Grof : turning a corporate services firm into a warm, human financial sidekick for founders

Repositioning Sprout Asia as Grof, from the positioning workshop to the brand guidelines, social templates and website, to make compliance and finance feel less intimidating.

Project overview

Role:
In-house designer and content marketer
Team:
Logo and colours by another designer
Year:
2022
Website:
grof.co

What I worked on

  • Positioning workshop and statement
  • Brand guidelines (around the new logo)
  • Social media templates
  • Swag and email signatures
  • Website redesign
Grof’s two founders laughing in navy Grof T-shirts, in front of tropical plants.
A business owner on a leather sofa, reading a tablet with a cup of tea in her hand.
The Grof logo, the orange mark and white grof, on navy.
Hands working through a stack of invoices with a pen and a calculator.
A hand-drawn figure pushing a giant orange clock.

Compliance already intimidates founders. Sprout Asia’s brand wasn’t helping.

The brief was to rebrand Sprout Asia into Grof, a fresh, tech-driven identity for a firm growing into a financial platform, with its core services intact. Its visuals and tone were inconsistent: mismatched colours, unclear language and templates that didn’t agree with each other.

Our clients are founders of SMEs and startups in Singapore. They’re busy, they’re not finance people, and every other provider talked to them like a bank.

Sprout Asia, before

Before: nine Sprout Asia social posts in mismatched greens, blues and yellows, myth and fact cards beside a karaoke party.

Flat, bright pops of colour

Grof, after

  • A Grof biz tip on a lilac gradient: ‘Become the brand your customers think of first’, two men cut out like stickers, a doodled signature.
  • ‘5 Malaysia tax myths you may not know’ on a pale gradient, a man thinking, doodled question marks.
  • A testimonial on a soft gradient, ‘Quick and efficient’, a round photo and a hand-drawn loop.
  • Two of the team laughing in Grof T-shirts: ‘Why choose us as your financial sidekick’, with doodled sparkles.
  • ‘Daily POV of business owners’: a man cut out on white with a doodled thought of pizza.
  • ‘Cash flow mastery: a cheat sheet’ in hand-drawn letters over pastel cards and small illustrations.
  • ‘Business news you missed’ in hand-drawn capitals, a speaker cut out, a red scribble and an orange tag.
  • On navy: ‘Learning from the pros: how I built a $6.5 billion app called Duolingo’, a smiling man above.
  • A hand-drawn table, before Grof and after Grof, on white with doodled coins.

Pastels over soft gradients

The approach

Grof stems from growth, from seed to full bloom. In place of Sprout Asia’s flat, bright pops, I gave founders pastels over soft gradients and a scrapbook of doodles, hand-drawn illustrations and real people: warm and inviting, and still modern.

Grof’s hello card: ‘hello, we’re grof, your financial sidekick for exceptional business growth’, the logo circled in a hand-drawn orange ring, beside a smiling man in a Grof T-shirt.
  1. Logo

    A seedling, for a firm named after growth. Drawn by another designer; I built the identity around it.

  2. Doodles

    Hand-drawn rings and strokes, like notes in a scrapbook, keep it warm and inviting.

  3. People

    Real people, cut out like stickers. Founders see a face, not a bank.

  4. Colour

    Orange and navy over pastels and soft gradients, in place of flat, bright pops.

  5. Palette

    Navy #13213D and orange #FB810E, with peach #FFC376, sky #BBE5FF and a soft gradient of lilac, cream and sky.

Applications across different channels

These visuals became the foundation of our unified brand identity, consistent across our social channels, website and marketing materials. Business tips in plain words, and the hard parts, like staying out of trouble with LHDN, said the way a friend would.

Grof biz tips post: a founder weighs ‘absorb cost?’, ‘pass it on’ and ‘register SST’ under ‘How to stay profitable while cost is rising?’
Grof post on navy: ‘How to stay out of trouble from LHDN’, a cartoon man peeking nervously at a door marked LHDN.
Grof post on navy: ‘When do you know it’s a good time to quit?’, the word quit underlined in orange.
Grof’s letterhead on a wooden desk beside a fountain pen, a coffee and a plant: the logo top left, and along the foot the phone, email, website and social handle, the Far East Square address and a waving hand-drawn figure.
Grof’s website, redesigned: ‘Your Financial Sidekick for Exceptional Business Growth’ beside photographs of three smiling business owners, with Get Started and the partners below.

Product launch video: Grof Corporate Card

I made the demo video for the Grof Corporate Card, a business account for owners to manage their own finances. Think Wise, for business. My job was to turn our product screens and use cases into a story about why it matters to a business owner. Here are a few of its moments, on a silent loop.

Watch the full video on YouTube

Every transaction in one list, so the strange one is easy to spot.
A spend limit on each card keeps a team within budget.
Freeze a card in one tap, or cancel it for good.

The impact

The rebrand strengthened Grof’s recognition after launch. Our LinkedIn following grew by 30% after rollout, and clients told us the refreshed look felt more approachable.

Three of the Grof team laughing over a laptop with the Grof logo on its lid, in front of a hand-drawn pastel rainbow with sparkles and a light bulb.