Design Case Study | Match Tonic Water

May 11, 2022

Designed by Series Nemo for CURIUS, a new beverage producer launched to disrupt how drinks brands are created, MATCH symbolises the catalyst for change in the soft drinks industry, breaking out of the FMCG code.

Tell us a bit about the brand – its heritage, its story, and its markets – and the brief for this project. How does the design express the brand’s values?

According to one of the co-founders, Juan Carlos Montoro, “For us at CURIUS it is vital that the packaging has a very badass feel to it, making it stand out from anything else in the category. That’s why, from the first time you see the brand it gets into your head and you may not remember the brand name but you’ll never forget “that greenish square bottle with a perforated label”; that’s the most valuable asset and the one that many new brands are short of”.

Subsequently, the design has to have a meaning and a purpose. For that reason, a square like a LEGO is the most optimal & safest format to carry bottles in essence and CURIUS took that idea to the next level by using recycled glass which is also lighter.

What is unusual or innovative about this pack?

There has never been a square bottle before due to the technical challenge of bottling, but there are many more iconic elements such as the texture of the label with soft touch hinges and its perfect perforated effect using PP material. The colour of the recycled glass is also unprecedented in the category as all soft drinks bottles are usually long neck and transparent.

The 4-pack is highly innovative as it is 100% optimized for e-Commerce sales: the bottles do not break thanks to the square format and the separators that give them extra protection, they do not come out of the pack as they have wings that prevent movement even at 180º degrees. The edges are rounded so that in one blow in transport the pack always arrives at its destination with an optimum look & feel and finally, in a supermarket shelf in the space that you put a single 4-pack of a soft drink, two MATCH packs fit in, being hyper efficient in all these senses.

What technical challenges did you have to overcome to manufacture this pack?

CURIUS worked with its top notch strategic partner Series Nemo design studio, due to their vast knowledge of packaging developments & industrial engineering which can push the limits of what’s possible. Thanks to Series Nemo “out of the box” thinking they created a bottle squared on the outside.

The big handicap in the bottle is that non-rounded shapes are often the biggest challenge for carbonated beverages; as the gas pressure is not evenly distributed and a lot of pressure is applied to the corners with the risk of explosion.

So working on a technical level where aesthetically the bottle is square on the outside but inside the edges are smoothed to dissipate the tension is a challenge; in addition to convincing the glass industry which is extremely conservative and even fearful of such innovations, this MATCH concept would probably have been shelved as a mere concept in rendering without the key contribution of ESTAL as a glass partner to undertake the project.

According to the designers, “The label was another tricky element, as we fell in love with the perforation visual element since day one, but then we thought that the mass production at the printing machines would be unfeasible. Along with the EUROSTAMPA team, we organised a session in their Innovation Lab testing different ways of making this label reliable and using PP material. We achieved a simulation of the perforation combined with soft touch varnishes”.

In the case of the 4-Pack, Durero’s technical department contribution was extremely important to bring it to life, they were able to improve the first sketch and bring it to life without sacrificing design and carrying handles; applying that curvature on the sides that is extremely complex to apply.

What reactions have you had from your consumers?

So far, MATCH has no real feedback from consumers, only from people in immediate environment and industry professionals.

But in every time the project has been presented, everyone assumes that MATCH is a future LOVE BRAND and that it changes the code of the industry, similar to what happened when Absolut was launched in the late 80’s making its competitors obsolete immediately.

Thanks to these credentials CURIUS has been able to close several key retailers in markets to launch MATCH with very attractive volumes for a new brand.