Montville Coffee

Montville Coffee is Queensland’s first organic and Fairtrade coffee roaster. After 15 years in business the Montville team realised their logo didn’t match their purpose. The old design showed stylised latte art in an industry that’s saturated with similar marks, so the project goal was to realign the brand’s visual appearance with their future ambitions.

Not all brands need a symbol alongside a wordmark. Sometimes the brand name on its own is enough, particularly with a distinctive name like Montville. But with more than a decade of equity in the old logo (below, left) it was important not to radically change the visual appearance.

The new design (below, right) carries the serifs from the old, presenting them with more strength and confidence, while bespoke stencilling hints at the typography seen on the sacks and wooden boxes that are traditionally used for coffee transportation.

The black and white palette retains further visual equity, while also lowering the cost of ensuring consistent reproduction in the full range of Montville products.

Packaging for Montville’s beans was kept purposely simple to put the emphasis on the three most important elements — the name, the blend, and the Fairtrade certification. Coloured art adds a visual clue when customers search for their preferred blend.

Client feedback

David came back to us with one identity design that perfectly embodied our brief. I don’t think I have ever seen something get unanimous approval in this business, but we all agreed without a single change required — everyone loves it. David was able to understand our market and our vision, creating an identity to take us there.

— Sam Barnett, Montville Coffee