Tactile Branding: The New Coke Can

Today, I was skimming through PSFK, a great site for cool, new & inspirational ideas, and I came across an article on Coke's new touchscreen vending machines, which are, currently, being testing at select malls across the USA. The below video does a great job explaining and showing how amazing these interactive machines are:

This is a great way to create a memorable experience that embeds the brand into the consumer's mind, as they have, now, had a chance to personally engage with the brand! And to be honest - it sure makes buying something from a vending machine a lot more fun!

What also struck me was the iconic shaped aluminum can that popped out of the machine:
A few years back, I read the book Brand Sense, by Martin Lindstrom. The book talks about becoming a memorable and highly recognizable brand by utilizing the 5 senses - touch, taste, sound, smell & sight. Essentially, branding beyond the logo - creating more ways to ensure your brand is recognizable, even if the logo isn't present.

He mentions the idea of being 'smashable', which I absolutely love! To be a truly 'smashable' brand, you should be able to take any product, service, etc. and break it into a million little pieces and still know what brand that product belonged to!

For instance, if I covered the Apple logo on my computer...

Image from Marty Neumeier's book The Brand Gap

... you would still know it was an Apple product. Even if I smashed my MacBook on the ground (which I would NEVER do), you would be able to pick up a key from the keyboard and know that it came from an Apple computer. This is because Apple thinks of how its brand will present itself in every medium through all senses.

This is exactly what the original designers of the, now, iconic glass bottle kept in mind when designing the bottle for the first time. They wanted a bottle that could be recognized as Coca-Cola even if they were holding it blindfolded, hence the unique curves and ripples around the bottle. They also wanted it so that when the bottle was found in pieces on the ground, people would know it was coke from the greenish glass.

It was a shame to see all that hard work slip into the background as plastic bottles and aluminum cans came onto the market – especially with the generic aluminum cans.

After reading this portion of the book, I couldn’t help but think – they will have to come up with a shaped aluminum can one of these days to reinvigorate the iconic Coke bottle, which has become as recognizable as the organization's logo itself! So, needless to say, I was excited to see an aluminum can shaped like the iconic Coke bottle pop out of these new vending machines, because not only are they eliminating a generic brand experience with the regular can, but they now have a vending machine that will make this more easily mass distributed!

It’s so important, as a brand, to create as many unique and memorable experiences that communicate the brand essence, because as I mentioned in my Digital Reasons to Believe post, people are 10-20 times more likely to repurchase a brand that they have shared a positive and memorable experience with.

Coke is definitely one of those brands. I mean they're the number one brand in the world, with a value of $68.7 Billion - their brand is worth more than the organization's tangible assets!

Image from Marty Neumeier's book The Brand Gap