Those nuts at Publix have done it again. Pecans, walnuts and sliced almonds are now available in a Publix baking aisle near you. The slogans are particularly witty, but that pesky “which word to highlight” issue pops up again.
On the pecans, the line reads “Pecan-can.” The white flood on the bag leaves three strategically shaped areas open, and a simple sketch completes the picture of three pecans dancing. Clever! Some of us can also feel vindicated by the confirmation of correct pronunciation—after all, if the nuts are going to dance, they’re not going to do the “cahn-can!”
Onto more important matters…the highlighted attribute of this title is “PecanHalves.” There’s no subtitle, and they use the two-color sans-serif variation on the title. The walnuts have a similar setup. “Walnuts” is the emphasized word, and the line reads “Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall-nut.” (Awesome.) There’s a matching sketch. But the sliced almonds take a different approach. The transparent area of the bag is in the shape of a cleaver, and the tagline is “Slice, slice baby” This is all amazing. But the emphasized word is “sliced.” What’s that about? Seems to me that “almonds” should have the emphasis to keep in line with the rest of the nuts.
But, the choice of emphasis words has long confused me. It’s sure not a decision I’d like to make, because sometimes one word is more fitting than another. But at least within the same product line—if not the entire line—make it consistent!
Lest I lose sight of my original impression, though, these nuts are amazing. The taglines are great!
I adore Publix packaging. They could sell me just about anything in that packaging - I’m hooked and I don’t plan on getting help.
I’m also legally-blind, so my shopping experience is a little different than the average Joe’s. A lot of the problems you point out in the packaging are great for me, whether that was the intent of those design choices or not.
For example, the chocolate chips. I love that they’re totally different colors, like a red and a brown rather than two different browns. I see the bright color stripe first, but to read a package better I usually have to pick it up. I’m not comfortable pawing through every item in the store, so I’m glad I can go “Oh, red bag!” I know I like the ground chuck, so rather than touching all the meat I look for blue, though blue for meat might seem an odd color.
It’s similar with the emphasized words. While a corn can that proclaims “NO SALT” might put you off, I know the yellow cans are corn. Now I just need to know what kind. And look, they’ve marked it in big letters for me! Great! On to peas!
Hope that makes the designs more bearable. Lie I said, I don’t know if that’s why they chose to do it, but it sure worked out great that way.
“CheddarCheesy’s”, however, is just plain irritating.
I just found your site today, and let me say… this is great! I, too, am a big fan of the Publix packaging, and I’m glad that someone felt strongly enough to document all the wonderful ideas they’ve come up with.
Keep new pictures coming, please!