Richard Moore Associates

Market Situation
In the 1990’s, Apollo Sports was a successful manufacturer of underwater sport diving equipment, such as swim fins and air regulators. In Japan, market share was good but stymied. Internationally, all of Apollo’s exports were sold under the brand names of others. Apollo was poised to capture a larger share of the growing domestic market and go after the international market under its own brand name, but to do so, it needed a much stronger brand identity. Richard Moore Associates was asked to help formulate objectives, develop a competitive identity and implement it in a wide range of communications.

Objectives
Diving is a lot of fun, but all divers know that their safety depends upon the precision of their equipment. Although using diving equipment can be complicated, Apollo engineers were very skilled at making the gear as simple to use as possible. After studying Apollo’s strengths and opportunities, we recommended that the company’s Brand Identity be based on the personality traits of:
– Precise
– Simple
– Fun

Action & Result
Formulating a clear Brand Personality is an important prelude to the development of our creative work, and the three brand personality traits were used to guide every aspect of Apollo’s brand identity. To ensure that the brand received maximum prominence on products and promotion, a fixed system of sub-brands was developed. The result is a cohesive appearance in all media that conveys Apollo’s sincerity in producing safely engineered products that maximize fun in the underwater world. The brand was successful introduced in US, Australian and European markets, and soon grew to top sales status in Japan.