› ›photoshop user› february 2016064
DesignMakeover
COLUMN › ›JAKE WIDMAN CLIENT
Appalachia Cookie Company
http://appcookieco.combefore
makeover submissions
We’re looking for product packaging or labels, print advertisements, websites, and magazine covers that are currently in the marketplace for future “design
makeovers.” So if you or someone you know has a design that you’d like us to consider making over, or if you’re a designer and you’d like to be considered for a
future “Design Makeover,” send us an email at [email protected]. (Note: This is purely a design exercise and the designers do not work directly with
the client, create functioning websites, etc.)
We’ll also be covering real-world makeovers in this column, so let us know if you recently had a branding makeover or if you did a branding makeover for a
client that you’d like us to consider.David Holloman opened his Appalachia Cookie Company (http://
appcookieco.com) in the mountain town of Boone, North Caro-
lina, in late 2013. The company started with baking cookies and
delivering them to students at Appalachian State University, Hol-
loman’s alma mater. Over its first year, the company saw dra-
matic growth, fueled in part by celebrity chef Paula Deen deem-
ing the product one of the 10 best cookies in the country.
By the beginning of 2015, though, Appalachia Cookie Com-
pany was also outgrowing their original logo and image. The com-
pany launched with a logo “born out of necessity,” says Hollo-
man. “We were on a deadline to get something for the marketing
materials.” They wanted something that said both “cookies” and
“mountains,” and they came up with a drawing of cookies with
bites taken out of them to leave jagged peaks. “It captured what
we wanted,” says Holloman. “It looked good for the first year.”
But it didn’t suit an ambitious, growing company. Holloman
wound up chatting about his brand with Charles Bateman, who
at the time was working for a marketing and advertising com-
pany called High Country 365. High Country was doing print-
based marketing work for Holloman, and when the two men met
one night at a bar’s trivia contest, they started talking about the
company’s website and, soon, about the future of the brand.
“We talked about not just bringing the brand to a more cur-
rent state but also to a point where he could really expand and
build on the brand style and brand system,” recalls Bateman. The
discussions gradually moved from just rebuilding the website to
ways to update the brand into something that could work across
different print media, digital media, and retail applications.that’s how the cookie crumbles
“‘We talked about not just bringing
the brand to a more current state but
also to a point where he could really
expand and build on the brand style
and brand system.’”—Bateman