Coca-Cola just rebranded without touching its logo

Coca-Cola put out a new global look on July 20. The script logo did not change.

The most recognized wordmark on earth, a full identity overhaul across more than two hundred markets, and the design team left the script where it was. They rebuilt everything around it instead. The typeface on the packaging, the rules for photography, the red ribbon from 1969 that now runs through more of the system than it has in years.

Your shop has the same two layers. There is your logo, and then there is every other piece of type a customer reads. Most owners I meet want to redo the logo. Almost none of them have ever picked the second font, the one carrying your menu, your hours, your prices. Some template picked it, and you have been living with that choice ever since.

What did Coca-Cola change in its 2026 rebrand?

JKR handled the global identity. SUPERULTRARARE rebuilt the packaging system. Brody Associates did the type.

Coca-Cola's supporting sans-serif is a face called Unity, also drawn by Brody. Coke pushed it to the back and promoted a serif family called Better With, which Brody built in 2023 for one holiday campaign. Three years later it carries the brand's global communications, in wide and narrow styles, across Latin, Greek and Cyrillic.

JKR moved the 1969 Arden Square and the ribbon back to the center of the design. Three photographers, Guy Aroch, Anna Palma and Martin Wonnacott, set the standard for how Coke's photography looks from here. On cans, the script rotates from horizontal to vertical. Rapha Abreu, Coca-Cola's global VP of design, described the result as "a single, bold brand experience."

Piece	Before	After July 20, 2026
The script wordmark	Horizontal on cans	Same drawing, rotated vertical
Lead typeface	Unity, a sans-serif	Better With, a serif
The 1969 ribbon	Supporting element	Runs through the whole system
Photography	No named standard	Three named photographers set it

The rollout starts in Europe, the Middle East and India. Latin America and Asia follow. North America gets it in 2027, so the cans in your cooler will look the same for another year and a half.

Not everyone loves it. Designers spent last week pointing out that the new serif sits very close to the Marlboro wordmark, an awkward resemblance for a sugar brand in a year when more governments are taxing sugar. Brody did not use Marlboro's typeface, though the likeness lands.

Why the second font matters more than the logo

Count where your logo appears. The sign out front, maybe the cup, the bag, the top of the website. Four or five surfaces.

Now count where your second font appears. The menu, the price list, the hours on the door, the paper sign under the hours explaining the new Sunday schedule, the receipt, the appointment reminder, the Canva post about the sale, the invoice. Twenty surfaces without trying, and every one is a place where somebody is reading rather than glancing.

I can date the signs in a shop by their fonts. The oldest one is Times New Roman. The next one is Calibri, because somebody made it in Word. Then a Canva default lands on top of both. The logo is often lovely. The wall around it looks like four different businesses.

Your logo gets looked at once. Your second font gets read every time somebody checks your hours, your prices, or your menu.

A bike shop in Fishers has a hand-drawn chainring for a logo and I like it a lot. Their service board reads TUNE-UP $85, BRAKE BLEED $45, WHEEL TRUE $25, set in Arial because it printed out of a spreadsheet. The logo says small careful shop. The board says municipal parking notice.

A vet clinic in Noblesville has four signs on one glass door: the clinic name in its logo face, a leash notice in Times New Roman, a laminated holiday-hours card in Calibri, and an index card in ballpoint. A client reads all four in about two seconds and takes away something the clinic never meant to say.

What should you do this week?

Coke's version took three agencies. Yours takes an afternoon.

Photograph every piece of type a customer reads. Walk in your own front door like a stranger. Door, menu, price list, counter signs, receipt, the last three things you posted. Count the distinct fonts. Most shops land between five and nine.

Pick one, and do not pick your logo font. A type designer draws a logo face for one word at large size. Set nine menu items in that face at 11 point and the spacing falls apart. Coke made the same call here: the script stays a logo, the serif does the reading.

Write it down where you can hand it to someone. One note, three lines. Headlines in this font at this weight. Body in this font. Prices in this font. Give it to your sign maker and to whoever posts to Instagram. Coca-Cola built a governance tool with Adobe to hold two hundred markets together. You need a note in your phone.

Fix the two signs people read most, not all nine. For most shops that means the menu or price list, and the hours on the door.

Free faces that hold up in a shop: Fraunces or Instrument Serif if you want the warm serif Coke is chasing, Inter or Source Sans 3 if you want a plain workhorse. All four sit on Google Fonts at no cost. Read the license before you send anything to a sign maker, because the terms that cover your website do not always cover vinyl and awnings.

A record store in Garfield Park redid its price cards in February. Same cards, same prices, one font instead of three. Nobody has said a word about it. The owner told me people stop and read the whole rack now instead of picking up one sleeve and putting it back.

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Sources

#	Source	What it backed up
1	Coca-Cola Unveils Newly Refreshed Global Visual Identity System (The Dieline)	The July 20, 2026 announcement, the agency roles, the photographers, the vertical wordmark on cans, and the rollout order ending with North America in 2027.
2	Coca-Cola Better With (Brody Associates)	That Brody drew both Unity and Better With, that Better With began as a 2023 holiday campaign face, and its wide and narrow styles across Latin, Greek and Cyrillic.
3	Coca-Cola Unveils a New Global Brand Identity (PRINT Magazine)	The 1969 ribbon moving to the center of the system, the 200-plus markets, and the Adobe-built governance tool.
4	Everyone's saying the same thing about Coca-Cola's new font (Creative Bloq)	The Marlboro comparison and the reaction from designers.
5	Fraunces (Google Fonts)	One of the free serif options named above.
6	The font in your logo might not be licensed for your sign (Luminest)	Our earlier piece on why desktop and web font licenses often exclude signage.