Denomination sustainability blog series: September 2021

Number 1: Our manifesto

As a global drinks design agency with more than 20 years’ experience in the sector, we’re acutely aware of the impact that climate change and sustainability are having on our industry.

 

We watched as the winemakers of Bordeaux recently added six new grape varieties to their blends, and as major French Champagne house Taittinger, founded in 1734, decided to move north to Kent in Southeast England to accommodate higher temperatures and shorter growing cycles.

 

We’ve seen drinks producers across all sectors search for meaningful ways to connect with a new mindset of drinker that prizes sustainability and responsible production as much as it does flavour, intensity, balance and value.

 

We’ve witnessed countless producers of wines, spirits and beers ponder how they’re going to protect their provenance and the sources of their highly prized ingredients.

 

And we’ve listened to our clients as they have expressed a desire to address the increasing concerns of everyone connected to the drinks industry, from the growers and suppliers to the makers and consumers.

 

Our mission

 

At Denomination, we’ve been on a mission as individuals and as a business to get on board with the sustainability agenda for a few years now and have worked alongside pioneering producers to make a real difference. We were granted Climate Neutral Certification on Earth Day: April 22, 2021.

 

The more we have learnt, however, the more our eyes have been opened up to the complexity of the subject. And we appreciate just how daunting it can be for people in the industry to even start thinking about how they’re going to take the first crucial steps towards addressing these concerns.

 

But we have to if we’re to secure our business for the future, respond to the modern consumer agenda, and do our bit for the planet.

 

So, we have made it our mission to guide the drinks industry with category-focused expertise. To embed circular thinking into the packaging value chain. And to ‘futureproof’ our planet and our clients’ profits.

 

We’ve developed a proprietary ‘futureproof’ model in collaboration with industry leaders in sustainable solutions, Circuthon, global consumer insights specialists, Wine Intelligence, and some of the world’s leading packaging manufacturers, suppliers and printers.

 

As drinks branding and packaging specialists, we’re in deep, and we know how complicated it is to put together a 360° initiative. We want to help drinks brands keep up with shifts in regulations, to stay on top of product innovations, their associated costs and the impact on the bottom line. We want to help our clients improve consumer buy-in and C-suite engagement, and to maintain a solid, recognisable brand.

 

In this sustainability blog series, we’ll explain why what’s good for the planet and good for the global population is also good for the bottom line. We’ll discuss circularity, breaking it down into manageable steps. We’ll outline how to keep up, service and maintain the sustainability agenda so that it’s robust and can accommodate future regulation changes. And we’ll talk about the role that design has to play in all this – and how drinks brands can tell the world that they care in an authentic, meaningful and original way through brand identity and packaging design.