PACKAGING TRENDS: Frenzied Designers & Mad Men

Posted on May 22, 2013 by Rob Atkinson

With the new season finally airing, the Mad Men frenzy has begun again, this time evoking nostalgia for the 60s. Making everything old new again, the series continues its ripple effect of influencing sectors, from fashion to lifestyle, to film making, and packaging design. One by one, brands have been inspired by the Don Draper era.

Taking items that Peggy and Joan might use on a daily basis in the world of Mad Men and splitting them down the middle against their 21st century counterparts, Shutterstock compares and contrasts the creative tools of trade for two wholly different worlds. However irrational and time consuming they now seem, the magic of old school methods is infectious and undeniable.

Banana Republic has teamed up again with Mad Men’s costume designer for a modern take on the razor-sharp tailoring, polished lines and and colour optics of the 60’s. The Mad Men collection reflects a mix of modernism, cubism and Mondrian design.

Inspired by flower power, shimmery pastels and kaleidoscope pop art combinations, Estee Lauder has brought to life its 60’s collections under a new limited edition design. The three individual, fabulously chic pieces would freshen up any make-up collection.

Don drinks whisky like water, and alcohol is a prominent theme in the popular series. Shifting from Draper’s favourite fuel to beer, the Mad Men drinking culture gets a modern touch in this student project. The design intends to reinterpret whisky and its typical design cues by bringing their essence across to the beer category. The black on black look is slick as they come and the bold features are symbolic of masculine elegance (perhaps something today’s men could learn from Don and co).

As the shows frame looks set to continue to the 70s we hope we won’t be seeing Don Draper trading his suit for a floral print butterfly collar. But as long as Mad Men continues to achieve huge viewing figures and keep style at its epicentre, brands and designers will be taking note.

PACKAGING TALKS: Early Years

Posted on May 15, 2013 by Rob Atkinson

Convenience has become a key feature in almost everything we do or use. Amongst those seeking it most are parents juggling their careers with young children. As you’d expect, brands have taken note. Clear signposting, bright and colourful design, alongside format innovations, mean these packs and products minimise stress, while being safe, smart and sustainable.

We’re very proud to have design packaging for the leader in the baby foods category, Ella’s Kitchen. The first brand to use squeezy pouches, Ella’s is a true pioneer and a host of copycat brands pay it compliments on shelves in all corners of the planet.

Picking a brand clearly influenced by Ella’s, Squooshi think that convenience is not only about speed, but also efficiency and sustainability. Being easy to carry, store and use on the go, its resealable pouches are the perfect alternative to heavy jars and hard-to-open cans.

Karim Rashid’s IiamoGo baby bottle reflects the perfect balance between beautiful design and a simple, innovative idea – the milk warms up in a few minutes at the press of a button. Though its ideal on the go, the liamoGo bottle’s non-reusable warm-up cartridge means it lacks in the sustainability department.

With its natural colours, product textures and shape, Mimijumi is as close as you can get to a comfortable and natural experience for bottle-feeding. The lovely packaging design has the right amount of essential information and nothing more, placing the product under the spotlight.

These packs would suggest that the baby and child category isn’t just a place for bright, bold colours and clear signposting but that animal imagery is another almost constant motif.

PACKAGING TRENDS: Transparency

Posted on April 24, 2013 by Rob Atkinson

As part of a recent trend for simplicity, big name brands like Starbucks and Nivea have modernised by undressing their identities in favour of minimalist persona. Other brands have read the same mantra but are taking it further and reflecting it in their pack design, removing extra layers of material and various design elements, to welcome a wider array of transparency on pack.

Hatziyiannakis Dragee Pebbles’ packaging demonstrates the manufacturer’s pride in its products. The pack gets away with being relatively light on text as it’s so brilliantly heavy on imagery.

Complementing the naturalness of the Pietro Gala brand is its cardboard packaging. The quirky yet humorous product reveal really got our attention.

Waitrose own Herb range stands its ground against any premium one. These classy designs are combined with bold typography giving clear product signposting. Herbal cooking inspiration has never been as easy and fun.

