Putting together a logo for your company is both exciting and super stressful. But it is OH SO important to how you will communicate your brand and your product to the world. It also might be the only thing they remember about your product besides the fact that they liked it. We always had a company name that we loved but the branding was much more of an adventure. I’ve mentioned it before but really want to dive into what that creative journey looked like for us. Let’s go!
MUSICAL INTERLUDE
Hello!!
Welcome to Courage and Other C Words! I’m your host, Jenn Root Martell. Thanks for joining me today! I know I missed a week there and I’m so sorry. This little one is just throwing off my time management in a huge way and though I’m loving every minute I’m with her, it really cuts down on productivity. Especially when you need to sit at the computer and just write out pages of script. I’ve never been great at studying with music on or being able to focus on more than one administrative task at a time so juggling writing for this episode and a screaming, hungry child just isn’t in the cards for me. But we’re back on track now and I’m glad for that. Can’t believe August has now come and gone and what I was expecting to be an episode about what my three months of maternity leave looked like, we all know what happened there.
So instead I’d like to do a company-focused episode because it’s been a while. I’ve already talked about how we got the company started and what that looked like as far as space and equipment and a business plan, but an important part of all of that was the vision of what the product actually looked like. We had a great juice hook-up so what went in the package as far as the cider went was never really an issue for us. But coming up with the logo and a brand that could translate across many different bottles and cans and tents and tablecloths and coasters and whatever else was a whole different story.
Luckily for us, we did have a name that we loved. The directionality of South City Ciderworks and the association with a particular space and the culture that went with it was very appealing. For our logo, we wanted to continue that direction-focus of “Simply head South” for the best cider in the Bay. The compass rose was always in the back of our minds, or at least the direction arrow to be used in some way. Our first go at a logo was through a friend and co-worker of Alex who was a graphic designer. We knew we didn’t have the thousands of dollars that one could easily throw at a large marketing and design company, and we also wanted to steer away from a logo that looked over designed and super corporate. So his friend sat down with us and busted out a few great options for what a South City cider logo could be. This was so early on that we were just looking for something to put on our business cards. We hadn’t even gotten around to packaging or what a label could look like. That might have been helpful in retrospect but what did we know. We just needed cards to hand out at CiderCon in February and getting something/anything on paper was a good start. He was a great designer so we at least had something to start with. I also had just gone through a rebrand at the non-profit I was working for so had in my head that we also had to buy the rights to the fonts and make it a more serious design process that it probably needed to be. For the record, you do not need to buy fonts. That was $250 that I still regret to this day. But you don’t know what you don’t know I guess.
This original logo ended up being actually a vertical logo with the full name going from bottom to top and a directional arrow going through it with some emphasis on the pointing down, or South. And ciderworks in a small font at the bottom. It had a black and red color palette and was bold and eye-catching. No apples to speak of, and could have worked for pretty much any South City company but we liked the idea of it, and the vertical concept that we didn’t see very often out in the market.
With a bold logo in hand, we got things rolling with the build out and actually creation of the company and the product. We decided to go ahead and pull the trigger on printed cans because they were less expensive than labeled or shrink wrapped cans that can be ordered in more on demand quantities but don’t work as well with our pasteurization process. Not being able to take that quality control element out of our production process, we needed to come up with a can design as soon as possible. Looking at that vertical label again and the large amount of space that you need to fill on a can, we realized that this would not translate into branded packaging.
So we had to scrap it. Back to the drawing board.
This time we leaned on each other to come up with an idea for a logo. We couldn’t shake the compass concept, so that featured strongly in those first logo ideas. We also spent a lot of time in front of the beverage aisle looking at what others had done, what was eye-catching, what colors worked, etc. Doing that exercise now with so many more companies making so many more beers and ciders and kombuchas and hard seltzers, I think I would get a headache really quickly. Especially for those who crank out new labels every week or so. I’m still amazed by that. But for the logo of the company itself, we wanted to see what others were doing and what worked, and what didn’t. Trying to keep the industrial vibe, we definitely didn’t want to go with the more floral and ornate designs that you see on many wine labels. We also didn’t want to go with the larger format bottles or cans for our packaging to stay with the concept of accessibility we were shooting for.
I think that even in the last few years since we were doing this exercise, the market has changed dramatically and though it’s important to have your logo on your packaging, artwork and the names of the products seem to have come to the foreground and make the most impact on customers. When I go to the store to grab an Old Rasputin, Death & Taxes, or Denogginizer, I am not thinking as much about what brewery these beers were made but more of what’s in the can or bottle. Trumer Pils might be one of the few that has their name associated with the actual beer itself. And good on them for sticking with one beer and making it amazing. But when we were starting out, the name of our flagship cider was wrapped up pretty thoroughly in our company name - South City Cider. If you remember, we were just going to make one cider way back at the beginning of all this. So it made sense to just focus on the one brand and the one logo.
