Bringing Bella Italia’s heritage to life through an engaging nationwide promotional campaign for their new menu.
Bella Italia wanted to create a campaign that celebrated the authenticity of its Italian roots while encouraging repeat visits and increasing customer engagement across its restaurants by telling the story of their suppliers. The challenge was to develop a campaign that felt premium, playful and unmistakably Bella Italia, while working seamlessly across a wide range of customer touch points.
As Senior Designer, I was responsible for translating the campaign concept into a cohesive visual identity that could be rolled out consistently across print, digital and in-restaurant environments.
The Challenge
The campaign needed to:
- Tell the story of Bella Italia’s suppliers, and their close connection to the premium ingredients customers would experience when receiving their orders for the new menu.
- Reinforce Bella Italia’s brand personality and Italian heritage.
- Create a consistent experience across every customer touchpoint.
- Be flexible enough to work across restaurants nationwide.
The creative solution centred around the idea of Tradition & Treasure, a campaign inspired by discovering authentic Italian traditions, ingredients and rewarding guests throughout their journey.
My Role
I led the creative development and production of the campaign, collaborating closely with the marketing team to ensure every asset supported the wider campaign objectives.
My responsibilities included:
- Campaign concept development
- Art direction
- Visual identity creation
- Print design
- Point of Sale (POS)
- Large format graphics
- Promotional materials
- Digital assets
- Supplier-ready artwork
Design Approach
The visual language combined rich Italian-inspired colours, textures and illustrative elements to evoke warmth, authenticity and discovery.
Every design decision was made to create a recognisable campaign that immediately stood out in busy restaurant environments while remaining true to Bella Italia’s established brand.
From window graphics and table talkers to promotional materials and supporting collateral, each asset was designed to work as part of a unified customer journey rather than as individual pieces of artwork.
Deliverables
The campaign was rolled out across a broad range of customer-facing touchpoints, including:
- In-restaurant POS
- Promotional signage
- Window graphics
- Printed marketing collateral
- Table displays
- Campaign branding
- Supporting digital assets
The Outcome
The final campaign provided Bella Italia with a distinctive promotional identity that celebrated the brand’s heritage while creating a consistent customer experience across multiple locations.
By designing every touchpoint as part of a connected campaign ecosystem, the creative maintained strong brand consistency, increased visibility in-store and delivered a memorable promotional experience that encouraged customer engagement.
Bringing together words such as love and tradition with Italian and family gives a sense of warmth and togetherness. When applied over images of suppliers in situ, guests would get a sense of Bella Italia’s values.
Nothing sells a menu better than food photography. It sets guests’ expectations, but to set Bella Italia apart from the competition, linking the food on the plate to how it got there is also key to the experience.
As well as the overall look and feel of the restaurant, people will make a decision on whether to eat somewhere if something catches their eye.
Blending imagery of the cuisine and its origins will help promote the experience. This coupled with emotive language leads to intrigue.
Short promotional videos for the likes of Instagram and Twitter bring an added layer of interactivity and show there’s more to Bella Italia than just Italian food.
Appealing emotively to a social audience could help increase their participation with Bella Italia’s brand, story and frequency of visits to their restaurants.