Casa Visco: Italian food rebranding

An excerpt from Package Design Magazine:

Consistency, simplicity, and familiarity are the keynotes of BEACH’s approach to refashioning the brand image of the Casa Visco line. Gone are the variations that have crept into the style of the original packages over the product family’s 51-year history. In their place is a design that’s clean and direct.

… A photo of a spoon with a die-cut window reveals the jar’s contents. Says Ludacer, “Having a bit of the product show through the spoon hole is fun and makes a nice visual metaphor for what your spoon will soon contain if you buy one of Casa Visco’s awesome products.”

… Ludacer explains that in order for the die cut spoon idea to work well, other visual features of the label needed to be simple and direct. Although such simplicity might, in his words, “flirt with a private-label type of look,” he notes that there are other elements at play as well. “We included some fun features that make it something else altogether—something that wouldn’t look out of place on a shelf at Dean & Deluca or Whole Foods.”

Among these fun, value-added features is one located where fun isn’t ordinarily expected to be found: the UPC code on the back of the label, which morphs into a forkful of spaghetti. It’s an engaging visual pun, but will it affect scannability? Ludacer, whose blog contains a thread on the surprising design possibilities of UPC codes, says that no harm will be done at checkout as long as the scannable portion of the UPC isn’t altered. The laser doesn’t record anything that it doesn’t recognize as a bar code and does not object to a forkful of pasta in the vicinity.

Ron Romanik, Package Design Magazine, August 6, 2009

(See also: Dave’s Gourmet)