Platters Pizza & Records
Platters Pizza and Records is a fictional business that I invented as an exercise in creative direction, branding, and graphic design. Starting with a concept for a pizza parlor with a bar attached to a record store, I built a brand. The initial concept was inspired by recurring pizza and record nights that some friends and I had for a while -- it was a personal joke that pizza was the perfect food to eat at a record night because they're the same shape (yes, some pizza is square, but so are flexi-discs, so it still counts)..
The first objects I designed were the record bags and pizza boxes. As another fun nod to shape, the merchandise bags for the record store are designed with a classic-looking pizza box graphic and the pizza boxes are designed to look like a record in a sleeve. The song titles are clever opportunity to highlight important elements of the brand. There's another easter egg with the track list, too
-- if you can find it.
The next piece of material I designed for Platters was the coasters. I've been a fan of interesting coasters ever since I was young and my dad brought back some from a trip to Germany. To me, the coaster is a particularly useful little marketing item: customers consistently interact with it, it's easy to look at when there's any sort of lull, and a particularly interesting one can become a souvenir. It's also a practical physical place to put a schedule of recurring events. A coaster is effectively a flyer with a secondary physical function -- which is how Platters uses them. In addition to being coasters, fresh ones are placed in every bag with a record purchase.
I designed the top graphic as a pizza on a record player -- influenced by the iconic Technics SL-1200, but rearranged to fit in a square. On the back is a schedule of weekly events for the fictional establishment.
After building out a schedule, it was time to create marketing materials for the weekly events. I created 11" x 17" posters and social media images for Instagram, TikTok, X, and Bluesky for each one.
Mondays are Manic Mondays - an all day (10am - 10pm) happy hour hoping to bring folks in on a traditionally slow restaurant day. The poster image is inspired by the Bangles' album Different Light -- which Manic Monday appears on -- but in the Platters visual language. As with the other weekly events, the social media images are all based on the poster. On Mondays every week the social media manager posts a different version of the song by a different artist.
From left to right:
11" x 17" poster, Instagram/BlueSky image, X image, TikTok/Instagram Reels image
Tuesdays are music trivia - which I branded "Liner Note Nerds" in honor of the people who read every piece of material that comes with a piece of physical music media and anything they can find online. The graphic was an opportunity to play in the illustration space. The scratchy/inky looking image references the hand writing involved in trivia, references the analog feel of reading physical media materials, and captures the frazzled but enraptured energy of going down a
good rabbit hole.
Happy hour is extended through 8pm on Tuesdays and there are prizes from both the pizza and record sides of the business.
From left to right:
11" x 17" poster, Instagram/BlueSky image, X image, TikTok/Instagram Reels image
What's New? Wednesdays are a chance to show off a little more of the record side of the business. Every week our record staff picks two recent releases and we have free listening sessions on our sound system in the pizza side. This is an opportunity to show off some of our record store inventory while also providing a good hump day opportunity for folks to come, kick back with a slice or two, and listen to some music.
From a design perspective, What's New? Wednesdays provided a unique opportunity for social media images - specifically instagram. Since we play two records on the same night, I built slides for both records together as well as each one individually. This gives more opportunities for people to share what they specifically are looking forward to and also allows for a better showing of the album covers. When posting, the social media manager chooses
a song from the albums.
From left to right:
Top: 11" x 17" poster, X image, TikTok/Instagram Reels image
Bottom: Instagram/BlueSky slides
Thrifty Thursdays is fully about the record side. All used records are 25% off on Thursdays. This is for the crate diggers -- and to keep inventory moving...
The design for this poster plays on shape again, this time the roundness of a penny and a record. The goal for this poster was to be striking, straightforward, and
to the point.
From left to right:
11" x 17" poster, Instagram/BlueSky image, X image, TikTok/Instagram Reels image
Friday and Saturday evenings are Platters Pre-Funk. Platters isn't a nightlife establishment, but it is all about music, food, drink, and community. Positioning ourselves as a stop for a meal and first couple drinks before heading out to a concert or a club is a unique space that Platters is particularly well-suited to fill. With our sound system, we invite local or touring DJs to come play a set each
night from 6-10pm.
Doing the promotional materials for Platters Pre-Funk also gave me the chance to invent a couple of fictional DJs -- DJ Danny D and Citric Sid. It was a fun exercise in creating branding that was believable for two DJs that play different styles of music. It also provided a similar circumstance to What's New? Wednesdays in that it made sense to build separate slides for Instagram. This time there was the added dimension of creating individualized posts for the day of each DJs performance, which I included for TikTok, Reels, and Instagram/BlueSky posts.
From left to right:
Top: 11" x 17" poster, X image
Middle: Instagram/BlueSky
Bottom: TikTok/Reels
Self Care Sundays is Platters meeting people where they are - at home, recovering from Saturday night and/or resting before the work week starts. Designing this poster was particularly entertaining. I knew I wanted to reference sweatpants and TV but over the course of sketching out ideas I realized a nod to Blink-182's Take Off Your Pants And Your Jacket album made sense as a nice little easter egg and chance to chuckle for those who catch it, but still good design for those who don't.
From left to right:
11" x 17" poster, Instagram/BlueSky image, X image, TikTok/Instagram Reels image