Nextel has been through a lot of brand changes. In the United States, it merged with Sprint more than five years ago and kind of disappeared off of the radar when it comes to customers. However, the Nextel brand is still alive and kicking in other parts of the world, such as the booming Latin American market. In fact, Nextel has almost ten million customers. And, they are rebranding to be more inviting to these markets as well.

The old Nextel logo featured the name in an eggplant purple, with horizontal stripes through the last three letters that gave a sense of movement. The writing was all in upper case letters, which created a formidable impression. The new logo design, on the other hand, is as friendly as can be. The color is a youthful bright orange, and the lettering is all lower case—a device that is overused in modern logo design, but could actually be appropriate in this case. The X is the real change; it has been modified to resemble two arrows coming together.

The new slogan will be “Your World. Now.” This will, obviously, be translated into the appropriate languages for each audience. It is a simple tagline that should not create problems in translation. The two arrows in the logo design are meant to imply different ideas coming together.

The old Nextel logo design was, well, old. When I first heard about this rebranding, I thought, “Surely they are not still using the same logo from a decade ago!” But indeed they were. Yes, it is well past time to rebrand. I like the new wordmark; the kerning is well-done and the arrows are obvious without taking over the logo design. Communications is a fast moving business. A telecommunications logo design that seems passé and out of date says nothing good about the carrier that it represents. After all, who wants to be seen using last year’s cell phone?

The tagline is a little generic, but there is a good reason for that. It can be difficult to develop a phrase that translates well into a variety of languages. In fact, the only way to accomplish this is to be as simple as possible, which is exactly what Nextel did. I tend to associate the color orange with Cingular, but perhaps the Latin American market does not make this connection. In addition, there is a European company in the same line of business that is actually called Orange—and guess what color they use?

I am not familiar enough with Latin American markets to comment on whether this is an appropriate design for them, but this design would work perfectly well in the United States. It is a simple, memorable update that feels modern and fresh while still communicating what it needs to say. The Nextel logo design feels like a communications logo. The arrows forming an X is a device that has been done before, but not enough that it feels overdone.

There is nothing original or mind-blowing about this logo design, but it is definitely an improvement over the old. It is hard to imagine a logo design worse than the old one, in fact!

Discovery, a network that markets mainly to women and children with such hits as I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant and Jon & Kate Plus 8, is planning a new channel that will appeal mainly to ‘upscale men’. It is due to launch any day now and will be a replacement of the Discovery network channel known as HD Theater. The new channel is known as Velocity and will feature programming aimed at this market, which is currently underserved by other Discovery channels.

Like all television channels, this one has a logo design. The old logo was somewhat of a placeholder, and was merely used internally within Discovery. It featured a shiny chrome chevron with the name of the channel below in the signature Discovery font. The new logo design features the same core shape, but with a silver globe nestled in the corner of the chevron. The shiny metal is still present, but it is slightly darker, which gives a more masculine feeling. The font has been changed as well; it is now written in Futura. This stylistically matches the space age feeling of the logo a little better.

On the other hand, I cannot help but be reminded of another shiny object in similar shape (http://www.geekalerts.com/u/star-trek-starfleet-command-badge.jpg) . It conjures up images of geeky cool. The problem with this is that the nerd group (which I consider myself a part of) is already being wooed by other cable channels. If Discovery wants to reach an elite male audience, retro sci-fi may not be correct look.

From what I have heard, the new channel will feature several car shows. In this perspective, the logo design makes a little more sense. It is definitely reminiscent of a logo for a car company and rather looks like it belongs on the hood of some powerful machine. The inclusion of a globe detracts from this a little, moving the dial closer to the sci-fi side. On the other hand, the globe makes the logo design look less like a device meant to beam you up to the mother ship. I get that it is supposed to be a letter V, as in the name, but that is not the first thing I think when I see the design.

