Bette

A long-term family business in a restrictive market dominated by wholesalers: how can a brand continue to grow successfully in such conditions? How can it pass down to the next generation and survive the digital transformation? The Westphalia-based bathroom manufacturer Bette has taken on the challenges and shown how to handle the transformation.

The business magazine brand eins sums it up nicely: ‘Family businesses in Germany have overcome crises, wars and owner disputes. Now they are facing their greatest test.’ Digitalisation and generational change at the same time. Bette was no exception. The family business has been manufacturing quality architectural bathroom items out of the natural resources glass and steel since 1952. Bette offers a 30-year warranty on its glazed titanium steel products.

From one generation to the next.
Many of its products have received awards for their outstanding design. They are manufactured by a team of people, some of whom are third-generation employees of Bette. We have been providing comprehensive support – in the form of consulting, coaching, strategy, design, editing and visual language – for the development of the Delbrück-based company since 2016.

In this time, Thilo C. Pahl took over management of the company from his father Fritz-Wilhelm. Bette is opening itself up to new topics, formats and channels, and by communicating content – not just products – it is able to reach out to consumers, designers and architects strategically for the first time. In doing so, it is using a new digital and analogue corporate design combined with a new, modern verbal identity and imagery.

How was the change implemented? With trust and empathy.
The marketing and sales teams are growing and, alongside the management, are the drivers of change: fresh campaigns, modern communication tools and new digital sales channels are being explored. There is no time to be idle.

Change like this does not happen overnight. Change requires optimism and empathy. It depends on people in the company trusting us, the brand agency, and on us having a profound understanding of the market and of the values of the traditional family business.

Innovative, excellent, complete.
We developed this closeness with a dedicated team that spent a lot of time on site. In production, on sales trips, in discussions and workshops with the management and various team members, at product launches and at trade fairs.

This made it possible for us, as the brand agency, to set the right pace for the transformation of Bette. As a brand agency that thinks and acts with the bigger picture in mind, we inspire, drive innovation and support the brand through digital development processes.

For the global launch of the BetteAir, we are designing an exclusive microsite with interactive product videos, images, animations and content tailored to the target group. Alternatively, we are designing the Bette Lookbook, which offers more than just a digital and analogue look at the products, on a regular basis. Rather, it tells the stories of selected bathtubs, shower trays and basins, from the initial design idea to the finished product, turning the Bette brand into a visual, communicative and tactile experience in the process.