The little souffle-like cake, Souffy Snow, is just as sweet and delicious as its completely transparent packaging sugests.

Handcrafted with care and love, the Beurre & Sel biscuits don’t need a complicated pack design. Its unique story is enough (read it here).

Festina use transparent packaging to show complete confidence and satisfaction in their product. These waterproof time pieces prove themselves on shelf and won’t fail to catch your attention.

Bob Studio’s beer, served in a jar, is definitely one of a kind. As if the unusual pack format wasn’t enough to catch our eye, it’s also see through.

For Fruute, the packaging is only a cover, as the products speak for themselves. The packs look great but do you think these cookies would make it home from the store without crumbling?

One thing is clear: a brand that has the courage to expose itself as it is, speaks complete confidence in its product. Transparent packs not only drive brands to play more with the product itself, but also have the power to innovate in markets that are too ‘crowded’ with the same old shapes and colours.

AFFORDABLE ART FAIR NYC

Posted on April 15, 2013 by Rob Atkinson

Last weekend the spring Affordable Art Fair was held in NYC’s Chelsea neighborhood. The event, which occurs twice a year, showcases works from up and coming artists in more than 80 different galleries. All the art is for sale and visitors can get their hands on some originals from just $100, with the top priced work at $10,000.

The fair is a refreshing reminder that investing in art doesn’t have to kill your budget – there are plenty of talented artists producing great pieces that can be purchased for a reasonable price. Since the fair is geared to those who are interested in art and not necessarily experts, the organizers provide some advice on their website about collecting. Novices and aspiring collectors can get tips on what pieces to start with and what traits to look for in the artists. The most important factor though should be whether or not you have an emotional connection with the work.

Look out for when the fair reaches a city near you.

PEPSI BITES THE BULLET & GOES SPORTY

Posted on April 9, 2013 by Rob Atkinson

After 16 years Pepsi has decided to turn the page and unveil a new shape for its bottle, the redesigned structure is claimed by the beverage giant to make the pack more ‘grippable’ and enable Pepsi to tap into a younger market and challenge Coke’s iconic bottle.

Pepsi bottle chance in the past years.

Following its most recent logo change in 2009, Pepsi has taken a masculine approach to redesigning its bottle shape, perhaps due to an increasing number of male Pepsi drinkers. Pepsi claim that the new bottle’s base allows consumers to have a more stimulating, tactile interaction with the bottle itself. It’s clear that the new structure gives Pepsi a more chunky and powerful feel, which seems to have been its aim.

Pepsi

In its endeavour to stand out from its lifelong rival and create a more branded and recognisable shape, Pepsi have lost the curves and grace that served it well back in the 20^th century, shifting slowly towards an aesthetic closer to that seen in today’s sport and energy drink category.

The redesign has been a brave move, and is a major step in Pepsi’s ongoing effort to create a more cohesive look for its brand, in reflection of its ‘excitement of now’ positioning. But while its famously alliterated nemesis has managed to create and maintain a timelessly cool, fresh, and smart image, we wonder whether Pepsi’s effort to keep up new will help it reignite the excitement its looking for.

BLUE MARLIN LONDON DO FIRST THURSDAYS

Posted on April 5, 2013 by Rob Atkinson

Last night Blue Marlin London braved the current bizarre April freeze and travelled the District line across the city from our Fulham studio to trendy Shoreditch seeking some culture. First Thursdays, organised by the Whitechapel Gallery and supported by Arts Council England, will see (on the first Thursday of every month) over 170 galleries and museums in east London stay open till 9pm with free events, talks, exhibitions and private viewings.

We beefed our Instagram feed yesterday on our venture. Follow us on Instgram.

For more information about First Thursdays click here.

DRIVING CHANGE: Innovative Ideas to Make the World a Better Place

Posted on April 2, 2013 by Bluemarlin

Changing the world isn’t easy. Charities and awareness groups face several challenges to not only get their message out there, but to engage the public into response. Firstly, the issues at hand, from poverty to the dangers of spiked drinks, tend to be troubling and overwhelming. People may genuinely care, but no one likes to be depressed and so they shut them out. Rattling people with the truth may only cause feelings of guilt and despair – or even worse, apathy since there doesn’t seem to be a real solution. Secondly, for many charitable organisations the resources available to multi-national corporate businesses are in a different stratosphere, large scale campaigns and monopolising ad space are simply out of their grasp.

