Redesigning Racist Brands
Task
To redesign three Spanish food brands that depicted racist visual identities.
Amid the Black Lives Matter protests, the Conguitos chocolate brand (literally meaning “little Congolese”) faced intense backlash on social media. In response, we decided to take action. We redesigned the naming and packaging of three Spanish food brands that featured racist visual identities, aiming to demonstrate that it is possible to rebrand them—removing racist imagery while still keeping them recognizable to consumers.
The original design was full of images rooted in colonialism and racist stereotypes, with a mascot that was literally a grotesque caricature of Black people, depicting them as wild, uncivilized, and primitive.
For Conguitos, we decided to create a neutral name that directly reflects the product itself. We came up with Chocohués, which in English could be translated as Choconuts—a playful and catchy name that is easy to remember. Naturally, the mascot had to be completely redesigned, bringing to life one of their chocolate-covered peanuts. The new mascot is a friendly and welcoming icon, free from racist stereotypes.
ColaCao’s imagery was once again rooted in colonialism and racist stereotypes. The lyrics of their original advertisement included the line, “I’m that lil’ black guy from tropical Africa that sings the ColaCao song while working.”
For ColaCao, although the company had already redesigned its brand image a few years ago, we believed a more substantial change was needed. After reading the statements of Iris Sastre Rivero, the person behind the Change.org campaign asking Lacasa to update its image (“The best would be to see them consume the chocolate drink” – El País), we decided to literally illustrate her words. In addition to removing the harvest scene, the new image focuses on Black people enjoying the product.
Virtually not a single black person can be seen on their commercials, while still using a black woman as their logo. Fun fact: in this, their latest video, they added a black woman as a response to the viral anti-racist movement happening on the streets and social media but previous promotional videos had no black people at all -and neither does this one.
Finally, Negrita (literally translated as “little black girl”) is the last brand we decided to redesign. We completely made over the logo, empowering the women depicted and again enjoying the product rather than producing it. Her formal and even complacent expression has been purposely replaced by an empowered, joyous posture and gesture.
In September 2022, we had the pleasure of traveling to Copenhagen for the annual Design Matters Conference and talk about the project and its impact. In Design Matters words ‘From the challenges they faced as white people talking about racism to the repercussions the project had in social media, the designers will reflect on what the role of graphic design must be in our current society.’
We are always grateful to be allowed to talk about such a poignant topic in front of a large audience. As we have always stated, design is deeply political, and its impact goes way beyond what one may initially think. Finally, a big shoutout to the Design Matters team and the incredible set of speakers for redefining what a design conference can be!