Greggs:
Standing out at Christmas
Delivering characters that customers could fall in love with, through a crafted design that kept the joy of the season at its heart.
// Case Study
Greggs:
The challenge
Greggs wanted Christmas cups and packaging that would stand out in the food-to-go market during the Christmas season. They asked us to create a more memorable festive experience across its touchpoints and drive positive sentiment, build excitement and make customers feel immersed in a recognisably Greggs Christmas.
The Buyer Insight
Brand mascots and characters can create genuine connection and positive brand sentiment, particularly at Christmas, when buyers are more open to playful brand experiences. The idea was to introduce collectible mascots to key touchpoints at Christmas that people actively looked out for.
The solution
We developed a cast of Christmas characters that appeared first on cups and packaging, then expanded into in-shop screens and motion. The illustration style was designed to feel warm, funny and unmistakably Greggs, with subtle brand cues like the quatra-dot and sausage roll details built into the characters. Key to their success was to ensure the characters could interact with each other, the products and the digital world around them. We developed personas and key actions and behaviours to give them personalities that could easily be animated and help bring them to life.
The Impact
The characters created genuine affection and repeat interest, with customers returning to see which cup character they would get next.
The Christmas characters brought a real sense of personality and joy to everything we did over the festive period. The feedback from both our colleagues and customers has been fantastic, and it’s been great to see how these characters gained genuine affection for the Greggs brand.