How is it possible to see an own-brand beer and know which mainstream product it is intended to replace in your basket? That’s the power of ‘brand codes’.
Brand codes are the colours, shapes, words and iconography companies use to help you notice and recognise their products.
A rule of thumb we’ve heard is that you ought to be able to recognise a brand if two or more of its codes are present.
That’s why we know a can contains Coke, even without the name – because it has that shade of red and that white ribbon, for example.
The flipside of this is that you only need to rip off two or three brand codes to signal to buyers that own-brand product X is similar to, and just as good as, the real thing.
The most recent triumph from Aldi is a lager design to evoke Carling and also Coors Light – both produced for the UK market by Molson-Coors.
The brand codes ‘Carters’ borrows from Carling include:
- the mostly-white can
- the black accent colour
- an angular font with a broken A
- brewed in Britain
- the two-syllable name starting with ‘Car’
- geometric stripes and slashes
- the general layout
Then, from Coors, we have:
- the mountain
- the pale blue accent colour
- the mostly white can
There’s also, perhaps, a bit of Carling Premier, the nitro variant, in the mix.
When we asked people on social media platform BlueSky which brand they thought Carters was designed to bring to mind everyone said Carling and/or Coors.
Brasserie 1867, Grande and Shark Bay
There are others in Aldi’s current beer range, too.
Brasserie French Style Lager 1867 borrows its blue can, prominent historic date, red accent colour, and general Frenchness from Kronenbourg 1664 (Carlsberg).
Grande Spanish Lager is clearly inspired by Madrí (Molson Coors) with a mostly red label, line illustration of a retro-hipster bloke with facial hair, a very similar font and a name that’s sort of half rhymes with Madrí.
One of our favourite examples is Shark Bay Amber Ale from Lidl, usually displayed alongside bottles of Sharp’s (Molson Coors) Doom Bar.
This one is so similar that we can imagine someone picking up a bottle by mistake, if they don’t pay close attention.
Some of it is quite subtle, though: the silver shark sits in about the same place as the silver Sharp’s logo; Shark sounds a bit like Sharp’s; and the word ‘bay’ in all capitals looks, at a glance, like the word ‘bar’.
Craft beer brands are, of course, not immune from having their brand codes hinted at. Aldi has two beers clearly inspired by, and designed to evoke, BrewDog.
Anti-Establishment IPA is a hilariously literal take on Punk IPA, hinting at the original with the typography, the various shades of blue, and text highlighting that it is brewed in Scotland.
And Memphis Blvd, a grapefruit IPA, does the same for Brewdog’s Elvis Juice.
Brand codes into category codes
If brand codes are about helping you spot individual products (or recognise bargain knock-offs of the same) then category codes are designed to signal which shelf a beer should sit on.
In 2024, craft beer codes tend to be things like:
- indie-style cartoon illustrations
- vibrant colours, gradients and patterns
- on-trend style-magazine typography
- abstract, poetic, quirky names
- cans over bottles
While trad ale codes might be:
- ‘heritage’ colours and tones
- shields, crests and heraldic symbols
- details in gold or silver foil
- simpler, more straightforward names
- or nostalgic ‘heritage’ names
- bottles over cans
What confused things a few years ago was when brewers in the second category started borrowing codes from the first category in an attempt to muscle into that growing market.
That can be a problem when the beer in the would-be trendy can doesn’t match the expectation set by those codes.
And now we also have craft brewers borrowing ‘trad’ codes to help people understand where their new milds, bitters and porters fit into the scheme of things.
Main image sources: Aldi (Carter’s) and Molson Coors (Carling and Coors Light).
3 replies on “Brand codes and beer packaging”
Many years ago, I had a truly delightful phone call with one of the lawyers for Coke over my employer municipality’s swoop in our logo. I think I gave assurance that (i) we would never ever put a twist in the swoop and (ii) we would avoid the single swoop wherever possible and (iii) we were not now and had no plans to be in the swoop selling business. We still have a swoopy logo. https://www.cityofkingston.ca/
Carter’s, as broken down here, reminds me of a clip of TV Burp. Can’t find it now but Harry Hill asks “have you ever noticed they don’t stock any of the usual beers at the Queen Vic?”, as a lead in to someone wanting “two pints of Stelberg”.
Just picked up a bottle of Dead Canary by Glamorgan Brewery, which seems a mick take to Dead Pony but also a bit to local mining tradition, although the packaging is nothing like Brewdog’s.