While many companies have a little wiggle room when it comes to a logo design—they can modify the design a little bit over time—Discovery Velocity does not have this luxury. The new channel has only has one chance to make a first impression on their core audience. If the target market checks out the channel and does not identify with it, Velocity will be stopped by a lack of momentum. It will become just another cable channel competing for the time of housewives and science geeks.

In some industries, it is important to make a first impression and to open shop with a bang. This can have more impact than anything else you do in the course of your business. Having a great logo design and visual identity is the first step to making this impact.

Sometimes the simplest logo design concepts are the most extraordinary.

San Francisco’s Asian Art Museum is an amazing place to spend a day, if you ever have the opportunity. The museum recently launched a new and visual identity package that is based on, simply, the letter A turned upside down. We have seen logos with inverted elements and lettering before, but this one is truly a first in that it uses just an upside down letter.

When I try to describe the concept, it sounds plain and boring. This is a case in which a design is more than the sum of its parts. The A is rendered somewhat three dimensionally in print due to the use of a gradient. The museum’s sign takes advantage of this element with a fully 3-D letter with the same lighting.

The old museum was not bad… in fact, it was quite good. It featured a red square—red is an auspicious color throughout much of Asia and even a common color for Chinese bridal gowns. We associate this color with the East more than any other. A square is a strong and powerful shape that grabs attention, especially when combined with a bright color. The custom font was simple yet brilliant. In fact, the only bad thing I could say about the old is that it is not as good as the new one.

There are many three dimensional logos out there, but many of them simply do not work. They often seem overly ‘blingy’, without any depth. They always look great on a computer screen, but not so much on paper. This logo is multifaceted without being limited. It will look great on brochures and on t-shirts, but it still has the power of three dimensions.

In addition, an upside down A is used in mathematics as a symbol meaning “for all.” The designer designed the logo knowing this, giving the math nerds among us a little thrill. Because the museum is intended not just for Asians, but for people of all ethnic backgrounds, this is appropriate and even brilliant. To avoid stating the obvious, I’ll leave out the stereotypical jokes about Asians being good at math.

In addition, the logo gives a sense of approaching an everyday object with a new perspective. If that is not art, what is? This bold logo offers a wide range of interesting ideas and interpretations, all in one easy to render and easy to remember package.

Will this spawn a rush of copycats and upside down logos on crowdsourcing sites? I predict that it will. After all, if a site is willing to repackage and sell the WWF panda image, upside down lettering is certainly up to plagiarism. However, the Asian Art Museum logo is simple and unique enough that we (and consumers) will know the copycats as soon as they appear. I am always writing that museums and design-related businesses need to make sure their own design is top-notch. This one certainly meets that criterion.

If you have been through the logo design process, you know that it can be intensive and challenging. When you end up with a design that works perfectly for your company, you feel protective of it, almost like a child. It is a hard-won victory that morally and legally belongs solely to your company.

No one protects their brands as vigilantly as large multinational corporation. There is a reason that you choose Nikes over the cheaper models at Target. There is a reason that you reach for certain products over others. You trust certain brands, and they have worked hard at building this loyalty. It rightfully belongs to them.

This is why these large (and small!) companies get very defensive, and even take the offensive, when their brands are threatened or misappropriated. Take Apple, for instance. This is one of the original computer brands. It has been through numerous ups and downs, and fought hard for its current place at the top of its industry. The Apple logo design is so common now that it is virtually ubiquitous, and people around the world associate the bitten apple image with the company that it represents.

If another company began to use the same or even a similar image for their own products, it could really hurt Apple. This, in fact, is what is occurring. Chinese company Sichuan Fangguo Food Co uses an image of an apple as their logo design. As they are expanding to the American market, they recently filed for a trademark for their image. The problem is that the logo is strikingly similar to that of both Apple and LG. In fact, if you look at the image, it is almost an amalgam of the two.

Sichuan Fangguo defends their logo design, claiming that it is a completely original design that incorporates the Chinese characters representing the company into a wholesome, food related image that perfectly represents their company. Apple has filed papers in hopes of stopping the purported imitation from being trademarked to another country. LG, which seems to be the real victim here, is silent on the matter, probably because Apple is a formidable enough opponent that the design has a good chance of being rejected by the powers that be.

