Brands and Brews Marketing Podcast · Brands and Brews

S3E13 - Creating a Winning Design Strategy for E-commerce Brands with Lauren Schwartz

·31 min·1 clip

Montucky Cold Snack gives away 8% of revenue to nonprofits and runs a mascot contest with NASCAR truck prizes.

The host opens with beer. He spends time on Montucky Cold Snack, pointing to the retro horse-and-mountain look, the Montana base, the four percent alcohol, and the way it speaks to skiers, snowboarders, and younger drinkers. Lauren Schwartz takes over the design talk. She describes research that starts with the product in hand and then moves through customer reviews, social media language, the brand's organic presence, and the competitive set. That research is treated as visual strategy work. The idea is to understand how people encounter the brand and what they are already saying before choosing how it should look and feel. Liquid Death gets the biggest nod. The brand is held up as an example of water made cool through marketing strategy, creative choices, the way it talks, and where it places itself. The host keeps that contrast in view. Water is ordinary, but the episode keeps showing how a brand can turn an ordinary product into something that feels like an identity choice. Loft 325 comes in near the end. Lauren Schwartz points listeners to the company's website and social channels, where more work and portfolio material can be found. The pace stays conversational. The host reacts, asks follow-up questions, and keeps moving between beer, brand examples, and the practical side of design. Nothing gets overworked. The episode is interested in how a brand presents itself, how people answer that presentation, and how those signals feed a better visual strategy. It never turns sterile. The tone stays relaxed enough to let the examples breathe while still keeping the discussion tied to business impact. The closing returns to Loft 325. By the end, the episode has tied a can in the host's hand to the larger work of building a design strategy that fits the audience.

As heard by us

A design conversation that grounds creative strategy in brand research.

The episode treats design as part of a working process, opening with Montucky Cold Snack's retro horse-and-mountain look and using it to show how a brand can speak to younger consumers.

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Why you'd press play

You want design advice that starts with the product and ends with a clearer brand read.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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