Beer labeling strategy tip: Look backwards

Creating labels for your brewery’s products is no trifling matter. In the craft beer space, marketing budgets likely don’t cover commercials or other forms of all-out advertising. When potential customers walk the aisles of their local stores, they’re encountering dozens of can and bottle designs they’ve never seen before. If your brand’s offerings are the most compelling options on the shelves, you can rack up some extra sales.

In such a high-pressure environment, the first instinct may be to go over the top and opt for extremely colorful and excessive beer labels. After all, the craft brewing space isn’t known for its tasteful restraint. However, you can and should consider more than one strategic option when designing bottles and cans. Depending on your company’s history, you may win customers over by bringing back or paying tribute to a beloved design from the past.

Turning back the clock four years
You may be concerned that you craft brewery hasn’t been open long enough to use nostalgia as a marketing tactic. However, in the fast-moving world of beer, a limited or seasonal brew may become a treasured memory in a matter of months. A recent announcement from Founders Brewing Company is a great example of this strategy in action. The company decided to bring back its Mosaic Prime seasonal beer, winner of the ArtPrize label design contest in 2014.

The new release of Mosaic Prime will have a slightly different can design than the one that won an award four years ago. The new version is designed to act as a celebration of the first version. The fact that the new cans are a limited seasonal release, and will only be available through November, leaves the door open for another modified version to pop up next year or later, once demand peaks again.

Recreating the past
While Founders is banking on updating a well-regarded can design from the immediate past, Miller Lite revitalized itself by going back to a more distant heyday. Bloomberg Businessweek pointed out the simple can design Miller launched in 1975, with its logo on a plain white field, caused a surge in demand when it came back in 2014 – sales rose 14 percent. Bloomberg suggested this approach to company history may be worth trying for brands outside of the beer world that have fallen in popularity, such as Harley-Davidson.

When it’s time to switch up your beer labels, you need to ensure your brand’s printer can generate high-quality results – check out Optimedia Labs’ U.S. store or Canadian shop for inspiration.