West Lea Farm Shop

Brand refresh, packaging, website & collateral design

One wintery afternoon, West Lea Farm Shop's lovely new owner Rachel Peppiatt, called me over after a moment of frustration - she was heroically trying to design a flyer that looked like what she was imagining and having difficulty translating that onto the page.  What began as a rescue mission became a meeting of minds - over mugs of tea, we talked about Alresford, the food industry, branding, her vision for the shop and what excites her; local producers, their stories, and love for our beautiful corner of Hampshire - it became apparent that we needed to work together.

Living just a mile from the shop as the crow flies, Rachel had always loved its situation, between two small bridges over the river and surrounded by historic watercress beds. She went all in when it became available to buy during the pandemic and set about reviving it as an essential place for locals to pick up quality produce in an unfussy and friendly environment. The original shop started life decades ago as a humble honesty box - and thankfully, much of that modest charm remains today. I had always admired the old shop - I drove past it most days on my way to a client site nearby - so I was delighted when I noticed someone injecting new life and ideas into the space. I became intrigued by who had taken over as I could see it was someone with a great eye and taste. 

Rachel's innate self-reliance resulted in her creating the branding herself with help from her lovely family. Whilst the new vision for the shop was still fresh, we took the opportunity to refine what she'd worked on and create a unique identity that would grow with the business. We explored expressing their brand story through a series of projects from visual identity, brand voice, packaging, website, collateral, and content.  When refreshing the website, we focussed on expanding and improving the content by implementing a blog and new pages celebrating their offer and interests - watercress, producers and the local community. In addition, we added an e-commerce element to showcase their incredible hampers and gifting options. We also looked at refreshing the website's look and feel, introducing new custom fonts, background textures, colours, photography and film. 

The result is an enticing experience - an invitation to visit, support local producers and become a friend of the shop. Since the work has been completed, the shop has enjoyed its best months and a significant increase in online and offline traffic, despite the current challenging economic climate shopkeepers are experiencing in food retail. It’s been a pleasure to help Rachel extend her audience and express her vision for the shop in a way that honours all her hard work and dedication. Rachel's gift for articulating her passion for local produce and her successful revival of the shop also caught the attention of TV chef James Martin. It was featured on his Saturday morning cooking show - he created some delicious soup and soda bread with West Lea Watercress - which is the best! Learn more and join their community of fellow food lovers here www.westleafarmshop.co.uk