Maps don’t get cheddar than this!

A while back I had a hankering for some cheese (truth be told, when do I not?), and I came upon this incredible map showcasing Tillamook dairy products. Pretty quickly, the Tillamook map had a cult following amongst Mapbox employees. The 🧀 emojis cropped up across our Slack channels and many lactose-free and vegan diets were put to the test. I knew I had to get the backstory, so I tracked down the folks at Wildlife, the LA-based agency that designed Tillamook’s map. I asked President and Co-Founder Jake Friedman and Executive Creative Director Scott Friedman to whey (ha!) in:

Hi Jake and Scott! Tell me a little bit about your company Wildlife.

JF: We use technology to tell stories and create experiences for forward-thinking brands that are intuitive, engaging, and shareable. Our team of designers, developers, animators, and producers build content that ranges from websites, mobile apps, live-action and animation, live-streams, AR and VR, and experiential activations.

What inspired you and your team to design a custom map style when you were creating something for Tillamook?

JF: We knew Tillamaps wouldn’t be “Tilla-worthy” if it looked like the other boring maps that come in and out of our daily lives. This is something special, and discovering new foodie experiences with Tillamook is meant to be a pleasure; it needs all the accouterments of a totally custom, premium map experience while establishing a strong visual identity. With an otherwise focused and minimalist design language, the map becomes even more core to the experience — a hallmark of the platform and brand.

How did you build your map, and was there anything you were particularly excited about?

JF: We used a combination of Mapbox Studio, which empowered our designers to heavily customize Tillamaps and deliver ideal details dynamically across various scales, in concert with the custom React.js web app being developed by our engineers. This process gave our design team the tools they needed to fully visualize the experience ahead of development. Mapbox Studio helped even early prototypes of the app feel premium because we could easily drop in our custom map design while we optimized other elements of the experience.

We especially love the silky smooth, highly controllable transitions and animations that we can designate as users move between zoom levels with the map data adapting on the fly.

Design has always been central to Wildlife projects, so we are thrilled to have access to a tool like Mapbox Studio that balances form and function and does the heavy lifting of creating a dynamic map while letting our team focus on beautiful, engaging, and high-quality interactive experiences.

What was your experience using Mapbox tools?

SF: Mapbox Studio makes it incredibly straightforward to design a very customized and artistic map through the controls and real-time preview. The mix of granularity and control of minute details, through a dashboard that’s visual and easy to understand, allows designers and developers the chance to collaborate in real-time. The tools enabled us to rapidly design the look of the map central to this experience and get a prototype together that looked great very quickly. We were also able to apply client feedback immediately and ensure the brand look and feel was consistent whether users are looking at the big picture or street-level details.

Did you encounter any challenges along the way, and if so, how did you solve them?

SF: We set out to map all of the delicious bites featuring Tillamook around the country, but that data is only meaningful if it comes with the utility of a well-built experience, and actionable tools for consumers to use on a regular basis.

It was important to distinguish and elevate Tillamaps from other common food and mapping resources but still deliver on modern user expectations. To find this balance, we relied on the inherent speed and performance of Mapbox, and the ability to quickly tune, layer, and personalize the map experience, focusing our energy on features that provide unique Tillamook value to users.

Any more cool maps you all have created that we should check out?

JF: Last year, we launched the OnStar Stories Hub, leveraging Mapbox to power a cross-platform showcase of member stories, statistics, and content across the United States. The custom 3D-enhanced map, with search and sorting features, help provide location-based personalization while sharing OnStar’s history with new audiences.

Thanks to Jake and Scott for sharing more about their process and for making us all a little bit hungrier! Mapbox Studio gives you full control over styling interactive maps so you can build for whatever experience you’re looking to create. If you’d like to build your own custom map, sign up for Mapbox Studio today.