Creating brands through divergent perspectives.
Do Your Lips Dream In Color?
CO2LORS : An art brand that sells cannabis.
While it looks like a regular vape pen, it tastes like nothing else on the market. Contentious brought in a chef who had never done marketing but could describe flavors along with a pop visual artist, a poet and 3D artist. The result was synesthesia, a brand that at once fills your senses and rearranges with them. Taste colors, smell flavors, enjoy all of your senses with Colors.
Product Development. Naming. Brand Creation/Branding, Illustration, Animation, Photo & Video Creative/Art Direction. Packaging. Go to Market.
Powder to the People.
Flower Powder : The Joint of the future isn’t a joint at all.
Flower Powder delivers a true smoker’s high in the convenience of an edible powder. Our quick-dissolving, fast-acting powder uses the entire cannabis flower, including its full strain-specific terpene profile. This allows your body’s THC absorption processes to deliver that unbeatable smoker’s high anywhere a joint would cause a stir. This is a product created and launched inhouse with Supergalactic Brands in my role as CCO/CBO.
Product Creation. Product Development. Naming. Brand Creation/Branding .Illustration, Animation, Photo & Video Creative/Art Direction. Packaging. Go to Market.
Cannabis is digital. Weed is analog.
Roll One Portland : “Got a light” has made more friends than hello.
Somewhere along the way, the social aspect of marijuana got lost. That’s why we created RollOne, weed that was created to share. The RollOne identity started from the plastic container where you used to store your weed, but also played nicely into the simply joyful act of rolling a joint. This analog feel was brought out by the immediacy of the images and the simplicity of hanging out with friends. We brought together a group of brothers, their girlfriends, and a lifestyle still photographer for a video shoot on the Columbia River. RollOne was just like an analog camera where you don’t know what you are going to get until it develops. Cannabis is digital. Weed is analog.
Product Development. Naming.Brand Creation/Branding. Photo & Video Creative/Art Direction. Packaging. Go to Market.
Roll One Brooklyn. Different City, Same Friends.
Cannabis is digital. Weed is analog.
Second in a series of brand content shoots for Roll One we went to Brooklyn and shot a series of friends with photographer Jacob Pritchard.
Product Development. Naming. Brand Creation/Branding. Photo & Video Creative/Art Direction. Packaging. Go to Market.
Focused on growth. Focused on goodness.
Modern Flower : A Modern Conversation About Cannabis.
For the canna-curious to the more seasoned user, Modern Flower offers quality, approachable products to fit contemporary medical marijuana lifestyles.
Product Development. Naming. Brand Creation/Branding. Packaging. Photo, Video & Animation Creative/Art Direction. Go to Market.
We believe life’s not full of problems but realities and we relate.
The Functional Chocolate Company : The Sweet Taste of Health.
Best friend energy. Funcho brings the fun to the function, and we can help you get your HOT SEXY RHYTHM back so you can GOGO feeling CAREFREE until it’s time to SLEEP. Yup, we can also incorporate all of the names of our bars into a sentence to remind you we are not just fun but clever. We’ve stacked the smartest super ingredients with life of the party chocolate for the funnest fixer ever. So keep the function’s guest list tight; stick with us from day to night.
Product Development. Naming. Brand Creation/Branding. Packaging. Photo, Video & Illustration Creative/Art Direction. Go to Market.
From The Garden of Your Mind.
Sano Gardens : Splitting One Brand Into Three. Introducing Orchard, Amber. & Aqua Live from Sano Gardens.
A single brand with great 3 products re-envisioned/re-introduced to the market as 3 individual stand alone brands,
ReBrand. Asset Development. Product Development. Photo, Video & Illustration Creative/Art Direction. Brand & Social Style Guide. Go To Market.
A Poster Project Becomes State Pride.
High Profile Dispensaries : Making Happy Happen.
What started as a few retail posters became a lot more to the locals.
Brand Campaign. Look & Feel. Retail Design. Promotional. Social Assets. Illustration Creative/Art Direction.
The Remaking of Shoes.com.
shoes.com : Splitting One Brand Into Three. Introducing Orchard, Amber. & Aqua Live from Sano Gardens.
What started as shoebuy.com a bargain style clearinghouse for online shoe shopping was transformed to be alternative to Zappos.
ReBrand. Asset Development. Product Development. Video & Still Art/Creative Direction. Brand & Social Style Guide. Seasonal Campaigns.
The Power of the Flower.
EVOLAB : The Science of Cannabis Evovled.
What if you focused the best PhD botanists on creating luxury products for the cannabis connoisseur? You’d have a truly elevated experience. These inspired users described these experiences in a nuanced way and the only way to get at that truth was with many different images. So we brought together a cosmetics brand writer with a deep science background and a well known editorial collage artist to express these truths. This is a science brand brought to life thru art.
