Dole: Making Global Feel Local

Challenge

Dole faced a modern paradox: as the company had organically built up a digital presence over the years across global markets, with various goals and project leads, they now found themselves with a fragmented global digital presence with inconsistent branding. Additionally, the culture had shifted in recent years toward local, farm-to-table food, and radical transparency around food came from and how it was grown, threatening to undermine the global produce company's relevance. 

Audience: Six distinct consumer mindsets, from budget-conscious nutrition-focused shoppers to convenience-seekers looking for quick meal solutions, plus B2B customers (retailers, restaurants, foodservice).

Objectives:

  • Unify fragmented global digital properties into one cohesive brand experience

  • Drive conversions at key moments (meal planning, shopping list compilation, point of purchase)

  • Position Dole as transparent, farm-focused leaders in an era of conscious consumerism

  • Increase awareness of Dole's full product range beyond bananas and pineapples

Insight

Through stakeholder interviews and market research, we identified the core tension: consumers wanted local transparency and connection, but Dole operated at global scale. The cultural shift toward "knowing where your food comes from" wasn't going away, and Dole's size could either be a liability or an asset.

The insight: Transparency wasn't just about disclosing information, it was about behaving like a community member, not a CPG company. If Dole could make their farms, farmers, and processes visible through content, they could transform "big ag" from a negative into proof of expertise and reach.

The strategic bet: "Think small. Feel like a farm, while delivering on the positives of being a large company." Build a digital ecosystem that met consumers in the moments that mattered, not when Dole wanted to sell, but when people were actually making food decisions.

Solution

I led the strategic foundation for a comprehensive digital redesign and content marketing engine that positioned transparency as Dole's competitive advantage.

What I Led:

  • Website audit identifying what was working (strong EU blog SEO, rich research content produced by Dole Nutrition Institute, farm walkthroughs) and what wasn't (fragmented sites across seven markets, technical writing that didn't connect emotionally, product awareness gap beyond bananas and pineapples)

  • UX content strategy that consolidated seven market websites while allowing regional customization. By creating page-level messaging hierarchies that considered business goals, user desires, pathways in, desired actions and destinations, and the story that needed to be told I led a content-first website build

  • Website information architecture that consolidated and organized regional navigation needs in such a way that would be intuitive across cultures, organized around how customers actually search

  • Content marketing strategy built on the Hero/Hub/Help framework and ensured every piece had clear purpose (educate, entertain, convince, or inspire):

    • Hero: Go-big branded moments (Disney partnership campaigns, product launches, holiday content)

    • Hub: Regular content tapping into health trends (seasonal food series, nutrition tips, sustainability stories)

    • Help: Search-optimized utility content (how-tos, preparation tutorials, produce selection guides)

  • Bringing the strategic platform to life: The website became the living connection between consumers and the farms and farmers behind their produce 

Key Innovation: Developed a content atomization approach that allowed one piece of content to feed the blog, social channels, and CRM, creating efficiency while maintaining consistent brand storytelling across touchpoints.

Outcome

Successfully developed comprehensive digital strategy and content marketing framework

  • Created scalable content approach that addressed Dole's resource constraints while meeting diverse audience needs

  • Positioned transparency and farm connection as Dole's differentiator in an era of conscious consumerism

Core Responsibilities: Discovery, Research, Website Audit, Ideation, Design Sprints, UX Content Strategy, Content Marketing Strategy