A spokesperson from the Chinese food company states that when the company developed their logo design, they had never even heard of Apple. The company began as a state-run business in China and only recently went private. The whole bit about not having heard of this global giant seems unlikely and, in our opinion, undermines Sichuan Fangguo’s credibility in the matter. To make matters worse, the food company tried to register it in a variety of categories, including notebook computers and electronic diversion software (which means gadgets). Both are categories in which Apple dominates.

Whether it is a purposeful theft or an accident, the problem for Sichuan Fangguo will remain the same. If the image is determined to be too similar to the existing trademark of Apple, it cannot be used to represent another company in the United States.

Appropriated Logo Wins Award: If you have any familiarity with the world of advertising, you have probably heard of San Francisco advertising firm Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, known in the industry as GSP. If you are familiar with the world of logo design, you may have heard about the controversy surrounding this company’s new logo design.

GSP is one of the big names in advertising, having designed campaigns for notable names such as Chevrolet, Yahoo! and Got Milk? Despite its prominence, the agency is relatively new, opening less than three decades ago. They have received numerous industry awards for their advertising campaigns, and now they have received a design award for what appears to be a misappropriated logo.

Like many companies, GSP rebrands and changed logo design occasionally to stay relevant in their market. Rather than hiring a professional logo design agency for their latest change, the company partner Rich Silverstein did it himself. This is not an approach that we generally advocate, and in this case it ended badly.

The problem, as many design blogs pointed out, is that the new design is strikingly similar—an almost carbon copy, in fact—of the design used by a now closed company called S & Co. To be clear, there was probably no actual copyright infringement here; the original owner of the logo design has been dead long enough that the design is most likely in the common domain.

However, many people were incensed simply because of the deception involved. The company clearly tried to pass off the design as an original, not mentioning the source until it was pointed out repeatedly in the media. In fact, GSP entered their logo design into a design contest based in Cannes, along with a brief that included no indication of the fact that the image heavily borrowed from another. They ended up winning an award.

As many people like to point out, there is nothing new under the sun. Most designs borrow heavily from others, if not from actual copyrighted works as from certain schools and motifs. There are only so many ways to draw an idea. However, it is important that the original and rightful owners be given the credit they are due, and that the design is open for legal use. An executive in the advertising industry is well aware of the fine line between inspiration and plagiarism.

However, the creator of the logo design defends his decision to use a recycled logo with no reference to the original. In a statement sent to many both within and without the company, Rich Silverstein claims, “Our new logo is old… it’s not a coincidence that the logo looks like a 100 year old ligature. It was 100% intentional.”

Intentional or not, the way this logo design was introduced (and entered into a design contest with no note of the inspiration behind the design) feels a little dishonest. Because designers pride themselves on honest and integrity in work, it ruffled a lot of feathers.

Destination branding is a subject that we write about quite often, for good reason. There is no industry in which image is more important. As we have noted before, people no longer go to the same destination year after year. We like to explore new places and see the world in our precious off-time. Most Americans are currently experiencing a dramatic downturn in vacation funds, which makes branding all the more crucial. No one is going to spend precious and limited money on a vacation that turns out to be miserable.

The Dominican Republic’s capital city of Santo Domingo is hoping to encourage visitors with a new tourism logo design to represent the city. Santo Domingo actually has a lot to offer tourists. As the oldest city in the New World, it has all of the history and culture that we love to experience in our world travels. It is exotic but safe. Did we mention that it is an island paradise on par with the Bahamas and Puerto Rico? In addition, the country is actively building infrastructure that will make tourism more attractive, including a large Coral Highway and new hotels.

