The Creation of a Brand Experience

Just outside the bustle and noise of Cool Springs in Franklin, TN stands a quiet hillside covered with the young grapes of Arrington Vineyards. They stand in the foreground of a beautiful hilltop lodge where music, laughter and conversation can be heard throughout the summer evenings.

My wife and I had the opportunity to visit the vineyard with some friends this past summer. We packed our picnic basket of green olives, hard meats, gourmet cheese, and bread and merged with the hundreds that visit on the warm Saturday nights.

I was amazed from the moment we entered through the gates by the attention to design throughout the grounds. The goal of every company, whether offering a product or service, is to create an experience for their customer. This experience should not only be enjoyable, but memorable, consistent, and something that will make them want to do it again. That is definitely the case for Arrington Vineyards.

Just off Highway 96 East in Franklin, TN, Arrington Vineyards was founded in 2005 by country artist Kix Brooks, Fred Mindermann and winemaker Kip Summers. The entry is flanked by two giant wine casks, brandished with the vineyard's mark. The logo is simple, a circle seal with the AV initals working together to create the styled design. The mark looks wonderful standing alone, but here it's paired with a cursive typestyled namesake of the vineyard, evoking the feeling of the rustic feel of hand-worked land. These barrels set the stage for all of the branding's textures and materials. Aged, stained wood and black iron grace nearly every wall and floor in some shape or form.

Arrington carries 12 different wines (two additional special edition bottles are also available) in each of the 4 general categories: Red, White, Rosé and Dessert. As a designer with a deep pining to design wine labels, I was surprised by the simplicity of the labels. Why so, I don't know. They give off the same hand-worked feel as the AV logo. The black type on white paper offers an informal description of each wine (which, as a side note, were all great! Especially the raspberry dessert wine.), probably a shout-out not only to the care and love it takes to develop a wine, but also to this Middle Tennessee Valley region as well. This land was worked long before the malls and residential developments were constructed.

Architecturally, the lodge is an amazing, earthy construction, using wood and stone to create a warm, woodsy interior (It also turns out the lodge was originally a home built on the estate before AV bought the land!). The wine tasting room is incredibly welcoming, as it should be. That's where you pick up a bottle or two to take home! In spite of the droves of wine/conversation lovers that flock to the Vineyard throughout the summer, the wide open space keeps it from feeling cramped. Not to mention the view from the hillside and mellow music offers a great distraction from any potential elbow bumping.

Photo by Ryan Myers, UD+M

In an industry steeped in tradition and 'old world' appeal, and a city growing exponentially, Arrington Vineyards has merged the two marvelously, creating a chic evening venue for a modern experience.

Photo by Erik Jacobson

Photo by Ryan Myers, UD+M

All photos from Arrington Vineyards website unless otherwise noted.