WHITE SPACE GROUP

Breaking With Tradition: Building Gather & Gown

Bridal veterans Vincent Piccione and Michael Shettel joined forces in 2014 to revolutionize the way bridal parties shop for dresses. After designing their collection, they turned to White Space Group to help define, build and launch their business online.

WSG started with a blank “brand” canvas and worked with the executive team to define the brand values, create the identity & purpose and carried this through the impactful packaging.

Once the brand and packaging were complete, G&G then worked with WSG to desgin the website and associated digital/social platforms . Due to the nature of shopping as a group, the purchasing process for brides and bridesmaids is a very social experience. WSG set about creating a range of engaging tools that support this unique shopping process. WSG managed the content creation process including the production of high editorial fashion shoots around New York’s Central Park as well as in-studio photoshoots to gather assets needed to launch a best-in-class ecommerce business.

Next came the website build phase, and in less than 6 months from WSG’s first meeting with the client, www.GatherandGown.com was live. Subsequent to the launch, WSG shifted gears to the activation phase, focusing on driving qualified visitors through print and digital campaigns, then building engagement strategies to drive from awareness to purchase. The business continues to grow at 300% per month since launch, WSG looks forward to being a long term strategic and marketing partner for the G&G brand and executive team for years to come.

BRAND IDENTITY

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INFLUENCERS

PRINT ADVERTISING

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PACKAGING

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Project Overview

Bridesmaid dresses for the wedding day and beyond, all for under $200

Free Shipping, Free Returns

Shop collaboratively with your girlfriends

Dresses in-stock and shipped to the consumer in a few days

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Brand Strategy

WSG collaborated with the executive team to identify key weaknesses in the current bridal dress business. WSG created G&G’s value propositions to strategically capitalize on open industry opportunity.

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Naming

WSG used their naming process in presenting the final choice, Gather & Gown. After narrowing down the options from a list of hundreds, WSG then developed a shortlist that occupied a brand/legal white space. Finally, WSG completed research that yeilded feedback from real customers to land on Gather & Gown.

Street Style –

legitimize the dress outside of the wedding

High Society –Combining elegant studio shots with spontaneous moments

Girlfriends –evocative lighting, emphasize the group

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Brand Image

WSG conducted style research in the strategy phase in order to establish the brand’s look and feel. WSG combined several different types of aesthetics to arrive at the customized G&G brand style.

High Society

Girlfriends

Street Style

HABITASSE PLATEAQUISQUE UT VULPUTATE LACUS.

PROIN PORTA & PORTA

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Brand Identity

WSG sought to create an image and personality that appealed to a new audience of millennial female shoppers across channels. This was needed to create a brand and identity that spoke to the new audience of women who were the desired shoppers. Gather & Gown spoke to both the process and the experience that we wanted to convey.

Typography Styleguide

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Hello Beautiful!

Thanks for shopping with Gather & Gown.

Here's to a wonderful wedding and all the other

occasions this dress will take you to.

Any questions? Log on to gatherandgown.com

or give us a call.

Enjoy!

Designer

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Packaging

The overall packaging aesthetic is feminine and luxurious, making shoppers feel special when they receive product via mail. It was critical that the box had a “wow” effect. The script of “Hello Beautiful” captured the emotion for G&G, and pairing that with our coral signature color, and custom graphic it all came together perfectly.

Box includes tissue paper in a signature texture and a message from G&G’s designer, Michael Shettel.

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Website Design

WSG wanted to design a clean, simple, fast site that enabled the images of the dresses and models to stand out. The site is optimized for desktop, mobile and tablet interfaces. Over 50% of G&G visitors are on non-desktop devices.

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Customers can easily browse a wide range of colors & sizes.

Each dress has a runway video

Each color family has its own corresponding Pinboard

Website Design

WSG created a fresh new PDP layout that included front, back and alternative views. Each PDP also includes a runway view and inspiration page to add additional context to each dress design.

Personalize with your event details and wedding theme colors

Import inspiration boards from Pinterest

Organize your favorite styles

Loop in your party – Invite your special ladies to shop with you and share their options.

Track your party’s order and delivery information

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Social Commerce

WSG assured the site leveraged the social nature of bridesmaids dress shopping. By creating a tool called The Loop, brides and her party can pick favorites and shop collaboratively. Shoppers can add Pinterest boards for color inspiration and rank their favorites.

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Content Creation – Editorial

In order to ensure that the site launched with the best visual assets, WSG worked with its production partners HQ and renowned wedding photographer Terry Gruber to make it happen. The shoot created over 20 iconic images to later be used for both print and web materials.

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Content Creation – Studio

WSG oversaw the pre as well as post production of all visual assets including model casting, styling, photgraphy and art direction. WSG had to ensure all the still and video assets created for the critical Product Detail Pages was as engaging as possible. These were then also used for merchandizing and ongoing storytelling to the G&G customer.

Video footage was captured of the runway show to accompany the product photography

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Email –CRM

It is crucial that G&G connect with its growing audience and capture new leads. Once a lead is captured, G&G needs to ensure it tells the story of the brand, and vision to the consumer. Every new lead gets sent a welcome series of 7 emails over 2 weeks, each reinforcing the brand pillars that make G&G unique and different within the category. These emails ensure that the business drives as many leads to purchasers as possible.

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Email – Marketing

Beyond the Welcome Series, WSG creates and manages the content calendar and then creates the marketing emails used as promotional content to tell brand aspirational stories and further engage the G&G audience.

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Advertising

WSG helped to drive the media mix strategy, and developed the creative assets that were used in both lead print publishers like Brides, The Knot and Bridal Guide. WSG also manages all the digital creative and campaign execution.

Print Ad Banner Ads

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Influencers

When launching any new brand, it is critical to leverage reach in creative ways. WSG ensured that key influencers were involved in the photo shoot, and pre-ordering of the dresses. Their endorsement helped drive early trust and credibility for the new brand.

Sonia from The Not Vanilla

Aileen from The Style Boro

Olivia from Corporate Catwalk

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Press

WSG supports G&G with its Press outreach, designing all the press materials. G&G was selected by Good Morning America for a segment on weddings, which resulted in an enormous spike in traffic. WSG designed a flexible cloud hosted ecommerce solution, so the infrastructure could be increased for the few days when publicity was at its highest.

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#BreakWithTradition

WSG created a launch campaign for G&G called #BWT to drive its organic fan based on Facebook and other social platforms. G&G now has 10,000 fans in just two months since launch. WSG works with the G&G marketing team weekly on strategy of storytelling to ensure relevant and consistent messaging across all social channels.

VISIT

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GATHERANDGOWN.COM

WHITESPACEGROUP.COM