The new logo design reads “Santo Domingo es Alegria,” which is Spanish for “Santo Domingo is Joy.” This is a little generic, as are the bright colors which are seen in every Caribbean logo that we can think of offhand. The logo is designed to feel spontaneous and hand-painted, which is definitely in its favor. We’re sure a visit there is a very joyous occasion, if only because one does not have to go to work in the morning, but this logo design does little to differentiate the country from its neighbors. “Come and visit us because we are like every other tropical nation in our general vicinity” could be a compelling argument for people who are tired of their current favorite Caribbean vacation spot, but it may not be enough to attract the much larger American market.

An interesting part of this landmark-logos.htm”>city logo is that the last two letters of the city’s name are placed in different colors so that they create the words ‘to go’. This makes little sense in the context of the logo design. We are sure that the tourism council does not want people to view Santo Domingo as a place that you should pop in and visit for a second before going to your real destination, but this seems to what this element of the logo implies. We suspect that something was lost in translation.

Even so, an attractive but somewhat generic logo design is certainly better than none at all. We will call this a good start and hope that the brand is developed further through other marketing ventures. An interesting note about this initiative: the Dominican people are apparently unused to heavy tourism, so the country has started a program to teach them how to interact with tourists and raise awareness of the importance of tourism to the country’s success. We unfortunately could not find the logo design for this awareness campaign.

If you are even minimally involved in the microbrew and home brewing world, you are probably familiar with the American Homebrewers Association. This organization has been representing and advocating for home brewers since 1978 and now has a sizeable following within the niche, with 27,000 members, an industry magazine and a well-attended annual conference.

The organization is prominent within their field, no thanks to their logo design. This design is not bad, merely a poor representative of their industry. It features two stalks of barley (drawn in a way that could be interpreted as wheat or any one of many similar grains) swirling around the letters AHA. The lettering is square with a hint of serifs and almost feels like a fraternity sign to me. The burgundy and gold do not relate to the beer industry in any way; if anything, they make the logo design feel like one for a restaurant or other food industry business.

Clearly there was a lot of room for improvement here. It is a nice logo design, but it does not represent the business, which is an instant fail. The new logo design is much more specific to the industry. I see a beer cap, a pilsner glass, a hop, and that familiar stalk of barley, which is easier to identify in this context. Warm colors reminiscent of beer have replaced the old and ineffective palette.

This is a definite improvement, no question there. However, there are still a few issues. First, the logo feels a little crowded. This may be due to the fact that all of the elements have been given the same weight; your eye is not sure where to go first and thus skips around over the different parts of the logo design. The barley feels like it is dwarfed by the hop, which is not a good representation of their actual sizes. In addition, the glass could have been drawn to match the lines of the circular shape better, especially at the bottom of the glass.

And then there is the wording. The AHA has chosen a heavy and thick font that may be a little too blocky for this application. It definitely feels like a  beer-related font and a has a classic feeling that matches the rest of the logo design well, but the lettering just does not seem to fit well. In addition, the way the wording wraps around circle makes half of it upside-down. People just don’t like reading words that way. The words could have been placed so that all of the letters are right-side up, making for a much more user-friendly logo design.

A last nitpicky question: is this logo design specific enough? It certainly beats the old logo in this area, but it remains appropriate for any beer business. It could represent a brewery, Anheuser-Busch, or any business remotely related to beer. There is nothing here that screams ‘industry association’. If anything, the beer cap shape makes me think I am looking at a microbrew logo design until I read the wording.

Destination branding is one of the hottest areas of logo design. While people once decided on a vacation spot based almost entirely on prior experience and word of mouth, they now tend to look for new and interesting locales to visit. A logo design is an integral part of becoming that new and interesting location. Having a great destination brand has become even more important in the past few years, as an increasing number of people have dwindling vacation budgets. In order to bring in new tourists, an area has to present the perfect image.

The St. Petersburg/Clearwater area is one region that is trying to use branding and logo design to bring in more tourists. Both cities are located in Pinellas County, Florida, near Tampa Bay. The area offers many of the same opportunities and amenities as Tampa Bay, but it is lesser known and thus has fewer visitors. This is a situation in which marketing can help immensely. However, the old logo design did nothing to help the lack of awareness of the area. It featured a somewhat boring sun and waves image with the name of the area in thin, italicized writing.

