Packaging Design & Illustration
The brief of this project was to create an in-house premium food line for H-E-B that would compete with existing name brands, focusing on ways to differentiate the product and stand out on the shelf. A secondary objective was to adapt the H-E-B line product for the more affordable HCF brand. With an emphasis on scaling down the design to fit a budget-conscious market while maintaining visual cohesion and brand recognition across both product tiers.
ABOUT
Solar Swirls is a vibrant, mascot-driven children’s pudding brand with fun, and playful flavor swirls. At the heart of the brand is Arlo the Anteater, a character inspired by my favorite childhood space heroes, such as Buzz Lightyear and Samus Aran. Arlo’s long anteater tongue is a nod to the most fun part of eating pudding—licking the lid!
Succesful children’s packaging treads the fine line that is capturing a child’s imagination and a parent’s approval. Well established pudding brands have stuck to a less extravagant design language compared to similar markets such as cereal. This presented an opportunity to shift the focus of pudding packaging in a more playful direction, developing a brand with a recognizable mascot that would set Solar Swirls apart from its competitors on the shelf. Solar Swirl’s unique take on pudding is the swirled flavors. It’s common to see layered chocolate and vanilla pudding cups, why not turn this into a visual element? Use flavors with saturated colors and flavors, the swirls are reminiscent of a spiral galaxy, a perfect setting for a space ranger mascot.
TOOLS
Illustrator, Photoshop, Blender, Procreate
WORKING WITH LIMITED SPACE
The small form factor was a challenge when laying out the composition of the packaging. Breaking elements across the fold lines, utilizing playful type and floating flavors helped to maximize space while establishing the setting. Floating elements are grounded against the color coaded flavor swirls while adding a sense of movement to the design. Leaving as much space on the front for necessary content left little room to add a violator to the design. Utilizing the empty space in the dieline for the pudding cups left enough room to add a hanging violator in the shape of a comet that thematically matches the outer space theme.
EXPANDING THE BRANDING
The accompanying comic gives a better glimpse into Arlo’s personality. Where he bravely explores a powered down space station, before being ambushed by para.sitic robots. While brave, he’s a little goofy, and he wastes no time running for his life whilst setting the space station to self destruct. Arlo’s design deviates from his design on the front of the packaging. The comic format gives room for a more elaborate character design. Both are largely the same, but with the information dense packaging a simpler space suit comunicates the character well without cluttering the already busy label with unnecessary details. The poster was riso printed and uses a zine fold + cut to achieve a one page comic layout
While generic products are often chosen for their affordability, branding them thoughtfully adds value and trust, setting them apart from other low-cost options.
Creating a flexible design system that could adapt seamlessly to the diverse needs of each flavor was by far the greatest challenge. Every flavor comes with its own particular graphic elements, which made it difficult to establish consistency without compromising individuality. For example, it was simple to apply the signature chocolate bar pattern across the top of the chocolate-flavored packaging, but that design didn’t translate quite as effectively to the vanilla flavor, where a lighter, more delicate look was needed. Ultimately, establishing a strong and cohesive typographic identity across the line provided the unifying thread that tied each pudding flavor together. This way, even though no two flavors shared an identical color scheme, the typography maintained a sense of brand cohesion that allowed each product to stand on its own while still feeling like part of a larger family.