Design Intelligence Framework · Benjamin Cuenod

Brand decisions made
without a structural read
cost more than the read.

For a mid-size or large organisation making six or more major brand decisions per year, one will be structurally misdirected without a diagnostic layer. That decision — a repositioning built on the wrong foundation, a market entry that misreads the audience, a product launch that fractures rather than extends the brand — costs more to execute and reverse than the diagnostic that would have prevented it. Design Intelligence produces that diagnostic: a precise structural read of what the brand actually is, where it breaks down, and what any given decision will cost or protect.

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Signal
0.91
Coherence
Presence
Structure
Alignment
01 — System

The method

What a brand says is heard.
What it is is felt.
Few organisations know how to work with both.

When both correspond, the brand does not need to persuade. It resonates.

Design Intelligence works at that second level.

Most brands do not fail suddenly. They drift. The pressure for short-term performance is constant — clicks, conversions, quarterly returns. The brand responds. It optimises. It gets louder. And slowly, without anyone deciding it, it stops being what it was. The surface stays active. The signal beneath it quietly empties.

What made the brand real is still there. It does not disappear — it gets buried. Finding it is not a creative act. It is a diagnostic one.

That is where this practice begins.

First, the brand is mapped — its emotional architecture, its products, the audience relationship as it actually exists. Then coherence is tested across all three. Where the correspondence breaks down, the gap is named and its cost made legible. The proposals that follow are not strategic options — they are structural corrections. And the governance that comes after ensures that as the brand evolves, the coherence evolves with it.

Coherence compounds. A brand that is structurally itself attracts the right people, retains them, and earns the room to evolve. Not because it was marketed correctly. Because it was true.

What this is worth
Argument 01 · Most defensible
A bad decision costs more than the read that prevents it.
Documented repositioning reversals at mid-size European brands place direct execution cost between €500k and €1.5M — before the revenue lost during the correction period. A Brand Read costs 2–6% of that. It identifies whether the structural problem exists before the brief is written, not after the campaign has run.
Argument 02 · Revenue upside
One structural correction moves the metric the board watches.
The diagnostic identifies which single component of audience connection is suppressing performance — and which metric it is tied to. A 1-point improvement in consideration, retention, or NPS at mid-size or enterprise scale is worth millions annually. Reference case: BMW California scored 0.27 on a structural alignment measure against a direct competitor at 0.74. The score measures how completely the brand's emotional architecture connects with the target audience's actual decision drivers. The gap between 0.27 and 0.74 translated to €22,544 in price premium per unit the brand could not command — not because the product was inferior, but because the structural signal was.
Argument 03 · Governance value
One in seven major brand decisions is structurally misdirected without a governance layer.
The calculation uses your numbers: how many major brand decisions your organisation makes per year, what each typically costs to execute, and what a 14% structural error rate means at that scale. For a mid-size brand making eight decisions at an average of €400k each, the protection ratio on a governance retainer is 5:1 before any revenue upside is considered. The actual ratio is calculated in the first working session using your figures — not estimated averages.
What you can commission
01 Portrait & Diagnostic Entry point for every engagement

The structural read of your brand built from public evidence — communications, product positioning, market signals, competitive context. Maps the emotional architecture, resonance gaps, configuration, and priority intervention points. The entry point for every engagement. Prices in the confidential service catalogue.

02 Brand Creation For brands built from zero
03 Execution & Governance Ongoing — requires completed diagnostic
For whom
CEOs navigating a consequential decision
A repositioning, market entry, leadership transition, or acquisition where the brand's structural capacity is unknown. The decisions are expensive and consequential. The diagnostic provides the structural read that should precede them — not follow them.
Senior brand and marketing leaders
CMOs and brand directors who feel the structural problem clearly but cannot articulate it in terms a CFO or board will act on. The diagnostic produces that argument — in the client's own numbers, not in estimated benchmarks.
Organisations under competitive pressure
Brands losing share to a competitor they cannot clearly differentiate from, or facing new category entrants who are redefining the terms of competition. The diagnostic identifies the structural gap before the market response is built.
Consulting partnerships
Strategy firms and M&A advisors who win engagements that include brand structural questions their team cannot answer. The diagnostic is the specialist layer — produced in consulting register, integrated into the existing engagement.
02 — Process

How we work

The same sequence applies to every engagement. What changes is where it starts and how far it needs to go.

01
Orientation
We read first
Before any analysis begins, we read — the brand's history, behaviour, and moments where its character was most visible. Most of what a brand needs already exists inside it. Finding it requires patience, not invention.
02
Excavation
We find what is real
We surface the founding logic, the naming instinct, the things the brand refuses. The assets it has never claimed. These are not invented — they are recovered.
03
Foundation
We name what it is
We name what the brand actually is — its emotional logic, the world it inhabits, the character it expresses. Not what it should become. What it is, stated precisely enough to act from.
04
Diagnosis
We say what works
We test whether communication, product range, and audience relationships are coherent with what the brand actually is. Where they are, the signal is clear. Where they are not, we name the gap and what it costs.
05
Output
We build what is needed
Everything produced — voice direction, visual logic, campaign structure, the portrait report — is derived from the structural read. Nothing is added from convention. The output is a consequence of the diagnosis.
06
Continuity
We protect what is built
Brand coherence erodes quietly. We govern the execution layer — checking each new output, partnership, and market move against the brand model. When the brand is ready to grow, we ensure that growth is a deepening of what it is, not a departure from it.
03 — About

