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By Nathan Eckhous // Design by LUcy quintanilla
Bland Marketing 101
Casper
Allbirds
Burrow
Hims
When it comes to selling unsexy things—mattresses, pans, or generic Viagra™ (okay, maybe it’s not all unsexy)—a wave of new consumer companies have rewritten the rules with a predictable, practically interchangeable, visual playbook. Their trademark look is a checklist that’s quickly growing stale: Negative space, pastels, full-bleed photography (preferably of ingredients), a well-curated Instagram, and models who ooze American Apparel. The uniformity is largely due to Brooklyn creative agency Red Antler’s leading role (they branded 3 of our 5) in the negative space, but the question remains why anybody cares how their cookware does on Instagram. Let’s dig in.
potluck
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Making the
the
Making
In the grand history of the blands, Casper will forever be known as supreme leader. They shuffled on the scene with fresh, fun illustrations, and a simple, calming, nap-inducing look. When they started, Casper felt anything but bland, but their big visual idea (a souped-up Ikea catalog scene) quickly metastasized and led to the following blands.
Full-bleed Images Illustrations White Space Pastels Plants
Full-bleed Images
White Space
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Courtesy of casper
back
Courtesy of Potluck
Like Cinderella’s slipper, Allbirds can make you into the yuppie you were always meant to be. Hailing from artisanal San Francisco, they made a splash with the tech crowd first and focus on sustainable materials. Bask in the whimsical shots of sheep, bamboo, and carefree millennials that give these wool and wood shoes their energy.
Illustrations
White Spoce
Courtesy of allbirds
photo credit tk
Millennials buy couches, so you better believe there’s a bland just for them. Their big thing is that it’s easy to put together, take apart, and reassemble their furniture—a nice innovation for apartment nomads. Their site is exceedingly spare, but their photography style stands out by often posing models face down, turned away, or otherwise obscured.
Plants
Courtesy of burrow
Insider tip: Hims sells stuff for guys. Hair-loss medication, ED medication, skin care, gummy bear vitamins, shampoo—you know, man stuff. Well, everything except the ED meds are also for women (and sold by their sister brand Hers). Their style is metaphorical plants with shedding leaves or unable to stand tall. Add on pastel backdrops and voila—a men’s health bland.
Courtesy of hims
For every major life event—marriage, moving, graduation—there are new homegoods. Evoking a 70’s cookbook, Potluck offers a minimalist bundle with saucepans, a skillet, and a pot. They really missed the Instagram branding train, but they more than make up for it with a site so beige, so spare, so boxy, that you hardly realize it’s there.
Pastels
