Supremia, a provider of creative solutions and integrated process management for promotional product development, has developed a distinctive two-bottle gift pack featuring Maker’s Mark and Maker’s 46 Bourbon Whisky. Created for a variety of holiday promotions, the package’s rugged paperboard design recalls the rustic craftsmanship of the manufacturer’s iconic bourbon whisky bottles, each of which is hand-dipped in red wax and features hand-cut labels.

At the project’s inception, Beam Suntory, the parent company of Maker’s Mark, challenged Supremia to develop a gift pack that would leverage the familiarity of its traditional bourbon whisky label to promote its newer, lesser known premium product. The double-pack would comprise two smaller-than-usual bottles – 375 ml each – of the popular Maker’s Mark and the newer Maker’s 46, raising awareness and generating new consumers for the less established premium product.

Supremia was then tasked with creating a “premium feel” gift pack that remained true to the unpretentious, homestyle appeal permeating the Maker’s Mark brand. Supremia’s design innovation team pushed the boundaries of what could be achieved with various papers and finishes, creating a wood-cut look that blended perfectly with the simplistic craftsmanship evident in all Maker’s Mark bottles. To create this tactile feel on the outer carton, Supremia performed an overall deboss of a wood grain texture on the vat dyed board.

To create the appearance of a hand-applied strip stamp and wax seal wrapping over the top edge of the carton, Supremia used a combination of emboss/deboss and print to create the strip stamp, and a high relief emboss with a gloss finish on the wax seal. For maximum shelf impact, wood-stained graphics were printed on the inside of the windowed carton. For this, a custom wood grain print was produced on 0.010 SBS and laminated to E-flute microflute, meeting aesthetic desires while ensuring structural integrity. The final touch was simple: Supremia removed the pack’s window film, allowing the bottles to stand out without risk of glare or film clouding.

The project proved a great success, as it achieved all goals within budget, and ultimately increased efficiency for Beam Suntory by producing enough packs for a year’s worth of promotions with only one print run.

“We could not be any happier with the Maker’s Mark gift pack,” says Stacie Dunn, senior commercial marketing manager at Beam Suntory. “Supremia’s team implicitly understood what we were trying to accomplish, worked with us in true partnership, and was able to produce high-quality samples and comps early in the process. The end result was a creative, value-packed and altogether successful rollout that exceeded expectations.”

“Supremia’s visionary design team works hard to achieve tight collaboration with our customers’ marketing and brand teams,” says Robert Catalano, president, Supremia Americas. “By working closely and cooperatively with the Beam Suntory team, we were able to gain a deep understanding of their brand values and promotional strategy, which we combined with our own experience and research to produce a winning solution.”