Brian Crooks

Neenah Cabinet

2011

The Brief

The world of design and print is changing. It’s a world where the designers are no longer concentrated in offices sitting at their desks. They are working at home and in cafés. For Neenah, this means it is much harder to get sales people in front of clients to share swatch books and talk about products. Combine this with the ever increasing costs of print production and distribution, and what some paper companies would see as a problem, they saw as an opportunity.

Our Approach

We quickly decided that a digital solution would solve our cost and distribution problems. There would be little to no overhead, no waste, and more meaningful interactions between the sales team and the customer.

The Solution

First, we needed to help Neenah identify which of their four customer types would be our focus so we could clearly identify the functionality and specifications for the tool. I began by conducting interviews with Neenah's four primary customers and researching Neenah's current media mix. The research made it clear that the designer would be our primary audience and that a desktop application would prove the most effective at addressing our problems. The result is the Neenah Cabinet: A virtual library of Neenah swatch books, promotions, and customer favorites that allows users to browse, find and work with papers in a totally new way. Neenah now had a means to get the customer exactly what they want or need and still convey the breadth of their offering in an intuitive way that is familiar to the designer.

My Role

Worked with the creative director to identify key goals for the project.

Conducted design and user research.

Implemented or art directed UX and UI design.

Directly managed development and production.

Project management.

Complete at And Partners.