Goo Goo Clusters: Make Your Own Candy!
Read Time: 2 minutes
Using live action, animation and creative technologies, SEGD member firm Fivestone Studios (Nashville, TN) specializes in creating touchscreens and digital interactives for businesses and organizations. One of their latest projects allows touchscreen users to custom-make their own candy (yum!) inside Nashville’s preeminent confectionary: the Goo Goo Chocolate Company. Read on to discover how Fivestone collaborated with other design firms to integrate a fun digital interactive into a larger “Willy Wonka-esque” experience.
Famously known as Music City, Nashville is home to the Grand Ole Opry, the Country Music Hall of Fame, the National Museum of African American Music, and … Goo Goo Clusters.
What the heck is a Goo Goo Cluster? Well, if you’ve never been to the Goo Goo Chocolate Company in downtown Nashville, you’re missing out! Billed as “America’s first combination chocolate bar,” the original Goo Goo Cluster consisted of a roundish mound of caramel, marshmallow nougat, and roasted peanuts wrapped in a milk chocolate shell. (yum!) Mass produced since 1912, the candy is a classic treat not just in Nashville, but enjoyed across the American South.
Recently, Goo Goo spent $2 million to transform its flagship store into a kind of “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory” experience. Here, visitors get a behind-the-scenes look at how Goo Goo Clusters are made, and they can order their own custom-designed confections, courtesy of “Design Your Own Confection Stations” created by Fivestone Studios (Nashville, TN) in collaboration with SEGD member firm Diversified (Kenilworth, NJ).
“Literally the visitor makes their custom Goo Goo to order based on what they input into the digital touchscreen, and the store hands it to you, right there,” says Traylor Woodall, Executive Creative Director at Fivestone. “It’s a whole physical experience; it’s just like you’re in this beautiful crazy Willy Wonka factory, and our digital component really aligns with that vibe.”
Walking up to one of four kiosks, customers are invited to “Design a Goo Goo.” The interface takes them through a four-step process: (1) choose their shell, (2) choose their filling, (3) choose their add-ins, and finally (4) finish and order. Then, boom! Their confection is custom-made by Goo Goo’s “chocolate factory workers” and ready to take home.
And how fun is that?!
“It’s not just a ‘walk-up-and-pick-your-items’ experience,” explains Traylor. “It’s a really fun kind of gamified retail experience that makes designing your own Goo Goo Cluster interesting and creative.”
To make the touchscreens part of a seamless visitor experience within the store, Fivestone and Diversified collaborated with a host of other design firms and fabricators including Centric Architecture, Dillon Works and I Saw the Sign. They also worked within Goo Goo’s brand guidelines and menu designs.
“We pride ourselves on really strong brand and design direction, so that our digital interactives are right on brand and seamless to the overall experience,” says Traylor.
So, next time you’re in Nashville, stop by the Goo Goo Chocolate Company and check-out the Design Your Own Goo Goo for yourself, for strictly … uhm … professional reasons. Yes, that’s it, “professional reasons.” 😉
Road trip anyone?
Watch the project video HERE!