B (Can I call you like that?), it took me a few days to operate everything that youāve written cause your words are just priceless. Thank you for that.
And of course, I have tons of questions and thoughts to you:
It seems to me that remoteness, hardiness and ruggedness are not the advantages that I personally would love to use as the main origins in our presentation. Maybe itās just my subjective feeling that itās ordinary, boring and even forbidding but I think that there is no inner pleasure, joy to buy something from rugged people that live in terrible cold (even if itās qualitative and gorgeous wood)ā¦
Itās not a strong selling point, I donāt feel passion or joy while thinking about having this wood at home.
The differences between our wood and the American wood that weāve been recognised (we ordered reclaimed barn wood panels boxes of various American brands to compare it with ours) are:
Our wood is a little bit thicker, and it cracks lees than the wood of the most our local competitors;
It has brighter shades and a deeper color and also it has a more relief pattern due to the age and weather conditions where it has been āgrownā;
The age of our wood is at least 20 years. Some American companies age wood themselves or the others have wood with a natural age of 5-10 years in general;
I think, these are the main features.
Yes, I agree with you that there is so little information about us on our website as a Siberian, Russian company. However, Iām afraid that if we use the characteristics that youāve mentioned above, nobody will fall in love with our product and us as a company because itās not an appealing, attractive portrait: rugged people that live in a severe climate with no civilizationā¦ Frankly speaking, I wouldnāt be the one that bought this presenting :(. It pushes me aside, what do you feel about that?
And about downplaying the Russian aspects - itās a great idea, but when we were working on our website, we were following the idea to demonstrate ourselves not as outdated, obtuse people. We wanted to demonstrate our willing to develop, learn and use new technologies, that weāre a contemporary company that keeps up with the time and its tendenciesā¦
And thank you for your comment again. Itās so curios and pleasant to discuss different topics with people like you and your friends/colleagues on this forum. I appreciate it a lot.
The other problemā¦with new construction, there is such at thing as LEED compliant. Itās a whole āgreen buildingā thing that architects can require for a project. One of the big contributors to LEED points is sourcing products locally (the term locally has varying radii, but within 100-500 miles of the job site is usual.)
On the other hand your product also falls under LEED for Salvaged or Reused materials. The shipping distance is a killer thoughā¦
Not all new build projects have LEED requirements though so it isnāt a deal killer. You just have to be aware of it if marketing to architects.
Wow, I like it so far, and I really like the idea with eagles
However, the color isnāt matching our company and itās product in my opinion. Itās beautiful but I associate Siberia with a dark green color, with pine and forests, with something deep, powerful, gorgeous but modest.
The reason why I chose a shade of magenta in the first place was because I wanted to achieve an element of surprise.
Shades of green, yellow, brown and even blue are what your prospective clients expect, whereas magenta/pink is completely unexpected, which should make your brand more memorable.
Such a color also says āmodernā, āfashionableā, āexcitingā, āsexyā. It could help you appeal to a broader demographic.
Do you realise how rude that is - you werenāt commissioned to do this work - itās not a client - itās a bad attempt at a logo design that missed the mark by so many miles.
You can take down the work on Behance - itās not fair to portray that you did work for this client - where it is very far from the truth.
@Anastasiya you should demand he removes this from his Behance
Steve, thanks for your opinion.
I canāt agree with you that a discussion here is a waste of time in some ways because youāve helped us a lot here. Really)
About your questions:
The premium lumber market isnāt small. There are at least 10 companies in our niche that are great and we analyse them a lot. For example, the most popular (we think according to our information) are Stickwood, Plank&Mill and Centennial Woods. Also, there are some companies like TimberchĆc, Weekend Walls, TimberWall, Rockin Wood, but we see that theyāre not so popular and successful as āthe big threeā above). So, the market isnāt small and there are many companies (of we talk about real wood +/- like ours) thatād love to sell their reclaimed barn wood panels)).
Strengths and weaknesses absolutely varies on the company.
The most common weaknesses are:
The wood often cracks during delivery or when a customer tries to cut it;
The wood is thin and looks cheap, overpriced;
The quality of wood is lower than we offer (itās thiner, younger, without antiseptic top etc.)
The wood mustnāt peel off the wall at least during first 10 years (itās said on a website). Our wood can stay on the wall forever, but our guarantee is 20 years.
