Strategy and innovation take a commercial organization to the consumer
Worthington Industries is a global, diversified, metals manufacturing company. As North America’s premier value-added steel processor, Worthington provides products and services for a variety of markets including automotive, construction and agriculture and is also the leading global supplier of pressure tanks and cylinders.
Client
- Worthington Industries
Industry
- Commercial
- Consumer
Capabilities
- Strategy
- Research
- Product Design
Background
Worthington came to Design Central looking to expand their industrial business offering into the consumer market. Our innovative and strategic thinking, ability to mobilize stakeholders and develop producible concepts through innovation sessions and research brought Worthington back to Design Central to partner on additional brand evolution and product opportunities.
Results
Design Central and Worthington have worked together to expand Worthington’s industrial businesses and consumer categories. Worthington had existing capital, resources, processes and a powerful commercial brand and wanted to capitalize on recent acquisitions. As a result, they asked Design Central for help discovering the potential of a number of opportunities and to engage in brand evolution and innovation strategy activities. The partnership has produced opportunities for Worthington to use its resources in new and innovative ways.
Strategy
Design Central strategized with the Worthington team to look at existing capital, business resources and brands to devise a brand exploration strategy. We facilitated work sessions with the horsepower of the Worthington team to generate seeds of ideas that would be filtered into usable materials to move forward and expand offerings for brands like Balloon Time.
Innovation
Worthington depended on Design Central’s innovative thinking to expand and further develop commercial lines like Bernzomatic and others for the retail market. For these programs the team looked at all possibilities for products, including branding options, by considering partnerships between Worthington business segments in blue-sky explorations of “what could be.”
Research
Research was conducted by Design Central to define consumer experiences around new products for Worthington brands. Researchers defined and explored activities around different product settings and generated verbal concepts to fit potential experiences. Consumers were re-engaged for reactions to product concepts to validate the new product strategy and its right-to-life.