Conquering Brand Beasts - The Power of Weird in Building a Brand

Summary

In this episode of Conquering Brand Beasts, we break down how Skittles built one of the most enduring brand campaigns in modern marketing. From the shift to “Taste the Rainbow” to decades of surreal, unexpected advertising, Skittles carved out a distinct identity by leaning into weird, playful, and culturally relevant creative.

We explore how consistency, bold differentiation, and a strong brand world helped Skittles stand out in a crowded category, while continuously evolving across formats from traditional ads to live experiences. Along the way, we unpack practical lessons for small business operators, including the importance of testing ideas, not getting attached to early concepts, and staying aligned with your brand voice.

If you want to create marketing that people actually remember, this episode is a playbook on building a brand that lasts.

Takeaways

• Make your tagline open-ended so customers can project meaning into it. 
• Stay consistent with one core idea to build long-term brand equity. 
• Stand out by doing what competitors are not doing. 
• Commit to a clear brand personality and own that space. 
• Build a cohesive brand world so campaigns feel connected. 
• Align your marketing style with cultural trends to stay relevant. 
• Create memorable experiences instead of running standard ads. 
• Test different versions of your marketing even with a small audience. 
• Generate lots of ideas and refine down to the best ones. 
• Use exaggeration to make humour land more effectively. 
• Make sure your messaging fits your brand before following trends. 
• Know your audience and speak in a way that resonates with them. 

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Transcript

Thomas: Hello, hello, and welcome back to another episode of Conquering Brand Beasts, a segment of the Koyoti Small Business Podcast. As usual, this is Thomas, this is JCC, and today we're talking about something near and dear to our hearts as kids—confections. Before we start, John, did you have a favorite confection growing up?

JCC: Mini M&Ms. They were way better than regular M&Ms because of the candy-to-surface-area ratio. You’d take a massive handful to get the right amount of chocolate and that extra crunch.

Thomas: Or if you’re extra bold, you just pour them straight in. Any candy bars?

JCC: Frozen Kit Kats. That is the superior way. My uncle used to put Score bars in the fridge, and the caramel became extra brittle but extra chewy at the same time.

Thomas: I wasn’t a big sweets guy, so putting them in the freezer muted the sweetness for me. Plus, it made them crispier. This brings us to the brand we’re talking about today: Skittles.

JCC: I didn't have a personal relationship with the candy itself, but their advertising was so "sticky". Even if you didn't eat them, you knew the brand.

Thomas: In our research, we found their 1971 launch slogan was "The rainbow of fruit flavors," which lasted through the 80s. But it’s not sticky because it’s too on the nose and leaves no space for creativity or imagination.

JCC: Like the De Beers tagline, "A diamond is forever".

Thomas: Exactly—"forever" allows the audience to imagine what that means to them. When Skittles landed on "Taste the Rainbow" in 1994, it became a palpable idea that could adapt across time.

JCC: That’s why this 30-year campaign is still going; it works for everything from Super Bowl ads to social media. They set themselves up as the oddballs and bizarros pushing boundaries.

Thomas: It reminds me of Nike’s "Just Do It"—it’s become synonymous with the company.

JCC: Some other big ones are McDonald's "I'm lovin' it" and Mazda's "Zoom-Zoom". Skittles really found their footing around 1998, paving the way for other brands to have more fun and use "weird" ideas.

JCC: The 90s were perfect for this because culture was becoming "weird and wacky," like the introduction of slime on Nickelodeon.

Thomas: It was spearheaded by MTV in the late 80s. Skittles took that cultural shift and applied it to advertising, starting an odd, wacky counterculture approach that grabs attention.

JCC: The agency was Darcy, Masius, Benton & Bowles. At the time, a cloud raining candy was a far-fetched idea, but now it’s normal—we even have anthropomorphic M&Ms going on dates with humans.

Thomas: They started with print ads, like a Skittles tree, and then went "full tilt" into surrealism between 1996 and 1998. We watched one that looked like Lord of the Rings with an elf princess and a stone with a stylized "S" on it.

JCC: There was also the alien worms on the moon. They were agitated until a rainbow rained Skittles on them.

Thomas: They really figured out the message with the farmer planting Skittles to grow a rainbow. It was a multi-sensory experience where you heard the "tink-tink" of candy hitting a metal bucket like rain.

JCC: Fast forward to 2009, and we get the iconic "Touch the Rainbow, Taste the Rainbow". That gave us the man with the Midas touch who turned everything into Skittles—even his phone and potentially his grandchild.

Thomas: It’s about zagging when everyone else zigs. It gets serious and then zags back to being funny. But I have to mention "Skittles Pox"—that was disgusting.

JCC: Disgusting, but hilarious. Like the girl eating a Skittle off the guy's face.

Thomas: Then there was the sour milk ad with the tough mafia guy hooked up to a milking machine. The concept was: if asparagus makes your pee stinky, why wouldn't sour Skittles make your milk sour?

JCC: And the giraffe eating Skittles from the clouds and being milked for more Skittles—that was genius.

Thomas: I didn't like the arm-wrestling town as much because it didn't feel like it was part of a specific "Skittles universe". You have to think about the story you’ve built over time.

JCC: The real genius was their Broadway musical instead of a Super Bowl ad.

Thomas: It costs a lot, but so do Super Bowl ads. By doing a musical, they created something unique that they owned completely without competing for attention. They also live-streamed someone watching an ad, which got millions of viewers. They are a challenger brand creating experiences rather than just ads.

JCC: It’s like an artist I saw who draped a whole room in painted cloth to create a universe. Skittles established the "rules of their world" enough to bring it into real-life theater.

Thomas: To bring this back to small business: it’s about AB testing. Even if you have a small list, test different versions of your emails or thumbnails.

JCC: Don't be married to your first idea. Writing rooms might go through a thousand ideas to find ten gems.

Thomas: And regarding humor, George Carlin said you can joke about anything, but the more serious the topic, the more exaggerated the joke needs to be.

JCC: But be mindful of your brand. Don't jump on a trend just because it's a trend. Patagonia can say "Don't buy this jacket," but a fast-fashion brand like H&M couldn't.

Thomas: Finally, believe in your message. Skittles believed in "Taste the Rainbow" for 30 years.

JCC: Don't take yourself too seriously. Understand your demographics and psychographics, and communicate in a way your community wants to be spoken to.

Thomas: Beautiful. That’s another episode of Conquering Brand Beasts. For KSBP, this is Thomas.

JCC: This is JCC. Until next time. Cheers.