International travel is more than a break from the office; it’s an extension of the creative toolkit. Whether you’re a brand strategist, designer, or brand manager, a trip abroad helps to sharpen the eye and inspire the imagination. These fresh perspectives broaden your entire brand ecosystem, from strategy and messaging to design decisions and product innovation.
Picture this: You’re wandering through a bustling Tokyo convenience store, where even the most mundane products tell spectacular visual stories. Or you’re discovering how Italian luxury brands transform history into sensory theater.
These aren’t just trips – they’re masterclasses in global branding.
The world becomes your mood board: vibrant street art in Mexico city, minimalist packaging in Copenhagen, and innovative retail experiences in Japan … each experience adds a new layer to the creative palette, helping you craft brand narratives that feel both authentic and unexpected.
Cultural Immersion as Inspiration
At Moxie Sozo, we build travel into our DNA. After four years, team members earn a month-long paid sabbatical to recharge and seek creative stimulation. Why? Because we’ve seen how stepping into unknown territories transforms good creators into exceptional ones.
Exploring other countries helps you gather inspiration from their foods, flavors, packaging, colors, patterns, art, and worldviews. It sharpens your eye and expands your imagination with combinations that feel authentic, alive, and culturally aware. Creating through the lens of cultural intelligence and empathy equips you with fresh stories, metaphors, and references to enrich strategic and creative execution. While eclectic letterforms, textures, and color schemes are everywhere, nothing compares to seeing them in context, especially when browsing supermarket aisles in foreign countries.
Field Notes from our Wanderers
While the benefits of cultural immersion are numerous, nothing illustrates its transformative power better than the firsthand experiences of our team members. One of our Senior Account Directors, Meg Quinlan, completed a month-long sabbatical in Italy this past summer and shared, “Venice reminded me of connection — to people, culture, and history.”
Catelyne Hayes just returned from a fifteen-day trip to France and Italy and shared that “The retail experience in Italy is less about surprise and delight through modern or innovative activations and more about an understanding that a timeless and luxurious experience can be a deep and impactful representation for a brand. When I think about stepping into Santa Maria Novella in Florence, it was the history, sensorial experience, and beautiful interiors that made an impression and enhanced the product.”
Sophie Verrill, a Senior Designer at Moxie Sozo, shared: “I could go on and on about design shops, art museums, print and furniture showrooms galore, but what always resonates with me at an emotional level when I visit Copenhagen is the perspective shift in how the people respect and value design. There's a different air of appreciation there for design in all its forms. It always feels like a breath of fresh air to be in that city and it makes me feel proud of what I do for a living.”
We often celebrate seeing our beloved brands “in the wild,” too. During my month-long sabbatical in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, I spotted the Creyente bottles that Nate Dyer created, prominently displayed on local shelves. I filled my phone with photos of the bottle line-up and brand blocking, competitive shelf sets, unique form factors, and inspired label artwork that captured the magic of the place.
It’s Not Just About Aesthetics
While many of our travel experiences focus on design inspiration and creative discovery, sometimes the journey takes us deeper into understanding the human impact of our work. Last month, six team members traveled to Uganda with our client H2ALL to understand the challenges their CPG bottled water aims to address. The brand funds critical water well-building efforts in East African communities facing clean water scarcity, and we were engaged to tell the consumer story about how every purchase makes a real impact.
Derek Springston, CEO and managing partner at Moxie Sozo, shared that being there in person and understanding what’s happening at a cultural and economic level helped our strategy and creative teams ensure that “every creative decision back home is grounded in the realities of the people we serve. Once you’ve connected with the people in the community, the stories become personal and the mission becomes impossible to forget.”
These experiences in Uganda underscore a fundamental truth about modern brand building that extends far beyond aesthetic considerations.
From Local to Global
That’s really what it’s all about. Though miles and oceans may separate us, we’re deeply interconnected. A brand that can authentically show up resonates, especially with today’s consumers fully embracing global flavors. Brands reflect their environment, history, and people, and culture shapes perception and loyalty. As brand shepherds, we must maintain our cultural curiosity and hunger to learn more, see more, taste more, and experience more.
The bottom line? Brands need to speak with cultural fluency and avoid tropes. Every stamp in your passport is an investment in bolstering your creative tools and connection to consumers. So pack that carry-on with curiosity. Your next breakthrough idea might be waiting in a Tokyo vending machine or a Parisian café.
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