Fresh look for Scottish soap brand drives Record Sales

In the 24 months following a full rebrand, which saw family-run business Arran Aromatics make a clean start, transforming its brand identity to become ARRAN Sense of Scotland, the company has revealed record sales of its luxury bath, home and body care products.

When Scotland went into lockdown and physical shops were forced to close most feared the worse, but the family-run brand pivoted and invested in its online presence. The team also threw itself into supporting the local community supplying free soaps to every island resident, as well as care packages for the homeless and NHS workers.

Combined this has contributed to:

• Exponential growth in turnover – increase of 220%

• Growth in new customer acquisition, up 95%

• Engagement with the brand up 21%

• New website users up over 130%, plus national brand recognition

• Increase in demand for key products (soap bars, hand wash, shower gel, and reed diffusers.

During the height of the pandemic traffic to the ARRAN Sense of Scotland website increased by 185% and sales of its soap bars soared by over 300% YOY, reflecting both the brand’s investment in digital and the increased appetite for natural and sustainable body care products.

Andrew Russell, Sales and Marketing Director and founding family member explains more:

“We knew that we needed to change things up in order to stay relevant and take the brand to new audiences, the challenge was how we did this while still appealing to our established customer base, who had been loyal followers of the Arran Aromatics brand for 30 years.

“Rather than completely reinventing the business, we decided to stay true to our central values of quality products, lovingly made, infused with the history and heritage of our family and island home. That meant continuing to produce our core products, including the best-selling fragrance range – After the Rain - and of course ensuring we remain true to the fact that we are very much aligned with and inspired by nature. 

“The new brand identity was designed to keep the Isle of Arran, our inspiration, at its heart while also reaching out to and connecting with a new customers base. In reality, we took this one step further and renamed all of our fragrances after the places on the island that inspired them. We completely overhauled our offering, improving our product formulations and using more local, natural ingredients wherever possible, such as seaweed and oatmeal from Arran. Even our packaging was redesigned to reflect our connection with nature, and we started on the journey of reducing our plastic consumption and investing further in sustainability.

“This was the first step towards future-proofing the business and it gave rise to more investment into refreshing the digital face of ARRAN Sense of Scotland. I’m really pleased to say that we’re now starting to see that return on investment. As a brand, I think we’ve scrubbed up pretty well.”

Backed by a new senior team including CEO, Kevin Meechan, Sales & Marketing Director, Andrew Russell, Head of Digital & Ecommerce, Claire Logan and majority investors Endless LLP, the new brand identity has given the company a new lease of life. It has been the driving force behind the rapid expansion of the business, paving the way for a new brand purpose and significant inward investment to invigorate its digital offering. 

This included a new website and improved digital marketing activity; influencer marketing outreach, to improve new customer acquisition and expand demographic reach; a revived email marketing strategy to target customers with a more personal approach and engage them with the new brand identity; social advertising to reach new audiences; and an expanded affiliate programme for increased national brand reach.

The record figures are perhaps even more impressive given that ARRAN Sense of Scotland’s physical stores and key business channels have remained closed for most of the pandemic. It has successfully navigated challenges thrown up by coronavirus and Brexit, whilst also giving back significantly to the local community.

In early 2020, 15,000 soaps were donated free of charge to residents of the island (Isle of Arran), it reached out to the neighbouring Isle of Jura with care packages and,on the mainland the company lent significant support to Simon Community Scotland’s charitable campaigns to help the homeless, as well as gifting over 30,000 shower gels, shampoos and body lotions to keyworkers throughout care homes and the NHS. 

These herculean efforts in the community led to a new brand purpose being outlined for the business - in helping the world create connections with nature, the brand hopes to nurture physical and emotional wellbeing.

CEO Kevin Meechan added: “We’re thrilled with the business performance since our rebrand, but we won’t be resting on our laurels. We have plans in place for further expansion and when we can, reopen the retail shops, where we’ll be continuing with our strategy of creating destination shopping experiences that has led us to win industry accolades, such as the Trip Advisor Travellers’ Choice Award, which put us in the top 10% of attractions worldwide. This fusion of experiential bricks and mortar retail tactics with our ever-growing online strategy is very much where our future lies. 

“Furthermore, we are looking to partner more with the hospitality sector to further expand our customers experience with our products. Our hospitality partners enhance physical and mental wellbeing of our customers and we were proud to work with them on the Unite on Wellbeing campaign to support the industry and bring a true sense of wellbeing to a wider audience, during these uncertain times.

“We’ve also set out a comprehensive environmental policy with clear targets for reducing and recycling plastic packaging which includes a move to using 100% PCR (post-consumer recycled) material in all ARRAN Sense of Scotland bottles by 2022. As well as reducing virgin plastic consumption across the business by 81%.”

ARRAN Sense of Scotland is a 32-year-old family business, with family members still involved to this day. All its products, including bath and body ranges, skin care, fragrances and scented candles are still made and hand-finished in Scotland, before being sold in more than 30 countries. Its products are proudly made on the Isle of Arran at the company’s Home Farm factory - an old dairy farm near the historic Brodick Castle.