The former St. Petersburg/Clearwater logo is not an unattractive one, but it is more than a little dated and does not grab the customer’s attention. It really says nothing, except that this is a sunny, beachy area, which most people already know.

The new logo design is a definite improvement. The color has been changed to a clear, modern blue that is reminiscent of the tropical water that dominates the area, in a circular shape with swirling water lines. The image is modern and artistic, a far cry from its predecessor. The sunshine is implied in the round shape, but it is less obvious and less clichéd.

This new logo comes with a new name: St. Pete Clearwater. This removes the cumbersome slash and also uses the traditional nickname for St. Petersburg. The new font is bolder than the old one and has a few wavy elements that tie into the image. There is nothing generic or dated about the new logo, resolving the two main issues with the old one.

Overall, this logo design is a huge improvement and will work harder to build this destination brand. Branding is important because it will be one of the most important factors for the success of this area. While no one will admit to choosing their vacation spot based on its logo design, this and other visual elements of the brand will play a huge part in the subconscious part of this decision.

Whatever the type of business or organization you are promoting, logo design is a huge part of achieving success. Branding communicates important information about your company to your target audience. Your logo design will have a huge effect on your bottom line. If you don’t have a professionally designed logo that you can be proud of, it is time to get one!

This month marks an anniversary of one of the best known images in modern marketing and logo design—the Nike Swoosh. Although it looks as young and fresh as the day it was born, the Swoosh is celebrating its fortieth birthday.

The Nike Swoosh is not just one of the longest-used modern logos, but one of the ones with the most interesting story. While a design student at a local university, Carolyn Davidson was approached by the founder of Nike and asked to create a logo for the brand new company. Phil Knight was enamored with the Adidas logo design and wanted something similar—something simple that followed the lines of the show while making a huge visual impact.

Carolyn Davidson created several prototype logos, which were presented to a group representing the company. Phil Knight was not happy with any of them, but needed a design quickly as the shoes were already in production. He ultimately chose the Swoosh as the ‘least awful’. Yes, that is a quote. The cost for the logo design services was $2 per hour, which came to a whopping total of $35.

The other designs have since been lost, but it is safe to assume in retrospect that the Swoosh was the right choice. Nike is currently the largest global producer of athletic shoes and other gear. They are one of very few companies in this industry that saw a profit last quarter. This growth and market dominance is due, at least in part, to the simple and memorable logo design that graces almost every item leaving the company factories.

Indeed, the Swoosh is one of the most recognized logos on the planet and also one of the most valuable. Many of Nike’s competitors, including the founder’s favorite Adidas, would love to have an image that is this simple, this memorable, and this successful over an astounding four decades of use.

In addition to her $35 payment, Davidson was later presented with Nike stock as well as a gold Swoosh ring to thank her for her contribution to Nike’s long term success. In addition, she has one very powerful design to place on her resume.

For us, the most interesting part of this story is the fact that Davidson initially disliked the Swoosh logo design. In fact, if this had not been a rush job, it is probably safe to say that Davidson would have been sent back to the drawing board or even fired from the job. Sometimes business owners reject simple, graphic designs because they see them as too simple. It is not unusual to see a client stare in shock at a logo prototype and gasp, “… my four year old could have drawn this!” Indeed, some of the best designs—and the ones that take the most skill to design—are the simplest. Designer knows best?

• We are sure that Phil Knight now appreciates the power and timelessness of a simple logo design. This image has been more important in building the company than any other factor.

University of San Francisco has had the same logo design for two decades now. Gee, you think it might be time for a change? Indeed, the change in logo comes with a new brand and a new logo design.

We write all the time about changes in academic logos. In general, the genre is just not that great. They tend to be blocky and awkward, with school colors that were out of style when your dad went to school there and a generally generic feeling.

The new USF logo design is a refreshing change. This logo is simply good. It features the name of the school in very simple lettering, with an image that is bright and interesting. The school colors are used, but they are executed in a way that does not detract from the university’s professional brand.

