Imagine if one day you woke up from a long sleep and found yourself in a whole new world; a very different world from that which we are in right now.

In that world, you start your day by taking a shower with soap, brushing your teeth with toothpaste and taking your daily dose of caffeine. Suit up and you are ready to work. But everything is plain, without any design or branding on your everyday items. Every item you bought, every item you consumed, all just the same.

How would you feel about it? Pretty dull, right? This imaginary world is a world without brands at all – a brand-free world. Soap will be soap, not Lux or Dove. Coffee will be just a drink, not Nescafe or Starbucks. Perhaps we could not stand to live in such a world due to the boring and plain environment, with the absence of our favorite brands.

There is a book explaining that branding is a part of capitalism. The book also initiated the thought of a “world without brands”, a dystopian existence exactly like that mentioned above.

Is that kind of world possible? we doubt it will happen in the near future. We do not believe in a brand-free world.

There are already some movements that are directly or indirectly moving toward a brand-free world. For instance, the Australian government has initiated a policy for the cigarette industry to omit design and branding elements from their packaging. It is a standardization policy so that every cigarette packaging will have the same design, but with different brand names (in standard color, layout and font type).

However, that kind of movement is still way far from being an embryo for a brand-free world. Why? If we take a closer look at the Australian cigarette standardization case, the packaging may look similar due to the standards, but then again, the names of the brands still appear on the packaging. Consumers will still notice the brand from its name; whether it is Marlboro, Lucky Strike or another brand.

Another example comes from a Japanese retail brand. Muji, which is also available in Indonesia, is known as a brand-free retail brand. Muji comes from the words mujirushi ryohin, which means no-brand quality goods.

Those familiar with Muji understands what they mean by “no-brand quality goods”. All products of Muji have no branding elements at all; simple and minimalistic. That value is inherited by this brand and applied to all of their products worldwide.

If we take a closer look at the concept of Muji and connect it to the brand-free world movement, perhaps we can easily say that Muji has applied the brand-free world ideology into their brands. But let us think again, is it true that Muji does not have branding? If so, what is the name Muji itself? It is a brand.

From these two cases, what we see is only a logo-free world and not a brand-free world. Fundamentally, logos and brands are two different things.

A logo is only a symbol that visually differentiates one item from another. Meanwhile, a brand is a differentiator of items or products in terms of the image, perception and reputation that work at an emotional level.

In the future, there is still a possibility for products to have standardization of design or logo, but then it will be a logo-free world. When the products still have names and can be associated with a certain image or reputation, they still have brands.

That is why, for us personally, a brand-free world is definitely only a dystopia.