A cracking brand identity at Cracked Bean Roastery

Sam Dobson setup Cracked Bean Roastery (CBR), the first social enterprise of CIC Cracked Bean Enterprises but needed help to get the brand kick-started and someone who could take the burden of setting up all the communications off her shoulders. Through a series of workshops with Sam I developed the vision, values, mission and tone of voice for the organisation. Originally I was working with the design assets and website that had been created for Sam but I realised quite quickly that the logo did not fit the brand essence. CBR is the first social enterprise coffee roastery in the North East and through their work they would be created a welcoming and nurturing environment to train long-term unemployed people to be baristas, as well as multiple roles involved in running a coffee bean roastery.​ I felt that the original logo didn't demonstrate the quality or the warmth that we wanted the brand to emanate. Using capital letters felt too harsh and as there are many successful coffee bean roasters in the North East, I wanted to create an identity that was unique and would stand up to the competition and appeal to millennials who are most likely to purchase the coffee. I worked with my sister, Christine Cutmore, a designer, who developed the seventies style coffee bean logo that was chosen to replace the original logo. The bean looks like it has a plant shoot inside it or a path which represents the growth and supportive journey CBR's employees would be on. This logo felt so much more comfortable as a fit for the brand. I developed a colour scheme that was warm and had hints of coffee colours like latte and coffee bean green. I developed assets to accompany the logo such as the cup and the tagline 'supporting employability bean by bean'. Once the logo was developed and finalised I created a handbook which went through the vision, values, mission, tone of voice and brand guidelines for any volunteer or employee to introduce them to the brand. Finally, I set up the social media accounts, templates and content plan as well as designing the website for Cracked Bean Roastery using the bean and cup wallpaper for the background to ensure the brand identity is clear throughout the site. I loved working on this project and developing the full brand identity and working closely with Sam to make sure the finished result reflected her hopes and vision for the business.