Client: Matthew Clark Brands
Brand: Blackthorn Gold
Designer: Coleman Planet
Launch date: May 1997
Visited a pub recently? If you have, the experience is now as confusing
as the instructions on flatpack furniture. Peering around you for
something you recognise is quite a task. The bar person stares
scornfully at your style-failing appearance and singular lack of
knowledge about the latest Algonquin alcopop to get you in the mood for
clubbing. In desperation you spot a dimly lit circle of blue plastic,
ask for a half of Foster’s and slink back into oblivion.
Prior to the MMC beer orders in 1987, which changed the face of the pub
trade irrevocably, Dry Blackthorn, the father of Gold, could rely on
tied-trade outlets for its presence on the bar against arch-rival
Strongbow, itself redolent of serpent and lads’ drinking imagery. They
had both made the break into draught products but were never really
adopted by the heavy drinkers because of the product characteristics of
acidity and gravity.
The clever redesign of Blackthorn Gold, now owned by Matthew Clark, is
taking on the premium mantle dropped by Merrydown cider in the early
90s.
It combines the reassuring expansiveness of Stella Artois on the bar
with, in its canned off-trade format, a leaf taken from the book of
Boddingtons’ creamy smooth product character.
In the crucial early relaunch period these new clothes will serve the
brand well and make the task of persuading the on- or off-trade drinker
in the crucial decision seconds of ordering at the bar a lot easier for
Blackthorn cider than in the past.
The cleverness of the repackaging and revised product character is that
it blurs the distinction between beer and cider that will allow the
latter to move out of the ’box’ for ever and take its place as a session
drink alongside the beers.
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