Global design firm launches from Laga and Desgrippes merger

The newly merged company will provide services from brand strategy and consumer insight to brand identity, industrial design, package design, graphics, innovation, interactive retail experience and architecture.

The company is being created specifically to take advantage of the rise of design over advertising as the primary tool for building brands.

Brandimage will have around 300 staff in Asia, Europe and the US. with offices in New York, Chicago, Cincinnati, Paris, Brussels, Tokyo, Seoul, Hong Kong and Shanghai.

Jim Barrett has been named chief executive officer of Brandimage and Joel Desgrippes takes the title of chief creative officer.

Barrett said: "We are seeing a significant transition in marketing today, with brands looking beyond traditional advertising and promotion for more effective ways in which to establish and maintain strong relationships with the consumer and create experiences.

"As a result, design has emerged as the best way to give life to brands, because design can create those experiences and provide a personal and authentic relationship with consumers.

"Brandimage has been created specifically to service this change and to do so in a manner that offers all the needed design services in an integrated format."

Laga was founded more than 60 years ago as a design and innovation company and Desgrippes Gobe was founded in Paris in 1971 by Joel Desgrippes.

The merged company's clients include Air France, AOL, Banana Republic, Campbell Soup Company, Nestle, Saucony, Staples and Telefonica, among others.

This article was first published on brandrepublic.com