Peak Design: Brand Positioning Case Study

A couple years ago a friend sent me a YouTube video by Peak Design. A company that makes backpacks, phone cases, and camera bags. Not exactly revolutionary.

But the video kept my interest. It was a parody Peak Design made after Amazon had completely ripped off their Everyday Sling Bag design.

A David vs. Goliath brand battle? I was hooked… and have been ever since.

In a sea of sameness, Peak Design has found a way to stand out. Sometimes going as far as buying a domain and doing a giveaway called “garbagebagfullofcash.com.” That’s why they’re the subject of this week’s brand breakdown. Let’s get into it…

 💼 The Brand: Peak Design

After a 4-month trip around the world in 2010, Peter Dering was inspired to create a device that would make carrying and using a camera much easier. He spent 10 months designing his invention, Capture, and launched it on Kickstarter. Peak Design has since become known for their smart carry solutions and meticulous design.

💛 The Heart (Purpose & Values)

Peak Design is refreshingly transparent about their purpose: which is to create happy, meaningful lives for the people that work there… first. They believe their mission can only be achieved “when their self-actualizing, highly stoked staff enthusiastically steps into the Peak Design office every day.” This also reflects their belief in “prioritizing people and planet over profit.”

👤 The Head (Strategy & Positioning)

Peak Design may sell bags and phone cases, but at the end of the day they’re a design company.

That might sound a little “high-brow” — so how does that translate into ridiculous marketing stunts like a garbagebagfullofcash.com and poking fun at Amazon?

It’s a part of their positioning strategy. You might expect a camera bag company to have a rugged, adventurous personality — but Peak Design leans into the “Connected” brand personality type.

Meaning that every marketing tactic we’re about to point out in the next section has a single goal: connect with their audience on a deeper level.

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✋ The Hands (Tactics)

BONUS: We recorded a short video breaking down Peak Design’s entire website messaging strategy here. Like it? Let us know and we’ll do more 🙂

A few years ago Peak Design’s best-selling bag was carbon copied by Amazon. Peak Design quickly responded with a parody video pointing out the differences in quality, social responsibility, and the fact that you’ll get exactly what you pay for. That video now has almost 5M views. Peak Design 1. Amazon 0.

Another one of their marketing stunts included an iPhone 14 event guessing game with a $10k garbage bag grand prize. To enter, you had to guess at questions like “How many times will presenters say the word nits?” or “What kind of shoes will Tim Cook wear?” It created some free viral publicity and promoted their new phone case — but more importantly, it solidified their peer-like connection with their audience.

How You Can Steal Their Strategy

Match your audience’s sophistication level. You can imagine that a buyer of an expensive, high-quality camera bag would be pretty sophisticated. That’s why Peak Design’s name, brand, and overall positioning is so genius. Their “inside jokes” and satirical humor plays perfectly in the minds of their target audience who are highly technical camera geeks. It doesn’t matter so much if your product/solution/service is sophisticated or not, what matters is that your marketing matches your sophistication level — whatever it is. That’s what empathy is all about.  

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