INDUSTRy: CPG
CPG design that earns the second purchase.
Almost Always is a creative agency that designs brands and e-commerce for CPG companies that need velocity, not just shelf presence. We help CPG teams turn a good product into a brand people reach for twice.
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The brand is the distribution.
Velocity isn’t a retail metric you watch from a dashboard. It’s what happens when someone sees your product for half a second and gets it. The best CPG brands don’t just stand out. They explain themselves instantly. Most don’t get there. Not because the product is bad, but because the brand makes people work too hard.
Your CPG brand has half a second. Most spend it mumbling.
Almost always, a CPG purchase is decided in passing. A scroll, a shelf glance, a friend’s kitchen counter. Most categories get to build consideration. CPG gets an instant, and the brands that win make that instant count.
In CPG design, clarity beats cleverness.
Shoppers won’t read your back label until after they’ve decided. Great CPG design does the persuading up front. The name they can repeat. The category they can place. The difference they can feel at arm’s length. The clever pun that needs explaining is a lost sale. These aren’t nitpicks. They’re the job.
Your CPG brand is a signal. Make sure it’s sending the right one.
Bold sans-serif. Bright pastel can. A winking mascot that could belong to fourteen different better-for-you brands. You know the look. So does your shopper. Somewhere in their lizard brain, it reads as: another DTC brand that read the same trend report. Looking the same in this category is invisibility.
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Good CPG brand and e-commerce design starts with the moment of purchase.
We don’t start with moodboards. We start with where your product gets bought, what shoppers compare it against, and why your repeat customers come back. Strategy comes out of that. Design comes out of the strategy. The goal is always the same: a brand that sells when nobody’s there to explain it.
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CPG brand strategy can’t be templated. The judgment is the work.
There’s no template for this. The judgment calls — what the name promises, what the pack leads with, what the site says in the first scroll — that’s the work. Anyone can make a pretty can. The judgment about what makes it move is what you’re actually hiring for. If you want a team that owns that, we should talk.
OUR SERVICES
Branding
Brand identity designed to own a position in the category, not disappear into it.
Digital design
Websites, apps, and digital experiences that do the hard work so the user doesn’t have to.
Development
Built custom, accessible, and shipped on the tech stack that doesn't break when it matters.
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For CPG founders, CMOs, and growth leaders
The velocity unlock
Breakout velocity doesn’t happen because the formula got better. It usually happens because the shelf and the site finally tell the same clear story. That’s a brand and design challenge. And it’s one we’ve solved before.
Impact
12
Established CPG partners
$120M+
in fundraising
170 countries
and counting
$90M
in fundraising
Who you'd actually work with
The founders in El Segundo. Senior-level creative and design experts on every project. The work that requires judgment is the work that requires people. So the people who make the calls are the ones in the room.
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CPG FAQs
What do you love about designing for DTC and CPG brands?
What makes DTC branding different from every other kind of brand work?
In DTC and CPG, what are the pivotal moments when a company needs your help?
What do most DTC and CPG companies get wrong about their brand and/or design projects?
What are you working on?
If we're not a good fit to help, we'll say so. And point you to who is.
Talk to a co-founder
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