Toluu

Brand New

Opinions on corporate and brand identity work. A division of UnderConsideration.

In Brief: Kiss This, Mexico CityDecember 2

Every now and then it's worthy to remind us of the horrible perils of spec work. Whether designers should do it or not is really not the question, each person can decide what to do, but what's clear is that the creative process and its manifestation is what suffers the most. A few months ago, Mexico City, through its Department of Tourism announced a contest to design the official logo for the city. Using the I♥NY logo as an example of what it wanted to achieve it then set the following parameters: The logo should depict the Angel de la Independencia monument and it should revolve around the theme of Bésame Mucho, the (rather lovely) song by Consuelo Velázquez. Anybody in the world could participate and vie for the prize of MX$1,000,000 (around US$73,000) to be filtered through a judging panel and the final winner selected by on-line voting. From 8,000 entries five finalists have been selected (one has already been removed for copyright issues) and are available for voting. The results are disheartening (other than the idea of No. 4). You can also see a number of the entries on a Flickr pool;

A Swirl of OrangeNovember 23

Sunkist, one of the many orange sodas looking to capitalize in parallel to the zesty orange success of Fanta, has recently updated its logo and line of packaging. Not much information to go on from the internet, but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out this one: More swirls equals more sales; it's the kind of thing they teach you at Harvard Business School. Serious. Swirls. And swirls within swirls? It's an implosion of success waiting to happen. In all fairness, the lettering isn't half bad, it resolves the counterspaces rather successfully, but the orange party happening around it is just a little too much to handle. And in comparison to the recent Fanta rebrand, this is just way too undercooked.

Old Sunkist packaging.

Promo image from Facebook.

Thanks to Tim French for the tip.

I ♥, You ♥, We all ♥ NYNovember 21

Back in May of 2007, it was announced that advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi had been awarded the I Love New York campaign run by The Empire State Development Corporation with an alloted budget of approximately $17 million — budget that goes into the production and media buys, not into Saatchi's pocket as some people have misunderstood — to promote tourism for the state of New York. The first set of print ads came earlier this year and the now infamous logo with a squirrel on it has been popping up regularly but for some reason there is a rekindled interest in this story and some fun material has come up, so we are happy to give this the attention it deserves.

The biggest concern when I read about Saatchi getting the job was that they would be a little too eager to change the 1977 logo designed by Milton Glaser, in an attempt to get some attention and show how clever advertising agencies can be. Luckily, the I ♥ NY remains the same… except that it has grown some actively annoying clip art appendages. These, along with the print ads, are meant to sh

Global BeerNovember 19

Yesterday, with approval from shareholders, Anheuser-Busch InBev was officially launched as the merger of two breweries: Belgium-based InBev — which was formed in 2004 through its own merger of Interbrew and Brazilian AmBev — and St. Louis-based Anheuser-Busch, established in 1860. The combined power, staff, inventory and line of products has created the world's largest brewer, representing powerhouse consumer brands like Budweiser, Stella Artois, Beck's and Bass, and in addition, the new company has a 50% ownership of Mexico's Grupo Modelo which sells the relaxing Corona, and they have a 27% share in China's Tsingtao which produces its delicious eponymous beer.

The new Anheuser-Busch InBev identity reflects the vision of our new organization, with our guiding principles at the very heart of its conception. It is designed to represent drive, authenticity and friendship.

[…]

Reflecting the rich heritage of both companies, the eagle represents strength, agility and focus

The Sweet, Funny Smell of CoffeeNovember 14

This is a slightly off-format entry, I have to admit. It's not a redesign, it's not about a logo, and it's not quite about packaging, at least not mass consumer packaging. But it is about branding at a relatively micro level, which may speak more directly to the kinds of clients the majority of us work on from day to day. So, this is a peek at the work that UK-based designer and illustrator Jim Smith has created over the past decade for Puccino's, a coffee retailer with franchise locations around the UK that has differentiated itself through humor and an off-beat attitude. And it has been the cups, in-store graphics and myriad little packages that have fully given Puccino's its unique brand through a consistent style, approach and tone of voice. Following is a brief interview with Jim who has just designed six, brand new cups.

Six new cup designs.

Armin Vit: When did you start working on Puccino's and how did you get the project?