Creating personal stories to be cherished
The brief
Project aim: Distinguish My 1st Years from competitors through unique (and fully customisable) product offerings i.e. children’s storybooks.
My 1st Years is an online destination for unique and personalised gifts for babies and children. They provide families with charming heirlooms which can be treasured for years to come!
Objectives:
Explore key trends identified by My 1st Years to establish an in-house, brand-style for the book aesthetics.
Write story manuscripts and illustrate storyboards alongside the product development team.
Illustrate and design a series of children’s stories with a comprehensive customisation system.
Impact
Enabled diverse representation
…through character development which recognises different skin tones and gender.
Developed new products
…to strengthen the brand offering and, in turn, created new sales opportunities for the brand.
Boosted in-house productivity
…by providing My 1st Years with an easy-to-use visual toolkit to help market and promote the books.
Story development
Buttercrumble was commissioned by My 1st Years to grow their product range with beautiful, personalised books inspired by trends, seasons and the current social landscape. It was crucial they fit harmoniously with the existing brand and products, as well as creating a new direction for their new book range. We delivered the following for each book:
Moodboards, concept, and synopsis creation
Story Manuscripts and storyboards
Custom illustrated book artwork
Marketing collateral Suite
Book illustrations
Each story was re-illustrated by us, with different characters, to create a comprehensive customisation system. The website allows customers from 15 diverse characters so many children can be represented.
We provided the printers with a complete suite of book designs so they could easily adapt the story to suit each customer’s unique needs and personalisation options (e.g. child’s name, gift giver’s name, character).
We illustrated the following customisable books:
The Amazing Adventure of You
It’s Good to Be You
My Christmas Book
“Thank you [...] for partnering with us as a creative directive on our own brand books project — it has been a joy!”
The results
My 1st Years now have a range of personalised books designed and formed in collaboration with Buttercrumble. This has enabled them to expand on their offering, find new audiences and develop their creative direction for this product type. Furthermore, the Christmas and Adventure books sold so well, they commissioned "It's Good to Be Me" to diversify their product line.
The book series are best-sellers and have since been reprinted due to their commercial success.