In 2006 & 2008, we produced a series of can designs for Diet Coke which expanded our creative thinking behind our campaign line: ‘Do your thing’. In effect, these four cans became mini-outdoor postings and helped to bolster the campaign on-pack.

One of the key learnings was the medium itself, designing on-pack has many more ink and print restrictions than traditional processes, simplicity is at the heart of a great can design that can shout louder than its competitors in the cooler cabinet. We also learnt that consumers each had their favourite design and would actively seek these out. Moonlight and Eye were the favourites. For Diet Coke drinkers, it is all about the can. They rummage to the very back of a cooler to find the coldest – and have a great deal of loyalty to its iconic design.

Moving into the second year, we took these learnings and created six new can designs that would each appeal to our audience in different ways. We treated the cans as fashionable accessories allowing the consumer to choose which can they prefer on shelf. The addition of the ‘Choose the look you love’ further strengthened this link with fashion. The can designs themselves were based on current fashion trends, for example lace and animal prints were very much in vogue.

The cans were an unbelievable success and created unbeatable coverage and talkability for the brand. People were actually collecting the complete set of cans which had a permanent home in the top of their fridge.

Outdoor to support the launch had immense cut-through and recall with consumers. Polka Dot, Zebra and Flock were used on 48 sheets, 6 sheets and Phone Kiosks.

The final year for ‘design can’ was 2008. With the introduction of new branding guidelines, the cans were simplified even further. A suite of six designs were created with the inclusion of the two most successful can designs from the previous year: Polka Dot and Zebra.

These designs really pushed what was achievable on-can with the print process. Metallic colouring was employed to great effect, especially on the Hawaiian Floral and Paisley patterns. An understanding of a restrictive print process and an insight into core drinkers made ‘design can’ hugely successful.