THE BLUE BOOSTS, FOR WHOM? WHY?

“The Blue Boosts” is a communication, strategy, and design support program aimed at startups, young companies, or CSR projects that develop an innovative ecological, social, or societal offer, service, or product.

Depending on the needs, a team of experts from the agency volunteers to serve selected project leaders over the course of 2 ½ days.

Last year, we supported two exciting projects: Hanso & Zédé and Simone&Co. You can find the projects and interviews of the project leaders here.

This year, we decided to slightly change the format to support one project over a longer period in 2021. And it’s the project Berny that has captivated our internal teams.

To tell you a bit about this Blue Boost, we interviewed Claire Nijdam, co-founder of Berny. You can read a summary below or listen to audio clips for a longer version :-)

BERNY, WHO IS IT? WHAT IS IT?

Berny is a Nantes startup that was created in 2020. With Olivier, we founded this company based on the observation that as consumers, we want to find solutions to throw away less packaging.

Olivier has worked in the fields of mass distribution and the agri-food industry throughout his professional career. He noticed a desire and a need from these actors to evolve on these packaging issues.

Specifically, Berny designs reusable packaging. We conducted a study to see what would be the most appropriate packaging for reuse. Choice of materials, shape, stackability of these containers to put them on a pallet, etc. In short, many avenues have been explored.

These packaging solutions are then made available to our clients, the agri-food industries, and mass distribution actors.

We also operate the collection and cleaning service for containers to work in a closed circuit. We therefore offer a turnkey service to facilitate the transition to reuse for our clients.

WHAT ARE THE INITIAL FIELD FEEDBACKS YOU HAVE OBSERVED?

Our first clients are the brands of mass distribution. From an operational point of view, it runs smoothly; it's easy, there are no major upheavals in their organization to establish a deposit system.

On the consumer side, we have been very positively surprised. The adoption rate of the deposit system was immediately high (x6 compared to our estimates). People quickly understood that the container was on deposit. 60% of the trays were returned, and week by week, consumers are participating by bringing back their deposit containers. For us, this is very positive.

WHY DID YOU TURN TO THE BLUE BOOSTS OF NOUVELLE VAGUE?

We are addressing a new topic (the deposit) for which we need to raise awareness among our clients and final consumers. As I mentioned earlier, during our first tests, 60% of people returned with their deposit trays. We would like this rate to rise to 80 – 90%. To achieve this, we think it’s important to convey the right messages so that people understand that this deposit container is meant to circulate and make as many cycles as possible.

When we heard about the Blue Boosts, we thought: “Who better than an agency, particularly Nouvelle Vague, can help us with this?”.

And I was not disappointed! From the very first meeting with the teams, I felt that there was a clear understanding of the subject, a perspective that allowed us to think about the topic more broadly, and proposals that enabled us to consider building a strong brand.

Beyond ecological responsibility, we want consumers to connect with the brand and the agency can help us achieve that.

WHAT HAVE BEEN THE DIFFERENT STAGES OF THESE BLUE BOOSTS?

We had extensive discussions for a diagnosis. We explained to the agency what we do, where we stand, what our challenges and objectives are.

From this first discussion, we felt an immediate understanding of the topic. Subsequently, the teams worked on the brand's priorities. They rose very high on the subject, even questioning what should be done starting from the existing brand.

There were discussions about brand strategy as well as creative aspects.

In fact, we had a second meeting with the agency to present the ideas and reflections around the brand, its identity, and its territory. It was a great meeting for us as we saw the realization of the tone we want to give to the brand.

Creative avenues in progress

The agency also told me they would continue to work on the identity, which is great! I still have one or two meetings left. The number is not defined; it’s mainly the deliverable that is. We are going to work on the logo with Nouvelle Vague.

In conclusion, I am incredibly thankful to the agency for this initiative. I think it’s a brilliant idea on their part. For us startups, it brings a lot to have an expert perspective and this distance to help us reflect.

What I really appreciated is this approach from the agency and their enthusiasm regarding the topic that Berny represents. For me, it is very positive, and I am very happy to have benefited from this support.