Reefill’s Brand Strategy

PROJECT OVERVIEW

Reefill is a New York City based startup with a vision to provide an affordable and effortless alternative to single-use plastic bottles, combating the environmental crisis while prioritizing the needs of the modern, on-the-go individual. It encountered its fair share of challenges, at the forefront was the intricately woven issue of customer acquisition and brand establishment. Our project team partnered with the Reefill team on a journey of insights and analysis. Through a comprehensive root cause exploration, we uncovered the underlying barriers inhibiting the widespread adoption of this sustainable solution.

Click here to view the white paper on the research

ROLE

– Conducted ethnographic research and field observation — Identified target audience and drafted user personas — Designed the prototype and lead creative direction

PROJECT TEAM

— Co-founders of the startup — Business Analysts — Product Designers

TIMELINE

— 6 months

RESEARCH & DISCOVERY PHASE

We conducted in-depth interviews, along with field observations in order to understand and define the business challenge. We got a holistic understanding of how different users interact with water, Reefill’s current state and the interconnections.

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BUSINESS QUESTIONS FOR SECONDARY RESEARCH:

— What are the brands people trust? Why? Does Reefill need rebranding? — What are the different water trends? — Who drinks tap water? Who refills water? Who buys water bottles?

From the interviews, we identified Reefill’s different user types and their daily consumption habits in contrast to their ability to access Reefill stations during their daily routine.

Through this map, we were able to identify areas and timings Reefill could add value for their user types.

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EMPATHY MAPS

This empathy map lays out the pains and gains of bottled water drinkers and tap water drinkers, while highlighting behaviors that can be tapped into, to enable a change. We used these tools to better understand why some people prefer drinking bottled water vs tap water to see how we can solve for Reefill.

IDEATION

The ideation phase of our journey started with a workshop. The workshop was a timed-interval sketching session tackling the challenges our team identified for Reefill.

THE SOLUTION

Though our research, we identified the pain points of our consumers and the occasions at which they end up buying bottled water. Reefill has the potential to alter its offerings, by penetrating events that create a significant waste of single use plastic. The idea here is to reduce plastic on a larger scale, rather than tapping into consumers who buy bottled water as a one off.

Area of Opportunity:

Many tap water drinkers allow themselves to drink bottled water in certain situations because they think it’s a one-time event. However this happen multiple times on a daily basis and generate millions of waste every year.