VANCOUVER, B.C. (PRWEB) October 04, 2018 -- The program curates ideas brought forward by principal Sean Carter and the talented team at Carter Hales.
“We’re entrepreneurial people who experience and interpret the world through the lens and language of design and strategy, and we have no ‘off ’ button. As a result, we generate an overabundance of creative ideas,” explains Sean. “We constantly see compelling opportunities to revitalize products in categories that haven’t seen fresh ideas for a long time, and to create new products in vibrant emerging categories.”
For all of the brand and product ideas, design is the key differentiator. For the
most promising opportunities, Carter Hales seeks to partner with individuals and organizations who have the entrepreneurial vision and the specific manufacturing and distribution capabilities required to bring them to market.
Carter Hales was successful with its very first experience with creating and running its own brand. Pink Door was launched in 2007 with a line of eight notecard sets. With extension into the stationery and beauty categories, the brand grew to 167 SKUs with distribution in six countries. In 2017, the stationery line was sold. Today, with JRS Amenities on board as a partner, Pink Door is focused on an amenity line of 3 distinct scents which are marketed and sold to boutique hotels and airlines.
Carter Hales recently partnered with Burritt Brothers to create a line of rugs. “We noticed the trend of fine-art paintings reinterpreted as hand-knotted wool and silk rugs,” Sean explains. “Naturally, that inspired us to imagine rugs featuring beautiful packaging designs.” The result is a distinctive series of rugs that provoke questions about the intersection of art and commercial design.
Carter Hales is seeking strategic partnerships to bring two more fully developed concepts to market: MoonKøl is a line of charcoal face and body bars for men; and Coiffur is a cat shampoo.
Both products take a fresh approach to categories that are stale from a branding point of view. Since charcoal soap has purifying characteristics and an otherworldly appearance, designer Rosie Gopaul created an illustration for MoonKøl featuring an astronaut surrounded by flowers. It cuts through the barbershop motifs cluttering the category. Cat shampoos typically feature cute cat photos and lavender stems, ignoring the fact that shampooing a cat is often a traumatic experience for all parties. For Coiffur, designer Andrew Schick took a playful, honest approach, complete with entertaining instructions for successfully bathing an animal that is averse to being submerged.
“Our ultimate goal with the Idea Lab program is to find manufacturers who are set-up to launch, run and expand on these ideas,” Sean says. “We want to partner with companies that require innovative design and new products to plug into their existing distribution framework or with entrepreneurs that have the business skill to launch a new brand.”
Carter Hales’ success with Pink Door led to the relationship with Burritt Brothers, who were initially interested in creating rugs featuring some of the colourful geometric prints from Pink Door’s packaging. They decided there were too many similar products in that space, but then the idea emerged to weave some of the studio’s iconic packaging designs into rugs.
“These pieces are for homeowners who have a bold and adventurous design aesthetic and want something unique,” explains Sean. “The rugs are pop art that you can walk on.”
The wool rugs, which are handmade in Nepal, will be on display at the highly anticipated Interior Design Show September 20-23 in Vancouver.
Tessa Andrews, Paxson Fay, http://www.paxsonfay.com, 617 719 4398, [email protected]
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