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Food & Beverage - Consumer Goods - E-Commerce

Foraged Market

Brand, campaign, and platform design for a marketplace connecting people to hard-to-find food.

Foraged is a marketplace that connects small-scale food producers with people looking for ingredients they can’t find in traditional retail. The platform brings together foragers, farmers, and makers, giving them a direct way to sell what they source and produce. At the time, the company needed to better communicate its value to both customers and investors. We partnered with the team to define the brand, develop a campaign, and shape how the marketplace functions as both a store and a source of knowledge.

Services

Brand Strategy

Brand Identity

Art Direction

Content Production

Campaign

UX/UI Design

Food & Beverage - Consumer Goods - E-Commerce

Foraged Market

Brand, campaign, and platform design for a marketplace connecting people to hard-to-find food.

Foraged is a marketplace that connects small-scale food producers with people looking for ingredients they can’t find in traditional retail. The platform brings together foragers, farmers, and makers, giving them a direct way to sell what they source and produce. At the time, the company needed to better communicate its value to both customers and investors. We partnered with the team to define the brand, develop a campaign, and shape how the marketplace functions as both a store and a source of knowledge.

Services

Brand Strategy

Brand Identity

Art Direction

Content Production

Campaign

UX/UI Design

Making the Source as Important as the Product

Most food marketplaces focus on the product. Foraged focuses on where it comes from. Each item is tied to a person, a place, and a process. Who found it, how it was sourced, and how it’s used. This shifts the experience from browsing products to understanding them.

Building Trust in an Unfamiliar Category

Many of the ingredients on Foraged are unfamiliar to the average customer. Wild mushrooms, specialty goods, and region-specific products require more context than a typical marketplace provides. The challenge was making these items accessible without oversimplifying them. Rather than reducing products to short descriptions, we structured information to be understood progressively. Sourcing details are clear, seller profiles make the people behind the product visible, and usage guidance helps customers understand how to work with unfamiliar ingredients. This allows new users to build confidence while giving experienced users the depth they expect.

From Curiosity to Purchase

A typical product page doesn’t answer the questions these items raise. A listing for wild morel mushrooms, for example, shows where they were foraged, when they were harvested, who sourced them, and how they’re typically used. Information is layered from a simple overview into deeper context, allowing first-time users to quickly understand what they’re looking at while supporting more experienced buyers who want additional detail.

Brand Identity and Illustration System

The identity draws from how foraging is documented and shared. Photography focuses on real environments rather than isolated products. Illustration is used selectively to explain species, seasonality, and process. Typography stays restrained, allowing content and imagery to carry meaning. Rather than presenting ingredients in isolation, elements are combined to show relationships between product, place, and person. The system extends across different sellers and regions without becoming repetitive, while maintaining a consistent tone.

Campaign and Content Production

We extended the brand through a series of films following three foragers. Each piece moves from landscape to kitchen, documenting how ingredients are found and used in practice. The films act as an entry point into the platform. They introduce unfamiliar ingredients, demonstrate real-world use, and build trust through transparency. Rather than explaining the marketplace, the content shows it in action.

Marketplace UX and Platform Design

The marketplace is structured to support both discovery and decision-making without adding friction. Information is layered so users can quickly understand a product while having the option to go deeper. Seller profiles play a central role, making the people behind each product visible and credible. This allows unfamiliar items to remain distinct while still being approachable, supporting both new and experienced users within the same system.

Outcome

The work made the platform easier to understand, trust, and invest in. By connecting sourcing, product, and knowledge into a single system, Foraged became more legible to both customers and investors. Following the brand and platform work, the company raised additional funding, expanded its marketplace, and ultimately exited successfully.

Closing

A marketplace where understanding the source becomes part of the experience of buying it.

Food & Beverage - Retail - Hospitality

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Tropical illustration from the Far Out Ice Cream brand identity designed by Rugged Coastal

Rugged Coastal is a story-led brand identity and design studio based in Portland, Maine. We create narrative-driven identities, websites, packaging, and campaigns for brands across New England and beyond.

5:41:58 PM

52 Center Street
Portland, Maine
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Rugged Coastal is a story-led brand identity and design studio based in Portland, Maine. We create narrative-driven identities, websites, packaging, and campaigns for brands across New England and beyond.

5:41:58 PM

52 Center Street
Portland, Maine
Work
Studio
Contact
Instagram
LinkedIn

Rugged Coastal is a story-led brand identity and design studio based in Portland, Maine. We create narrative-driven identities, websites, packaging, and campaigns for brands across New England and beyond.

5:41:58 PM

52 Center Street
Portland, Maine