How to Build an Original Product Brand
Written by Kat Fletcher
As the creator of a premium product brand, you’ve likely poured a lot of time, effort, and money (read: heart and soul) into creating a quality product that’s worth the extra penny. But you’re also aware that a quality product alone isn’t enough to attract customers. It’s how they encounter and experience your brand that builds the desire and connection needed to buy. A brand that feels different from others in the market.
And yet, when you look around, it can feel like there is an abundance of brands in your industry all doing the same thing. Positioning themselves as premium, conscious, all with a similar aesthetic, similar product, and similar messaging. It’s easy to feel like everything has been done already.
So how do you create a product brand that’s actually original?
Maybe you have some ideas, but feel unsure which of them would really work. Or you find yourself wracking your brain trying to think of any way to make your brand different, but none of them feel that exciting or meaningful.
When a brand lacks originality, the business can start to feel like pushing a boulder up a hill. Like you need to market louder, do more, create more products, and push harder to be seen. Yet even with all this effort, the sales often don’t come as you would like them to.
When a brand has something about it that feels original, it creates intrigue and gives the brand a sense of value beyond the product itself. As people step into the brand world, a desire for the product begins to form, and this is where sales start to happen more naturally.
What is an original brand?
Today, it’s no longer enough to simply be a skincare brand that uses natural ingredients, or a candle brand that is clean and sustainable. These things do add to a brand’s value, but they’re not what will make it stand out in a crowded market.
An original brand often has a distinct world that extends beyond the product, one that people want to be part of. It inspires, and that’s why it’s remembered. People remember how the brand made them feel and what it invited them into.
A different way of thinking about originality
Often, original brands don’t invent something completely new. They take something that already exists and make it their lens. A passion, a theme, a thread that runs through everything. They have an idea that they build the brand around. It doesn’t have to be complicated. It doesn’t have to be loud. It just has to be something no one else in your industry has done yet.
Examples of original product brands
Jouissance
Jouissance is a perfume brand built around the idea of literary passions, distilled into scent.
Vintage erotic literature becomes their lens. Their perfume scents are inspired by female artists, writers, and fictional characters. Their photography is sensual and nostalgic. Their content features reading rituals, the art of romantic living, and book recommendations.
You see, they didn’t come up with erotic literature. They were simply passionate about it and wove it through their brand.
And what does vintage erotic literature have to do with perfume? Well, not much, until they made it so. And that’s what makes them original. That’s what inspires people, makes them memorable, and creates desire for their perfumes, not just because of the scent notes, but because of the world behind them.
Tatine
The candle brand Tatine draws from music culture. On their Instagram, you’ll often see their candles placed alongside old vinyl covers or images of artists like Amy Winehouse or Bob Marley.
There isn’t an obvious connection between candles and music, but over time this reference point gives the brand a feeling, an atmosphere, something people can connect with.
Wonder Valley
Wonder Valley takes a different approach. Rather than using a cultural reference, they built their brand around one ingredient: olive oil.
They started with high-quality olive oil, then expanded into other products using it as a core ingredient, like shampoo, soap, and body oil. They didn’t expand by adding coconut oil, nuts, biscuits… they stuck with olive oil as their core idea. Olive oil products, recipes, a rich depthful about how they grow and produce it. This one simple focus made them original.
Finding your point of originality
When you look at these examples, the pattern is quite simple. Each brand has chosen something and stayed with it. A reference point, an interest, a theme, a perspective. Something that gives the brand life.
1. Identify your creative lens
This might be something you already know. Or it might take a bit of ideation to find it. What are you drawn to? What do you find interesting? What are you passionate about?
Cinema. Poetry. Astrology. Architecture. Travel. Spiritual rituals. Botanical science. Art Deco. Bossa Nova…
If it’s not immediately clear, you can start simply. Take a piece of paper and write down the things you are drawn to. Look through the list and ask:
Could any of these become a lens for the brand?
Could this shape how the brand feels, not just what it sells?
How could this inspire your audience?
What could be explored again and again?
You could choose a few, or keep it simple and just choose one as your main focus. In this way, originality doesn’t necessarily require creating something completely new, but comes from weaving something that already exists into your brand in a way no one else has.
2. Explore it more deeply
Once you have an idea, spend some time with it.
Why are you drawn to it?
What does it represent?
How does it feel?
Why is it important?
How does it add to people’s lives?
What’s the story behind it?
This is about exploring the deeper and more meaningful layers behind your brand, and serves as rich material for your brand story and website copy.
3. Let it shape the brand
Expressing your brand through its creative lens is an ongoing process, but to start, brainstorm all the ways it could show up in your brand. For example through graphic design, photography style, brand storytelling, product or collection names, and of course, marketing content.
Consider how you could inspire your audience through blogs, collaborations, interviews, social media. Over time, your creative lens becomes part of the brand’s character. Something people know you for.
Final thoughts
A product itself may be original through its features, ingredients, materials, benefits, and craftsmanship. But an original product brand is built through the story behind it. The depth, the character, and the lens it’s expressed through.
With a unifying thread running through everything, the brand begins to feel more whole, more recognisable, and more distinct in the market. And that’s often what people respond to, brands that give them something interesting to connect with, beyond the product itself.
