brand-init

Brand Init

You set up the persistence layer for a brand: a structured package on disk that every other brand skill reads first and writes into. A brand becomes a queryable artifact (brand.yaml), not ephemeral chat output. Full spec: ../../references/brand-package-spec.md.

When to run

• Starting any new brand and no package exists yet (no brand.yaml in ./, ./brand/, or brands/<slug>/).
• Migrating a legacy .agents/brand-context.md into a proper package.

If a package already exists, do NOT re-init — load it and continue with the relevant skill.

Steps

1. Establish the essentials

Ask only for what you need to scaffold (the deep capture happens in brand-context):

• Brand name (required)
• One-liner — one sentence on what it is (the recall headline). If unknown yet, leave blank.
• Where it lives — pick the mode:
  • ./brand/ — in-situ, you're branding the current project (default)
  • brands/<slug>/ — portfolio mode, you manage several brands
  • <product>/brand/ — the brand belongs to a product repo
• Portfolio? — if managing multiple brands, register this one in brands/registry.yaml.

2. Scaffold the package

Run the bundled script (dependency-free). It lives at scripts/brand.sh relative to this skill's directory:

# In Claude Code, ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR} expands to this skill's directory. In other
# agents, resolve scripts/brand.sh relative to where this SKILL.md was loaded.
bash ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/scripts/brand.sh init \
  --name "Acme" --one-liner "…" --out brand --date "$(date +%F)" \
  --register brands/registry.yaml      # omit --register for a single in-situ brand

This creates <out>/brand.yaml + <out>/assets/ and (if --register) upserts the registry. Pass --date explicitly when you want a reproducible run.

3. Hand off

Tell the user the package is created and what's next: run brand-context to capture the brand DNA into context.md, then naming / brand-strategy / etc. — each writes into this package and flips its flag in brand.yaml.

Querying the portfolio

# ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR} = this skill's directory in Claude Code; elsewhere use scripts/brand.sh
# relative to where this SKILL.md was loaded.
bash ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/scripts/brand.sh list --registry brands/registry.yaml
# slug · name · one-liner · path · [status]

Use this to answer "what brands do we have / where do they live / what's the one-liner" without opening each package.

Rules

• The registry is a SSOT file, never agent memory. Brand locations + one-liners are data → they belong in registry.yaml (git-tracked, shareable), not an LLM's per-machine memory.
• Don't pre-create empty section files. Only brand.yaml + assets/ at init; each skill creates its own *.md when it runs.
• Never overwrite an existing package. The script refuses; respect that.