A little about the image: USF is actually a Jesuit school, as in Roman Catholic, so using a cross in the logo design makes sense. The old logo used a cross as well, albeit a more obvious one. In addition, the cross is made up of arrows pointing to both the interior and exterior of the image, which represents the exchange of knowledge. If you look at the image without focusing on the cross or the arrows, it feels like a diamond or a star—something bright and shiny. In all, this image does a lot of communication in a small and succinct package, which is every logo designer’s goal.

The university has also introduced a new tagline: Change the world from here. USF, like many Catholic universities, has a long history of advocating for social change and progressive values, so this tagline is an apt representative of the school.

The old logo was plain, blocky and overly religious, with nothing to differentiate the brand from any other religious school. It felt like a seminary logo, while University of San Francisco is anything but.

One other thing I really like about this logo design: It uses the full name of the university. Sure, most people in the community know it as USF, but there are actually several different universities with this same acronym and even a few businesses. Using the full name reduces confusion and saves you from wondering why the University of Southern Florida has a cross in their logo.

The USF acronym has not been abandoned; you can still call the school by its old name. In fact, there are several different versions of this logo design, as is typical in the academic field. The acronym will still be displayed on sweatshirts and other school paraphernalia.

As we said before, academic logos can be depressing. Most of them are so poorly crafted, not so much because of the designer but because of the demands of the field. Colleges seem to prefer the clunky, traditional logos, and a designer in the end must make their client happy. However, those facts make this logo design stand out even more as an example of how good academic logo design can be just plain good design.

Sleuth is a cable television network that was introduced in 2006 by NBCUniversal. As the name suggests, the network focuses mainly on crime and mystery shows. However, the name is in the process of being changed to Cloo—pronounced Clue—which hopefully will be more appealing to the cable television market. According to insiders at NBC, the switch will officially take place this month. The website at cloo.com was being finished at the time of this writing.

We are not normally huge fans of misspellings, but this one was done purposely, because the word clue cannot be copyrighted. This was the same rationale that led to the change from Sci Fi Channel to Syfy.

At first glance, the Cloo logo design seems rather simple, merely the name of the channel written in round, bubbly lower case letters that are set very closely together. It does not seem unusual at all for a television network, which can be a mixed blessing. On one hand, you will know from the beginning that the logo is appropriate for the medium, but on the other hand, it can be difficult to differentiate when your brand is functionally identical to those of the channels before and after you.

However, the Cloo logo design has a few hidden surprises. If you look closely at the space between the C and the L, a keyhole is formed. In addition, the L combined with the two O’s seems to create an old fashioned key. These hidden shapes will be an integral part of on-air graphics and promotional videos used to promote the new network. Moreover, they subtly suggest that the channel holds hidden mystery: secrets behind locked doors as well as the keys to open them.

The new Cloo logo is certainly an improvement over the one for Sleuth, which was simply the name of the network written in thick white letters across a deep blue background that appears to be the shadow of a door. It is not the worst logo design we have seen (or even the worst we have seen today), but it lacks the significance and hidden potential of the new one.

I will be the first to admit that I am thrilled by logos with hidden pictures and shapes, real hidden ones that I don’t immediately catch. Take, for instance, the FedEx logo design. I saw that logo every day for years before realizing that there was an arrow hidden between the letters. It takes a very clever designer and an open minded client in order to create masterpieces such as this. As a bonus, logos with hidden pictures have the simplicity and easy visual appeal of a plainer logo, but all the marketing and branding potential of a more complicated one.

Television network logo design has very specific needs—the need for the logo to be easily rendered in on-air graphics, for example—but every field has these small but important distinctions. This is why it is so important to work with a logo design professional who can create a meaningful design that meets the needs of your unique line of business.

Marketing and logo design are important for all businesses—including the business of theme parks and amusement rides. More and more roller coasters are using logos as way of promoting themselves to amusement park-goers looking for the latest rush. These logos belong to a unique genre, because they must by nature be flashy and over-designed, in keeping with the ‘product’ they are representing.

