Outokumpu Circle Green

Doubling share-of-search for sustainable stainless steel

Outokumpu Circle Green

Contributions

Brand Marketing, Launch, Brand Identity, Communications Strategy

Awards

European Excellence Awards 2023, shortlist

Industry

Green Tech, Mining & Metals

Stainless steel company Outokumpu is turning their industry upside down. Through exceptional innovation they’ve cut a whopping 92% of the carbon emission out of their production, resulting in the world’s most sustainable stainless steel product by far - Circle Green. A huge opportunity to take category leadership, but with one big problem – the world’s most sustainable stainless steel looks exactly the same as the world’s most polluting stainless steel.

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Our task was to challenge the very persistent misconception that stainless steel is stainless steel, as polluting as always and show our audience that often, some of the biggest innovations hide in plain sight

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You could be tempted to think that steel hasn’t evolved one bit since the industrial revolution. Stainless steel is stainless steel. The idea: What if we simply agreed with our audience, that nothing is different. That nothing has improved – visually. The point. It's not actually about how it looks, it's about how it was made.

We relaunched the Circle Green product under the campaign line Industrial Evolution that has since taken a much bigger role within Outokumpu and is now forming a core foundation for all brand activity.

In an industry not know for bold communication, this unconventional campaign stood out with more than 50 million total impressions and even more importantly, it made a huge impact in their main market, Germany, increasing overall sustainability searches within the category from 2,8% to 5,2% while Circle Green's share-of-search doubled.

With a simple and minimalistic approach far from the typical technical and masculine visuals of the industry, the campaign clearly stood out and positioned Outokumpu as something new and different, while our brand film took a big step in humanizing a brand of stainless steel.