Your Beverage Packaging Design Can Be Beautiful and Still Be Wrong.

I've seen some pretty incredible beverage packaging design over the years. Beautiful illustrations, clever typography, great colour combinations and some genuinely impressive creative work. But I've also seen packaging that looks fantastic on a designer's computer screen and practically disappears when it's sitting on a retail shelf. That's the funny thing about packaging design. You can create something that everybody loves, from the business owner to the designer, and still miss the mark with the one person who really matters. The customer.

A few years back, I became involved with an Ottawa craft brewery called Evergreen Craft Ales. They were doing what just about every craft brewer dreams of doing. They were brewing great beer, building their business and getting their products into retail outlets. The problem was, so was everybody else. Craft beer shelves had become a sea of colourful cans, clever illustrations and competing personalities, with everyone trying to outdo the next guy. Evergreen's cans were nicely illustrated, with different colours and artwork for each brew, but the brewery's identity was barely noticeable. Take a look at the photos above, and you'll see what I mean. Individually, the cans looked pretty good. Put them alongside a hundred competitors, and they became just another collection of colourful cans fighting for attention.

Unfortunately, Evergreen eventually reached a crossroads where selling or closing the business was becoming a very real possibility. That's when the opportunity arose to rethink the brewery and give it an entirely new identity. My inspiration came from the legendary Colt Peacemaker, the six-shooter that became synonymous with the American frontier. I wanted Pistols Brewery to have that same unmistakable presence, with a little Western mystique, a bit of outlaw attitude and a story worth telling. The logo became the foundation of everything. Bold, unapologetic lettering, subtle references to cocked triggers, and a knockout T that almost takes on the appearance of a cross. To me, the whole thing feels locked and loaded, ready to send you off to meet your maker. From there, we built a consistent brand identity around six carefully selected brews, each with its own personality but unmistakably part of the same family. Six brews, six chambers. It couldn't have been a better fit.

Now, I'm certainly not suggesting that changing a logo or redesigning a beer can is going to magically save a struggling brewery. There's a lot more to running a successful beverage business than good design. The product has to deliver, the pricing has to make sense, and you've got to get it into the hands of customers. But branding has an important role to play in all of that. It gives people something to recognize, something to remember and, hopefully, something they'll look for the next time they're standing in front of that crowded shelf. That's what we set out to accomplish with Pistols, and it's been rewarding to watch the brand develop its own place in Ottawa's craft beer community.

Which brings me back to those Evergreen cans. There was nothing particularly wrong with the illustrations, the colours or even the individual label designs. The problem was that the packaging wasn't doing enough to build recognition for the brewery behind them. Sometimes great packaging needs to be bold and colourful. Sometimes it needs to be simple and understated. And sometimes the strong, silent type wins in the end. The important thing is understanding what your brand needs to accomplish before you start designing something beautiful. If you're wondering whether your own beverage packaging is doing its job, take a good look at it sitting alongside the competition. You might be surprised by what you see. If you're considering branding for your beverage company, or breathing new life into an existing brand, let's talk. Pssst.... Curious how Evergreen became Pistols? Take a look at the Pistols Brewery brand development project. Jeff Quigley | Quigley Creative