The Chiquita banana sticker has long been iconic.
 
Dole and Del Monte always had stickers on their bananas but they didn’t have the foresight to use them as form of pop-art expression like Chiquita did. The commemorative stickers Chiquita created for the 1980 Winter Olympics are a great example of this. Tapping into a huge sports event was standard stuff for beer and potato chips thirty years ago, but for a fruit company? It stood out in a big way.
 
According to Chiquita, the inspiration for all this came from what people did with the stickers after they ate the banana. Some clever mind in marketing decided the brand could travel far beyond the kitchen if they made the stickers fun or even collectibles. Kids would affix them to their school notebooks and toddlers to their foreheads.
 
Flash forward to 2010. The idea for this latest installment in the Chiquita sticker tradition was simple: give each banana a personality.
 
And they look great. Created by Art Director DJ Neff, most come in the form of graphic faces that take their design cues from Japanese anime or skateboard culture. Others come in the form of meaningless platitudes like “Be Your Own Banana.” And you can also design your own custom stickers, (Mr. Potato Head-style) at EatAChiquita.com.
 
All in keeping with the tradition.
 
Dave Sylvestre