Thus, charities and awareness groups must depend on the cleverness of great ideas to capture and captivate the public. They’ve got one very significant thing on their side – the truth. With that in their arsenal, all they need is imaginative and innovative thought to truly make a difference. Perhaps big business could learn a thing or two from the campaigns dreamed up by these do-gooders.

Guerrilla Umbrellas. You could be next. That’s what the ‘Watch Your Drink’ campaign is trying to show you. ‘Nightclub ninjas’ place umbrellas into oblivious people’s drinks to prove how easy it is to spike someone in such an environment.

Experience the issue. German publication FiftyFifty altered the air conditioning in German cinemas, with temperatures dropping to the uncomfortable levels that the homeless brave every night sleeping outdoors. The audience were shown interviews with homeless people and given blankets with QR codes on, which when scanned would lead them to a site to donate to a homeless charity.

Thirsty? UNICEF’s Dirty Water vending machine confronted people across Manhattan with reality they mainly see in the media. Vending machine dispensed bottles of water apparently infected with deadly diseases such as malaria, cholera and typhoid. The brown liquid reflects what those less fortunate are forced to drink on a daily basis. Passers by are encouraged to donate through the vender, online or by SMS.

Real solutions. From raising awareness to positively impacting a community in the long term, there’s only a small, but significant step. UTEC university teamed up with an advertising agency to design a intelligent billboard, which turns air humidity into drinking water that turns air humidity into drinking water.

BACON PACKAGING LEFT BEHIND

Posted on March 25, 2013 by Rob Atkinson

We admit that it’s a weird one but it would appear that bacon has become trendy. Bacon has recently gained a huge amount of popularity in the United States and the fatty treat trend is now spreading to Europe and beyond.

Rashers are no longer the only way we can get your bacon fix, everything from bacon air freshener to bacon dental floss and Bacon Diet Coke is available.

Click here to see to see the top 10 weirdest bacon products.

We’ve noticed however, that despite the quite frankly insane bacon trend, bacon packaging hasn’t changed a bit. What’s the deal there? Why aren’t bacon brands capitalising on the popularity of their product with some innovative, unique pack designs?

Is the packaging formula for bacon tired and being left behind by the recent bacon movement?

PACKAGING TRENDS: Synergetic Brandmarks & Structures

Posted on March 19, 2013 by Bluemarlin

Building equity through synergistic brandmarks and pack or product structures appears to be a successful tactic for brands in their increasingly competitive categories. By finding elements of consistency throughout design from brand to pack and product, there’s opportunity for brands to tell consumers their story through simple on shelf interaction.

So which brands are playing the synergy card and playing it well?

Isklar – We often beging our packaging trends with a design of our own and aptly this one was a Design Effectiveness Award winner fro Blue Marlin. When we worked on Norwegian glacial mineral water brand Iskar we repeated the shape of the diamond shaped logo to provide structural shelf stand out.

Nivea – The worldwide cosmetic and personal care brand have recently released their new face care packaging with a new brand identity inspired by the iconic blue, which holds Nivea Crème.

P’tit Louis – Not long after launching in the 90s, P’tit Louis changed its generic shaped brand mark to a round green mark echoing the product within.

Whiskas – Whiskas Temptations’ structural packaging is directly linked with the brand’s identity. The kitty’s head shape is used as a visual in the brand mark and also as the shape for the box.

Dewars White label – The tail of the D was designed into the glass bottle as a debossed area.

If you can think of any more packaging examples we could’ve included we’d love to hear them.

GREEN SAFFRON STAND AT IFE13

Posted on March 18, 2013 by Rob Atkinson

Green Saffron was exhibiting at IFE today (International Food & Drink Event). We took a trip Eastwards across London to the ExCel centre to see the stall which we designed.

You can find out more about our work on Green Saffron Spices here.

One Marlin blog

Ideas and innovations from around the world of branding, design and marketing.

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