Alcohol Packaging Assignment Chosen Client: Somerset Cider Brandy Company

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The Somerset Cider Brandy Company is a 200-year-old establishment, that has been distilling cider since receiving the UK’s first full cider-distilling license in 1989. The company holds many awards for its Cider and offers Somerset Cider Brandy at 3, 5, 10, 15 and 20 years aged. The aesthetic of the brand mirrors their traditional and natural processes in creating their products. Their website focuses on the landscape of Somerset and the home of their company in Burrow Hill. They focus the design on greens and golds, with pops of colour featured in their galleries. To refresh and redesign the alcohol packaging, it is important to retain the personality and voice of the brand. They evoke the taste of the Brandy with the quote, “Swirled gently in the glass it reminds you of autumn leaves, ripe fruit, wild flowers and the sunshine of the Somerset Countryside”, providing visual connections that can be incorporated into the design to capture the brand. As featured on their current packaging design, they allude to their copper still from Normandy, equipment that embodies the tradition and age of the company and process of distilling. The Brandy is aged in oak barrels to provide complex flavours and retain the volatile alcohol, another element that could be featured in the design. The Somerset Cider Brandy Company has also been awarded Protected Geographical Indication status in Brussels, implying that the sticker will need to be applied to the packaging design.





The current packaging has a very simple design with a type heavy design. The glass bottle has a brown tint and an even neck to body ratio, giving the bottle a tall appearance. The design element for the product is reserved for the front label and accompanying box. The design has a vintage appeal, with accents of gold in the logo, borders and ‘Somerset’. The bottle and box designs are very similar between each age of Brandy, with slight differences mainly in colour and small design elements. The colours of the packaging vary from yellow/white for the three year, dark green for the five year, burnt orange for the ten year, metallic silver for the 15 year and brown for the 20 year aged Cider Brandy. Each feature the logo of the brand, a metallic gold tree on a hill illustration centred inside. The five-year-old Brandy features a small illustration of the distilling equipment at the top of the box. The type is predominantly script with a few uses of a sans serif and serif type to separate the information. The type is mainly black, but features red type to add emphasis to “cider brandy”. These images from the Somerset Cider Brandy Company website, only present the front of the bottles and not the reverse, therefore, in purchasing more of the design can be assessed later.


Somerset Cider Brandy Company: https://www.somersetciderbrandy.com 

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