The practitioner

Benjamin
Cuenod
Brand architect · 25+ years
NIO
Brand Design & Experience — Europe & UAE
Roland Berger
Brand narrative & consulting translation
Red Bull TV
Brand & content architecture
ARTE / 3sat
Rebrand & spatial identity (via Scripted Reality)
LA studios
Film title & broadcast design
DE EN FR IT

The work has always begun in the same place: listening closely enough to an organisation to surface what is genuinely distinctive — before shaping it into something others can recognise and trust. From film title studios in Los Angeles to broadcast networks across Europe, from automotive flagships to electric vehicle market entries spanning Munich, Amsterdam, and Dubai, the instinct has remained constant.

What drives this practice is not aesthetic ambition but structural honesty — the conviction that a brand either reflects something real about an organisation, or it costs that organisation money in ways it cannot easily name. The most useful position is the space before the brief exists: where the question itself is still forming, where scattered stakeholders are working from incompatible mental models, and where someone needs to give coherent form to something genuinely undefined.

At NIO, that meant bridging China headquarters and European markets simultaneously. At Roland Berger, it meant translating consulting logic into brand narrative. Across decades of broadcast work, it meant connecting spatial design, motion systems, and content governance into a single coherent architecture.

The combination is unusual. The craft grounding of someone who was animating frame by frame before After Effects had a name. The systems thinking of someone who has designed live-data broadcast architectures and multi-market brand governance frameworks. The strategic orientation of someone who has consistently operated upstream — defining the rails, not running on them.

On AI & the framework
Design Intelligence is AI-assisted, not AI-built. The diagnostic framework, the scoring logic, and the practitioner judgement are human. AI tools accelerate research, pattern recognition, and report production — they do not replace the structural reading or the findings. The capability here is genuine. So is the boundary: AI can generate anything. Coherence cannot be automated — and that is precisely why the practitioner's role exists.
How to begin
Start with a Brand Read.
No fee. No pitch.
We produce a partial structural diagnostic from public evidence — three findings, no commercial proposal. You see the quality of the work before any engagement begins.
The same approach produced the diagnostic that led a premium manufacturing brand's product leadership to table the findings with their CEO. It is not a teaser. It is a complete structural read at reduced scope.
There is no fee for the Brand Read. If the findings are useful and you want the full structural picture, we discuss a full engagement. If they are not, you have a partial diagnostic you can use internally at no cost. The commercial intent is transparent — the value is not conditional on it.
01
We read your brand from public evidence
Communications, product positioning, market signals, competitive context. No internal data required. Produced in 2–3 weeks.
02
You receive three structural findings
Specific, named, and commercially grounded. Not a capability overview — an actual finding about your brand, produced before any commercial conversation begins.
03
If the findings are useful, we discuss what comes next
The full diagnostic, the voice work, the governance retainer — or nothing further. The Brand Read is a complete deliverable. If you find it useful and want the full structural picture, that conversation is straightforward. If you do not, the three findings are yours to use.
04 — Case

The method in action

PUMA Sportswear · Global

A complete diagnostic from emotional root to strategic direction — showing what a full Design Intelligence engagement produces. Every finding came from publicly available information only.

Sample case — analysis from publicly available information only
01 — Emotional engine
What drives this brand at its deepest level
Not a values statement. The actual motivational current that runs through every product, every communication, and every relationship this brand builds.
Primary drive
Individual conviction
The decision made before the moment that reveals it. The person who has done the inner work, accepted every outcome, and acts from settled completion — not for the crowd. Rudolf Dassler crossing the Aurach river alone in 1948 and naming the company after the animal that hunts without an audience. That is still the deepest true thing about PUMA.
Secondary drive
Earned warmth
Not community. Not belonging. The warmth that comes from standing with someone when it costs something — when the cameras have gone home. Simburg boarding the plane with Smith and Carlos after the 1968 podium gesture. Care that is real because it was tested. This is where the brand's genuine warmth lives, and it is almost entirely invisible in current communications.
Present in communications — absent from identity
Community Joy Self-expression as performance
Core tension
A solitary predator being asked to perform for the herd. "Go Wild" was built from 10,000 consumer interviews targeting "convivial belongers" and "inspiring self-expressers." PUMA's founding energy is precisely the opposite: the individual who acts without requiring the crowd's validation. The campaign is technically proficient. The brand is structurally misaligned with what it is actually selling.
02 — Brand world
The world this brand lives in
Every brand has its own internal physics — structural rules that govern what feels natural, what feels forced, and what breaks the brand's own logic when violated.

PUMA inhabits a world defined by pre-decision. The moment that matters is not the gesture — it is the stillness before it. The preparation. The inner completion that makes the outer act inevitable. This is not a world of spectacle or community celebration. It is a world of precision and solitude, where quality is made for consequence, not for display.

The social atmosphere is intimate rather than public. One athlete, one decision, one moment of real cost. The emotional register is restrained and exact — warmth present but never performed, authority earned not announced. The Speedcat was designed for cockpit conditions. It did not ask to be worn on city streets. People chose it quietly, without being invited. That is the correct physics of this brand's world.

