Rittenhouse Rye — Inspiring Creativity
Ritenhouse Rye
Because Rittenhouse's sales have historically been dominated by on-premise trade, the brand needed a fresh creative campaign to reinforce brand awareness and deepen loyalty, specifically keeping this trade audience at the heart of the initiative. The primary challenge was taking a newly established, edgy brand identity—rooted deeply in its Philadelphia heritageand seamlessly integrating myself into those new branding guidelines. I needed to quickly adapt to this fresh visual DNA in order to expand their print collateral and social media outreach without losing the authentic, historic soul that bartenders loved.
To bring the multi-channel "Cocktail Creatively" campaign to life, I fully immersed myself in the newly established brand guidelines. This modern identity featured an edgy Philadelphia aesthetic, a reimagined classic label, and a custom emblem inspired by aerial schematics of the historic Rittenhouse Square.
By deeply understanding and internalizing these new design rules, I was able to rapidly expand their marketing toolkit across print and digital touchpoints. I utilized the new branding to design a wide array of on-premise print collateral, including posters and menu cards for bars and restaurants. To make the pieces resonate with the target audience, I creatively overlaid the new Rittenhouse Square map graphics with classic bartending tools and ingredients.
The expanded print and social media materials successfully launched the "Cocktail Creatively" initiative, cementing Rittenhouse as the ultimate "bartender's Rye". By leveraging the new brand guidelines to build out a robust, cohesive library of assets, the campaign successfully spotlighted noted mixologists and inspired a whole new range of rye-based cocktails across the trade community. The resulting collateral not only drove on-premise engagement but built a strong sense of community, ensuring bartenders felt genuinely proud to mix with Rittenhouse.
