic Design
Event Planning
Social Media Marketing
Retail window display shows a range of custom options that can be seen across the mall.
Branding
The branding for this event was designed to show an adventurous shift from our traditional roots while staying approachable, yet unapologetic. Our brand voice prioritizes sharing the stories behind the brand’s products with sincerity and confidence while getting the message across clearly and confident tone.
Reflected in the typography featuring bold and friendly curves, the Roots brand is welcome to everyone. The Roots wordmark combined with a “brand x brand” styling shows our connection with our most important customer - you.
Printed handouts given out in stores to promote the event.
Art Direction
Photographers and videographers were directed to capture as much customization options as possible. Everything from styles, leather types, colours, textures, zippers, badges, and straps were featured to make a customer feel as though the possibilities are endless.
Visuals were created to feel rustic yet fun, a tasteful blend between tradition and adventure. The selection of shots included finished examples of bags with various customization options. They also follow a recurring theme where many shots are focused and zoomed in to the detail of the material.
Edits to the photography were done in way to preserve contrast between the textures. As viewers are not able to see the materials in person until the event, the shots needed to show as much detail as possible for a viewer to get an idea of possible materials just by sight.
Marketing Strategy
One of the main goals of the event’s marketing campaign was to provide an immersive experience in creating a leather product. By provide a wide range of options to choose from, customers have the freedom to create something unique and meaningful to them.
Reinforcing our brand’s positioning on their Canadian made quality, we launched a promotional video across our online platforms to tell the story of the trust, experience, and pride rooted in the Roots’ leather products.
Challenges & Lessons
Creating a one-of-a-kind product often comes at a price, this would be one of the challenges we expected to face for this event. To offset the high costs of a custom bag, customers were given in-store incentives to make purchases at a discount depending on the amount spent on the bag.
As this event was in October, vouchers were also given out with the purchase of a bag to be used for the holiday season. By providing a generous discount that could be used for the holidays customers were encouraged return and take advantage of our offers.
The exclusive nature of the event turned out to be a double-edged sword. On one side, profit margins were higher for customized products and the booking process made things more organized. On the other side, we faced issues where some locations had a lower than anticipated amount of bookings.
To combat this, we promoted the event more frequently using our social media platforms and targeted a broader audience with the help of influencers. At the store level, we also offered cash bonus and a vacation incentive for our stores to sign customers up for the event.
Let’s build something beautiful.
It all begins with an idea. Whatever it is, the way you tell your story can make all the difference.