Peptaste®
Branding project for Buffalo, NY-based seasoning salt maker, Peptaste®.
A much-needed refresh results in a heritage brand with increased reach and record sales.
Rebranding Peptaste®
Peptaste® is a seasoning salt made from a unique blend of savory flavors first introduced in 1946. Peptaste has proven itself a durable brand with a loyal fan base.
Thanks to my decades-long relationship with the Harwood family, I’d been a longtime fan of Peptaste®. Douglas Harwood and I have been the closest of friends since childhood.
Douglas approached me to redesign the Peptaste® label.
The roll of thousands of original labels they’d printed in the 1980s had finally run out completely. I took full advantage of the opportunity and dug deep into the brand’s history and assets.
The Peptaste® Story
In 1946, lifelong Angola, New York resident Helen Miller and her friend Peter Gust Economou, the maître d’hotel and manager of Buffalo’s storied Park Lane Restaurant since 1925, created Peptaste®—with its secret blend of herbs and spices—for exclusive use in the popular restaurant.
Eventually, Helen Miller started bottling and selling the recipe herself. The Harwood family took ownership of the brand in 1980.
Fire destroyed the original Georgian-style building in 1971. Drawing inspiration from the King's Arms Hotel in Amersham, England, the Park Lane was re-imagined in a Tudor style. After three decades, the Tudor Park Lane eventually closed permanently in 2007.
The Park Lane dining room circa 1938
Examining the Original
Under the Harwoods’ stewardship, the original Peptaste® label used a mix of 80s-era clip art illustrations of food in an unsophisticated green and gradient orange color palette that wasn’t doing the brand any favors. It certainly wasn’t representative of an exceptional product.
Indeed, it looked like the kind of off-brand product you’d find at a mom’n’pop store while on family vacation upstate.
Redesign Explorations
Well into their eighth decade, I recognized Peptaste® as a heritage brand. The product required a redesign that visually established the seasoning as timeless, with a bold, high-contrast design that’d stand out on grocery shelves.
I began design explorations with an update of the original logotype and re-imagined the food illustrations as custom iconography, a clearer indication of the breadth of flavors enhanced by Peptaste’s seasoning blend.
Peptaste® label concepts round 01
With this new iconography and language befitting its history and place—”handcrafted in Buffalo, NY”—I presented several different treatments for consideration.
The bold black label was a client favorite and provided a clear direction for the next round of treatments.
Peptaste® label concepts round 02
Peptaste® final label lockup
The Final Label Design
The final Peptaste® label design visually establishes the seasoning as timeless, with a bold, high-contrast design that stands out on grocery shelves.
The label has an aspirational quality that hints at the care taken in its preparation.
Taking full advantage of its Western New York heritage, Peptaste® boasts it is “Buffalo-Blended since 1946.”
Selling Peptaste®
Additional collaboration included the design and launch of Peptaste’s web presence and ecommerce functionality, ensuring enthusiasts well outside of Western New York can continue to keep their favorite seasoning in the kitchen and on the dining table.
The site has proven to be a success, with orders coming in from Peptaste® fans across the United States and—thanks to touring musician and devoted Peptaste® enthusiast Deke Dickerson—several countries in Europe.