ReBrand. Asset Development. Illustration, Animation, Video & Still Creative/Art Direction. Brand & Social Style Guide.
Cannabinoids For Life.
CBx SCIENCES : The Science of Cannabis Evovled.
This is different from simply adding CBD to an existing product. This is a scientifically designed regimen that works together to change your life based on your EndoCannabinoid system--an innately complex idea. So we simplified without dumbing down the product. We cast regular people models and had a tattoo artist draw the system directly on the photos. The product shots relied on an editorial photographer and an award winning art director art director to create interconnected still life images. This couldn’t be faked
Brand Creation/Branding. Asset Development. Video & Still Creative/Art Direction. Social & Social Style Guide.
The Insiders Guide to Cannabis. 4.20.2022.
Harvest House of Cannabis : 420 In The Time of Covid. Social & Retail Campaign
When “Cannabis Christmas” falls during a worldwide shelter-in-place order, you have to be creative with your celebration. We started by tapping the activities and ideas of the whole organization: budtenders, botanists, and warehouse workers. Then we used a copywriter with a social strategy background to amplify these ideas working with a A fashion illustrator who created the illustrations and a packaging designer who created the lockup. This integrated approach was featured in Adweek for its innovative way to “bring home” 420.
Campaign Development. Social Campaign. At Retail Campaign. Assets. Video & Illustration Creative/Art Direction. Social & Social Style Guide.
The Paradox Of Passion.
Outside TV Features : Amazon Prime Launch for OutsideTV Features.
We believe authenticity matters. That’s why when it came time to promote these athletes’s stories, we turned to the athletes themselves. To get this Amazon Prime show traction purposefully, we chose older creatives with strong backgrounds in extreme and alternative sports like riding, climbing and skating. That’s how we ended up deciding to lean heavily on the athletes’ own social feeds and the athletes themselves to comment on their most memorable parts.Launching with an authentic voice.
Campaign Development. Channel Launch. Subscription Drive. Video. Creative/Art Direction. Social & Athlete/Influencer Campaign.
A Photographer’s Book.
Caroline Knopf : Hard Cover Promotional Book.
More coming soon….
Look & Feel. Logo. Brand Design. Book Design. Flow. Typography. Editing.
Highly Delicious Edibles.
Loveli Edibles : Have A Loveli Day.
Taste the Loveli difference of chef-inspired edibles. Each signature recipe was perfected with one goal in mind: to make the most delicious edibles in the world. The launch and brand development needed to match that as most edibles to this point still have a heavy weed taste. With Loveli taste had to come across first. Not Potency.
Product Development. Naming. Brand Development/Branding. Packaging. Social Assets. Photo & Video Creative/Art Direction. Go to Market.
A Day At The Beach With AWOL.
AWOL : A Walk On Water. Surf Therapy.
Capturing a day like no other. 40+ volunteers and bunch of really special kids spend the day on the water.
Product Development. Naming. Brand Development/Branding. Packaging. Social Assets. Photo & Video Creative/Art Direction. Go to Market.
Smoke Me With Your Leader.
Galactic Cannabis : Be Out There Somewhere.
More coming soon….
Product Development. Brand Development/Branding. Packaging. Social Assets. Photo & Video Creative/Art Direction. Go to Market.
Who We’ve Worked With.
CANNABIS
Harvest House of Cannabis
Evolab
Co2lors
Loveli
Modern Flower
FlorHaus
RollOne
Sano Gardens
High Profile
Dream Steam
SPORTS & LIFESTYLE
Nike
Airwalk
The North Face
Oakley
Outside TV
Scarpa
Gregory Packs
Audi
Land Rover
Mercedes Benz
BEAUTY & FASHION
Maybelline NY
Fekkai
St John
Napapijri
Shoes.com
Dr. Martens
Nine West
Converse
Revo
Sally Hansen
“If you don’t want to get challenged, go someplace else.”
Your customer is not a “Persona.” They are not simply an algorithm of the last breakfast cereal they bought plus their last app download multiplied by their zip code. Your customer is complex. Each has a myriad of passions.That’s why we, at Contentious, engage unusual combinations of creative people to bring your brand to life. From the agitation of varying views of your product, we create a depth and a connection that cannot be matched.
Don’t worry about sounding professional. Sound like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest. If you read the words back and don’t hear your own voice in your head, that’s a good sign you still have more work to do.
Evolving brands through divergent perspectives
It all begins with an idea. Maybe you want to launch a business. Maybe you want to turn a hobby into something more. Or maybe you have a creative project to share with the world. Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.