Macleod GLBAHealth & Beauty · Adcock Ingram (Bioplus)
From medicine shelf to energy shelf: the Bioplus mother-brand architecture
One mother brand, three ranges, migrated in steps.
Work by Gail Macleod, Stratcom Branding
Old and new
Bioplus before and after: the earlier pink pack on the left, the new red and silver range on the right.
The migratory steps
The old look migrates to the new in four steps, so the equity travels with it.
The logo
The arrow, the red and the logo are kept; the arrow is made iconic and the O becomes a solid red dot.
Interactive architecture
One mother brand, three ranges, a staged migration
Bioplus began as a pharmacy-only energy tonic. The brief was to move it from medicinal to fast-moving and keep the arrow, the red and the logo. The signed-off architecture put Bioplus over three ranges, each with its own job.
Mother brand
Equity keptCore
Energy boosterHealth
Healthier option for the bodyPlay
Looks like it tastes goodBioplus. The arrow, the red and the logo carry across every range. The arrow is an efficacy statement.
Source: Stratcom Adcock Ingram client folder: Bioplus architecture and concept design briefs and presentations.
The unusual part is the migration. Bioplus began as a pharmacy-only energy tonic, and the brief was to move it from medicinal to fast-moving without losing the arrow, the red and the logo. Stratcom built one mother-brand architecture, Core, Health and Play, and walked the old look to the new in staged steps, tested on shelf simulations.
The brief: less medicine, more energy
Bioplus began as a pharmacy-only energy tonic for Adcock Ingram. Effervescent tablets came later, and drinks, chews and sachets were added to reach the convenience market. The competitors the brief named were Berocca and Turbovite, and its differentiator was that Bioplus is the original energy supplement in South Africa.
Stratcom’s own write-up of the work says the brand felt more like a medicinal product than an energy booster, faced more competition in the energy space and needed to resonate with the millennial market. The brief asked the brand to move from medicinal to fast-moving, with the arrows, the red and the logo kept as equity.
One mother brand, three ranges
The signed-off architecture put Bioplus over three ranges. Core is the caffeine-filled energy booster, in syrup and sachet. Health is the caffeine-free range, led by the effervescent, as the healthier option for the body. Play is the carbonated range of drinks and chews that looks like it tastes good.
Each range was briefed and debriefed on its own. The Health range was pulled away from “energetic” toward Wellness, in white and green with a simple graphic, and it was not allowed to look like a variant of Core. The Play range had its own name generation, with a set of trademark-checked names measured against the brand values, and its concept routes included Atomic.
Migrating in steps
The new look was not switched on in one move. The presentations set out migratory steps, from the earlier pink pack to the red and silver one, with the logo changing in stages: the arrow is simplified and made iconic, the red is kept, and the O becomes a solid red dot. The core feedback was to keep the logo font and the target button.
Shelf simulations in planograms tested each step against Play and Red Bull. The files also record an extra step added between the second and third designs.
A new bottle and closure for the 100ml syrup
A pitch brief covered a new structure and closure for the 100ml syrup bottle: a structural audit, creative form and shape, engineering and a prototype, with no increase in cost of goods. The renders show silver bottles with the red arrow mark and three closure concepts with arrow-marked caps.
What the files do not show
Sales results. Stratcom’s write-up says Bioplus was launched into a new space together with the brand team, and the files used here do not report what happened on shelf. Fees, supplier quotes and client sales data are not shown.