Dorchester Brewing Company is not just a brewery — it is a contract brewery with a facility that offers other brewers a wealth of services including brew space, canning equipment, distribution, marketing assistance, and a variety of other benefits. And to top it all off, they have a public taproom with dozens of local beers on draft. The Boston area has been slowly developing a powerful craft beer scene over the past decade and DBC is sure to change the game.

When we first set out to define DBC’s visual identity, we held a series of creative discovery meetings and in-depth conversations. In a big sea of national breweries with a wide variety of brands, finding DBC’s aesthetic niche was key. Dorchester is a historic part of Boston with an extremely rich culture. Given that the target audience included both brewers and beer enthusiasts across a wide-range of ages, sending the right message was integral. The meetings were beneficial and in the end, we concluded that the three best adjectives to describe DBC’s future brand were sophisticated, gritty, and classic. Those who have been to Dorchester would agree that those words are very representative of the area.

 

This project involved weeks of sketching and experimentation. DBC’s branding would be used everywhere so it took a lot of consideration to determine the optimal way to showcase the words. In subsequent client conversations, we kept coming back to the fact that we were celebrating Dorchester. As a result, it became obvious that ‘Dorchester’ should be the emphasis.

Due to the amount of sketches I had done, I ended up proceeding into the execution stage with two directions. I generally have a very clear direction to the finish line, but in this scenario, I had to see what each idea looked like in a more polished context to make an objective decision. In the end, they both looked beautiful, but the scripted version really spoke to the brand much more accurately than the other. It’s always about solving the project goals.