How do you like them apples? Studio Deploy’s brand for Oma Appel is as humble as it is hardworking

“Our challenge was to come up with a brand that translates the passion and love for authentic, home-cooked food,” Designer Bas van der Burgh tells us, contextualising the identity of Dutch organic jam and chutney maker Oma Appel; crafted by Rotterdam-based design agency Studio Deploy. “In search of this nostalgic feeling,” he adds, “we looked back into Dutch vintage packaging designs throughout the 1960s and 70s,” drawing on striking, familiar and fun fruit labels to inform the charming typographic direction. “In this design research, we saw a heavy use of typography and bold colours,” he notes, leading to Aktiv Grotesk as the hero typeface, providing a sturdy, hardworking foundation to play upon. 

Deploy’s blithe visual approach, reflective of the whimsical name itself – which translates to ‘Grandma Apple’ – not only embodies the humble context of the brand, whereby all its ingredients are harvested from countryside gardens across the Netherlands, but also encapsulates an uncomplicated, familiar tone.

Referential to printed, nostalgic ephemera, the identity explores the expression possible within limitations, such as colour, type and dimensions, trusting the strength of the brand’s individual elements – an approach neatly encapsulated in their typographic logomark, constructed as an apple silhouette.

“Besides our typographic approach, we also included a memorable element to our digital brand,” van der Burgh expands, “so we designed an interactive fruit sticker pack which visitors can activate when clicking around,” routinely directing their audience back towards the modest bottom line of the brand, as similarly demonstrated in Deploy’s approach to colour – namely its use of a warm red hue. “Inspired by our design research,” van der Burgh concludes, “we went for a bold single colour to connect it with the core product, apples.”

Studio Deploy

Oma Appel