An organic line from Stonyfield and a renamed Greek cup from Dannon.

Oikos is a Greek yogurt brand of the French food group Danone, sold in the United States by its North American business. The name reached American shelves through two Danone-connected companies: the organic yogurt maker Stonyfield and The Dannon Company.

Stonyfield’s line came earlier. English Wikipedia says Stonyfield Farm, based in Londonderry, New Hampshire, was founded in 1983 as an organic farming school on a farmstead in Wilton, New Hampshire, and that Groupe Danone bought an initial stake in it in 2001, adding to that holding until it owned the whole company by 2014. When Dannon announced its own Oikos line in August 2011, its release, published by Food Ingredients First on 9 August 2011, said Stonyfield Organic Oikos Greek yogurt had been available since 2007 and would continue to be sold by Stonyfield with its own certified organic recipe.

Dannon’s line replaced a product it already sold. The 2011 release said Dannon Oikos Greek would take the place of the existing Dannon Greek brand while keeping the same recipe. It quoted Michael Neuwirth, then Dannon’s senior director of public relations, saying the company was excited to bring the Oikos brand to more stores nationwide and in more flavours than before. The company described Oikos as made with a traditional Greek straining process, which it said gave the yogurt a creamy, thick consistency.

The launch range mixed fruit and plain cups. The release listed flavours including honey, peach and black cherry, with blended flavours such as key lime, and it said plain and vanilla were also arriving in new larger containers. Together, the company said, Dannon Oikos and Stonyfield Organic Oikos would offer Greek yogurt in both organic and non-organic versions.

A party, a sitcom reunion and a quarterback with a league shield.

Oikos was launched with a familiar face. The 2011 release said the actor John Stamos would star in a new campaign that began airing on 8 August 2011, comparing Oikos with Champagne and Swiss chocolate. In the commercial, it said, Stamos brings Oikos to a party of stylish tastemakers, to the surprise of the host, who is won over once she tries it. The release quoted Stamos calling himself “a proud Greek and a proud yogurt eater.”

The brand then took Stamos to the Super Bowl. DairyReporter reported on 29 January 2014 that Dannon Oikos had advertised during the Super Bowl in 2012 and was returning for Super Bowl XLVIII with Stamos, Bob Saget and Dave Coulier, the cast of the sitcom Full House, back together under one roof. The full spot was set to run in the fourth quarter of the game, the paper said, on the same night that Chobani made its own Super Bowl debut in the third quarter. Sergio Fuster, Dannon’s chief marketing officer, told the paper that the brand’s big-game advertising helped show “how Dannon Oikos Greek yogurt fits into the fabric of American life,” and that the 2014 spot focused on “the lighter side of the big game.”

A new spokesman followed in 2015. FoodNavigator reported on 5 January 2015 that Dannon was rolling out Oikos Triple Zero nationwide, a Greek yogurt sweetened with stevia that the company described as having “zero added sugar, zero artificial sweeteners and zero fat,” in flavours including vanilla, coconut crème and mixed berry. The launch was backed by a campaign featuring the Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton. The paper said Art D’Elia, Dannon’s vice-president of marketing, told Advertising Age that Oikos had enjoyed “a great run” with Stamos but wanted a spokesperson and an advertising model that could help it appeal more to men.

The football link reached the pack itself. FoodNavigator said Dannon was the official yogurt sponsor of the NFL, and that under the tie-up the NFL shield was prominently displayed on Oikos Triple Zero. D’Elia also said the brand did not plan to return to the Super Bowl that year.

Design and documentation.

The brands in this group are all American yogurt names. Yogurt reaches people through a cup more than through any other object: a small tub of plastic or, less often, glass, kept cold from the dairy to the store and sealed with a foil or film lid under a snap-on cap. Single cups sit side by side in a chilled case, larger tubs sit on the shelf below, and multipacks are held together by a cardboard sleeve or a band, so a brand has to read clearly from a short distance and at a glance.

Because one spoonful of plain yogurt looks much like another, much of a yogurt brand’s identity is carried by the cup itself: its shape, the colour of the lid, the band of type around the side and the picture of fruit or flavour on the foil. The questions worth asking are plain ones: who started it, who owns it now, and where the yogurt is made.

Each guide separates what independent sources record from what a company says about itself, and marks plainly what rests only on the company’s own word.

A 2021 restage, a new parent name and a Stonyfield sale.

The Oikos look has been reworked in public. FoodNavigator-USA reported on 17 June 2021 that Danone North America was refreshing the Oikos blended line, replacing its signature blue packaging with a white background and images of fresh fruit. Surbhi Martin, Danone North America’s vice-president for Greek yogurt and functional nutrition, described the new design to the paper as “a white background, big bold lettering, and really luscious fruit,” and said the restage was meant to reach a younger audience that the older blue range had not served.

Martin told the paper the relaunch would be backed by a marketing programme across television, online video, social media, influencers, public relations and search. She also set the blended cups beside the brand’s other lines, Oikos Triple Zero and Oikos Pro, saying each was aimed at a different occasion even though some shoppers would buy across all three.

The owner’s name has changed around the brand. English Wikipedia says Danone completed its purchase of WhiteWave Foods in April 2017, naming the combined US business DanoneWave, and renamed it Danone North America in April 2018. To clear that deal, Wikipedia says, Danone sold Stonyfield to Lactalis in July 2017. Danone has owned the Dannon Oikos line since its launch in 2011.

For a design guide, Oikos shows how a brand can move from a single signature colour to a cleaner, fruit-led pack while keeping its name, and how casting — an actor who called himself a proud Greek, then a quarterback with a league shield on the cup — can set the tone as much as the label. Compare it with Fage, the Athens dairy brand, and Dannon, the Danone brand under whose name Oikos was launched in 2011. For this guide we use Oikos blue, strained white, berry red and honey gold with a heavy sans, an unofficial interpretation; no product or logo is reproduced.

Keep Oikos’s identity on hand — save it to a board in the Made Good inspiration library.