The youth of China today is a brand new generation. Their newfound confidence in their own culture and identity is pushing China forward into an unprecedented era – the era of a New China. Harbin Beer, China’s first beer born in 1900, had not changed its identity for more than two decades, and it was fast losing relevance among this unprecedented generation, painting a dangerous picture for the brand's future. In 2018, it decided it was finally time for a revamp, to behave like a beer brand fit for China's youth.

The idea was to visualize the spirit of China's new youth generation, as a representation of the New China they are building. That's why Harbin did a radical redesign of its entire identity from the inside out, mimicking the merciless pace at which China is changing today. The spirit of China's new youth was distilled into its most defining characteristics, then translated it into distinctive design elements.

THEIR OPTIMISM: This generation is about newfound hope and confidence. Their dynamic positivity is captured in the first character of Harbin’s Chinese name “HA” as reverberating, uninhibited laughter.

THEIR PROGRESSIVE MINDSETS: To represent Chinese youth's lightning-fast speed and foresight, Harbin’s iconic “Ice Mountain” was transformed into the “Ice Mountain Lightning Bolt”, integrated into the Chinese “HA” character so the brand’s visual icon is now bound with the logo name itself.

DUALITIES AS THEIR WAY OF LIFE: The engrained dualities within culture and youth identity is conveyed through the Harbin logo locking the Chinese and English brand names together, becoming an inseparable entity.

MORE IS MORE!!!: While the rest of the world is softly saying “less is more”, here it’s all about “more is more”. More options, more experiences, more new news. Echoing this, Harbin turns its otherwise ordinary beer label into statement stickers, completely taking over any touchpoint it meets.

In just four weeks after launch, sales hit 8,500,000 bottles (that’s enough bottles to go across the whole of France – TWICE!), outdoing itself by 5 times compared to same time the previous year. Furthermore, brand health also shot up simultaneously across all metrics: “Like to share with friends”, “More refreshing than others” and “For young people",

as tracked by Kantar Millward Brown Brand Health Report April 2019.