Blue Marlin gets to work on Brains brew

Blue Marlin has been appointed to redesign Brains’ cask ale portfolio as the Welsh brewer reacts to market shifts indicating real ale is experiencing steady growth.

Appointed in December 2010, the consultancy came through a credentials process which led to a five-way pitch won on a ’strategic approach’, according to Blue Marlin global business development director Simon Jones.

’Cask ale is moving away from being seen as an old man’s beer to reaching a broader audience – the discerning drinker under 25 and women. It’s a small but significant trend,’ says Jones.

Brains’ Bitter, SA, SA Gold and Dark are to be redesigned focusing on pump clips, before moving on to bottle labels and can livery, with a roll-out planned for late spring.

The incumbent designs have been in place for nine years and the relaunch will coincide with a push to gain territory with more stockists.

Brains’ sales and marketing director Richard Davies says, ’We felt that bar presentation needed to be reworked to increase the modernity, increase bar standout and, very importantly, give us a design device that we could own as much as Nike owns its swoosh.’

Jones says that the designs across the range will use a ’visual linking system’, which link the beers to each other and back to Brains. Each will have its own ’product story’ told and ’personality’ denoted through the design, which must be ’balanced’ with the linking system, Jones says.

A large financial investment is thought to have been made in the project. Although undisclosed, it is described by Jones as a ’significant amount’.