About Alterego

Alterego is a full service agency for marketing & creation, with a specialization in wine, food & culture. It was created in 2002 by Yuri Pieplenbosch and Michel Le Roux. Alterego’s expertise stretches from brand designs to full-blown marketing strategies, from off-line to on-line communication, from event marketing to sales promotion. We rely on our cosmopolitan team and network of specialized experts to carry out our work.

Among others, Alterego has worked for:

Vision

The fulfilment of an individual or a group of indiviuals is reached when a person opens himself up to others. The scope of this revelation is as broad as there are cultures to discover and experience. One of the finest conducts through which to express these cultures are food, drinks and products with strong identities and backgrounds. However, if a product identity upholds its own traditions and ways of origin, it can not truly blossom until it has succeeded in appealing to and convincing the final consumer.

 

Mission Statement

At Alterego, we both aspire to forge and diffuse identities, whatever their provenance, whatever their destination. We aim to catch the essence of a product or brand, determine its exact value and finally introduce it to the markets of the Benelux, Germany and Great Britain, in order to satisfy our target groups as best we can.

 

Methods

To Alterego, marketing simply signifies ‘positioning a product on the right market’. Other than following a product’s renown and image, sales rates are a large indicator of its success.

The typical methods we apply to reach our goals are as follows:

• We make use of the newest and most accurate in existing market research, and initialise our own investigations. Our market reviews are permanently updated for each product category.
• With our clients, we try to perceive their identity and their needs, by holding briefings and debriefings at their place of residence when possible.
• We refine the clients’ requests and determine the right market approach. We then integrate the target group’s preferences and combine them with the right positioning of products in their respective market segments, to create a perfect balance between product identity and consumer expectations.
• After this, a communication / promotion plan is built, including creation, media on-/off-line, sales promotion, PR, event marketing, and further communication tools needed
• We systematically evaluate our campaigns on a qualitative and quantitative basis.

Services

Alterego offers you the following services, and more:

• Brand strategy development
• Consumer marketing
• Trade marketing
• Product development
• Concept and creation
• Sponsoring, partnerships and joint promotions
• Print work (brochures, neck labels, posters, flyers and POS material)
• Media planning (radio, TV and print)
• Multimedia (corporate and promotion websites, SMS-campaigns)
• PR (specialised press relations, events, incentives)

Corporate Social Responsibility

Corporate Social Responsibility has been Alterego's top priority since the beginning. As far as possible, we follow the CSR-principles as described in the ISO-26000. The product of Alterego contains a lot of paperwork. That’s why we use FSC-certified paper to the maximum. The FSC-trademark gives the guarantee that the source of the paper is from responsibly controlled woods. And when you receive an e-mail from us, we always remind you not to print unless necessary. In this way and many others, Alterego contributes to the responsible use of materials and the optimization of our healthy environment.

Meleya Foundation

Since 2005, Alterego has been running its own project: Meleya. With this project, Alterego strives to strengthen African identity in Europe, trough fair trade and exchange of knowledge and experience between young people from two different cultures. In this, Alterego is led by principles of equality, transparency and social involvement.

Based on a collaboration between Dutch and Ethiopisn students, the coffee brand "Meleya, a unique embrace", was created. This Alterega brand symbolizes the warm embrace of two cultures. The keywords are: quality, mutual respect in business, cultural exchange and social development of the new generation.

Along with this project, the Meleya Foundation was founded. Alterego is still a very active partner in this foundation. it organizes projects focussed on development with the lead-in "Empowerment trough Exchange". People in underdeveloped areas have to learn to live an independent and qualitative life on the long term. We wish to achieve this bij exchanging knowledge and skills. In this way, Alterego contributes directly to stimulating entrepreneurship in Ethiopia. The Meleya Foundation supports the pursue af the 'Stichting Ethiopië voor Morgen' (SEM) millennium goals.

By simply, but actively, participating in the Meleya Foundation, Alterego contributes directly to community involvement and development, human rights, labour practices, the environment and fair trade.