What breaks the brand's logic: volume, community framing, joyful crowd energy, the language of self-expression as performance. These are the natural grammar of Adidas and Nike — brands built for the pack. PUMA's world has different rules. The animal on the logo is solitary by nature. Operating against that is not a creative choice. It is a structural error.

03 — Brand character
What this brand is
A stable picture of how PUMA thinks, why it exists, how it shows up, and how it changes — read from its decisions and history, not from what it says about itself.

PUMA thinks from settled conviction, not from market data. Every authentic moment in its history — Pelé signed against the Pelé Pact, the Cameroon sleeveless kit worn despite FIFA's ban, Bolt celebrating exactly as he wanted — shares one structural property: the decision was made before knowing whether the crowd would accept it. The brand's most credible posture is internal completion expressed outward, never the reverse.

At its core, PUMA exists to confirm the self-determined person's identity — not to build it. It does not invite people to become something. It recognises people who have already arrived somewhere. This is a specific and defensible position that no major competitor in the category currently occupies at identity depth.

The brand shows up through restraint and specificity. The Speedcat carries cockpit-grade engineering without announcing it. The Suede has held cultural weight for over fifty years without needing a campaign to explain why. The brand's best objects know what they are. Its worst communications try to be liked.

Where the character fractures: the decision to build "Go Wild" from consumer research rather than from identity conviction. PUMA's founding logic is that you don't ask the crowd what to be. The campaign did exactly that — technically excellently, structurally incorrectly. The result: top-five percent short-term sales effectiveness, a profit warning, a CEO departure, and Q1 2025 net income collapsed from €87M to €500,000. The campaign worked. The brand eroded.

Character in one line
Made before the moment. A brand that acts from inner completion — but is currently performing for an audience that is not its own.
04 — Market position
How this brand sits across eight psychological dimensions
Position is mapped across dimensions that describe how the brand's audiences think, feel, and make decisions. Brands that connect deeply tend to have at least one dimension where they clearly stand out.
Autonomy orientation
High
Identity stability
High
Cultural literacy
High
Resistance to crowd
High
Aspiration pull
Low — by design
Community orientation
Low
Tolerance for restraint
High
Risk acceptance
High
Key finding — uncontested space
The profile of PUMA's structural audience — high autonomy, high identity stability, high cultural literacy, strong resistance to crowd — is occupied by no major competitor at identity depth. Nike owns aspiration and community. Adidas owns culture and belonging. The self-determined person who has done the inner work and arrived somewhere is addressed by neither. That space is PUMA's by founding right. It is not currently claimed.
05 — Audience connection
How four audience groups connect with this brand
Connection is measured by how closely a group's values, aspirations, and decision-making style align with the brand's actual character. It is not preference or awareness. It is structural alignment.
Group 01
The Settled Self-Determiner
28–45 · Urban · High literacy · Inner-directed
Connection
Strong
PUMA's structural core. Has done the inner work, arrived somewhere, does not need external validation for choices. The Speedcat revival was driven entirely by this group — organic, subculture-led, before any campaign existed. The brand is failing to speak to them coherently in current communications.
Group 02
The Emerging Earner
19–28 · Urban · Still establishing · Culturally aware
Connection
Functional
Still in the searching phase — has not yet arrived at the inner completion PUMA's character requires. Resonates with the brand's objects (Speedcat, Suede) but reads the current communications as aspirational lifestyle rather than conviction. Connection improves as the person matures, not as the campaign changes.
Group 03
The Community Expressionist
18–35 · Social · Identity-as-performance · Trend-led
Connection
Marginal
The audience "Go Wild" was built for. High short-term campaign response, low structural loyalty. This group is Nike and Adidas territory — both command this space with more authority and more resources. PUMA cannot win here without abandoning what it is.
Group 04
The Performance Athlete
20–40 · Sport-first · Results-driven · Category-deep
Connection
Functional
Strong product credibility in specific sports (football, motorsport, running). Identity connection is functional rather than deep — the brand is chosen for performance, not for character alignment. On Running and Hoka are taking share in this group through more coherent identity signals.
06 — Structural issues
Five problems in order of seriousness
These are not communication problems. They are structural — meaning they cannot be fixed by changing the advertising. Each requires a decision about what the brand actually is and who it is actually for.
01
The brand has outsourced its identity to its audience's preferences
"Go Wild" was built from 10,000 consumer interviews. PUMA's founding logic is that you don't ask the crowd what to be. The decision to build strategy from market research rather than from identity conviction is the root error — and it is the precise opposite of what the brand's character is about. The campaign is working as a campaign. The brand is eroding as a brand. Q1 2025 net income: €500,000, down from €87M the prior year.
02
The Speedcat moment is being amplified in the wrong direction
The Speedcat revival was organic, underground, and driven by exactly the audience that constitutes PUMA's structural core. The brand's response: Ferrari collaborations, Lewis Hamilton campaign imagery, global out-of-home rollout. The shoe's value was precisely proportional to how carefully it was not amplified. Adidas governed the Samba revival with restraint and built a multi-year cultural anchor. PUMA is moving faster and in the opposite direction.
03
The brand shouts in its advertising and whispers in its best objects
The Speedcat is restrained, precise, technically derived. The Suede has carried cultural weight quietly for over fifty years. "Go Wild" is loud, community-oriented, visually emphatic. The incoherence is legible to exactly the people PUMA should be attracting — the high-literacy buyer who reads subtext. They see the mismatch and move toward On Running and Hoka, both of which grew 50–68% in 2024 without being louder than PUMA.
04
Seventy-five years of identity proof is sitting unused
Rudolf Dassler crossing the river alone. Simburg boarding the plane with Smith and Carlos. The Cameroon kit worn despite the ban. Bolt refusing to perform like someone who needed permission. Every one of these moments shares one structural property — the decision made before knowing whether the crowd would accept it. None of this is being used as identity architecture. It is treated as heritage content. The distinction: commemorative use looks backward. Generative use says this is what we are, and here is the proof.
05
The ownership structure is misaligned with the recovery timeline
PUMA is majority-owned by Kering. The right recovery direction requires three to five years of consistent execution against a single identity conviction — low short-term sales effectiveness, high long-term loyalty. The ownership structure creates quarterly performance pressure that is structurally incompatible with that timeline. The CEO instability of recent years is partly a product of this dynamic. The right strategic direction and the available patience for it are not currently aligned.
What the diagnostic produced
Two directions found
These are not creative ideas. They are the direct output of the structural findings above — the only directions available to this brand that do not fracture its own character.
Direction 01 — Identity reclaim
Stop performing.
Start being.
The diagnostic identified a single root cause: the brand is operating from market data rather than from identity conviction. This direction restores the founding logic — act from settled inner completion, let the audience find it — and governs every output against it. Not a rebrand. A governance decision about what the brand will and will not do.
Conviction — restored Restraint — active Speedcat governed

"Made before the moment."

Four words. No aspiration. No invitation. The claim is structural — it describes how the brand makes decisions, not what it wants you to feel. It is verifiable against the founding story, against 1968, against Bolt, against the Speedcat. It applies to product, athlete relationships, and communications equally. It is also the line that no competitor can say without lying.
Direction 02 — Audience precision
Stop trying to win
the wrong room.
PUMA's market capitalisation sits at approximately $8B against Adidas at $30B and Nike at $80B+. The gap is not a scale problem. It is an audience problem. The brand is competing for the most contested segment in the category — the community expressionist — with the least structural advantage. This direction exits that contest and claims the uncontested space: the self-determined, inner-directed person that no competitor addresses at identity depth.
Audience — precise Uncontested space Long-term loyalty

"Not for everyone. Recognisable to the right ones."

The line does what PUMA's founding character does: it lets the wrong audience pass and makes the right audience feel recognised, not recruited. It is the structural opposite of "Go Wild." It will not test well in short-term campaign metrics. It will build the kind of loyalty that On Running and Hoka are currently demonstrating is commercially real and structurally durable.
Note
This is a sample diagnostic produced entirely from publicly available information — brand history, press coverage, advertising, product communications, financial reports, and public statements. It was produced using the Design Intelligence Framework by Benjamin Cuenod. PUMA SE has no involvement in or knowledge of this analysis. The findings represent a structural read of a public brand, not a commissioned engagement.
Service Catalogue
Connect
— Service Catalogue

Engagements & pricing

Every engagement begins with a diagnostic. The diagnostic produces a brand model — a structurally derived, durable asset that the organisation can operate against for years. Execution, governance, and evolution work are downstream of that model. Nothing in this catalogue is available without a completed diagnostic foundation. Pricing is structured by organisation size to reflect the scope each engagement requires.

01 Portrait & Diagnostic
Core · Entry point
Brand Coherence Diagnostic — External
Full structural read from public evidence. Portrait, resonance gaps, configuration, and priority intervention points. The entry point for every engagement.
€4,500 – €8,000
2–3 weeks · Written report + debrief
€8,000 – €15,000
2–3 weeks · Written report + debrief
€18,000 – €32,000
3–4 weeks · Written report + debrief
€35,000 – €55,000
3–5 weeks · Written report + debrief
Core · Deep
Brand Coherence Diagnostic — Full
External diagnostic sharpened with internal data, interviews, and customer research. Validated scores and precise intervention points.
€9,000 – €16,000
4–6 weeks
€18,000 – €30,000
5–8 weeks
€40,000 – €70,000
6–10 weeks
€75,000 – €130,000
8–14 weeks
Intelligence
Concurrence Report
Structural analysis of 1–3 competitors. Maps positioning, drift, and space available.
€2,500 – €4,000
Per competitor set
€4,000 – €7,000
Per competitor set
€8,000 – €15,000
Per competitor set
€15,000 – €28,000
Per competitor set
Stress Test
New Element Coherence Test
Brands that have completed recovery work accumulate sediment when new decisions are made without testing them against the established model. This engagement runs every proposed move — new product, market entry, partnership, campaign, or leadership transition — through the recovered brand model before execution. Returns a coherence judgment with written reasoning. The instrument that holds the line.
€2,000 – €4,000
Per element
€4,000 – €8,000
Per element
€9,000 – €18,000
Per element
€18,000 – €35,000
Per element
Monthly
Presence Audit
Monthly drift check across live channels. Flags and correction brief. Requires completed diagnostic foundation.
€800 / month
Monthly · Ongoing
€1,500 / month
Monthly · Ongoing
€3,000 / month
Monthly · Ongoing
€5,500 / month
Monthly · Ongoing
Corporate
M&A Brand Compatibility
Pre-merger structural identity audit. Alignment distance, integration difficulty, brand dilution risk.
On request
Scoped per situation
€12,000 – €20,000
Scoped per situation
€22,000 – €40,000
Scoped per situation
€40,000 – €80,000
Scoped per situation
02 Brand Creation
Foundation · From zero
Full Brand Origination
All core elements defined from scratch: affective signature, world rules, character, mythic core, persona architecture, voice and visual governance. For new ventures and organisations that have never had a structural identity.
€8,000 – €18,000
6–10 weeks · Complete foundation document
€20,000 – €40,000
6–10 weeks · Complete foundation document
€45,000 – €85,000
8–14 weeks · Complete foundation document
€90,000 – €130,000
10–16 weeks · Complete foundation document
Voice
Communications Register
Practical voice and tone guide derived from diagnostic. Register, vocabulary, sentence logic, and what to avoid.
€2,000 – €4,000
Written guide
€4,000 – €7,000
Written guide
€8,000 – €14,000
Written guide
€18,000 – €28,000
Written guide
Narrative
Narrative Architecture
Complete story structure: founding logic, positioning, future direction. Written for pitches, press, and long-form communications.
€2,500 – €4,500
Written document
€4,500 – €8,000
Written document
€9,000 – €16,000
Written document
€20,000 – €32,000
Written document
Tool · Monthly
Voice Tool — Subscription
AI-powered text production tool built on your defined voice. Your team generates governed communications independently. Requires completed voice engagement.
€500 / month
After voice engagement
€600 / month
After voice engagement
€1,200 / month
After voice engagement
€2,200 / month
After voice engagement
03 Execution & Governance
Retainer · Monthly
Strategic Counsel
Regular access for live brand, positioning, and market decisions reviewed through the structural lens before they are made.
€1,200 / month
Monthly retainer
€2,500 / month
Monthly retainer
€5,000 / month
Monthly retainer
€9,000 / month
Monthly retainer
Retainer · Full Governance
Brand Governance Partner
Full governance layer during active repositioning or significant transition. Agency briefings reviewed. Designer and partnership decisions evaluated against the structural brief. Product and market launches stress-tested before execution. Weekly access. For organisations where the brand decisions of the next 12 months define the next decade.
On request
Scoped per situation
€4,500 / month
Min. 12 months · Weekly access
€9,500 / month
Min. 12 months · Weekly access
€16,000 / month
Min. 12 months · Weekly access
Direction
Creative & Strategic Direction
Briefing and governing agencies on behalf of the brand. Translation of structural findings into executable creative direction.
€1,500 – €3,500
Per brief
€3,500 – €7,000
Per brief
€7,000 – €15,000
Per brief
€14,000 – €28,000
Per brief
Evolution · Episodic
Product Discovery Engine
For brands whose recovery is in progress and whose character is operating correctly — the question becomes: what could this brand credibly build that does not yet exist? This engagement takes the recovered brand model as input and works systematically through the founder material, brand character, and cultural moment to surface candidate products, services, or ventures the brand could genuinely own. Delivered as a portfolio of named candidates with strategic rationale. Not available before a completed diagnostic. Not a strategy document — a structured discovery process that produces real options.
On request
12–16 weeks · Portfolio of candidates
€25,000 – €45,000
12–16 weeks · Portfolio of candidates
€55,000 – €90,000
12–16 weeks · Portfolio of candidates
€95,000 – €160,000
12–16 weeks · Portfolio of candidates
Structural coherence work at the campaign or launch level — brief before creative begins, or fast-turnaround review before anything goes live.
€800 – €1,800
Per launch
€1,800 – €3,500
Per launch
€4,000 – €8,000
Per launch
€8,000 – €16,000
Per launch
All engagements begin with a conversation — not a proposal. Prices are ranges; exact scope is confirmed before any engagement starts. A completed diagnostic is required before execution or governance work is commissioned.
Client Portal
Connect
— Client Portal

Active engagements

Each client has a private page accessible only with their individual key. This index is for practitioner reference only.

Engagement · Active
CLT-001
Report delivered · In conversation
Brand Coherence Diagnostic (external) completed. Three findings delivered. Full engagement proposal open.
Section I of IV delivered →
Engagement · Demo
CLT-002
Demo case · Public
Full brand intelligence report produced as public demo case — PUMA SE. Five structural findings. Two directions developed.
Demo case complete →
Engagement · Active
CLT-003
Diagnostic delivered · Engagement map open
Brand Intelligence Review and product line communications register delivered. Full engagement map with two paths, voice architecture, and Brand Intelligence Assistant in development.
2 items delivered · Map active →
Pareva GmbH — Client Page
Connect
IoT Smart Locker Solutions · Bruchsal, Baden-Württemberg · Founded 2018
Portrait — Structural summary
A platform brand communicating like a product company

Pareva was conceived as an access control intelligence platform — "controlled access management, connecting the real with the digital." Over seven years of commercial focus, the locker use case became the category definition. The original positioning was broader, more defensible, and still entirely true. The brand stopped saying so.

The company's deepest differentiator — the partner model, where Steelcase, BURG, dm, Charité and twenty others chose Pareva as their infrastructure layer — is framed as a commercial feature rather than a character statement. It is not evidence of invisibility. It is evidence of being chosen by experts who evaluated every option.

Operating across six countries under five domain names, the brand produces a different impression in each market without a structural identity governing any of them. Voice incoherence at this scale is not a future risk — it is an active structural condition accumulating cost in every market encounter.

Diagnostic findings
Finding 01 · Delivered
Platform brand communicating like a product brand
Finding 02 · Delivered
Strongest differentiator is the least visible
Finding 03 · Delivered
Six countries. No governing voice architecture.
Finding 04 · Full engagement
Audience alignment: where the brand gap creates market friction
Finding 05 · Full engagement
Suppressed expansion energy and what it takes to unlock it
Delivered
Brand Coherence Diagnostic — Section I of IV
External diagnostic · May 2026 · HTML report
Open report →
What comes next
01
Brand Coherence Diagnostic — Sections II–IV
Audience profile across six markets, brand-audience alignment score with component breakdown, and a sequenced intervention roadmap ordered by commercial return. Includes voice governance framework for international scaling.
Studio tier · €8,000 – €15,000 · 3–4 weeks
02
Communications Register — Voice Governance
A single governing voice document for all six country entities. Defines how Pareva thinks, acts, and speaks regardless of market. Resolves the US "Pareva Locks" regression and the bilingual-within-posts incoherence.
Studio tier · €4,000 – €7,000 · Follows diagnostic
03
Positioning Statement — Platform identity
A structurally grounded declaration that reclaims the original access intelligence positioning. Built to hold under commercial pressure and across six markets without requiring translation.
Studio tier · €4,000 – €7,000 · Follows diagnostic
CLT-003 — Client Portal
Connect
Client · Enterprise tier
CLT-003
Premium Bathroom Solutions · Germany · Global Distribution · Engagement active May 2026
Portrait — Structural summary
Design authority without emotional presence — and a leadership transition that will define the next decade

The brand holds a genuine structural moat — four decades of serious designer partnerships that no competitor has replicated. That moat is real, but it is not being communicated. The brand's emotional architecture operates at the level of quality and function rather than desire or transformation. In a market where V&B is gaining scale through acquisition and Chinese entrants are compressing mid-tier specification, the design authority advantage needs to be made legible and felt — not just present.

The SensoWash portfolio represents the brand's most commercially urgent voice misalignment: a product built around body experience communicating in specification language. The Canada facility — the world's first climate-neutral ceramic production site — is the brand's strongest proof point and is currently activated in no market.

An interim CEO with a transformation mandate is making brand decisions through an efficiency lens at the moment when the brand's defining structural assets require the opposite. The governance conditions of the next 12 months will determine whether the brand emerges from this period stronger or structurally diminished.

Engagement items
April 2026 · Delivered
Brand Intelligence Review — External Diagnostic
Five-part structural read of the brand from public evidence. Identity, gap, system, audience, geography.
Delivered Full report External sources
▼

Five-chapter external diagnostic covering brand identity and emotional architecture, the gap between product offer and brand communication, identity system performance layer by layer, buyer behaviour across four groups, and brand performance across five geographies. Closes with four priority recommendations.

April 2026 · Delivered
SensoWash — Communications Register
Practical voice and tone guide derived from finding 04 of the brand review. Working draft, ready to deploy.
Delivered Working draft Deploy-ready
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Five language principles specific to SensoWash. Tone calibration within the wider brand frame. Worked examples across six formats: product copy, campaign headline, retail material, press line, B2B specification context, and social. Vocabulary guide covering what to use and what to avoid. Addresses the most commercially urgent mismatch in the portfolio — sensation-first product, specification-first language.

May 2026 · Active
Engagement Map — What Comes Next
Two engagement paths, voice architecture scope, two further steps, and retainer options. Includes immediate add-on: Brand–Leader Resonance Report.
Active Decision open
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A complete map of what can follow the delivered work — two engagement paths at different depths, the voice architecture scope, geographic extension, brand foundation rebuild, and retainer options. All paths start from the same strategic question: what can the brand carry in a repositioning, and what will it cost to ask it to do something it is not built for.

