Bashas’ A to Z Pantry

The Challenge

The mid-sized, Arizona-based grocery chain, Bashas’, was looking to develop their own brands throughout the center store and beyond. The chain has a long, memorable history in Arizona and wanted to build a brand that connected with their hometown grocery roots.

While seeking to satisfy their current customers with their continued value offerings they wanted to set themselves up to capture new customers who were looking for higher-quality value products.

Our challenge was to ensure that the new brand connected to the roots of Arizona and elevated their own brand to compete with national brands while still connecting with value shoppers.

The Solution

Developing a brand name for a private-label line of groceries can be a challenge since the products span a large group of categories. It was imperative that the brand name tie back to Bashas’ and/or their Arizona roots. “Bashas’ A to Z Pantry” rose to the top of our exhaustive naming exercise and immediately provided the breadth for a large set of products while connecting to their state pride. It also allowed the brand to flex into broader categories e.g. A to Z Home, A to Z Essentials, etc.

The next step, create a brand design system where the visual architecture could quickly communicate the brand to consumers and help it stand out on shelf. The bold, iconic A to Z Pantry symbol and the simple yet playful use of photography helped to achieve a unique product set across the store.

What’s more, the flexibility of the system and typography allowed for special situations where creativity is needed to compete with national brands in categories like salty snacks, cereal, and soda. While the claims statements were designed to provide consistency across product lines, helping consumers quickly identify the product’s benefits.

Then, the packaging system needed to stretch to work across a large variety of shapes and sizes, different printing processes, and different substrates. Working to ensure that it had an impact at any point in the customer shopping journey, from frozen to canned foods. The design work proved that the system could communicate on any shelf in the store.