This time we wanted to step it up a little for the design work so we reached out to a local San Bruno graphic designer who had worked with some local restaurants to fashion their logos and we were fans of her work. We sent over some ideas of what we were thinking and asked that she put together those elements into something that was hi-resolution and looked better than what we could draw.
Key elements were:
The end product was a curlicue South City in lobster font as main focus of the design, circled with a large compass and a slightly smaller cider around the outside of the compass at the bottom. The main piece of the compass was that the direction of south was highlighted in a larger arrow in a different color. It was bold, could be interchangeable in colors, and kept to the more industrial theme we were looking for. Something that was also important was that the whole thing could be translated in just black or just white for shirts and other applications. This was key in making the design as well and we asked the designer to generate pretty much every different combination of blue, red, grey, white, and black that was possible before solidifying the design.
As we didn’t sign on to the idea that people actually read the text on the packaging, we opted for more of a macro design for our cans, having the compass logo on both sides of the can so that no matter how it was haphazardly placed on the shelf, you’d be able to get at least a little of the branding. We didn’t think taking up a whole side with our story and tasting notes mattered. I think this train of thought was also just part of the market at the time. And as a new brand we wanted to get the name and the logo out there before all else almost. Once people tried it at bars and restaurants, the cider would sell itself and we just wanted to make it as easy as possible for people to find it on the shelf.
As you might remember from past episodes, we also started the company to make one really good semi-sweet cider that had a dry finish and was served in a 12 oz can. So for this initial logo and can design, we were really thinking about just one cider variety. Not in the adaptability of our logo to fit other varieties that might happen down the road. Big mistake. Out of the gate we had a logo that read South City Cider for our semi-sweet south city cider cans. Only a few months later did we realize we really should have an option that showcased the whole company. So we had to go back to the designer and have her retrofit cider along the bottom into ciderworks. It still looked OK but was definitely busier and didn’t show as well on a shirt.
It worked for us for about two years, plastered on shirts and banners and coasters. I am still very fond of that lobster font and the compass pointing south.
The issue arose sometime in 2017 when we noticed that our Dry Me a River dry cider was doing really well in kegs and we were looking to put it into single serve packaging for stores. We didn’t know if it would really be something people would like so instead of doing cans, as they weren’t the go-to packaging that they are now, we opted for trying out the dry in bottles. And not the big 22 bombers that were slowly fading out of style, but the smaller 500ml bottles. The label for this packaging didn’t lend itself to big logos on two sides and in such a short amount of time, the market had shifted to enjoying reading what was on bottles and learning more about the company and the product that they were purchasing. So the bottle had to had a logo big enough that it would have brand recognition, but also have space for a product name that was different from the brand and the company logo. Oy… Trying to put our lobster logo on a bottle just didn’t look right.
So we had to scrap it... again... Back to the drawing board.
This time we sought the assistance of a designer out of Colorado who Alex had connected with and who had already worked with several breweries and other beverage companies. He knew the market and was excited to build out a whole new branding look for us. This meant many conversations around who we are, what our company culture is, what our cider is like, who our audience is, what we’d like this new logo to look like, and making it work on a bottle.
Kevin was great and took in all the information we threw at him. This time we didn’t have a vision for the logo like we did the first time around. It took serious soul searching but I finally came to terms with the fact that I was most likely going to lose the compass. We needed a logo that was more apple-focused, more industrial, and easier to showcase the brand, not just the product name.
So Kevin rolled out four or five different logos along with supporting brand art to round out the whole logo and potential marketing needs for packaging. One I remember was focused around the El Camino Real bell that is the logo for San Bruno but also appeals to California in general as that road runs the entire length of the state. He came up with one that was more modern with bold blues and blacks. One was cute with a blue box that had the name in it and then red and white stripes.
We sent it out to everyone we knew to elicit feedback. I’m pretty sure we event posted something on social to poll the audience to see what they liked. For me it came down to how easily it could translate to other marketing materials and how attention grabbing it could be on packaging. Though yeah, still sad to see that the compass didn’t make it into any of the designs. The focus was more geometrical, cleaner lines, and more attention grabbing designs. I get it. As an ode to the logo that I built a company with, I went out a year later and got a celtic compass tattooed on my left arm. So at least I have a little bit of that memory always with me. Shows how emotional these things can be and how generally sentimental I am I guess.
The one we chose was originally more of an oblong design which I then asked to be made into a circle so that I wouldn’t have to get custom made coasters and stickers. It was modeled after a vintage train sign to bring in that timeless industrial feel, and at its center is a red apple, no matter the product, to celebrate what’s inside. It also is again, a red white and blue design to pay homage to the US and our long tradition here of apple growing and cider making. Along with the circular logo, Kevin put together a chalice image with SC on it for South City that is found around the label of the can and is just another great branding image that we can use whenever we need something else. The diamond inside the main logo could also be extracted to stand on its own if we ever needed it.
