Manny the manatee as a true vector mark, four logo directions, and a palette chosen from the 40,000-foot view: it has to work on the cup, the awning and the future website as one system.

The 40,000-ft call on colour. Loaded teas are neon — every flavour is a different loud colour, and the website will be wall-to-wall photos of them. So the palette's job is to be a stage, not a star. That rules out the two obvious beach-brand choices: coral as a primary fights the orange and pink pours directly, and seafoam as a large surface is both the most over-used colour on this coast and a clash with the blue ones. Deep navy plus warm cream stays out of the way, and the drink supplies every bit of the brightness.

What that buys you. Coral only passes contrast on dark (5.09:1) and fails on cream (2.55:1) — so the website goes dark-first, which is also exactly what makes neon drink photography glow. One decision, and the site, the cup ink and the sign field all land on the same colour.

The mark — Manny

Base silhouette · 45-point vector

Paddle tail, blunt snout, two front flippers — the three things that read manatee and not whale. This one path drives every lockup below, so the brand only ever has one animal to maintain.

Four directions

1 · Badge

The workhorse. A circular badge survives being a sticker, an app icon, a cup lid and an embroidered polo without ever being redrawn.

2 · Straw hyphen

The hyphen in MANA-TEAS is a straw. It carries the pun with no extra element, and it is the one that stretches widest — awning, van, website header.

3 · Two-colour cup mark

The one you asked for. Exactly two spot colours, no gradients, compact and low so the layered pour stays the hero.

4 · Retro sunburst

The merch engine. Slab serif over a coral sunburst — this one sells tees, not drinks.

Palette — one set of tokens for print and web

Deep Gulf

bg / field

#0B2438

Website background. Sign field. The dark stage that makes a neon pour glow.

1 spot ink

Gulf Navy

surface / primary ink

#12324F

Cards and sections on web. The single ink for the one-colour cup print.

same ink, 1 plate

Sand Cream

text / knockout

#F6E7C8

Body and headline text on dark. Knockout for the mark. Light-mode menu boards.

knockout, no ink

Sunset Coral

accent — dark only

#F4634E

Buttons, the straw, underlines. Fails contrast on cream — never text on light.

+1 plate, use sparingly

Seafoam

cartoon only

#3FA79B

Manny's body in the illustrated mascot. Not a brand surface — it clashes with blue pours.

screen / direct-to-film only

Contrast — checked, not eyeballed

Pair	Ratio	Body text	Where it is used
Cream on Deep Gulf	12.98:1	PASS	Body text, headlines
Navy on Cream	10.77:1	PASS	Menu boards, light print
Coral on Deep Gulf	5.09:1	PASS	Buttons, links, accents
Coral on Cream	2.55:1	FAIL	REJECTED — never do this
Seafoam on Cream	2.38:1	FAIL	REJECTED — never do this

The rule this creates. Coral is a graphic colour on light backgrounds — a straw, a rule, a sunburst wedge — and a text colour only on dark. Put coral type on cream and it fails accessibility and looks weak in sun, which matters when the sign is outdoors in Destin.

Website alignment

manateas.co

MANA-TEAS

MenuFind usOrder

DESTIN · MIRAMAR BEACH

Slow down.
Drink something
loud.

Layered loaded teas, built cold and bright. Two hundred calories, zero chill required.

See the menuOrder ahead

manateas.co / menu board

MANA-TEAS

MenuFind usOrder

Same tokens, both modes. The dark site is the storefront — neon pour against Deep Gulf, coral call-to-action. The light mode is the in-store menu board and any printed sheet: navy on cream, which is the strongest pair in the whole system at 10.77:1. Menu items shown are placeholders, not the real menu.

On the cup — the actual constraint

Navy on clear — one spot ink plus a spot white underbase behind the mark only. Recommended.

Cream on clear — reads on dark pours, vanishes on pale ones. Riskier across a full menu.

Print rules this obeys (from the cup vendor research): dry offset, max six spot colours, no process colour, no gradients, bands about 1.5 inches tall. The mark sits low on the cup so the two-tone pour stays visible above it. Ask every vendor for "spot white underbase behind artwork only; no flood coat" — without it the navy shifts colour depending on which layer of the drink is behind it, and with a flood coat your clear cup turns white. Each additional spot colour is roughly $75–150 in setup, so the two-colour mark is also the cheapest one to run.

Small-size & one-colour tests

Holds to about 34px — the gap between the flippers is the first thing to fill in. Below that, use a body-and-tail-only variant rather than letting it turn to mud.

Cartoon Manny — video & social

Sticker Manny

Best of the batch. Clean line, friendly, already holding a layered cup — this is the one for reels, cup stickers and the loyalty card.

Retro poster Manny

Too detailed to be a logo; excellent as a wall mural or a tee back-print.

Honest caveat. The two images directly above were generated by AI (artificial intelligence) and are raster, not vector. Fine for screen, reels and DTF (direct-to-film) apparel transfers through Ninja Transfers. Not production art for a sign shop or a cup plate — those need the vector marks above. The cartoon Manny also does not yet match the vector Manny's proportions; if you pick a direction, the cartoon gets redrawn to match.

MANA-TEAS — mascot, logos & colour system