Excerpt from the Creative Brief

“ An American speciality moonshine distillery based in Richmond, Kentucky, Tudor '39 has recently had its company and rights sold to a Japanese conglomerate under the Japanese company Oto International. The family business has been running since before 1891 with original homemade recipes, and has a history of having persisted even throughout the state’s prohibition laws. The family believes their past local success is partly due to their resistance to government laws and taxation, the thrill that may come with purchasing something illegal, and the enjoyment of finding a liquor of excellent quality that is in fact home-made. Around 15 years ago, the company began to bottle and sell 80 proof sipping shine, legally. Now that the family business has been bought out by a larger Japanese conglomerate, the company is looking into a re-imagining and re-designing of the company’s identity associated to this product in hopes of appealing to a larger international audience. 

In order to achieve more recognition at the international level, the company wants to reinvent a brand identity that is more modern in nature and yet also remains loyal to its past by highlighting that the “colorful and illegal” family history associated with this business is what makes this moonshine liquor distinctly American. Note, the client believes this cultural trait may be appealing to a foreign audience as the general concept of American cuisine (outside of the US) tends to consist of fast food and is thus bland in comparison to other rich and varied foreign cuisines. Furthermore, while the product is no longer illegally sold, the company intends to keep theword “moonshine” as a means of holding on to its association with illegality, a concept that may appeal to the young audience, if not heighten their experience of the product itself. The Japanese conglomerate intends to begin selling this product internationally by starting in Japan, and is thus considering developing an identity that can work interchangeably between cultures. ”