Three many years earlier than TikTok’s obsession with tinned fish introduced us sea-cuterie boards, tinned fish cookbooks, and stylish manufacturers like Fishwife and Scout, there was Bela Model Seafood. This OG tinned fish purveyor hit grocery retailer cabinets again in 1997 with aesthetic, design-centric packaging—and now, it’s refreshing its model identification to remind trendy audiences that it took a wager on tinned fish earlier than it was cool.
Bela (previously referred to as Bela Model Seafood) was based by native New Englander Joshua Scherz and his mother, Florence. The model has remained family-owned since its inception, quietly rising with none funding from exterior traders. However in the course of the pandemic, Scherz says, canned meals of every kind skilled a form of “renaissance.” Tinned fish—together with Bela’s stock of sardines, mackerel, and codfish—started flying off of cabinets and onto screens through a deluge of influencer evaluations and recipes, incomes it the official title of “hot girl food.”
However together with that client demand, Scherz notes, has come a wave of tinned fish merchandise with the next value level, designed with trendiness and exclusivity in thoughts. In the meantime, the core of Bela’s enterprise mannequin stays centered round sustainability and accessibility (the latter is a key characteristic, Scherz says, for a product initially designed as a utilitarian pantry staple.) The model’s daring new look and digital presence brings it into the twenty first century whereas emphasizing Bela’s roots as a ‘90s model for the everyman.
Bela makes a splash
Again within the late ‘90s, Scherz says, tinned fish was a dying business. For Scherz, although, it had at all times been a relentless. Rising up within the Boston space in an Japanese European household, sardines have been a staple for his household; and, when he served within the U.S. Air Power for 4 years, they grew to become much more of a mainstay at mealtime.
As soon as Scherz returned from his time within the navy, he and Florence noticed a possibility to show their love of sardines right into a household enterprise. However, as they started to seek for a cannery associate in New England, they realized that the variety of choices had dwindled sharply over time. So, they determined to associate with a cannery within the coastal city of Olhão, Portugal that aligned with their objectives.
“Again then, sustainability meant supporting a neighborhood financial system that was disappearing,” Scherz says. “We needed to save lots of a life-style, a lifestyle, a enterprise, a product that was that quick declining. The canneries in Maine had gone away; the canneries in California had gone away; there have been no canneries left in america. Once we went to Portugal, sustainability meant making a product and maintaining it going.”
The OG aesthetic tinned fish
From the beginning, Bela set itself aside by packing its fish in additional virgin olive oil relatively than hydrogenated soybean oil. And the corporate actually stood out on grocery retailer cabinets for its playful, ultra-detailed packaging, that includes a lipstick-wearing fish mascot (or “spokesfish,” as Scherz nicknamed her) and a easy, sans-serif font.
“One of many issues about our design again in 1997 was that we have been one of many first lithograph, six-color course of cans,” Scherz says. “Every part else was a wrap, or a field, or it was soiled and dingy on a shelf with a plastic wrap. We acquired shelf placement instantaneously 30 years in the past, as a result of we have been at all times a really design-focused model.”
The selection to place package deal design front-and-center has confirmed to be a prescient transfer for Bela, as tinned fish has instantly discovered itself in an unlikely highlight.
“I name us pandemic gold,” Scherz says. “Sadly, the pandemic was what made sardines so standard. I imply, I’ve been promoting sardines for 23 years earlier than the pandemic, and we have been at all times in shops attempting to realize trial—however the pandemic was a compelled trial. Folks have been involved about cooking meals or getting groceries and wiping them down. We overlook how paranoid we have been 5 years in the past, however this product was clear, it was secure.”
In response to Scherz, Bela’s development plan of 8-10% per 12 months has constantly doubled within the years following the pandemic. And per a report from IndustryARC, the worldwide canned fish market is predicted to achieve $11.3 billion by 2027. The surge of curiosity within the product has brought about new firms like Fishwife and Scout to emerge with their very own fastidiously curated packaging and flavors (each firms promote their wares for round $35 per three-pack or extra, relying on the range.) In the meantime, new high-end manufacturers are charging as a lot as $75 for a three-pack of smoked eel or $26 for a single can of tuna.
However Bela desires to say which you could have your aesthetic fish and eat it, too—for costs ranging between simply $5 and $7 per tin. With its new branding, Bela is emphasizing its accessibility and family-owned enterprise mannequin with slogans like “Fish is household” (superb) and “Everybody’s welcome to the desk.” And, the corporate is inviting a youthful technology to get pleasure from its merchandise with a modernized website that permits clients to buy its merchandise straight for the primary time.
New design, identical ’90s vibe
On cabinets, Bela is sticking to its iconic ‘90s packaging—a wise alternative, given the current resurgence of ‘90s-inspired CPG branding and the emphasis on visually thrilling tinned fish designs (see Fishwife’s popular packaging, for instance). However the model’s digital presence is getting a significant overhaul, spearheaded by the design company Vicious Studio, with a brand new brand, web site, and merch that even Gen Z can get behind.
The Bela wordmark is now rendered in an ultra-bright-blue customized font. It’s an all-caps sans-serif, in line with the model’s packaging, however now in a a lot bolder and bubblier kind to convey the model’s look as much as 2025’s velocity.
“Bela’s new look is daring, vivid, and unimaginable to disregard—similar to the New England I grew up in in the course of the ‘90s,” says Vicious Studio designer Nicholas Jackson. “The wordmark has Fats letterforms with ink traps—a nod to old-school business however with a enjoyable, trendy edge. It’s punchy, tremendous legible, and stands up on a shelf prefer it owns the place.”
The “spokesfish” mascot, Bela, has additionally gotten a makeover. Now, as a substitute of being a full fish, she’s a type of “speaking head,” a extra versatile design that may be oriented vertically or horizontally. Her signature eyelashes and lips stay.
“The fish, nonetheless Bela at coronary heart, acquired a digital-first glow-up,” says Jackson. “We tightened her up, centered on her head, eyes, and lips, and made her sharper, extra scannable, and constructed for now. She’s now not hand-drawn, however she’s nonetheless acquired that very same vitality, now with knocked-out outlines and a halftone texture—just a little throwback to classic print and the grittier, hard-worn aesthetic of New England docks and fish markets.”
Bela can be test-driving a life-style transfer à la Sweetgreen and Erewhon with its personal merch. The launch features a stylish canvas tote bag, graphic crewnecks, and a few retro-inspired banners (in some way, Bela isn’t the primary fish-forward firm to put money into stylish merch up to now a number of months—see Gorton’s fish stick tote bag designed for Gen Z).
Within the coming months, Scherz says, clients can anticipate a fair bigger branding overhaul from Bela. For now, although, he’s centered on ushering in a brand new period that he calls “tinned fish 3.0.”
“Should you have a look at Bela 1997 as tinned fish 1.0, then tinned fish 2.0 could be across the pandemic time, when it began to morph just a little bit,” Scherz says. “Going ahead, we’re going to start out tinned fish 3.0—rebranding with fish-forward flavors and getting again to the utilitarian roots and authenticity of tinned fish. This 3.0 model isn’t going to be about glamour; it’s going to be about the truth that it’s a protein, it has omega-3, and it’s a scrumptious fish.”
