At the time of our first meeting with Ekaterina (October 2019) she was already about two years into making cold pressed oil. Gaining experience and learning manufacturing processes from her family (related to oil press machines also), she got it to the point where the product itself is good and demanded, but all the rest of what customers interacts with — from packaging to business documents — it either didn't keep to it or was not even made yet.

So, before growing our brand up, we had to get our hands dirty and get rid of all we didn't want to take with us.

Before working on our first big objectives — wholesale documents from business cards to order papers — we took the time to give our logo a make-up.

Though company's plans on expanding their product line were pointed out right from the get-go, it was not the main priority to start with. With several tons (like, literally tons) of bottles already labeled with old design, we had enough time to see if our other new visuals are welcomed by the clients. And by the end of May 2020 with sales constantly going up for 6+ months and production ready — it was a call for giving those bottles a fresh coat.

Apart from sunflower oil, which already got its local bestseller status and made company known for it, 3 more oils were brought to the party, made from black cumin, pumpkin seeds, and linseed. New flavors got smaller bottles (250 ml instead of 500 ml) since they are not as heavily used as sunflower oil, but had to keep up to their bigger brother in every other aspect.

To sum up what we were after: new packaging design for sunflower oil and 3 new oils, that would be not only fresh and good-looking, but well-thought on being eco. Yeah, eco, remember?

Since bottles themselves stayed the same and had square shape, we went for a single label taking three sides, just like you could have seen on some popular whiskey named Jack. It's cheaper in making and easier in applying to the bottle, since there's only one label instead of two individual ones. What's more, it allows for design elements to flow seamlessly across the bottle and conquer the shelf in an elegant way.

While layout, label fitting and initial designing process was going just fine, the biggest challenge was on that eco side. Our idea on using recycled craft paper had a bump on the road with no big print shops and label manufacturers having self-adhesive craft paper to make our labels on. It took about a week of calling other cities and reaching out to fellow design colleagues asking about where to catch that fish. And we finally got it! Huge shoutout to Glubina Tsveta for being out there for us with label craft paper in stock. And we could get our car back on wheels.

Spent about two weeks going back-n-forth from workshop to print shop myself, we got all the finishing touches just as the client wanted. With logo repeated as background color coding, QR-code for a special web page and even some leaves waving at you from the barcode — we got ready to hop on the shelf.

And as Ekaterina went on rocking the market with fresh new design, we got a contact of a wonderful photographer Arina Shelest, who turned or bottles into some hella models.

To support new product line and help the company in gaining attention on the web, I made them a little website using Webflow. Go check those animations at eco-maslo.com!

From testing background accent colors printed on yellowish craft paper to checking for barcode being scanned with no issues — it was a great experience on learning all the minor details in packaging design, which I would've never encountered or get taught otherwise.

And it's just one another level of happiness to see your work results not just favor the client's business, but loved by consumers and appreciated by biggest design platforms on the web.