The Asda rebrand features fruit stickers and an unexpected approach to typography

UK supermarket Asda has rolled out a rebrand courtesy of its advertising agency Havas London, who won the creative account for the retailer two years ago. The focus is on creating a more personable experience that unifies a brand that has become steadily “fragmented” as Asda has evolved, says Havas creative partner Nathalie Gordon. Asda is now a dual-colour brand, with adjustments made to that original primary green, and some graphic introductions like modern-day grocery stickers.

The redesign is at its most unique in typography, designed with Colophon. A prime example being the lead display font, Asda Headline, which is entirely unicase; Havas wanted to bring “some of the beautiful cursive quality of lowercase into bold cap height prominence,” says Lorenzo Fruzza, chief design officer.

To develop a typographic direction for an enterprise as mammoth as Asda, Havas launched an extensive audit and exploration, eventually deciding that two display fonts and two text (plus two styles) would suffice. “Asda has so much personality, we needed to create a face that would deliver that tone everywhere,” says Lorenzo. “Even in the spaces where the brand needs to be deeply functional and accessible.”

The answer to the type style came in the form of traditional greengrocers. An open sans serif incorporated the flares and swashes of hand-painted grocer signage. The irony of using such a local inspiration for a name like Asda is not lost on Havas: “They’re a big supermarket but this new branding is helping to communicate a more personable experience”.

Obviously, numerals would play a large role for Asda, and Colophon and Havas have found a way to communicate this information on signage with flair – “we further pushed the sign painter qualities here,” says Lorenzo. The crossbar of the pound sign mirrors lines found where prices include pence, which are underlined with a swooping stroke, and in percentages.

Fruit stickers have been a popular mode of communication in brand identities across markets for a while and have trickled their way into this work. “They’re also a very clever way to house a lot of information without overcrowding creative – plus that messaging feels light and fun (instead of boring and cold) because of the varying sizes and colours,” says Nathalie. “They’re actually incredibly hard-working assets.”

The colour green has been with Asda since the 1960s, with the best-known version of the colour established in the 1990s. “Green was and remains a key part of the Asda DNA,” says Nathalie. “As such, we wanted to keep it front and centre of the rebrand, but we had identified key challenges around hue and legibility in our research.” Havas addressed this with a higher contrasting single primary green, and a dark green as a new secondary pairing.

Shoppers might also note what appears to be a new Asda tagline, ‘That’s More Like it’, in assets. There have been some adjustments here in the past few years, with adverts changing from ‘That’s Asda Price’ to ‘Get the Asda Price Feeling’ in 2021. Havas says the tagline and brand platform ‘That’s More Like it’ was actually soft-launched last year and is showing up more prominently in assets now.

‘’When developing identities for brands like Asda, it’s important to remember that the channels they live in have evolved so much in recent years – they no longer just show up in traditional media channels,” says Lorenzo. “We have worked with Asda to create a new brand identity which stands out in the market and can flex across multiple channels – ensuring it’s relevant and meaningful to its customers.”