When brothers and co-owners Tristan & Jackson approached Play House, they emphasized how personal + meaningful it was to have just opened a brick-and-mortar café in their hometown of Battle Creek, MI; in recent years, downtown had become a transient place to do business and split-town (nicknamed “Cereal City,” Battle Creek is still home to Kellogg’s and once the home to Post). Tristan and Jackson knew there was not only the need for a great cup of coffee downtown for visitors and locals alike, but more importantly, there was an opportunity to provide community in an area that desperately craved it.

Café Rica knew their vision for the brand wasn’t fully realized; they expressed wanting the brand to feel tropical, approachable to the entire community, and pay homage to their Costa Rican heritage.

We quickly got to work, launching a refreshed brand identity, and new packaging for their 3 flagship cold brew flavors. Collectively we’ve now released packaging systems for canned cold brew, whole bean coffee bags, and canned iced tea. We’ve also launched single SKUs for lemonade and canned water, provided signage and menu design for the café, branded a podcast, designed + illustrated seasonal merch capsules, created event design and signage for community events hosted by Café Rica, and so much more.

PROJECT INVOLVEMENT:

Brand Identity
Packaging Systems, Design & Production
Signage & Environmental Design
Merch Design
Menu Design
Event & Campaign Design