As a nod to our compass beginnings, he also generated a design that was a thick arrow that housed Make Cider Make a Difference, our tagline. That can also be found on most of our packaging and is a great addition to the brand since we had such a strong foundation of giving back to the community and making good cider from the very start. That was greatly appreciated.
So yeah, a little more of an investment in money than the first iteration but a lot more that we could work with and one that showcased not just our company name but our product as well.
And with the new branding came some necessary label redesigns. The grey South City Cider can had to be overhauled and the cider renamed. Thus, Original Blend was born, to differentiate it from the brand in general. It was turned into a white can, and the 500ml bottle that we wanted to put together for Dry me a River was created. Along with that, we also added green elements and made a bottle label for All the Good Hopped Names Were Taken dry-hopped cider as well.
After a couple of years of dealing with bottles, we decided to move to cans for all of our products in 2019 and ordered a truck of dry and hopped 12 oz cans to match the Original Blend. This of course meant a redesign of the label to fit the cans instead of the white-focused labels that were on the bottles. Unlike a lot of other brands these days, the different ciders don’t have different branding or different designs. They have their specific colors that are attributed to the different products, and on the shelf they stand out in that way, carrying the same layout to make them match. I still think this is the way to go as it’s a clean and clear announcement of the brand on the shelf. And it’s super eye-catching when they’re all lined up together. I think so anyway.
A new addition to all these new designs was text. Now that we were a couple years into the market, things had changed where we realized people were more interested in the names and the context. They wanted the story behind the cider, and a little more personal connection to the company than there was before with just logos. So these bottles and the newly deigned cans had the logo still on both sides but the one on the front was much better for brand recognition and the one on the back was smaller and sat above a set of text that shared our story of the cider. It was definitely a cultural shift and I think it looks really good.
After the first batch of Original Blend cans, we did decide to cut out the location and date in the main logo to free up some space and make it look a lot less busy. We still use both logos but highlighting the name of the company is really more important at the end of the day than making sure all the details are there. People can figure that out on their own.
Along with these new printed cans, for our seasonal ciders we decided to go more of a craft direction and add some illustrations. The general label format is all the same and theres some nice gold accents to make it look fancy. And at the top of each one is special artwork to catch the eye and highlight it as a specialty in our repertoire. The Oaked Pomegranate has a take on wood grain along the top, Spider Bites has honeycomb with the honey oozing down from the top, Yerba Buena has mint in its design, and Mulled It Over has cinnamon and cloves. I also love that each of the seasonals has their own color pallet that is tied together with that gold line work. They are clean and clear and still have an air of specialty about them. Kevin did a great job. Even the last minute jalapeno and pineapple cider we made this past year got its own label with the same format and sticks out on the shelf in vibrant colors and a fun design along the top.
And the Dry Me a River is doing so well in the market that Kevin and I are working on what a 16oz design might look like to give customers another option in can packaging. This is mainly based on feedback from our bar and restaurant partners and we’re excited to see if that direction could be another great addition to our line up. Seems like the opportunities really are endless.
Everything just really came together and at the end of the day, we have a logo we can put wherever and a brand concept that can withstand the test of time. If we last that long.
And now we have moved into 47 Hills Brewing and are about to open up taps at the taproom for cider. It’s not necessarily a rebranding opportunity as one of the big positives with merging is that we were bringing a recognizable brand with us. But it is the first time that we have had a taproom for our cider, a physical space that we can draw people to for a pint. So exciting! So now we just need to adjust our marketing and social media strategy to include this great new avenue for our cider. We’re looking at some signage for outside, and in general need to look at glassware and production planning to make sure that we have all that we need in place before those taps open. It’s now not just a showcase of our package product or a constant thank you to the retail partners who have us. There’s a pull marketing strategy that has to happen to get people in the door to drink our cider. Something we have never asked them to do before. Having the community already in place helps, the taproom is always busy for the beer lovers who come by. But we need to make sure the cider lovers out there know about our space as well. We need to add this new cider outlet to our branding and shout it from the rooftops whenever possible. And those taps will be up and running soon so we need to get our act together and start talking about it. Which means more pictures from me, so stay tuned to see all that coming out on our socials. What a trip.
So at the end of the day, there’s an example of the evolution of a brand, from the design of business cards for a conference to the launch of a product, to the growth in the offerings, to the build out of a taproom. All the while trying to be clean and clear and memorable for those looking for our ciders on the shelf. There have been some misses, but I think we’ve come up with a real winner and look forward to seeing it continue to grow in the new space and with more distro.
And that’s a wrap! Are you looking to start a business and brainstorming a logo? Are you stumped? Just launched a brand with a new name and new logo? I’d love to hear all about it! Email me at info@othercwords.com.
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