Nom-Nomz

Summary:

Fast food branding doesn't have to disappear the moment the food is gone.

For Nom-Nomz, the goal was to create a brand that felt like an experience in itself, something customers would interact with, photograph, remember and want to come back to.

The visual direction combined strategic nostalgia with a sharp, contemporary execution, drawing from retro arcade games, collectible stickers and 90s fast food culture without simply recreating the past.

The result was a bold identity designed around personality and play.

Packaging became collectible. Menus became posters. Sauce labels became punchlines. Social content carried the same cheeky energy as the in-store experience.

Rather than treating each touchpoint as a separate design exercise, I built Nom-Nomz as a personality-driven brand ecosystem  one that could move between physical spaces, digital platforms, packaging and merchandise while still feeling unmistakably like the same brand.

At its core, Nom-Nomz was about turning an everyday fast food experience into something people could see, interact with and remember.

Challenge:

Making playful feel intentional, not childish.

The biggest creative challenge was balance.

Nom-Nomz needed to be playful enough to feel exciting, but sophisticated enough that adults wouldn't feel like the brand was designed only for kids.

Lean too far into the whimsical side and the brand risked becoming childish.

Pull back too much and it would lose the irreverence and energy that made it distinctive.

There was another challenge: standing out in an extremely noisy category.

Fast food branding tends to move towards two extremes.

On one side, brands use sleek minimalism to communicate quality and modernity.

On the other, brands embrace chaotic, highly themed visuals in an attempt to grab attention.

Nom-Nomz needed to cut through both without becoming another version of either.

And because the identity had to work across packaging, menus, signage, sauces, social media, events and merchandise, there was a real risk that such a bold visual language could quickly become inconsistent or overwhelming.

The challenge became:

How do you build a brand that feels exciting without becoming gimmicky, structured without becoming boring, and collectible without becoming cluttered?

Solution:

Giving the brand room to play with a system underneath it.

I approached Nom-Nomz by combining strategic structure with visual experimentation.

The idea was simple:

Let the brand be loud, but make sure it knows why. Every expressive element was supported by a set of rules that kept the identity cohesive across different applications.

1 - Build the brand around “familiar but fresh”

The starting point was nostalgia.

I looked at cultural references such as retro arcade games, collectible sticker packs and 90s fast food wrappers  visual worlds that already carry a sense of play, familiarity and discovery.

But rather than directly recreating those references, I used them as a starting point for something more contemporary.

This gave Nom-Nomz a visual language that felt nostalgic without feeling dated.

The idea of “familiar but fresh” became the filter for the identity, helping every visual decision feel connected to the same world.

2 - Create structure behind the boldness

A playful identity can quickly become visual chaos without a strong foundation.

I established a consistent type hierarchy and grid system to act as the invisible structure underneath the brand.

This allowed oversized graphics, patterns, illustrations and punchy phrases to coexist without competing for attention.

The system created an important tension:

maximum personality + controlled structure

The brand could break the rules visually because the underlying rules were already clear.

3 - Make illustration the connective tissue

Custom illustration became one of the main tools for giving Nom-Nomz its personality.

I developed a series of mini mascots and characters that could function in different ways across the identity.

They could become:

icons → patterns → stickers → standalone characters → larger brand moments

This flexibility meant the same visual language could appear on a sauce label, packaging, social post or large-scale mural without feeling repetitive.

More importantly, the characters gave Nom-Nomz something recognisable beyond its logo.

They made the brand feel alive.

4 - Turn packaging into part of the experience

Packaging was never treated as something disposable.

Bags, wrappers and cups were designed to feel like part of the brand experience  the kind of graphics customers might photograph, interact with or even want to keep.

Menus followed the same thinking.

Instead of functioning purely as information sheets, they were designed to have the visual impact of posters, using bold graphics, short copy and strong hierarchy to create quick moments of delight.

The goal was to make the customer experience feel entertaining before they even took the first bite.

5 - Give the brand a voice as bold as its visuals

The personality couldn't stop at the graphics.

Copy became another way to make the brand feel alive.

Short, cheeky phrases such as “bite me” and “too hot to handle” gave Nom-Nomz a voice that was confident, playful and slightly rebellious.

That tone carried across packaging, signage, social captions and loyalty materials, creating consistency between what customers saw and what the brand said.

The result was a visual and verbal identity that felt like the same character speaking through every touchpoint.

6 - Test the identity in the real world

A design can look perfect in a flat presentation and behave completely differently once it becomes a physical experience.

Throughout the process, I tested how the identity translated across different environments and formats.

• How does the illustration behave when wrapped around a cup?

• Does the hierarchy still work when a design becomes a large banner?

• Does the pattern become overwhelming at a smaller scale?

• Does the colour maintain its impact across different materials?

These iterations helped refine the system based on actual scale, texture and interaction rather than relying purely on digital mockups.

WHY THIS SYSTEM WORKS

Nom-Nomz wasn't designed to simply look different from other fast food brands.

It was designed to make the act of interacting with the brand part of the experience.

1. Can the brand feel playful without feeling childish?

Yes - nostalgia and humour are balanced with a structured grid, considered typography and a contemporary visual execution.

2. Can it stand out in a crowded fast food category?

Yes - the combination of bold colour, custom illustration, expressive typography and personality creates a distinctive visual territory.

3. Can a bold identity remain consistent?

Yes - clear hierarchy, grids, illustration rules and verbal guidelines provide structure underneath the expressive elements.

4. Can packaging become part of the brand experience?

Yes - bags, wrappers, cups and sauces were treated as opportunities for interaction rather than simply containers for the product.

5. Can the identity extend beyond the restaurant?

Yes - the same visual and verbal language can move naturally into social content, events, merchandise and other brand touchpoints.

The result is a brand that doesn't simply sell fast food.

It creates a world around it.

A world where the packaging is part of the entertainment, the menu becomes part of the visual experience, and even a sauce label can make someone smile.

Nom-Nomz was a reminder that branding doesn't always have to be serious to be strategic.

Sometimes, the most memorable brands are the ones that give people something to play with.

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