KELTY

WEBSITE DESIGN

PROJECT DETAILS

GRAPHIC DESIGN- NEW KELTY WEBSITE

MAY 2023

This website was created to in effort to elevate the Kelty brand identity and overall positioning through prioritization of design and an improved user experience.

The Kelty brand identity was designed by Iron Ladle Creative*

Kelty is an outdoor gear brand that was established in 1952 and has a long history of industry leading efforts towards innovation, sustainability and accessibility. The brand is owned and operated by Exxel Outdoors, where I held the position of lead Digital Designer from November 2022-December 2023. During my time at Exxel, I was given the opportunity to fully re-design the company’s largest ecommerce website, designing 15+ full webpage wireframes for desktop, mobile and tablet devices.
Outdoor enthusiasts seeking inspiration and expertise regarding outdoor adventures, Kelty marketing divides their primary consumer demographic into two categories. The first being individuals 40+ who are experienced, traditional, and trust the brand due to its legacy and familiarity. The second audience is comprised of individuals ages 18-39 who are spontaneous, vibrant, stylish and versatile adventurers who are encountering a wide range of activities (city-to-campsite, festivals, glamping, road trips, parks, beach, etc.)
The Kelty brand was established in 1952 by the founder, Dick Kelty, who both invented the first external frame backpack, and is widely credited for making the backpack accessible to the general public. In 1989, Kelty joined Patagonia and The North Face as a founding member of the conservation alliance. Given it’s long history, the Kelty brand has evolved over time, which resulted in the need for a more cohesive brand identity reflection across customer communications, marketing efforts & printed collateral. Prior to my introduction to the brand, an updated brand style guide had been introduced, but it had not yet been effectively integrated throughout all brand representations, notably the website. It was essential to appeal to both target audiences with this website update, while simultaneously simplifying the user experience in order to increase profit.

To design a new ecommerce website utilizing and expanding on the brand style guide in order to facilitate cohesion across customer communications, elevate the brand identity, and upgrade the website to surpass industry standard. The website should appeal to both demographics, while also inspiring the customers to experience the outdoors, and simultaneously educating them on the best practices to utilize when doing so. The new website design significantly improves the user-experience and therefore, results in more online sales.
In order to design a website that facilitated cohesion between customer communications while also elevating, unifying and expanding upon the brand identity, I emphasized the use of imagery, consistent brand elements, and the user-experience. In order to improve the user-interface and place this emphasis, I selected a San Serif font to accompany the unique brand font that had been solely used for all purposes prior to this project. This font selection aids the design in appealing to both defined demographic groups, as it evokes a simple, no-frills, functional, reputable connotation while simultaneously curating a modern, innovative, casual sentiment.
The final website design utilizes dynamic layouts, lifestyle imagery, typography, brand voice, unique brand elements, and simplicity to curate an innovative, inspiring, captivating, energetic, user-experience. The use of arrows, product movement, videos, parallax animations, and scrollable sections facilitate a fun, exciting, professional and thoughtful impression. The homepage blog integration, gear finder, and award winners section provide simple, integrated solutions to previously complex user-interfaces. The new additional font allows for greater typographical hierarchy, imagery emphasis, and accessibility. This, in accompaniment with the more strategic / sparse usage of the Kelty orange, intentionally guides the users attention. This allows for strategic choice presentations, effective layouts and increased selling opportunities that previously, were buried by distraction. Adjusting the darkest brand color to an off-black tone, utilizing dark gray, and incorporating more of the brand story throughout the website provides more personality and reputability. Incorporating vintage photography, highlighting earth-tone color products, and emphasizing the innovative functionality of the gear also provides a broad consumer appeal that is proven effective.

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