In addition to the profound economic, societal and technological changes brought on by the advent of the industrial age in the second half of the 19th century, the time period also saw the introduction of symbols and brand names for distinguishing and identifying products. Logos began as representational symbols, according to various regional traditions, and became increasingly abstracted and stand as the core element of a brand to this day. The use of colour was also soon regarded as another important element for identifying brands, following the example of national colours. As legend has it, barrels of Coca-Cola were painted red to help tax officials more easily differentiate them from barrels filled with alcohol, which was subject to heavy taxation. The world-famous trademark colour thus resulted from a purely practical consideration.
The laundry detergent manufacturer Persil, by contrast, very deliberately made its packaging green in 1907 to bring to mind the then-common practice of laying laundry out on the grass in order to bleach it in the sun. These brands and many others have used largely the same colours for decades to best maintain brand recognition, a factor that emerged as the highest goal of successful brands in the 20th century. At the turn of the century, the developments in design and advertising professions led quickly to innovations and to the professionalisation of brand communications.
One example, considered groundbreaking to this day, was the hiring of Peter Behrens (1868–1940) as the artistic adviser for the Berlin electronics company AEG in 1907 – a role that would be comparable to a chief design officer in a modern-day tech firm. Alongside his team, which included many of the foremost pioneers of modernism, like Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Walter Gropius and Le Corbusier, Behrens developed the world’s first corporate identity. Not only did all of the printed matter coordinate, the products and even the factory buildings were also designed in line with the corporate image. And there were other innovations, like the first in-house corporate typefaces and the knowledge that consistent, custom-designed typography greatly contributes to a brand’s recognition factor.