Gousto is a recipe box company that makes it simple to cook good food at home by delivering easy-to-follow recipes and perfectly measured ingredients. All right to your door.
When I joined Gousto in the middle of 2014, the company was starting to experience rapid growth while the brand was struggling to keep up with the change. The current brand at the time was not coveying the right message about the joy of cooking. So, assisted by a copywriter and another designer, I started creating a better brand that allowed us to show our core values.
The Gousto name is a composition of the Italian word “gusto” (meaning "flavor") and the foodie loving word “gourmet”. Since food is the heart of the business, the new logo should have been representing exactly that.
All of the early concepts were then focused on the cooking experience, which is meant to be enjoyable and fun. After sketching out various ideas, the final logo featured the Gousto pot, something that people are really familiar with. It has a humorous feel, reflects savouring and a cooking experience, hence reinforcing the good looks and warm vibes at every customer touch point.
Ultimately, the choice of using red as our brand colour was chosen to represent fresh food, happiness and love.
The icons are based on handrawn drawings that support and enhance the playful and quirky aspects of Gousto’s personality. The choice of handrawn icons was to make the brand feeling more friendly and accessible, thus giving an immediately recognizable and unique style which competitors were lacking.
We created a comprehensive brand experience that differentiates itself from the competition with a humorous and quirky approach to all media, content and communications. We strived to offer our customer something new, interesting and stimulating. Something to make them laugh, think or feel excited.
“Jess is a talented designer & illustrator whose unique creative style has been instrumental in developing Gousto’s brand identity. It’s fair to say that the Gousto brand would not be where it is today without Jess’s design talent.” TIMO SMITH, GOUSTO, CEO
Since launching the new logo and brand identity, Gousto registered an increase in customers engagement which can be easily spotted on social media. From only 500 followers on Twitter, Gousto reached 10,000 in a few months, all thanks to the new quirky pakaging that resulted appealing to people for its warmth and personality; making them want to engage with the brand and share their experience.
What follows is a mix of images prepared for marketing campaigns and other pictures shot by customers themselves.
Altogether with the brand, came also a new landing page to create consistency within the user experience. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, what better than a video in the background to explain the concept and also tempting the user straight into the story.
The "how it works" section follows the main part and, underneath, the pictures of the recipes reinforce the CTA. The last two sections highlight the social proof aspect, as knowing that other people are using the product or service can be very persuasive and reassuring, as well as establishing trust.
