Highlands Coffee Logo

Highlands Coffee is a Vietnamese brand of coffee and coffee-shops established in the country’s capital, Hanoi.  Despite being in a difficult starting situation, Highlands managed to become not just the most successful coffee-focused brand in the city, but also establish an international network.

Meaning and History

The company was created in 1998, and fully registered in 2000. Famously, it’s the first Vietnamese company to be established by a Vietnamese born outside of Vietnam – in this case, David Thai. The name likely stems from the fact that most of Hanoi is located on the elevated terrain.

2009 – 2010

The 2009 logo is an oval shape with several layers. The core is a pale beige space, surrounded by a rather wide red rim. Lastly, the oval has a light brown outline. The same color is used by a little ‘aroma’ illustration in the center of the picture – it depicts a wavy stroke of paint meant to represent the ‘smell’ aspect.

The company name itself was written over the red rim part in two opposite ends – ‘Highlands’ above, ‘Coffee’ below. Both are white and have a mild serif style.

2010 – today

The 2010 logo is similar: they altered the picture inside, changed the font on the wordmark and added more outlines. The picture is now combination of two brown images – a hillside above and a coffee bean below. Put together, they still resemble a coffee bean.

The letters became rather bolder and acquired a brown outline. The one logo had before moved slightly away from the red rim and became darker.

Emblem and Symbol

The company has a secondary logo that is basically a wordmark much like the ones they had on the emblems above, except now they are positioned in two straight lines without any additional colors other than their base beige coloring and occasional red background.