Chiquita Brand | Food Industry Brands

Chiquita
ripe
by Jonathan Schneider
July 1, 2002

Chiquita.com is the digital headquarters of Chiquita Brands International. Although best known for its bananas, the company keeps more than 60 countries across six continents well fed with a cornucopia of fruits, veggies, and canned foods. As the brand emerges from its recent bankruptcy barely bruised, we think it is a ripe time to take a look at the website.

A banana may arguably be the world’s most perfect food, but Chiquita.com is definitely not the world’s most perfect website. The navigation scheme is perplexing. Irregular fonts abound. A few of the page layouts would make a designer seek shelter. Some might say Chiquita.com is a website more suited to a banana republic than a serious banana conglomerate.

Amazingly, all that is okay. The site has a “quirk appeal” that seems befitting of a company that sells bananas. Chiquita.com puts visitors in a good mood as they enter – welcoming equatorial music plays in the background – and keeps things that way while they surf. The result is an experience that suggests the company means business about fruit. Anyone who loves bananas and anyone who loves brands will love Chiquita.com.

Satisfying the former lot, the site includes enough information about bananas to give visitors a virtual bellyache. Product recipes range from the mundane – banana bread – to the daring – whole-wheat flounder with Chiquita banana saffron rice. Fun banana facts might not get the little ones too excited, but a printable, colorable portrait of Miss Chiquita could keep them occupied. And just to make sure visitors take it all in – and remember it to boot – the site will be more than happy to administer a 12-question knowledge quiz.

For brand lovers, Chiquita.com is both a walk down memory lane and historic Madison Avenue. Deep within the site, pages contain a gallery of drawings and photos that chronicle the evolution of Miss Chiquita – the “first lady of fruit” – created by illustrator Dik Browne of Campbell’s Soup kids fame. The site also tells the story of the birth of the Chiquita Banana jingle in 1944 and its intent to “teach” Americans how to ripen and eat the newly imported fruit. Other pages contain video and sound files of famous commercials and the story behind the company’s hallmark hand-placed product labels.

Jonathan Schneider is the founder of Square One Research. He holds an MBA from Emory University's Goizueta Business School and lives in Atlanta, Georgia, with his wife Randee.

*Due to the constantly changing environment of websites, some reviews may no longer reflect the current website for this brand.


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