Introduction

What a fun creative endeavor this was, I got to embrace my inner willy wonka and doc brown to experiment with what does a "keegan's chocolate bar look like?".... i experimented with 3d printing, all different types of taste and flavorings, as well as figure out how to conduct a small batch production process scalable to a few hundred bars...

sooo... how did I get started.... well of course by doing ✌ "research"✌ (aka buying and eating a bunch of chocolate.)

Chocolate bar "Research"

Turns out there is no right way to create a chocolate bar....choclate bars vary from chocolate to the packaging there's plenty of experimentation. there's brands that vary in terms of what value and tastes they cater to... but what are some take aways that will ultimately build mine? So lets dig into the commonalities between them...

I put my lab coat on and started to meticulously collect data from the 50 different chocolate bars I bought from the local grocery stores... if anyone had one, I bought it.... including, Brand, Chocolate type, Size, Weight, Price, ultimately to help understand where i wanted my bar to land.

Collecting all of this data helped me view all the commonalities and differences between them all. This really helped me view how i wanted to navigate with the crowd of bars, but also navigate away from.

I categorized a few meaningful questions to help form

tastes good
looks good
i want it to feel like it's good value and impact for the money spent

Requirements for a Keegan's Chocolate bar

tastes good

So what tastes good? Lots of things... what narrows it down but makes a statement/splash and speaks to my overall brand? do i choose something simple and get good at it or do i push for the extreme and challenge myself to see what i can produce.... in comes some inspiration while i was having a conversation with a coworker partner in crime Jen! At work we have a very supportive relationship, collaborating at all hours to get whatever the other needs help with done, exploring, and expanding each other, and playing therapist for each other when we need to. If she could do anything, i was having one day. Ah the perfect inspiration and combo, a tribute to her and what's better than coffee + donuts?

looks good

Sketching ideas.

When approaching any idea including the caramels... i usually draw an orthographic view where you view it from the top, side, front, and angled. This helps make sense of the object that i see in my mind and is a habit from taking all those engineering/CAD courses in highschool and college.

To the ipad, i went designing shapes and playing with objects in Sketch Pro... i knew that i didn't want my chocolate bar to look like the standard chocolate bar image i had in my head. from all the research it was obvious that squares + simple shapes allow for ease of eating, intermediate snacking and sharing... perfect portion control. Other chocolate bars like Tony's use this irregular pattern which.

I was looking for something that looked kinda modern, so i moved to

What about the label?

First Layout + Draft of the chocolate bar label

i want it to feel like it's good value and impact for the money spent

I wanted my bar to feel hefty...dense, filled with character, and incoming pleasure.

3d printing & chocolate prototypes

3d rendering of first design mockup - meeting my size + weight requirements

Finishing touches

Tying back to the website, working on the label, designing the look and feel.

Where we ended up

Backup

stating with the size. i asked what feels good to hold, feel touch...
what are the patterns of tessalation to break pieces off... does that matter.
then weight... what feels like a good $ for cost.

Determining my bar

Then flavoring taste... what to choose...?

I wanted mypin pointed my bar at 100g

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