labels Branding/ Label design

[Steve5000]

I'm interested to know how many people are attracted or put off by 'burning ass' or satan/ skull inspired sauce labels.
Personally they are are a turn off for me and I would rather see some clever or smart textual design/artwork rather than a scull or a flaming ass, which seems to be quite prevalent, although those styles must sell units, as they are everywhere.

Sorry if this has been done before, but I am interested in peoples take on it.

Steve

Edit: Taste comes first, obviously

 

[ThrowHeat]

For me, the quality of the label artwork is more important than what the artwork actually is. But that's mainly because I am someone who dabbles in logo creation.

Beauty is only skin deep though. The label artwork really has no impact on whether I will buy a sauce or not. I'm more interested in the ingredients than the logo.

 

[Steve5000]

I also would also like to say that ingredients matter more to me that the logo or label design, but I know that I have bought sauces before (Jack Daniel's BBQ for eg) purely for the bottle design, even though i can't pronounce most of the ingredients

 

[Emrikol]

I think the logo matters to some degree. If I see a "ass kicking world's hottest ghost chile death head ass burner" label, I judge that book by the cover and assume it'll taste like vinegar and chemicals.

If it's something a bit fancier, and the ingredients back up the heat claims, I'm all for it.

 

[The Hot Pepper]

Cliche.

Oh and you are about to hear another argument that the devil is offensive in branding which I was surprised about, Dirt Devil, etc. But there are those that are offended and avoid those products.

Hell is fiery
Hot sauce is fiery
Show Hell
If it's a cold beer show an iceberg

I get it. Some people don't and think you're promoting Satanism.

 

[texas blues]

Cliche.

Oh and you are about to hear another argument that the devil is offensive in branding which I was surprised about, Dirt Devil, etc. But there are those that are offended and avoid those products.

Hell is fiery
Hot sauce is fiery
Show Hell
If it's a cold beer show an iceberg

I get it. Some people don't and think you're promoting Satanism.

So says you.

DEVIL WORSHIPER!!

 

[Lucky Dog Hot Sauce]

Cliche.

Oh and you are about to hear another argument that the devil is offensive in branding which I was surprised about, Dirt Devil, etc. But there are those that are offended and avoid those products.

Hell is fiery
Hot sauce is fiery
Show Hell
If it's a cold beer show an iceberg

I get it. Some people don't and think you're promoting Satanism.

this.

my philosophy was "why turn people off" - and unfortunately "people" includes grocery store and franchise owners. now that said, there's also honesty in labelling - if your sauce will melt the paint off of a battleship, maybe that's appropriate labelling. If your sauce has demons and skulls and blood and death on the label and it tastes like unicorn kisses and rainbow sprinkles, your customers won't care about the label other than being mad that you misrepresented the sauce. My $.02

 

[Steve5000]

The devil isn't offensive to me; far from it, but those kind of labels, along with flames coming out of some guys butt just seems un-imaginative to me, regardless of how good the sauce is and neither are something I would generally pick up off the shelf. This is just my 2c

 

[The Hot Pepper]

You are one person, it doesn't matter what is offensive to you. Consider your audience. Retail? Boutique? Specialized? Gourmet? Hardcore chiliheads?

 

[Steve5000]

I'm not trying to start an arguement, believe me - there is not much that is offensive to me, fat girls in tight bikinis and that is about it. I was just looking for opinion.

 

[The Hot Pepper]

Umm these are opinions no one is arguing.

Okay I'll bow out thought I was helping.

 

[Lucky Dog Hot Sauce]

THP is spot on.

It also doesn't matter if it would offend your target audience.

If you want it on store shelves, you can't offend the owners of the stores.

there's a logic to neutrality in labelling - it's a standard of marketing. Consider this: entire countries have boycotted a product because the product name means something in another language.

Sensitivity sucks, but if you want to sell things to people, you need to be aware of the risks of using potentially offensive labling or content.

Best,

Scott

 

[Steve5000]

+1 Lucky Dog, agree with everything that you said.
Personally, I am not for skulls and flames coming out of some guys ass; not because it offends me, but to me it seems like everyone does that and there is no imagination in it. Whereas your labels and others appeal to me because they do not scream 'novelty sauce'

 

[The Hot Pepper]

I was answering thinking you wanted to put out labels but now I see you are asking as a consumer (I think?). That's why I was saying it matters what others think, not you.

