Established in 2009, Very is a British online retail brand focusing on household goods. Through its parent body, The Very Group, the enterprise traces its roots to Littlewoods, a once-famous retail and football betting company. According to recent research, Very is still seen as a brand oriented mostly toward a female audience. Not content with that, the brand decided to gain credibility among a wider group of consumers. And this new strategy is expressed by its fresh visual identity, created by design studio SomeOne.
For the new identity, the design team reworked Very’s recognizable look, including the iconic pink square. Based on this element, a whole design system, named BrandWorld, was developed, expressing the major values of the brand.
Very’s previous logo was certainly special. However, the wordmark was not perfect, as its serif font made it less readable in small sizes. And given the fact that Very is still an online retailer, it was poorly suited to display in the digital environment. In addition, the typographical style of the “Very” is perceived as something that is related to women’s fashion.
The online-oriented rebranding was also caused by research showing that more than 80% of purchases are made through mobile apps. Keeping this fact in mind, someone developed each element of the new visual identity according to the rules of digital graphic design. While focusing on accessibility and functionality, they also didn’t forget the aesthetic side, which continues the cheerful spirit beloved by the customers of the brand.
The custom typeface was developed in cooperation with the F37 studio. Named Very Sans, it corresponds to the logo’s “digitalness”, having a strong personality that was influenced by the pink square, as stressed by SomeOne. Drawn by a square nib, according to the studio, the letterforms are described as effective and distinctive, while the typeface fits well to type headlines and body text as it is designed in a range of weights. The Very typography is intended to help the brand appeal to a broader audience by giving a feeling of modernity, as the SomeOne team’s head Ian Dawson said.
Pink stays the main brand color for Very. Moreover, an entire pink palette was created, making the brand’s face even more distinctive. Along with it, the company will also use monochrome gamma to appeal to male audiences.
The BrandWorld, in general, comes as a cohesive system with which Very will hopefully be able to establish connections with different audiences regardless of the product, season, or promotion.
