Behind the Creative Curtain: Brand Partnerships with West Elm

I found this event on Eventbrite, it free. The reason I choose to go to this event is that first, it’s free, second it about branding, I am interested in it because I have learned Brand Identity design in school, so I thought to go to this event could help me better understand on branding in order to do better branding design work.

When I first got up there, my first impression was the atmosphere is very nice, there are sofa, small bar, many young and professional people, I do saw a few students like me. They also serving beer and diet coke, some salad, chips. Before the event start many people just grab some food and talk to each other, some come with friends, some talk to people that are nearby. We end up with not enough chair for everyone, people who came late stood there. The person who hosts this presentation is: Ella Tay, director of brand marketing and partnerships for modern furniture and home décor brand West Elm.

The presentation started with an introduction on West Elm, and how they help out local artist to create their own brand and start their own business. “I think brand partnerships are a way to draw in a different crowd,” said Ella. What they are, the local artist would come up to them and ask them to make their product into brand and sell in West elm. As director of brand marketer, Tay would evaluate the artist in many different scales, in terms of product market potential, style, ect. Tay said, the most important thing they would consider is the story. Do you have a story, why you make such artwork? She plays a video about those artists that West Elm cooperates with, that video tell how unique about each of them and their product, and West Elm’s branding program bring their product into another level work of art.

Unfortunately, this is all about marketing but it does benefit me some way. When they do branding marketing for their client they want to do the story about them. The same thing with advertising design, we need to know about the client, know the story, know the product because those could turn into a sell point, and help to generate a creative idea to sell. I do enjoy this event very much and it my first time, I like to know more about what other people do besides knowing the people in my school, I think I had broken my own comfort zone in going out to meet people, I am excited to do it again in the future.

Video about doing branding with West Elm https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EgGaYxhI-gc#action=share