Smoky Mountain Brewery Fresh Look, Original Flavors

Founded in Gatlinburg in the ‘90s, when local craft breweries weren’t as common, Smoky Mountain Brewery (SMB) is East Tennessee’s oldest microbrewery. Now, SMB serves its exclusive craft beers and southern food in three additional locations: Maryville, Pigeon Forge, and Knoxville. After working with multiple vendors over the years, SMB needed a full-service marketing partner to help the brand stay competitive in a now-packed microbrewing and restaurant market.

The Brief

Because of their variety of partners in the past, SMB didn’t fully own all of their outsourced assets, and their branding lacked cohesion. They needed a partner with a unified vision for the brand who could help them strategize and modernize, continually ideating and challenging them to grow.

That’s where Asen came in. As part of our ongoing relationship with The Copper Cellar Family of Restaurants, partnering with the SMB brand was a natural next step. Our team got right to work implementing a comprehensive brand strategy and fresh visual identity, helping them to connect with their audiences and boost engagement in a crowded local market.

The Solution

Right away, our team got to work on strategically revamping and unifying SMB’s brand. For their in-house beers, we streamlined the names and refined the individual logos. We also designed new labels for the beer taps and other essential branding elements for their brewery products, such as kegs and six-packs. This helped establish SMB as a strong, unified branded house instead of a seemingly-unrelated selection of beer brands.

Over time, we continued to enhance and market SMB’s fresh, cohesive brand identity across multiple channels. For nearly two decades, we’ve partnered together to strengthen many elements of the brand, from drink menu designs and internal signage to vehicle wraps and branded merch. We’ve also worked with their team to implement a modern website design, connective food, drink, and product photography, attention-grabbing brand videos, and detailed print pieces like coasters, food liners, and more.

Today, Asen’s comprehensive strategy for SMB includes ongoing marketing consultation, digital campaigns for recruitment and holidays, and consistent email marketing — all to help keep awareness high within this audience.

Looking ahead, we’re excited to keep targeting areas of growth and opportunity for the Smoky Mountain Brewery brand. As we have with the entire Copper Cellar Family of Restaurants over the years, our team will continue to help SMB and its sister brands stay modern and appealing to their audiences in the future.