Food for thought – should you be wary of branded edibles?

At etc. Branding, we love branded edibles. Who doesn’t love a creamy cupcake or tasty truffle? And to top it off, quite literally, your business branding will be all over the tempting treats too.

Having said that, there are a few things to think about before you place your order.

Longevity

Branded edibles can really have the wow factor, and go down wonders with team members and consumers alike, but the first issue is longevity.

Although greatly appreciated by the receiver, your logo will be eaten in no time. Anything fresh will have a very limited shelf life and need to be delivered and given out in a timely manner too.

We know ourselves, as regular event exhibitors, that leftover fresh branded edibles like cupcakes end up going to suppliers at the end of the day rather than the customers they were intended for (not that we are complaining).

With this in mind, why not think about equally as tasty food items that will give you longer lasting brand value?

One way to do this is to choose sweet or savoury treats that have a much longer sell-by date, such as biscuits, jelly beans or even packaged chocolate.

We have supplied jelly beans in clients’ brand colours, and they’ve also been vegan and vegetarian friendly. Bonus!

Something else we do for a lot of our clients each Christmas is advent calendars. They are a good choice for branded edibles because not only will they give you brand awareness for a minimum of 25 days, but your business will also be giving daily excitement.

Prioritise packaging

Whatever branded edible you go for, food packaging should always be the focus, and for far more important reasons than longevity.

It’s actually food safety that should be the priority.

No matter where in the world you are based, supplying food will likely be subject to legal requirements that impact what packaging you use, how it is packed and the labelling.

For this reason, taking a DIY approach could leave your business open to may risks. If you source your own edibles and packaging and opt to brand them with sticky labels, for example, you’d need to follow strict rules about the material of the packaging, how it is packaged and the environment in which it is done.

Using disposable Polyethylene gloves in a disinfected office will not cut it.

You’d also need to have accurate labelling with all ingredients, allergen (there are 14) and quantity information, storage conditions and best before dates and traceability, which includes the country of origin and name and address of manufacturer.

We work with a lot of suppliers, but for this reason, it can be hard to source food packaging without the edibles themselves, because any incorrect procedures can be traced back to the supplier. They therefore prefer to supply the food and the packaging.

This can minimise the risk of unintentionally giving out branded edibles that are not prepared, packaged or labelled correctly, as well as saving you the hassle and costing you not a lot more than if you did it yourself anyway!

Make your mark

The best thing about branded edibles is not just how they taste, but how they are presented.

When you work with a branded merchandise agency like etc. Branding, we can help you come up with plenty of innovative ways to package and mark your food so that it hits the spot and makes its mark, while being deemed ‘food safe’.

We recently worked with a client who wanted to create a save the date with a different number for the day, month and year on three individual Neapolitan chocolates. The idea is that they would be attached to a designed postcard, enveloped and sent through the post.

All of this was possible for etc. Branding to fulfil, but we were concerned about the potential for the chocolates to fall off during transit and delivery, and end up floating around in the envelope. This would not have the desired effect, so we instead suggested a bespoke moulded shape chocolate bar flow with the dates, wrapped in a recyclable clear film and packaged in an eco-friendly, full colour branded window box.

The choice is endless these days, with plenty of lower impact and plastic-free packaging available, and even multi-purpose options like sweet tins that can then double up as pen pots for a lasting impact.

If this blog has given you the taste for branded edibles, give us a call to discuss some ideas!