In 1846, Jean-Romain Lefevre and his wife Isabelle Utile open a pastry shop in Nantes, France. Their various types of biscuits, especially the chocolate ones, became quite popular. Hence, in 1860, they decide to join their two surnames to develop a brand name for the marketing of their biscuits in stores. From that moment on, the patronymic Lefevre-Utile was used as a brand name.
In 1897, Alfons Mucha came up with a new logo design for an advertisement for the vanilla wafer biscuit. It became the first time that the initials L and U was used as a logo and from that point forward, the brand was simply known as LU.
Today, LU is owned by Group Danone and annualy produces 183,000 tons of food products, including 5 types of biscuits, 3 types of bread, and 4 types of soft cakes, all sold internationally at your local supermarket.
During my university years, I had the opportunity to work on a contract with a branding company to promote LU biscuits at a wine and food show in Ottawa. Because we were probably the only booth in the whole place to actually give out samples for free, we were a big hit with all of the attendees. However, the best part had to be how we were also a big hit with the other booths...so much of a hit that we were being inundated with offers of free booze and food in exchange for a couple of boxes of the biscuits. Needless to say, we all took full advantage of this scenario and I ended up getting quite hammered and a very full belly by the end of each day (it lasted 3 days). Thank God for LU!