For years, Tropicana Pure Premium was easy to find. In the refrigerated juice aisle, you looked for the carton with a bright orange pierced by a red-and-white straw. In 2009 Tropicana, owned by PepsiCo, decided to change it.
The redesign
The new packaging, created by the Arnell Group, was meant to feel modern and premium. It replaced the orange and straw with a close-up of a glass of orange juice. The cap was redesigned to look like the outside of an orange, and the Tropicana name was rotated to read vertically up the side of the carton.
It launched in North America starting January 8, 2009, on the brand’s best-selling product, backed by a reported $35 million advertising campaign, also created by Arnell.
The reaction
Shoppers did not see premium. They saw generic. The glass of juice looked like the image on a cheap store-brand or “from concentrate” product, and the brand name was harder to spot. Some customers said they couldn’t find their usual Tropicana at all and bought something else. Others simply didn’t like it, and said so in letters, calls and online posts.
The numbers
About two months after the launch, sales had dropped by 20%, a decrease The Branding Journal estimated at around $30 million. Packaging redesigns often bring a small, temporary dip in sales while customers adjust; a drop this severe was unusual.
Pure Premium was a big brand to gamble with: its sales were more than $700 million a year. In total, The Branding Journal estimated, the redesign and its reversal cost Tropicana more than $50 million.
On February 23, 2009, Tropicana announced it would return to its original design. Within months, the orange with the straw was back on shelves everywhere.
Why it failed
- It removed the brand’s main cue. Shoppers found Tropicana by its orange and straw. Without them, the carton blended into the aisle.
- It looked like a cheaper product. A plain glass of juice is what generic juice cartons show, so the “premium” redesign read as a downgrade.
- Juice is a habit purchase. People grab the same carton every week without reading it. Changing the look breaks the habit, and a competitor is right next to it.
- The research missed the shelf. A design can look great in a presentation and fail in a crowded refrigerator case.
Legacy
Tropicana’s redesign is taught alongside Gap’s 2010 logo change as a classic case of destroying brand equity by accident. The lesson is not “never redesign,” but “know what customers recognize before you change it.” Tropicana has continued to update its packaging since, including shrinking carton sizes, which drew its own criticism, but it has kept the orange.