This story is part of a series about rethinking a well-known local beer-mix brand, Borsodi Friss. Read more about the task, the strategy and the creative concept.

In the course of developing the brand strategy, we also received the task of rethinking the packaging of the Friss family, and though not a full 180-degree redesign, the result was an exciting facelift nonetheless. 

Testing the packaging versions showed us that there are some customary elements worth holding onto to aid the identifiability of the radler segment (which made our job easier and more difficult at the same time), and we also had to take into consideration the recognisability of the brand.    

Road to the final version

When designing the different versions, we kept in mind the goals defined during the brand strategy development process: appealing to the younger target group with a sleeker, modern visual world that suggests quality, and, very importantly, strongly differentiating the alcoholic and the non-alcoholic products (which gained legal significance later when developing the TVC). 

It was a real challenge to find a direction in this segment that is gender-neutral and exciting, but is still in keeping with the characteristic, fairly set graphic style of radlers (exploding fruits, icy water, etc.) It would also have been inadvisable to completely let go of the existing elements of the packaging (such as the Friss logo using a hand-written font). 

Among the first-round versions, there were some quite daring ones, radically distinct from the competitors’ packagings, some others that tried to break free of the conventional elements of the segment, and of course, the perfect happy medium (4 – this one ended up being the winner, as this was the direction that accomplished most of the goals we set, and it also performed the best in testing).  

The next step was to fine-tune the selected packaging. Here our most important guideline was to ensure the identifiability of the brand and the segment, and to strongly differentiate the alcoholic and non-alcoholic versions. We created some designs with stylized illustrations of fruits, but in the end we agreed on a more photorealistic depiction with the client.

Evolution of a logo

There was also the question of the Friss logotype: to ensure the identifiability of the brand, we chose the version that most resembles the original, but has a more modern look with updated colours.  

By the way, the colour of the Friss logo was also used to differentiate the alcoholic version. The base colour of the cans also serve this purpose: the non-alcoholic version’s base colour is white, while the alcoholic version’s colour is lent by the aluminium can’s chrome surface. 

All in all, we feel that we managed to achieve all of our pre-defined goals and designed a truly up-to-date, modern packaging for the Friss portfolio. 

What’s up with the visual world of the TVC?

The first script of the TVC development (created together with the director) was based on a live-action story, which at a certain point would have switched to scenes supplemented with colourful, drawn animations. 

And just when this script was completed and approved, the coronavirus struck. At that time, during the spring lockdown, pulling off a live-action, multi-location shoot was out of the question, so we had to rethink our possibilities. One of the options that presented itself was to move our film over into the world of animation in full. Needless to say, this is a typical love project for an art director, not to mention that it’s rare to come across a visually exciting, fully animated ad spot in Hungary.   

Moreover, the platform envisioned for the Friss portfolio was a great fit for a colourful, dynamic story taking place in a drawn world, so gradually our client also started to warm up to the idea. So much so, that not long after we were already picking between several beautiful treatments, submitted by various foreign and Hungarian animation studios. 

Here are a few examples of the different visual routes we explored:

Our key challenge was not to catch the attention of children with the ad’s vividness and animation style – which was a huge struggle for the team. Luckily in the meantime outside factors allowed it to go back to the live-action shoot with a limited crew. So we dusted off the first version of our script, and while we left out most of the drawn scenes to be safe, we still ended up with a beautiful spot after all the adversities of this difficult period.

This story is part of a series about rethinking a well-known local beer-mix brand, Borsodi Friss. Read more about the task, the strategy and the creative concept:

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The author(s)

Hargitta Csík

Art Director