"It has never been more important for companies to turn their brand into a service. Jaded, time-poor, pragmatic consumers yearn for service and care, while the mobile online revolution makes it possible to offer über-relevant services to consumers anywhere, anytime. Basically, if you're going to embrace one big consumer trend this year, please let it be 'brand butlers'."

For many years Beck's have been supporting young talent and showcasing the established artists by offering them to use Beck's label as a canvas for their work. Artists whose designs appeared on Beck's bottles include Damien Hurst, Tracey Emin, Jeff Koons, and many others.

2008 saw a beginning of partnership between Beck's and the Royal College of Art, which resulted in four promising RCA graduates having their work put on Becks' Canvas.

The four successful Beck’s Canvas artists are:

• Riitta Ikonen, 27, who is studying a two year MA in Communication Art and Design at the Royal College of Arts and graduated last month.
  
  
• Tom Price, 26, is an alumni of Sculpture (2006) who received a First Class BA (Hons) Sculpture degree from Chelsea College of Art in 2004 and currently works from his Brixton studio.
  
  
• Simon Cunningham is an alumni of the MA Fine Art, photography course (2007) who lives and works in London.
  
  
• Charlotte Bracegirdle, 34, is an alumni of the Masters degree in painting (2006). Originally from Devon, Charlotte spent seven years applying to art schools across the UK before accepting a place at the RCA.

One of these collectable bottles can be yours - they can only be purchased in the UK during August and September.

“The campaign vividly illustrates that Beck’s is different by choice. The updated ads should act as the start point on a ‘discovery trail’ - building intrigue and interest for the viewer - which will be rewarded when they see the bottle in a pub, bar or off-licence or experience the campaign on-line.” - Will Morris, Senior Brand Manager for Beck’s at InBev UK

Excellent

With the launch of the new model, Sandero, Dacia unveils its new brand identity.
As speculated, it is a combination of Renault, Nissan and Dacia, which appeals to a younger audience.

Chrysler has a new logo. The Pentastar got a metalizing treatment. It was 1962 when then-Chrysler president Lynn Townsend wanted a new corporate symbol to represent all of the corporation’s brands. It had to be a symbol with a strong, classic look, instantly recognizable and universal. Wherever you were, in whatever country, that symbol had to say “Chrysler.”
Now Chrysler is being Chrysler again.

more here

"Adobe's desktop brand system is a pragmatic & systematic approach to creating a cohesive functional visual language carried across our hundred products and their thousands of branded icons and screens. With a specific emphasis on clarity and legibility, this system expresses a singular focus of better enabling our customers and their work.
Our approach is pragmatic and utilitarian, literally "less is more". We have created a concise and coherent unified language in a deceivingly simple and highly distinctive visual system – from the branded desktop work through to interface and product design. Top-level point products (authoring environments eg. Photoshop, Illustrator, etc) follow a two-letter mnemonic 'nickname' system as their primary identifier... A product's icons are paired with a specific color, usually based on historical color association (Flash is red, Dreamweaver is green) and familied within a particular vertical. This color association is carried throughout the product's desktop brand in lieu of 'primary imagery', from install screens through app icons and reinforced through details on document and supporting icons." - John Nack on Adobe

A range of 15 new wines is being rolled out to pubs using Carlsberg's distribution service.

Under the brand name Invenio, the portfolio is exclusive to Carlsberg's on-trade customers, and has been sourced from countries and regions around the world including California, South Africa, and Australia. Packaging features details of the country of origin along with the varietal, plus tasting notes.

Carlsberg UK wine buyer Louise Boddington said: "Invenio offers outstanding, reasonably priced wine. It gives our trade customers the opportunity to retail a range of Old and New World styles for their customers at outstanding value for money under an on-trade exclusive label."

SiebertHead has created the branding identity for Invenio, which is Latin for, "to discover", including the gold font and design for the product's red, white and rose ranges. Artist Ruth Palmer has created eight illustrations featuring landscape designs to denote the country of origin for each wine.

Invenio white wines are produced from three varieties of grape. Invenio Chenin Blanc comes from South Africa, Sauvignon Blanc from Chile and Chardonnay from the United States. Of the red wines, Tempranillo is Spanish, Montepulciano d’Abruzzo Italian and Shiraz Australian.

Although the selection is relatively small, it’s a good overall range whose wines represent a versatile assortment of various styles. Of the white wines, Chardonnay has the most oaken taste and is worth trying with pasta and cheese. Shiraz red wine is also good to sample at a pizzeria.

Does this says "tender" to you? This is a new brand from Transavia, a chicken meat producer from Romania. The brand name is Fragedo, suggesting tenderness, freshness etc. Well, at least that's what I suppose they meant to convey. To me it sounds more like green. It doesn't make me think of "fresh chicken meat". But that's me.

Brandient is responsible for the design and naming. Transavia expects(ro) a 20% rise in total turnover with the new brand.

What do you think about the new brand, Fragedo?

College students in the USA, may love to use the latest gadgets and wear the hottest fashions, but they may not know where their favorite brands originate, according to exclusive new research from market research firm Anderson Analytics.

53 percent of students thought Finnish cell phone company Nokia to be Japanese, while 57.8 percent thought Korean electronics company Samsung was Japanese. And 48.5 percent mistakenly thought Adidas clothing came from the United States, not Germany.

"For the most part, this next generation of educated American consumers either have no clue where the brands they use come from or simply assume everything comes from the United States, Japan or Germany," said Tom H. C. Anderson, Managing Partner, Anderson Analytics,

The study is based on an online survey of 1,000 US college student conducted during the fall 2006 semester by Anderson Analytics’ GenX2Z.com, which provides in-depth research on the youth market. See how students rated brands here