Palletower

Palletower, a long-established supplier of storage and handling equipment, had merged with West Pennine Storage Equipment to add a full storage design and installation service. On paper it was a powerful, end-to-end offer. In the market, almost no one knew Palletower could do it, and buyers of high-stakes installation projects instinctively trust specialists over generalists.

Installing a warehouse storage system is a major decision. It is expensive, disruptive, hard to reverse, and signed off by several stakeholders over a long, cautious buying process. Buyers put projects out to tender and scrutinise every supplier, so a new, integrated player has to earn trust quickly.

Palletower also had two audiences pulling in different directions: traditional product customers buying roll pallets and racking off the shelf, and installation customers making complex, six-figure commitments. The rebrand had to serve both, add the new service without diluting the core business, and do it better than competitors still working the same old way.

I led the UX research and strategy, and turned a deep evidence base into a clear direction for the rebrand. In practice that meant:

• Planning and facilitating stakeholder workshops to surface what the business already knew about its customers
• Designing and running the research programme, from data analysis to in-depth buyer interviews
• Synthesising more than 2,400 insights into personas and a single customer journey map
• Translating the evidence into a repositioning strategy and a new information architecture
• Setting the direction for design and shaping the structure the team would build against

The strategy drew on a deliberately broad evidence base, combining what the business knew with new, direct research:

• Stakeholder workshops with teams from across both businesses
• GA4 analytics and Microsoft Clarity session analysis
• In-depth interviews with warehouse buyers and decision-makers
• Four personas spanning the range of roles, budgets and buying styles
• A customer journey map built from more than 2,400 individual insights

The interviews told a remarkably consistent story. These are high-stakes, high-trust purchases, and buyers reward suppliers who prove expertise and reduce risk.

• Technical expertise wins. Buyers expect deep, specific knowledge of their warehouse, and the right expert in the room at the right time, not a generalist sales pitch.
• Proof builds trust. Case studies, references and especially video testimonials from comparable projects carry more weight than any claim a supplier makes about itself.
• Downtime is the real cost. Every extra day of installation loses money, so buyers need to see that risk addressed directly, in the messaging and the plan.
• Flexible payment matters. Staged payments and a clear return on investment make a six-figure commitment feasible, especially for smaller and expanding businesses.
• Local presence is a competitive advantage. Buyers assume a nearer supplier means faster maintenance and a stronger long-term relationship.
• An integrated offer is appealing, but only if it stays credible. One supplier for equipment and installation saves time and cost, as long as it does not read as a generalist spread too thin.

I turned the evidence into a clear repositioning and a structure to deliver it: one integrated proposition, presented so that each specialism still reads as expert.

The strategy became a design language and a template system, built to carry a far larger, more complex site and to make Palletower look like the expert, integrated partner the research said buyers wanted.

• A design system of colour, type and components gave the rebuilt site one consistent, credible voice across products and services.
• Templates were designed for the new page types the strategy called for: service landing pages, an integrated case study hub, and industry and location pages.
• Product pages were reworked to support comparison and confident choice, with clear specifications, options and a visible next step.

The programme gave Palletower a research-grounded strategy and a designed, integrated experience: one brand, one navigation, and a clear, credible story that brings storage equipment and the new design and installation service together as a single end-to-end offer.

The result is a blueprint the business could build and sell against: a repositioning, a new information architecture, a design system, and templates for the service, industry and location pages the strategy called for.

What I would do next

If continuing, I would validate the new structure with buyers and prove the proposition in market:

• Test the new navigation and key journeys with real warehouse buyers before build
• Build and instrument the case study hub, then track how proof influences enquiries
• Measure local and industry landing pages against the search terms buyers actually use
• Track enquiry quality and conversion across the long, multi-stakeholder buying journey