Member Article

Ringtons undergo historic makeover

Historic North East tea business, Ringtons, has changed its iconic packaging for only the third time since the 1960s, signalling a new era for the brand.

Creatives at Sunderland-based Lateral Advertising helped Ringtons to re-establish the famous horse and cart symbol that commemorates the company’s Tyneside heritage.

The family business was founded in 1907 and today Ringtons boasts over 200 Doorstep Delivery Drivers who have swapped the traditional horse and cart for vans, servicing 260,000 door-to-door customers.

Lisa Thornton, head of Marketing at Ringtons said: “We’re very fortunate in that our business model is built around developing personal relationships with each and every customer and this ensures a very customer-centric approach is followed. Our packaging re-launch has been no exception, and we’ve taken our customers, old and new, on this journey with us.

“In an increasingly competitive marketplace we need to make sure we stand out from the crowd and this starts with ensuring that our products are perfect. We always ensure that our tea and coffee is of the highest quality and freshness is absolutely key to this. We know this is one of our unique selling points so our packaging needed to reflect this to offer wider appeal. Our new designs showcase our ranges better and more accurately reflects us as a modern thinking company with traditional values and expertise.”

Lateral Advertising managing director, Alex Giles, said: “As a North-East based company ourselves, we know just how well loved Ringtons is not only in the region but across the UK, so it has been a fantastic opportunity for us to conceptualise and manage the redesign of the Ringtons packaging.

“The range previously did not have a unified look so it was great to be able to use the strong associations of Ringtons of heritage and quality to design new packaging that not only reflects these fantastic messages but which also protects the heritage of the company and brings it up to date, in a manner that will help explain the offer better to current customers and also attract new ones.”

For the last 30 years Ringtons has also operated its Beverages division that supplies tea and coffee, machines and sundries to hotels, restaurants, cafes, offices and businesses.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .