Payments software company Paddle tapped the brand transformation team at Butchershop to audit their communications. The findings? Everything about the brand screamed tax compliance and missed the true distinction – only Paddle gives SaaS companies a complete infrastructure that removes barriers to selling software globally – while the brand expression was weighing down growth with clashing aqua colors and too much information about arcane tax situations.
Butchershop found a new premise by exploring all the ways SaaS companies can fail. And then they expanded the focus from Paddle’s technology to how it helps all kinds of software companies grow. The result is a rallying cry – “Go there” – that aims to take the brand from tax troubleshooter to a global gateway.
The new logo symbolizes the North Star suggesting that Paddle guides companies to “what’s next.” The star forms a perfect circular geometry within the P in the Paddle wordmark, giving it a twinkle. Brand imagery connotes travel into the unknown to suggest the unique places Paddle can take a business. Graphics include maps and badges, symbols of terrain and a voyage completed to a new destination – all in a style that mimics the wonder of Eighties science fiction.
The brand created by Butchershop was executed by the Paddle team to create a bolder, clearer and simpler website with yellow and white text on a black background. The design has been incorporated in a series of banner and out-of-home ads with snappy one-liners such as “We have 67 global bank accounts, so you don’t have to.”
