Punk Not Junk: How&How's rebellious identity for a heavenly sweet brand

For those who take the time and effort to consider the ingredients of many children's sweets, then you'd be horrified (but probably not too surprised) to discover there's a ton of sugar, E-numbers, animal gelatine, palm oil...even talcum powder in some cases. If only there was a guilt-free solution for sweet-toothed kids.

Enter Wild Thingz (previously Just Wholefoods), the latest star of How&How's branding efforts. Today, it's unveiled its new look, pinned on its mission: to create a sweets brand that parents wouldn't feel bad about and kids would go mad about.

Cue a hugely enjoyable challenge for Cat How and her team (currently based across London and LA), as it was a blank canvas from the off. The organic, plant-based sweets have no artificial ingredients and half the sugar you might expect elsewhere. "This was a full brand build – from concept to launch and beyond. It also involved crafting the shape of the sweets themselves. Even better," says How&How.

The project began by examining the existing category to see if there were any opportunities. "The world of organic is wholesome, white, and hempy," it says. "Think smiling snakes in perfect blades of grass. Yet the 'bad sweets' are an explosion of bright colours, flashy logos, and exciting in-pack games." This begged the question: Why does junk get to have all the fun?

As Cat How puts it, the industry was calling out for a challenger: a "category-defining brand that has the ingredients of a saint, but the energy–and shelf appeal–of a sinner".

And so, the first task was to come up with a name. Wild Thingz felt organic but with a rebellious twist, inventing a world where "kids can be kids and parenting doesn't always have to look perfect". This clever name gave the brand a voice and an opinion: "rebels with an anti-artificial cause". And the whole messaging calls out the category for containing "so much crap"... "Think punk, not junk," says How&How.

As you can imagine, the resulting visual identity is a riot of fun, colour, and originality. The logo is made out of thorns and bushes—a Venus flytrap mascot with a mohawk supposedly inspired by grunge skater and snowboard brands. Radical. The typeface is very much rock-and-roll. And the colour palette is dark and brooding, with not a dollop of heavenly white or hemp in sight.

To take it one step further, How&How created 3D worlds complete with overgrown forests, rusty shopping carts and abandoned buildings. Kids are going to love it. Cat How and the team then developed the product SKUs and designed packaging, point-of-sale media, launch assets and the website. A dream project, no doubt. As Design Director Priyjah Paramasivam explains, "We've created a whole world of playful plant anarchy. It's not every day that we get to work so closely with a client who is happy to go for it and push our idea to the limit. Honestly, it's been f-ing fun."