Freedom Reveals Rebrand Via The General Store

Australian furniture and homewares retailer Freedom is rebranding as part a retail and product renaissance with an emphasis on championing Australian designed products.

The rebrand includes an evolution of the logo and brand ID that was last updated in 2006.

“The new logo and brand ID is fresh, bold and contemporary and gives the brand a sense of modern utility,” said general manager marketing Jason Piggott.

“Moving the wordmark from lowercase back to uppercase gives strength and authority to the brand for enhanced clarity and impact. From here elements likes fonts, colours and tone of voice were aligned so that we had the building blocks of a brand that conveys a strong design aesthetic that aligns with our core DNA – namely design as our centre of gravity.”

Freedom’s marketing and visual merchandising teams translated the brand platform building blocks into various elements from photography direction, television and radio commercials, outdoor campaigns, digital and social assets, catalogues and directories launching across October. A new global best practice website will go live pre-Christmas, while 12 key stores will be refreshed and rebranded by November with the remainder updated throughout 2021.

New logo

Old logo

New Australian designed and made product created by dedicated design and product development teams will begin to hit stores in October with monthly drops thereafter.

Piggott says the new brand platform is anchored in the idea of furniture and homewares as objects of desire, inspired by a relaxed and contemporary way of life and our love of open spaces both inside and out.

“By styling our furniture alongside local landscapes, textures, people and colour, the Freedom brand’s look and feel becomes a celebration of beautiful design and effortless ease, whilst establishing Freedom as a part of our Australian cultural heritage.

“To excite customers and elevate the brand, we’ve taken creative cues from fashion campaigns using stylised imagery, photography and modern music – cementing Freedom as the home of design.”

Piggott said the new brand direction brings the company back to its roots.

“Freedom was the first furniture and homewares retailer to make design accessible to Australians. Now heading into our 40th year, we’re celebrating this local heritage and cementing our brand purpose of  ‘making beautiful things for the home available to everyone’.”

In conjunction with partner The General Store, the rebranding process was about stepping through brand workshops, research and creative development to ensure they were delivering on objectives.

“Freedom is a brand steeped in heritage. Our job was to capture the essence of its uniquely Australian design aesthetic and build a brand platform that could rollout across everything the brand does and says, both internally and externally,” says Matt Newell CEO The General Store.

“There are three key shifts that underpin our thinking as a team,” added Piggott.

“The first is our move to being a ‘lighthouse brand’. This means being absolutely clear about what we stand for, understanding how Australians live in their homes and presenting them with a clear definition of how they can bring this to life through thoughtfully designed and curated product ranges and in-store merchandising.

“One of the challenges around a legacy brand such as Freedom is how do you keep being relevant? For us, it was also a shift from being ‘your mum’s brand’ to being ‘your best friend’ – what we mean is that while you trust your mum for advice, if design and style are at the heart of our business, we wanted to capture the essence of a best friend who just knows how to pull it all together and create that perfect look.

“And finally, it’s about celebrating the products, ‘attainable objects of desire’ and bringing concepts to life.”

“Undoubtably, 2020 has seen the greatest societal shift in modern history due to COVID-19 and everything to do with the home has experienced enormous growth.

“We believe that COVID cocooning will continue , driven by property and renovation trends and the new normal of spending more time at home, making 2021 being the ‘year of the home’.

“Our focus is on growth in market share and resetting the brand in terms of product, brand reinvention, investment in eCommerce and a revitalised in-store experience.

“Breathing new life into a loved and trusted brand like Freedom will position it as the number one Australian destination for furniture and homewares,” he said..