NA

If your business is all about design, the transformation should start there.

The creative team didn’t just come back with a beautifully simple campaign idea, they created a new design language that would live far beyond a single campaign.

The language conveys the philosophy and serves a human need to cut through ‘impenetrable confusion’ in-media, in-store, and on-pack. It sits alongside the raft of ruthlessly simple and intuitive brands iconic to young people today.

The language uses only two shapes to highlight what is essential (functions and benefits). We have removed masses of distracting information, so essential messages cut through.

Colour use has changed. It was used aesthetically. Now it is used to help people navigate products more intuitively – getting to good choices quicker.

Photographic sets are reduced to the essential - only using objects required for action – e.g. a sink, a mirror and a human.

Strategy identified how to do this: not pastiche-ing old designs, but uncovering a human need and philosophy that would make Braun relevant.

At the heart of Braun’s history is designer, Dieter Rams. He established principles that inspire aesthetic design today, e.g. Apple. But Braun wasn’t living them.

We unearthed a deeper human need behind his work: to him, the world was an “impenetrable confusion of forms, colours, and noises”. Design’s role was to cut through it - removing clutter, being simple.

This was our breakthrough. Rams and today’s youth were experiencing the same problem. His principles were useful for more than just product design, guiding aesthetic choices – they were a philosophy of life.

This was more than a one-off brief, it was a permanent brief. A brief that would make Braun behave as the most iconic brand in history, once again.

We didn’t write a brief; we took a word from Rams and wrote a philosophy:

Essentialism.

Essentialism is not minimalism. It’s focused on enabling action. Not ‘less is more’ but ‘less doing more’. It’s removing distraction. It is giving the information that helps people make choices – and removing the rest.

Our aim was to transform the business by putting a new, more powerful philosophy at its heart.

Within 18 months of launch, 100% of the business (by share) had adopted the design language. A big feat for a global organisation such as Braun.

The visual language translates across markets and small space media. Young people responded: “It made me stop and look”. Others recognized it as new: “I wouldn’t expect this from Braun”

Our essential philosophy has done more than just create a new design language. It is becoming a driving force for the way that the whole organisation behaves:

• It is informing conversations around core business strategy and challenges such as sustainability and durability, (withheld for confidentiality).

• It is informing human development decisions, e.g. Braun is now in partnership with Adobe, helping the next generation of designers imagine their own design vision through AI technology.