According to The National Restaurant Association, more than 1 in 6 restaurants permanently closed their doors during the COVID-19 pandemic. For those that didn’t, new challenges were myriad: mandatory closures with short notice, reduced seating capacity, and costly outdoor build-outs, to name a few. All this on top of the industry’s historically razor-thin margins. In order to survive, restaurants need to adapt. And that’s why Hyphen was created.
Developed by veterans of Instacart, Sweetgreen, SpaceX, and Apple, Hyphen is an automated makeline designed to increase efficiency and food safety in modern kitchens. With Hyphen, repetitive tasks are put on autopilot, allowing restaurant staff to focus on the human elements of hospitality and culinary creativity.
During their inception, Hyphen invited Geist to help them prepare for launch. Drafting off the naming and positioning work done by A Hundred Monkeys, we began by crafting the visual identity. We developed a logotype that echoes the metaphor behind the name: the connection between seemingly opposite concepts. Old and new. Human and machine. Flexibility and precision. Color and typographic decisions were inspired equally by the rigor of technology and the vibrancy of healthy food. And the system is rounded out with a suite of icons and pictograms designed to work equally well across marketing and product applications.
Next, we set to work on building Hyphen’s digital presence, beginning with a minimal site structure aimed at making the benefits of the product crystal clear to restaurant operators. We then worked closely with the client team to articulate site-wide messaging. Because the product was still being prototyped, we brought together a team working across CGI (Atmos Visuals) and traditional photography (Lincoln Barbour), collaborating with them to create imagery of the makeline in action.
Finally, we brought in the heavy development talent at Van Holtz Co. to bring the site to life, with care and attention to every last interactive detail. The site was built with a modular approach using Craft CMS, making it easy for the client team to keep it up to date with speed and efficiency.
Shortly after coming out of stealth, Hyphen raised a $24 million Series A, and saw an additional $18 million follow-on investment by Chipotle’s Cultivate Next venture fund. We can’t wait to see what they cook up next.
