Making brands distinctive. From established icons to new ideas.

Taste is local. Brands need to understand that.

Food is culture. What looks delicious in Amsterdam might not have the same appeal in Paris, Milan or Warsaw.

We’ve worked with food brands across EMEA and learned where international consistency matters and where local culture needs a voice. The challenge is knowing what to keep consistent and what to adapt, without losing the distinctive brand assets that make the brand recognisable.

Sometimes that means finding a common visual language strong enough to work across borders. Sometimes it means giving local markets the freedom to reflect different tastes, traditions and expectations.

We’ve learned this first-hand working with international Unilever brands such as Cup-a-Soup, Knorr and Calvé and food of Pepsico, as well as strong local brands like GoTan and De Ruijter.

Think international. Understand local. Stay distinctive.

What if design starts before the design brief?

Some of the most valuable design work happens when the answer isn’t clear yet.

A new consumer need. A new benefit. A new proposition. Maybe even a new brand. At that stage, visualising possibilities helps marketing teams turn abstract strategic thinking into ideas they can actually see, discuss and evaluate.

We’ve learned this through more than 15 years of working with FrieslandCampina on brands including Mona, Optimel and Vifit, in the Netherlands and across Eastern Europe like Napolact and Fruttis.

Much of that work started when there was little more than something to taste and a first idea of what it could become.

That’s where design can make a real difference. Exploring different propositions, names, identities and packaging directions early helps teams see the possibilities—and make better choices before everything has been defined.

From extending established brands to creating entirely new propositions, we use design to help turn innovation into something consumers can understand, recognise and choose.

Sometimes design doesn’t start with a brief. It helps create one.

Besides FrieslandCampina we worked for Sodiaal International, Nadec Saudi Arabia, Alpro and Danone giving us a broad expertise in daily consumer needs.

Sugar is seen by many as a commodity. But that doesn’t mean consumers have to experience it as one. When the product is similar, the brand has to work harder.

Through our longstanding partnership with the Südzucker Group, we’ve helped turn commodity products into locally loved and distinctive brands. Brands that build value through provenance, heritage, sustainability and design-led storytelling.

In this category, brands are local by nature. Each has its own history, consumers, competitors and cultural context. Understanding what makes that brand meaningful and turning it into distinctive brand assets is how you move beyond product and price alone.

For brands like Tiense, that means building on what people already know and value, while finding new ways to keep the brand relevant for the future.

When products are similar, distinctiveness creates value.

A category built on distinctiveness

From global portfolios and established brewers to Trappist tradition and independent start-ups, we’ve experienced beer from very different perspectives.

Working with brands in the Heineken portfolio, Grolsch and Bavaria, alongside La Trappe and independent breweries like Gooische Bierbrouwerij, has taught us how much of beer is built on perception, culture and distinctive brand assets.

Established beer brands have years of recognition and heritage to build on. But drinking habits are changing, and connecting with new generations often means finding the freedom to behave differently without losing what made the brand recognisable in the first place.

That can mean rethinking the identity and packaging. But also moving into new categories, creating new propositions or collaborating with unexpected partners.

For new and independent brands, the challenge is different: how do you create distinctiveness and recognition when you don’t have decades of heritage to draw on?

We’ve worked on both sides of that challenge. Helping established brands evolve and new brands find an identity they can truly own.

Because if there’s one category where perception and distinctiveness matter, it’s beer.

And if you think ‘my category is not in there?’, next to all these, we worked for Food brands across EMEA, detergents, health & beauty, retailers and durables. All this experience helps us to get to the point quicker; help your teams to tackle brand and packaging issues based on thorough thinking and help you get more out of them. Through serendipity workshops, creative sketch sessions or brand & packaging audits.