Seattle's Best Rebranding

I had all intentions of going to bed half an hour ago after a busy day, until I decided to read this week's issue of Creative Loafing Atlanta. Flipping through I noticed something completely different about a semi-household name and got so excited about it that I'm pushing back sleep to blog about it (such is life).

Seattle's Best has rebranded themselves. It's current, it's fun, and it was very much so needed.

What a drastic difference, am I right?

Along with their branding, it only makes sense that new packaging has also been introduced.

Overall, I think it's a definite improvement. The main crit I have is that the logo is reminiscent of healthcare and blood donation, and many comments on sites and blogs agree with that notion. Obviously, red is a huge part of their brand and had to incorporate it, but the red semi-circle could easily be changed to brown to obviously represent coffee (maybe that was too cliche for them? Who knows?!). Yet again, it is supposed to represent a smile, and the drop kind of seems like an implied tongue as well. There are just so many ways to look at it! 

I really appreciate the coffee bag the most: nice repetition of the circles, varying type weight to show hierarchy, clean in general. 

Here's a chart of their design reasonings:

What are your thoughts on Seattle's Best rebranding? Yay or nay? Any other crits to offer?

Edit: I didn't realize how far behind I was with this, but in my defense, there are about zero Seattle's Best coffee shops in the Atlanta-area.