Case Study
Tinbits
Tinbits was a small startup that I co-founded with my sister back in 2009.
The company launched a series of collectible 1″ pins and also served as a vendor for a business that needed promotional materials.
Creating the brand
The company’s name came after many hours of brainstorming and playing with the words “pieces of metal” as a representation for the actual pins, and the slogan for it is also cheeky by saying “it is more than just tin.”
The logo needed to reflect both the whimsical aspect of the product name and yet be corporate enough to be used as the brand for the company itself. With that in mind, we spent hours figuring out what the name could be.
Brand Colors
The color selection for the brand evolved as a representation and take-on the duality of the business but also by the fact that two people co-founded the business.
pantone ds 74-1c
Pantone P Process Black C
Logo Variations
Continuing with the idea of the brand’s duality, we decided that it would be fun to have variations of the logo that highlighted the words “tin” & “bits.” Adding a color background allowed for this, and ultimately, this approach was carried across the branding of the products.
Typography
The strategy for selecting the typography used in the logo was vital, as it had to embody the brand’s playfulness. Another key consideration when selecting fonts was that they had to work well in small brand applications and support Latin characters like é, ü, and ñ.
Primary
The Tinbits logo is customized logo-text lettering based on the Tw Cen MT typography. In contrast, the brand slogan uses Pump Light. These fonts are only used for the logo.
Secondary
I carefully selected the second set of fonts to complement the brand; these fonts are used for all the packaging and collateral materials.
Branding & Collateral
Stationery
I designed a custom A4 letterhead and a small 3.5 x 8.5 cm coated business card that was printed in both of the brand colors.
Product Packaging
Product packaging was an exciting challenge. It was essential to do something budget-friendly, and that highlighted the design of each pin.
I created two different sizes, a 5×6 cm for single pins and a 12.5 x 8 cm for six or eight pin collections.
Pin Designs
These are some of the collectible pins we had in the 300+ Tinbits collection.
Web Presence
I was responsible for the website’s design and implementation, which was used for promotional purposes as the pins were only available for purchase at retail partner locations.
However, the website did have an online catalog of all the available designs, locations of the retail stores, a mailing list subscription form, and a place where people could download wallpapers of some of the designs. The About Us section featured all the different promotional products that we the company offered.
