Why does nostalgia have such a powerful hold over consumers and brands? And how can companies tap into the past and evoke emotion, in a way that grows their business, rather than answering to the trend cycle?
Branding can dazzle us. It can invite us. It can seduce us. And, sometimes, it can comfort us.
That might be what’s behind a surge in companies adopting identities and campaigns that feel a little bit… familiar – type that’s a throwback to the 1970s, colour palettes that feel like product design of years gone by or vintage ad layouts that could have been torn from a 1980s print mag.
In our role as agency matchmakers, we’ve met plenty of brands that are using nostalgia in clever ways. Sometimes they’re linking to the past through product experience, or it might be brand design, advertising, a social campaign, or something else entirely. Whatever the method, the goal is ultimately the same: nostalgia is a path to emotion, and that’s a powerful draw for any business.
WHY IS IT EVERYWHERE?
“Good branding evokes a feeling,” says Rachael Yaeger, co-founder of digital creative agency Human NYC. “If the feeling that we need is one of familiarity or coming home or truth or authenticity, then when the design team is looking for a reference, it makes a lot of sense to look to the past. My mom always used to tell me: ‘everything is cyclical’. There’s no real net new.”
“When nostalgia is done right, it’s not necessarily timeless, but it is familiar, comforting, and effortlessly moves through time.”
Sarah Di Domenico, Founder, Wedge
“Today, we yearn for soul,” says Sarah Di Domenico, founder at design studio Wedge. “Nostalgia brings that immediate spirit and emotional experience of pre-algorithmic authenticity. It’s everything Millennials remember from their parents or grandparents, and that Gen Z didn’t actually live and touch but are drawn to. When nostalgia is done right, it’s not necessarily timeless, but it is familiar, comforting, and effortlessly moves through time.”
It’s not just brands that are drawn to it either. Just like everyone else, creatives have been overwhelmed by the deluge of content pouring into the world via various social media and streaming platforms. In response to that, some have found respite in looking to another time.
“The amount of stuff we’re being shown every day is exploding, and going into a library or an archive and looking at something that isn’t online feels like an escape from that,” says Tom Finn, co-founder at design studio Regular Practice – who AUFI recently introduced to fashion label In Print We Trust, for a branding project that very much draws on the past.
“There’s a physical intervention in actually going and searching,” he adds. “It’s referential and it’s authentic, versus going on Pinterest and looking for something ‘old’ and finding it. It’s about telling that story.”
DIGGING IN THE RIGHT PLACES
Tapping into nostalgia isn’t just about putting the right 70s-coded typeface on a product, or deciding to shoot on film rather than digital. Wedge’s Di Domenico recommends businesses start with the important underpinnings – the story, ethos and strategic foundation – well before thinking about the aesthetic brand world.
“When culture and truth guides expression, you’ll land on something lasting,” she explains, “versus chasing an aesthetic that’s hot at the moment, and everyone else is chasing too. Your visual signature must be true to your business and beyond surface level. And ask yourself: are you inspired by this aesthetic because it made another brand very successful as a business? Or because it’s the right direction for yours, and true to your ethos? Therein lies a difference.”
“If you already know what you want [something] to look like before it’s done, then it’s problematic. You’re limiting the process and limiting the potential.”
Kristoffer Sølling, Co-founder, Regular Practice
As Regular Practice co-founder Kristoffer Sølling says: “If you go into something chasing an aesthetic, then you’re not doing it right. If you already know what you want it to look like before it’s done, then it’s problematic. You’re limiting the process and limiting the potential.”
“If you choose the right crayons in your crayon box, it’ll all come together,” explains Yaeger. “But when brands all of a sudden try everything at once and are really loud, they’ll sizzle fast because it feels like just a moment. The internet makes moments fleeting, and I think nostalgia is timeless. It’s about how you create something that can stand the test of time. People can smell falsehood from a mile away.”
“It’s about going digging in the right places and finding the right thing,” agrees Regular Practice’s Finn. “That then drives the expression and it feels authentic, because it existed 100 years ago and it’s from a totally different time.
“It’s not about redrawing it; it’s about how you can create a new take on that thing. Sometimes it’s about how it can be elevated, or how it can have more weight, or less weight, or more quirks. Sometimes it’s about finding a particular letter or ligature and using that to build from.”
IT TAKES A LOT OF WORK
Because nostalgia is so seductive, and so intimately connected to emotion, it’s easy to assume that it’s a straightforward process. But getting it right takes work.
For example, Sølling says clients often bring along vintage magazine ads as inspiration – VW’s iconic Lemon campaign is a firm favourite – without considering how a similar approach might work today, on social media.
“It’s relatively low-hanging fruit, because it’s page five of the history of brand and graphic design books,” he says. “But if you’re not thinking about how it works, and how you can translate that, it falls a bit flat. And it’s really easy for other people to copy.”
“You want something that has longevity, and isn’t just quickly tapping into the surface level of trend – which means it’ll look cool for two years, and then it’ll look so dated. You’ll be embarrassed to be sharing this. An idea is great, until it’s replicated over and over again, and it becomes a style that people are too familiar with.”
IS IT ABOUT NOSTALGIA, OR IS IT ABOUT EMOTION?
“It's not: what does this look like? It’s: what does this mean? How are we going to make these people feel?”
Rachael Yaeger, Co-founder, Human NYC
Maybe what we’re talking about isn’t so much nostalgia, it’s the need, and the desire, for brands to connect with people on a deeper level. And, as Di Domenico reminds us, this was something the brands of yesteryear did, often effortlessly. “The copy ran long and told a real story,” she says. “The voice had something to say. The aesthetic was at times playful or at other times enduring. A genuine expression that feels like it lasts, like the quality is good, like what they are selling isn’t just a thing, but thought-of and thoughtful. Today there’s a yearning for genuine entertainment and what is really, genuinely good.”
Although, all that said, maybe looking to the past to make a connection doesn’t necessarily mean looking to someone else’s past. As Human NYC’s Yaeger explains, her agency recently finished a rebrand for a skincare business, and instead of starting afresh they decided to delve back into the “OG brand book to find kernels of truth”.
“We were like, why don’t we just resurface what you’re actually so good at?” she says. “We don’t need to redefine something, or uncover some insight, or look at a trend report and try to be predictive in culture and the market.”
And maybe, evoking a time that – in our minds at least – felt slower, less ‘branded’ and more imbued with craft is one way of building back a stronger relationship between brands and consumers. “If nostalgia is defined by a feeling, that’s such a cool way to look at your work and your job as a branding agency,” says Yaeger. “But it’s not: what does this look like? It’s: what does this mean? How are we going to make these people feel?”
“There is something about nostalgia that we can feel even if we can't specifically name, which is a strong and instant emotional connection,” says Di Domenico. “Strategically familiar yet entirely new again.”
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Images from top: Vacation packaging by Wedge, In Print We Trust rebrand by Regular Practice, Matheson Food Company by Wedge, Vacation packaging by Wedge, Back to Nature brand by LOVE; website by Human NYC.