Immediate · No prerequisite
Brand–Leader Resonance Report
Structural alignment between the incoming CEO and the brand he is now leading. Maps overlap, drift zones, and governance conditions. The most time-sensitive item in the engagement — brand decisions made in the next 12 months are being made without this read.
€18,000 – €28,000
2–3 weeks · Can begin immediately
Path B — Light engagement
Targeted Research + Priority Voice Register
8–10 internal interviews across leadership, sales front line, and one product line manager. Targeted external intelligence. Diagnostic revision on three priority gaps. One priority voice register (SensoWash full production or ME by Starck). Revised brief and positioning note for leadership.
€32,000 – €48,000
5–6 weeks · Europe only · Designed to inform Path A decision
Interviews
8–10 internal
Voice registers
1 priority line
Output
Revised brief + note
Duration
5–6 weeks
Path A — Full engagement
Complete Strategic Intelligence + Voice Architecture
20–26 interviews across all five internal groups plus external buyers. Full external market intelligence. Complete diagnostic revision. Six voice registers — four product lines, internal, and PR. Leadership strategic brief delivered in person. The full picture before any repositioning decision is made.
€95,000 – €130,000
10–12 weeks · Europe first · Gulf + Americas in Step 01
Interviews
20–26 total
Voice registers
6 documents
Output
Leadership brief
Duration
10–12 weeks
What follows — Step 01
Gulf + Americas Intelligence Brief
Market-adapted strategic briefs and voice guidance for the two highest-growth geographies. Follows Path A or B.
€28,000 – €42,000
6–8 weeks · Follows either path
What follows — Step 02
Brand Foundation Rebuild
Structural identity definition for the next phase. Requires Path A completion. Not a visual redesign — a governance framework for all brand decisions going forward.
€65,000 – €95,000
10–14 weeks · Requires Path A
Retainer options
Ongoing governance — three formats
Presence Audit (€3,500/month · drift monitoring), Strategic Counsel (€6,500/month · decision access), Brand Governance Partner (€12,000/month · full governance during active repositioning). All begin after either path.
Min. 6–12 months depending on format
Available · In development
Brand Intelligence Assistant — Voice Tool Subscription
Private AI assistant trained on the diagnostic findings, voice principles, product lingo, and brand elements. Monthly subscription for your team.
In development SSO · Q3 2026 Subscription
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A private text interface for your team — trained on the diagnostic findings, SensoWash voice principles, competitive positioning, product line lingo, and key brand elements. Ask any brand, positioning, or communications question and receive an answer grounded in the structural read of this brand specifically. Not a generic AI assistant. This one only knows what the diagnostic found about you.

What the assistant is trained on
Diagnostic findings
Emotional architecture · 5 structural gaps · Competitive position · Canada facility opportunity
Voice principles
SensoWash register · Tone calibration · Vocabulary guide · What to avoid
Product lingo
All product line names · Internal terminology · Sector-specific language · Partner names
Deepens with engagement
Path A completion rebuilds the assistant on full primary research · More precise, more specific
Subscription
€800 / month
3 users · 50 queries per user · Billed monthly
Access
SSO gated
Company login · Usage dashboard · Admin panel · Q3 2026
Requires
In development
Available after lingo capture session · Activates on engagement start
Lingo capture — required before activation
Before the assistant is built, a short structured session captures the elements the diagnostic cannot see from the outside — internal product naming conventions, department-specific terminology, approved and banned vocabulary, key partner names, campaign shorthand, and any brand language that lives inside the organisation rather than in public communications. This session is included in the subscription setup. It is what makes the assistant yours rather than generic.
Volkswagen AG — Demo Case
Connect
Demo case · Enterprise tier
Volkswagen AG
Automotive · Wolfsburg, DE · Public demo — not a live engagement
Portrait — Structural summary
A care-dominant brand in a forward-energy category without a succession plan

VW's emotional architecture is built on Care and Continuity — historically its greatest asset. The brand's strongest connection, the Heritage Loyalist group (45–65), is aging out with no replacement. The Dieselgate trust deficit continues to suppress connection across all audience groups. No campaign resolves this — only verified behaviour documented over time.

The EV pivot is a product decision being mistaken for a brand decision. VW's care-dominant character does not carry the forward energy the EV category demands. Every major competitor is increasing their forward signal. VW's restraint reads as hesitation in this context — not as confidence.

The diagnostic also identified the strategic position available exclusively to VW: the only major automotive brand that can credibly remove aspiration from the EV register, because its Care root is the right engine for sustainability — protection of the future, not desire for the new.

Diagnostic findings
Finding 01 · Delivered
Brand position is nobody's aspiration — identity drift at root level
Finding 02 · Delivered
EV pivot: product decision mistaken for brand decision
Finding 03 · Delivered
Trust damage is structural cost, not a communications problem
Finding 04 · Delivered
Strongest audience aging out with no replacement in sight
Finding 05 · Delivered
Brand character in direct conflict with most important category
Delivered
Full Brand Intelligence Report
Demo case · Public · Identity, audience, portfolio, leadership, competitive, solutions
View demo case →
Directions produced
01
Audience Succession — The same feeling, new materials
Bridges the 28–40 buyer back to VW's Care root without abandoning it. Respects younger buyer scepticism of legacy brands while keeping structural character intact.
02
Category Strategy — The electric car for people who don't need to perform caring
Removes aspiration from the EV register entirely. The only position available to VW that no competitor can credibly occupy. Restraint as structural confidence.
02 — Partners

The network

Every partner in this network was selected through the same method Design Intelligence applies to clients. They are not aggregated — they are chosen because they operate in the same spectrum. Hover to read further.

