Chupa Chups – The expansion of a universe

Design: Vibranding
Location: Spain
Project Type: Produced
Client: Chupa Chups
Product Launch Location: Global
Packaging Contents: Snacks

If there is one brand that is instantly recognisable on account of its logotype and its visual identity, then that brand is Chupa Chups. Its visual code is powerful, colourful, psychedelic, a bit motley… It is unique, as brands should be. And they came to us with this request: How can we continue to build our brand in the food products that we license? The answer was obvious: with imagination, relish and charm.

Brand architecture helps to diversify corporate identity. Branding is marvelous when it opens up new territories without losing its entity.

One of Chupa Chups’ business lines (as occurs with many mass-consumption brands) is product licensing. Licensed products need to have an independent visual code to stand out, while also fitting in with the brand’s visual corporate identity. It is a highly meticulous job of brand architecture that must take numerous factors into account; a complex briefing that calls for a great deal of creativity.

A brand’s pure essence — We were commissioned with creating the graphic criteria to ensure that any company with a Chupa Chups food product license can develop their packaging and sales communication elements within a specific visual code. And the foundation for this visual code was a very simple idea: the actual Chupa Chups flavours.

The flavour of a Chupa Chups is a very powerful element in the brand’s identity. The most powerful one? Possibly the most powerful one, together with its logotype. This is why the idea was to graphically represent this forcefulness of its flavours. This gave rise to the pattern that we created as a leitmotif in the brand architecture for this project. Waves of colours that represent the Chupa Chups flavours, peppered all over the place.

Defined flavours — Another one of Chupa Chups’ highly representative aspects is the combination of colours associated with each flavour. We maintained this concept in the new visual universe for the licenses and created some new codes, such as multi-flavour or tropical flavours. Since the added value offered by Chupa Chups to its licences is precisely the flavour, we wanted the latter to take all the limelight. In this way, the licensed product (an ice cream, cereals, a soft drink or muffins) is quickly recognised within the brand’s visual universe.

We also established the complementary graphic elephants, typefaces and uses, flavour pictograms, the icons that we needed to complement the identity of the licensed designs.

All of this is described in a comprehensive brand book designed in accordance with the new visual identity and which contains all the key items for any designer or studio to create both packaging and communication and support elements for sales actions.