“Detailing by Design”
Traditionally being sold in the “me-too” packaging of sprayer bottles, Shell’s automotive accessory group came to TricorBraun Design with the age-old question “How can we make this better?” Under the well-known nameplate, Black Magic Tire Dressing, they wanted to improve the functional, aesthetic and ergonomics of how tire dressings are applied.
The traditional trigger sprayers pumping out a high silicone based product presented several downsides to the application process. Over spraying and dripping were the most important challenges that we needed to address.
A more direct application approach similar to what is used on shoe polishes seemed to provide a solid direction. A sponge pressure feed head allows for direct application from bottle to tire. No drips, no spills, no overspray. By pressure we are not talking about batteries and engines, we are talking about inverting the bottle, pressing to flood the sponge head with the product and a direct application to the tire.
To support TricorBraun Design’s theory of branding by shape the other design elements enhanced were ergonomics and aesthetics. The category was accustomed to larger, bulky trigger sprayer bottles. Competing against bottles in a smaller size, new look and new application process created multiple challenges in achieving huge shelf impact in order to get the customer to pick up the product – how to get that “wow” factor.
Creating a soft, clean, organic pod-shaped paddle gave the end-user easy access to pick up and use the product and prompted the consumer to say, “what is that?” We wanted to get the consumer to pick it up and by doing that, there would be a more likely chance that they would purchase the product.