• by Larissa Faw , May 8, 2019

Borden is overhauling the 150-year-old brand's iconic cow logo to make itself relevant in a world full of dairy rivals and newer competitors, like soy and almond milk producers. 

Borden is partnering with BrandCory on its logo refresh and with Ohio-based Curiosity for its marketing strategy.

The campaign's centerpiece is the more modern look for brand's "spokescow" Elsie. Over the years, Borden flittered between prominently showcasing Elsie as well as placing her on the backburner in favor of more famous faces. 

Ten years ago, to that end, Selena Gomez served as the brand spokesperson and ambassador.

“Our research showed that Elsie represents pure joy and optimism for American families, which we are harnessing as key drivers in all marketing initiatives in 2019,” said Joe DePetrillo, Chief Marketing Officer, Borden. (More detail can be found here.)

Elsie’s new appearance can be seen across the company’s marketing channels and will be on product packaging in dairy aisles throughout the southeastern U.S. this summer.  The cow’s reintroduction will also be supported with a new marketing campaign promoting the tagline “Glass Half-Full Since 1857" designed to highlight the “pure joy” and optimism of Borden products. 

DePetrillo explains his key challenge is to balance the brand's legacy while staying relevant to today's consumers. The Borden brand still holds a lot of equity, he says. “Elsie remains a beloved and iconic representation of this proud heritage with people of all generations. For these reasons, we wanted our brand refresh to be evolutionary in nature rather than revolutionary." 

This refresh follows Borden's a change in control to private equity shop ACON Investment in 2017. The firm installed a new leadership team. Since taking the helm at Borden in March 2018, CEO Tony Sarsam has selected his executive team, reorganized the marketing and sales functions, and added a research and development team.