Individual · Automotive
Kerstin Dahnert
Brand experience & automotive marketing
Resonance
0.91
Kerstin Dahnert
Marketing Manager at Porsche. Deep expertise in brand experience, experiential marketing, and how premium automotive brands create physical presence. Panel speaker at the International Festival of Brand Experience. Operates at the intersection of brand strategy and live activation.
LinkedIn →
Brand experience Automotive Live activation
Individual · Creative
Dona Abuaf
Retail brand experience & spatial identity
Resonance
0.93
Dona Abuaf
Senior Design Director, EMEA Brand Creative Retail at Nike. Over two decades translating brand identity into physical retail environments across flagship stores in Rome, Milan, Paris, and London. Rare capability: making a brand coherent in space, not just on screen. Based in Amsterdam.
LinkedIn →
Retail identity Spatial design Art direction
Individual · Academic
Inga Skowranek
Intercultural brand culture & digital branding
Resonance
0.84
Inga Skowranek
Professor for Intercultural Brand-Culture and Innovation at Brand University Hamburg. Teaches across brand design, digital branding, UX strategy, and system design. Brings academic rigour to questions of how brands travel across cultures — and where they lose coherence in translation.
LinkedIn →
Brand culture Digital branding UX strategy
Individual · Comms
Eleonora Tuveri
Communications & institutional relations
Resonance
0.80
Eleonora Tuveri
Communications and stakeholder relations professional based in Switzerland. Background spanning Nestlé and the institutional sector. Brings rigour, multilingual range, and access to European institutional networks that are otherwise difficult to navigate independently.
LinkedIn →
Institutional Multilingual Switzerland · EU
Individual · Strategy
Roman Fernandez
Capital strategy & business development
Resonance
0.82
Roman Fernandez
Founder of EVOLVIA, Berlin. Helps complex businesses raise capital and achieve exits at their target valuations. Roland Berger network connections. Operates at the intersection of brand positioning and investment narrative — where the story a company tells becomes the story investors believe.
LinkedIn →
Capital strategy M&A Investor narrative
LK
Agency · Branding
loyalkaspar
Brand identity & creative production
Resonance
0.89
loyalkaspar
New York branding agency founded 2003. Thinks like an agency, designs like a studio, produces like a production company. Clients include Disney+, ESPN, Marvel, the Smithsonian, and the White House. Rare in the industry for operating fluently across strategy, identity, and motion without losing coherence between them.
loyalkaspar.com →
Brand identity Motion & production New York
M
Studio · CGI & Visualisation
Machenschaft
High-end CGI & automotive visualisation
Resonance
0.87
Machenschaft
Munich-based CGI and visualisation studio, founded 2012. Premium visual quality for automotive, product, and industrial content. Recently merged with Rapid Images to accelerate AI-assisted production workflows. The partner of choice when a brand's visual world needs to exist before the product does.
machenschaft.com →
CGI Automotive Munich
lomi
Agency · Strategic Design
Lomi Agency
Strategy & design for complex organisations
Resonance
0.86
Lomi Agency
Oslo-based strategic design consultancy. Applies design to shape strategy — not decorate it. Clients include Audi, BMW, NIO, Mercedes, and Volkswagen Financial Services. Built by founders from Tandberg, where design was used to build a premium brand and become the market leader in videoconferencing. That is a specific credential.
lomi.agency →
Strategic design Automotive Oslo
Open · By selection
Network grows through resonance
05 — Lab

POCs & tools

Working experiments, proof-of-concepts, and built tools — each a live instance of a system principle. Select any to open the artifact.

Intelligence · 04
NEURA Robotics — Brand Architecture Diagnostic
Full structural brand assessment of NEURA Robotics. Emotional foundation, audience architecture, portfolio coherence, five risk vectors, and sequenced priority actions.
Live →
Intelligence · 05
Apple × Ternus — Brand–Leader Resonance
Structural analysis of incoming CEO John Ternus against Apple's brand identity. Six-axis character mapping, drive signal comparison, resonance distance, narrative stack, and voice coherence audit.
Live →
Intelligence · 06
Volkswagen — Full Brand Intelligence Report
Comprehensive brand intelligence across identity, audience resonance, fleet coherence, leadership drift, competitive landscape, and a sequenced solution plan for the European market.
Live →
Intelligence · 07
BMW Group — Brand Portrait
Structural analysis of brand identity, product alignment, audience resonance, and incoming leadership impact across the BMW Group portfolio.
Live →
Intelligence · 08
Duravit Group — Brand Intelligence Review
Five-part analysis covering brand identity, emotional positioning, identity system performance, buyer behaviour, and geographic market fit.
Live →
Intelligence · 09
SensoWash — Communications Register
A practical brand voice guide setting out how SensoWash should sound — grounded in what the product delivers and who it is speaking to. Tool for brand and creative teams.
Live →
Intelligence · 10
Champion — A Structural Reading
A structural brand diagnostic tracing Champion's founding logic — institutional utility, material truth, and accumulated cultural weight — against its current positioning and strategic opportunity.
Live →
Tool 04 — Coming soon
Tool 05 — Coming soon
Tool 06 — Coming soon
Section · Partners
The network
Curated partners selected through the Design Intelligence method — individuals and firms operating in the same frequency. Access requires a key.
Restricted →
Section · Priorities
Life bento
Six areas of life held in parallel — goals, tasks, and weekly slots. The live operational layer behind the method. Access requires a key.
Restricted →
— More coming
04 — Priorities

Life bento

Six areas of life, held in parallel. Goals carry time horizons. Tasks carry weight. Drag from the depository boxes below to load what's in play. Drag tasks back to archive them.