Garden rebrands Sainsbury’s Tu range

Garden has created a new identity for Sainsbury’s Tu clothing range.

Tu identity
Tu identity

The consultancy has been working with Sainbury’s since July 2012 and this is its first completed project for the retailer, according to strategist Raouf Rumjaun.

The Tu brand was initially launched in 2004 and Garden says it has aimed to create an identity with a bolder presence as well as one that addresses occasional confusion over the name.

Tu print material
Tu print material

Joe Hedges, creative director at Garden, says, ‘Some people thought it was an acronym. We wanted to create a mark that was bold, had more presence and personality and moved away from the possibility of being mistaken as an acronym.

‘We also wanted to refocus the original pronoun nature of the name: “Tu = you, the individual”, which in turn is highly aligned to the proposition of “live your style”.’

Tu swing tag
Tu swing tag

The Tu wordmark has been reconfigured, with a lower-case ‘u’ introduced, as well as the new ‘live your style’ strapline.

Rumjaun says, ‘We needed to make it clear that, while Tu is a brand in its own right, it still sat comfortably with Sainsbury’s proposition of “live well for less”.’

Tu photography
Tu photography

As well as the new identity and branding, Garden has also worked on packaging, photography and roll-out guidelines for the relaunched Tu.

The new Tu range is set to land in Sainbury’s stores across the UK in September.

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Comments
  • Jody Ward November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    Hey, brand looks really nice and crisp but can you explain the thought process behind the change in the style of the ‘u’?

    Thanks!

  • AHA November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    Jody – The lower case ‘u’ indicates ‘Tu’ is a word and not an acronym or initials. ‘TU’ (both letters in uppercase) could be interpreted as initials for say, Texas University. Also, people who understand or speak Spanish will recognise ‘Tu’ as Spanish for ‘you’ (informal). Personally I think both the letters should be lowercase ‘tu’ as that would have the same affect but reflect the informality. (Formal ‘you’ is ‘vu’)

  • Emma Atkinson November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    Looks like Gu to me.

  • Stephen Mortimer November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    I don’t really understand why the ‘u’ is shaped like it is or what the curve represents.

  • Ricardo November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    Tu means You, in Portuguese.

    So it only means sense the current upper case/lower case.

    So it reads: “You only at Sainsburys”. Instead of; “T” “U”

  • Narjas Mehdi November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    I believe that the shaped curved tip on the ‘u’ points upwards to hint at a sort of umlauty U sound, similar to the French word ‘tu’ meaning ‘you’, and pronounced in an umlauty way.

    So the ‘ü’ reminding us of Gü is possibly no coincidence.

    Therefore this ‘Tu’ works because it visually creates a linguistic reference that helps us to read it correctly.

    We read it as the “ooyeuw” sound that this ‘u’ needs (as in ‘über’) — as opposed to the ‘u’ in ‘hut’.

  • Brett Harrison November 30, -0001 at 12:00 am

    Immediately reminded me of Gü as well.

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