JKR

What do you think of these rubber clad Hennessy bottles? The answer to that question might depend on which side of thirty you are. They caught my eye in duty free (see below) and back at work, I saw they had done the same for our creative director, who had one on her shelf. We got chatting about them and agreed that they were not to our taste, ‘ a little tacky’ etc.

Yet as Oscar Wilde noted ‘There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.’ The fact is we had noticed these packs and were talking about them – and neither of us could remember the last time we had felt inclined to have a chat about this doughty cognac brand. So the design had done its job and perhaps if we were the young side of thirty, we might even have been raving about them. The design, I guess inspired by iPod cases and suchlike, is certainly a clear declaration that this is a brand looking for relevance to a younger audience. Certainly the ad below suggests this is cognac for the Apple generation

Seth Godin defines effective design as being remarkable. Meaning work which can actually inspire remarks and so build saliency. On this  criteria, the Hennessy bottles do really well.