And the advantages of our American competitors:
Itās a peel-and-stick and itās easier to install the boards on the wall. So, minimum equipment.
Itās not about the wood but - the companies are local, and itās more psychologically reliable for natives to order smth from regional brands. maybe Iām wrong because everything is changing so fast these days and absolutely okay to order something from abroad, but. I think that itās still an issue.
And about āenticing the buyerā:
Our wood is older, itās at least 20 years old (average age of our wood is 25-35 years);
The naturally weathered pattern on the wood is brighter, more textural, and the color is more saturated too;
We have an office and warehouse in NY, Brooklyn, and I think it allows our customers to trust us more because weāre not delivering directly from Siberia)) The wood has a long journey
We have a full production cycle: from the barn to the panels and pieces of furniture for example, that are ready to be delivered to any point of our planet.
I think these advantages are main for now. We also want to understand what a client and support system a typical American customer is get used to. Maybe some details and particular point about delivery, return, maybe online help with installation, just anything that will be necessary and helpfulā¦
OK. I understand your reservations, and I think theyāre legitimate. There are several ways to brand the personality of a product.
Even so, I think you might be missing an opportunity based partially on a slight misunderstanding of American culture and American views of Russia and Siberia.
Youāre selling a niche product (barn wood). You seem to want to downplay the very thing that makes your barn wood truly unique ā itās exotic (to Americans) Siberian origin.
You seem to want to stress your woodās other qualities: color, texture, and thickness as your productās āmain features,ā as you phrased it. I think these are important qualities to mention, but making them your marketing focus places you in head-to-head competition with other North American barn wood suppliers who claim much the same thing. All barn wood distributors will claim their wood is better and special. Yours, however, is unique. As far as I know, no other aged barn wood sold in American can say itās from Siberia. I could be wrong about that, though, because I have no marketing research.
I donāt know what the retail price of your wood might be, which would greatly influence my arguments. I am assuming, though, that shipping wood from Siberia to an American distributor will increase the cost of your wood. Iām also uncertain how tariffs and, possibly, sanctions might affect the price. I suspect, however, that your wood will be more expensive than its North American counterparts. Again, I could be wrong about that.
If Iām right about the two preceding points, your barn wood will be somewhat more expensive and canāt compete on price. Itās not going to be bargain wood sold at a discount, which means youāll need to market it as a higher-end product. Again, I havenāt done the marketing research on this, so Iām assuming a lot based on experience and hunches.
With phrasing like that, you have a point. However, this is where I think you misunderstand American consumers. There are regional differences in the United States. Older and more urbanized areas in the United States might view your product differently than other parts of the country. For example, people living in New York City might have a different impression of barn wood than suburban California.
If you want to market your product as a high-end, chic, stylish product suitable for big cities, thatās one approach. Marketing your products to architects for larger commercial building decor might be another. Aiming at residential building contractors is still another. Again, I have no marketing research backing up where the most demand might be.
However, there are some known quantities in all this. You are selling an inherently rustic product. Americans do not regard rustic as inferior ā they will pay a premium for rustic and rugged. Youāre selling a niche product to a niche audience that gravitates to a rustic look and personality.
Not everyone will want your niche product. Some demographic areas and groups will see no value in old pine and spruce. There is another substantial demographic group in the country that will love it. America is a relatively new country, but itās changed. Many American values are rooted in its not-too-distant but disappearing past. Many Americans are nostalgic for what their grandparents and great-grandparents had: farms, horses, barns, guns, and struggling to carve a country out of the wilderness.
Today, the descendants of those people live in semi-urban suburbs in million-dollar houses, yet they buy $50,000 pickup trucks that they rarely drive off the paved roads. They spend thousands of dollars on hunting and fishing equipment and look forward to their occasional visits to the country to ārough itā for a weekend in their $80,000 trailers pulled by those $50,000 pickup trucks. A significant section of America longs for the frontier thatās been tamed. These Americans are nostalgic for the dust, the mud, the dirt, the wind, the hunt, the fresh air, the outdoors, the freedom, and the wide-open spaces where the rules are few and nobody tells them what to do.
These are the people (primarily men) who will buy your authentic barn wood. These are the people with money to spend. These are also the people who will love wood from a harsh environment where life is hard, the winters are cold, and the people are tough ā like they want to be.
