As I write this it's the beginning of 2025 – that time where there are a wide variety of reflections on brand over the last year – with ‘wraps’, ‘reviews’, ‘round-ups’, ‘best / worst of’s’ etc… and then into ‘predictions’, ‘forecasting’ or that dreaded word ‘trends’ for 2025.
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As you will have guessed from that last line, I’m not too keen on ‘trends’. It always makes me feel that unless you are the ‘trend-setter’ a trend is merely an exercise in following an opinion or style in an attempt to keep up with a current fashion. As such I rather liked this ‘anti-trend’ article where 8 designers were asked to flip the idea and pick things they would rather not see any more of in 2025. See if you agree…
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Now, for all my nay-saying, this is not to do a disservice to those looking to push boundaries, experiment and really tap into a zeitgeist. Far from it, I am all for this and I look forward to seeing more and being inspired and excited by it over the next year. The best brands are driven by a continual (or at least regular) examination of themselves and their customers. Really questioning what it is they are doing / stand for, finding that ‘reason’ and building upon this – it really does present meaning to your visual identity. Whether one is fully bought into them or merely a passive observer absorbing by osmosis – brands are emotional things and certainly benefit from being grounded in some solid strategy and meaning. Just look at the furore surrounding the reimagined Jaguar brand identity… or perhaps you are still taking time to absorb the latest updates to your Lloyds bank app. Admittedly two very different arenas and depending on your opinion… two very differing outcomes. I’ll let you guess what I think…
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So, bringing it back to the reason for putting this short missive together the following are some of my thoughts, not predictions or trends, but areas I think may impact on us all over the next year:

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Know your brand

This year I’m hoping for more brands to really consider and connect to their reason / personality. As I have already mentioned it does all begin with this as your foundation. Visually this past year has seen far too many copycat pastel colour palettes paired with flared serifs. I have nothing against either, but I’m pretty sure there was a fair bit of trend following here! And just because Mocha Mousse is this year’s colour doesn’t mean your brand should be!    

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Decentralised / Community based Brand Ownership

I think it would be really interesting to explore how brands might engage to an even greater level with their employees and end users by allowing them access to areas where they are able to co-own the space, help shape a brand area or take ownership of their own information and build their own communities.
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Two examples of this model in Web3

• ‍DeHealth where through specialized NFTs—DeHealth Tokens—customers can sell their data to clients, such as pharmaceutical or insurance companies, for medical information, and use secure blockchain tokens to pay for the app’s universal health services.
• Nikes .swoosh where customers form a community to share their own designs, explore products and wear their own gear in the Nike games.
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And a more current approach from Lego, where fans are asked to share their creations and creativity, enter challenges, showcase proposals for new LEGO Ideas sets and vote for awesome models dreamt up by your fellow fan designers. Lego Ideas

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Hyper-Personalisation

An opportunity for brands to take AI and data analytics to deliver a more personalized customer experiences, from product recommendations to dynamic branding elements that adapt to individual user preferences including guides, renewal policies, videos and Social.

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Regional over Global

Businesses have always looked to engage locally – none more so than in the B2B sector – HSBC built a whole campaign as ‘The world’s local bank’. Being a slightly more cautious arena B2B sometimes takes its lead from B2C and this is a great Campaign example from Coca-Cola of an opportunity / inspiration for how the element of local can be embraced by a global player. ‘Every Coca-Cola is Welcome’

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Inclusive Branding

Inclusivity (on all levels) has long been a hot topic for brands and as we continue to navigate this underdeveloped and often forgotten area let’s hope that representation will extend beyond tokenism as brands develop truly inclusive design systems that adapt to different audiences and accessibility needs. An area where designers often forget that they are not designing for designers and things have a very different use. A few simple and very effective uses to date:
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• Transcripts make website content accessible to people with hearing impairments and visitors in sound-sensitive environments
• Accessible brand colours, fonts and typesetting
• Website built in accessible tools
• Alt text

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AI

Of course this had to make an appearance. There has been so much discussion around the subject and how it might be used. There were notable fails such as the Coca-Cola holiday ad which just looked peculiar. However there was for me a solid and logical approach into using AI as a real aid with Pentagrams Performance.gov project which should leave us all considering alternative ways to use it as a tool to enhance our ideas.

In 2025 brands are sure to face many of the past years difficulties and it will be hard working meeting these challenges there is much to be positive about too. Personality is the key. The world has not succumbed to SkyNet… just yet… and as we have more of an understanding of what technology can do to help us we must also realise it’s limitations. The emotional connection that gives us cause to be so passionate about things is our own. The randomness of our thoughts that create those magic moments is not beholden to any algorithm so let’s look to build strategies and brand identities that create genuine meaning and connections without sacrificing creativity for the sake of a trend.  

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Want to know more? Get in touch with the brandformula team to discuss all things creative and brand: info@brandformula.co.uk