Snazzy: giving an award-winning cocktail a brand to match
Snazzy had already got the most important thing right: the drink.
Inspired by the classic American Arnold Palmer, Snazzy takes the familiar combination of iced tea and lemonade and brings spirits into the mix, with whiskey, vodka, tequila and rum expressions. The idea has its roots in founder David Peterson’s childhood summers in Napa, making lemonade from lemons picked in his grandmother’s garden. Years later, his love of half iced tea and half lemonade led him to experiment with adding different spirits. That personal recipe eventually became Snazzy.
And people were already paying attention. The liquid has been recognised by the San Francisco Ready-to-Drink Competition, SIP Awards and RTD Magazine, with honours including Best of Class, Double Gold and Editor’s Choice. Its Whiskey Half & Half Cocktail was also named Best Whisk(e)y-Based RTD at the 2025 Top Shelf Awards.
The liquid was working hard. We needed to make the brand work just as hard.
RTD is a busy place to be. Snazzy needed an identity that could command more attention, communicate the quality of what was inside the can and give the business something it could continue to build from as it grew.Working with David, we rebuilt the identity around a clearer, more confident idea, creating a visual world with enough personality to make Snazzy memorable while bringing the different expressions together as one cohesive brand.
Our creative idea, Dazzling Decadence, takes its cues from a modern Gatsby world: Roaring Twenties glamour, celebration and indulgence, with a distinctly Snazzy sense of fun. Art Deco-inspired geometry gives the identity its structure, while expressive typography, gold in abundance and bright colour dial up the theatre. At the centre is a new Snazzy wordmark, giving the brand a recognisable signature across the range. Colour works hard too. Each expression has its own palette, helping to cue the different spirits and giving individual cans their own character, while making sure the full range hangs together as one brand.
For all the glamour and decadence, Snazzy was never supposed to become too polished or precious. This is a canned cocktail designed to be enjoyed, and the identity needed to retain that sense of fun.
As our Design Director Glenn Thorpe puts it: “We wanted Snazzy to feel like a modern Gatsby: full of Roaring Twenties decadence and theatre, but never too serious. Art Deco gave us a strong visual world to build from, and our creative idea, ‘Dazzling Decadence’, gave it the Snazzy spin. Gold in abundance and bright colour help the brand stand out while keeping the range feeling cohesive. It gives Snazzy more presence and personality, while keeping the fun at the heart of the brand.”
The result brings Snazzy’s product, personality and ambitions into the same world, giving an already award-winning cocktail a brand with just as much character.
As David Peterson, Founder and CEO of Snazzy, says: “Over the last year, the response to the liquid has given us real confidence in what we’ve created. People love the product and the choice of whiskey, vodka, tequila or rum, but we knew the identity needed to do a better job of communicating the quality and personality of Snazzy. Working with Thirst gave us the chance to build a brand that feels much closer to our ambition for the business and where we want to take it next.”
Sip something snazzier.
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