Not sure. Oh well.

 

[Lucky Dog Hot Sauce]

All the PC stuff aside, I enjoy the creativity people show with their superhot labels - and as I'd said, many of those are appropriate, much like a rattlesnake's rattle or a wasp's black/red or black/yellow coloration is appropriate. They serve to warn the consumer that it ain't ketchup!

lol

There are a lot of funny and sometimes gross labels - I appreciate all of them and would never personally boycott a product because of it. But it does sometimes confuse me that people selling a food product would put something really unappetizing on their label. But each to their own.

I was responding with a more practical approach above - at the core of the matter, THP nailed that too - it all depends on where you want to sell and to whom. Hardcore chiliheads might think my labels are lame because they aren't gross or funny. There's 2 sides to every story.

I was answering thinking you wanted to put out labels but now I see you are asking as a consumer (I think?). That's why I was saying it matters what others think, not you.

Not sure. Oh well.

Yeah - that confused me too.

 

[Scovie]

I have talked at length with a certain Lady here that makes Salsas and sauces.
She has a good take on it. She doesn't want her kid eating something called Devil's ASS or the like, and be taking it over to his friends house and sharing it.
But she is coming from a producing stand point which makes sense.
I personally like the creativity of some of the names, but when they get silly, I'm out.
They are fun to read and look at, but to buy? hmmmm.
If I walk into a Hot Sauce store with thousands of bottles, I would enjoy looking at all of them,
but when it comes down to laying down cash? It would be for something a little less "novelty" and based on the ingredients of course.

I think a lot of those sauces are cheap productions made with extract, and selling because of the novelty name only, IMO.

Just my 2¢...

 

[The Hot Pepper]

If the conversation is what we will buy... well here's exactly what I do. I read the ingredients. Does the label draw me to that bottle first? If done well, yes. So if the ingredients are to my liking, I buy it and they did their job in grabbing my attention because there could have been many good sauces. So labels matter. And everyone is attracted to different stuff. So it is very important. But I'm an "all natural" shopper so if it has fake colors, flavors, etc. that bottle that just got my attention gets put right back on the shelf.

 

[Steve5000]

Sorry, if I caused confusion by posting in the food business forum, I was asking the question as a consumer. I saw a bottle on facebook and everyone was raving over the design of the label. To me it looked like a schoolkid had given the designer his idea of a good label concept.
Because of the design, I could really only see It ever being a one-off novelty purchase that a parent might buy for their teenage son's birthday. By all accounts the sauce was great, but I felt that by using this novelty flames coming out of a guys butt design, they are limiting their market.


Steve

 

[Lucky Dog Hot Sauce]

Was it "ass in the tub"?

I've had that sauce - pretty funny label.

 

[salsalady]

One theme that hasn't been mentioned is the "SofaKing Hot" design. There was one design posted on here somewhere showing a fat slob with belly hanging out and holey sox sitting on a couch. I get the Sofa-King Hot pun, but I wouldn't buy a sauce with an unappetize picture like a fat slob on the label. Makes me wonder if the slob on the label is a picture of the person who made the sauce. And another lady sauce producer said the same thing.

The whole flames-out-the-ass theme has been done soooooooo many times. yawn. The quality of the actual label and artwork is more important for a first impression for me. I won't even pick up something like "Osama Bin Laden Killer", that just looks like a novelty sauce with a funky catchy label and the makers are hoping to sell the sauce because of the label and not the sauce.

LDHS is right about a hard core label and the sauce tasting like fairy kisses. I gave up trying to come up with catchy names and funky labels. Partly just for practicality. It costs a lot of money to have a label professionally produced. We decided to settle on a simple business name, call each sauce what it is( Chipotle BBQ Sauce, Smoked Habanero and Garlic Hot Sauce...how original is that? ) and then keep the same style for all the labels but customize it for each flavor. Kinda like LuckyDog's red label, green label, orange label. Same look but different for each sauce.

My son "collects" hot sauces and he had a bottle of "Whoop Ass". He didn't like the name and didn't want it in his room. He eventually put the bottle in the kitchen pantry.