Of course, itās just the illusion they want to buy. These people want rustic and rugged, but they also want it civilized. They donāt really want to live in a hut in the frozen taiga, chop wood and hear the wolves howling at night, but they still fantasize about it. If you can bring a civilized but authentic piece of that fantasy into their air-conditioned world, theyāll love it.
Alaska has a $2.2 billion annual tourist industry catering to these very people. They want to see the bears (from a safe distance), they want to hear the wolves (from inside their pickup trucks), they want to camp near a wild stream (in well-tended rustic cabins with fast internet connections). For these people, bringing a piece of the Siberian wilderness into their homes would be something to brag about. āSee that wood on the wall? Thatās genuine Siberian barn wood.ā
So with all that said, itās all based on gut instincts and experience. If you were a client at one of the ad agencies where Iāve worked, Iād recommend doing the market research to determine whether or not what Iāve suggested is the right way to go. After all, I could easily be wrong, and your approach might be the best. There might also be other approaches, like marketing directly to commercial building contractors or architects. Thereās no way to be confident without solid data to back it up.
Thatās a great point because when we were entering the American market for the first time, we wanted to be everywhere: Amazon, HomeDepot, eBay, Etsy, Wallmart etc. Now weāre only on Amazon, and I think thatās a good start. We have our target audience there, we approximately realise what these people want, how they live. But other marketplaces are another platforms with their own rules, clients etc. And now everything is for us and our product.
BTW, is anything else so popular and useful in America like Amazon and people can buy there something like our wood?
Yes, it is inappropriate, @Jakub_Trybowski .
Please, remove the logo with our brand from your Behance. And before posting something thatās connected to other brands/names/etc., ask for the permission of the owner or representative about that.
Youāre putting words in my mouth. I never said that. What I said was that you needed to go more in depth than asking folks on an anonymous forum what their thoughts are. There are some informed and helpful people here, but surveying a very small sample of people on a graphic design forum is not a substitute for market research.
Is this wood treated in some way to come into the US? Kiln treated or fumigated?
Iām pretty sure you canāt just ship a rough wood product from there to here without treatmentā¦? That might affect itās use and/or look even.
I think youād benefit from looking at the branding strategies of companies stationed in Alaska, and to a lesser extent Montana. Both of these regions market their products and locations in a very American way, focusing on the positive qualities JustB mentioned that many Americans would associate with Siberia - namely the untamed wilderness, romanticizing the Mountain Men, Lumberjacks, and anyone else with the physical and mental strength needed to live in harsh environments. The idea that sells these sorts of products is that of being tough - that theyāve endured the rough weather and are still doing their jobs.
But like everyone else mentioned you are going to be competing with native weathered woods, which are going to be focusing on those same points, and will have the home field advantage in reduced shipping costs and local loyalties. Youāll have to do research on this, and see what advantages your product has on itās competitors and market those as high qualities - ultimately it comes down to why Siberian wood, and not, say, Montanan or Alaskan?
You mention the color variety - thatās a good point to work from! People in construction/interior design can be very particular about the colors, so thatās one potential edge. Since Iām assuming these are mostly softwoods/conifers, you could also upsell the scent, or any unusual properties the wood may have - such as Cedarās insect repellant properties.
But setting any actual, physical differences aside, youāre going to have to sell Siberia as much as the wood itself, and for that you might want to look at local tourism approaches. If someone is going to pay extra to put Siberian Wood into their home, theyāre going to want it to feel Siberian - and the branding can really sell that. While theyāre opening the package and putting it on the wall, whatās unique about Siberia that you want them to be thinking of?
Living in a rural/touristy area of Montana myself, I can definitely tell you that the market for weathered, outdoorsy products is niche, but the buyers are very willing to pay well. Aim high, and upsell the wilderness and (relative) exoticness of your region and you might carve a nice little spot out for yourself.
@Anastasiya I took a look at your competitorsā logos.
If you want to stand out, and avoid any confusion, you should avoid black and very dark colors, shades of green, turquise and yellow, as well as brick-like colors.
In my opinion, one of your best bets at standing out is the color I suggested earlier:
@Kaegro The problem with Siberia is that itās not much different from Alaska or northern Canada. Itās cold, snowy and wild, but so are the other two regions. Thereās nothing truly distinctive about it.
It would take a really clever marketing story to convince someone to choose second-hand planks from Siberia over ones from Alaska or Canada.
The fact that most of those planks probably are from the Soviet era isnāt helping the least bit.
) geography isnāt a strong point too)).
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