Skyrush is the latest ride to get on the logo design roller coaster. This new thrill ride will debut in 2012 at Hersheypark. The roller coaster features a 200 foot climb followed by a similarly large drop, taking riders back to sea level at speeds up to 75 miles per hour. The descent is almost perpendicular at 85 degrees. There are several rises and drops with steeply banked curves and general craziness. The Skyrush will open as the tallest and fastest roller coaster in the world and also feature winged seats—that is, with no floor below the terrified passengers.

The logo design for this ride needs to be as over-the-top as the experience. However, when I searched for other roller coaster logos to compare the Skyrush logo design with, I was surprised at the results. Most roller coaster logos simply are not that good. They lack some of the elements of basic design and seem to be marketed at people too young to ride them, rather than the marketing-savvy young adults who seem to be filling the lines outside the rides.

Within this perspective, the Skyrush logo design is looking better and better. It features track looped around wildly in the background. The name is written in slightly angled letters filling a stretched banner across the front. The feeling is of movement and pushing limits. The letters even feature lines that promote the feeling of speed. While the roller coaster does not to our knowledge include loops, the logo nonetheless gives the right feeling without resorting to clichés.

If I had to pick a single issue with this logo, it would be the color. The calming, serene blue was probably chosen because it references the sky, but it is the absolute wrong choice for this logo. A roller coaster logo design requires a bolder, more aggressive color, perhaps red or even a youthful orange. I suspect that the coaster itself is going to be blue, but even so, the wording and stretched banner would look better in another color choice. The font works, but it feels a little off, like that of a minor league (or little league) sports team.

This logo is a good example of how design varies with the industry. It would be too much, a complete eyesore, for any other type of business. We see logos like this every day and shake our heads sadly. In this case, however, the logo is just perfect. If anything, it needs to be bolder and more in-your-face, with attention-grabbing colors that set the right emotional tone for the ride.

I have been seeing murmurs of a new logo design for Lebanese chain Zaatar w Zeit for several weeks, but I decided at the time not to write about it. However, I was thinking about American fast food design the other day and decided to look up the new logo to see how Middle Eastern fast food brands differ from those in the States.

American fast food logo design varies according to the particular brand being represented, but there are a few commonalities. The most common colors are red and yellow, which have been proven in studies to increase hunger. The images tend to be homey and appeal to people’s comfort food cravings. Moreover, many of these logos feature friendly characters that add to the comfort of the restaurant, making people feel like they are eating at the home of a familiar friend. There is little in the typical American fast food logo design that suggests quality, freshness or health; after all, these factors are not the reasons that most people patronize fast food restaurants.

Clearly the market is different in the Middle East, where Zaatar w Zeit has most of its chains. Although the restaurant offers Middle Eastern versions of fast food favorites, the logos, both old and new, show key cultural differences. The old logo features the image of an old fashioned sign in an earthy brown, with the name written in both Latin and Arabic lettering. An olive oil jug in the center refers to the name, which means Thyme and Olive Oil. The new logo is crisp and green, with a thyme leaf and a droplet representing the two ingredients in the name. The name of the fast food restaurant is written in lower case letters that are round and friendly.

The Zaatar w Zeit logos are both earthy and have traditional aspects, but the new one especially seems to emphasize health and freshness. This is a huge change from the typical American fast food logo design. In addition, the older design is more ethnic. The change may be due to the chain’s gradual expansion into European markets, where fresh and healthy will likely be valued above Middle Eastern flair.

The new logo design is also more literal, with a very graphic representation of the name (which encompasses two of the main ingredients as well). It is friendlier and more approachable, not to mention more memorable.

If you are looking for a new logo design, brand differentiation is an important concept to keep in mind. I predict that the Zaatar w Zeit logo design and brand will be just as compelling in Western markets as they are in other parts of the world. The brand presents a restaurant chain that is so different from the standard fare that people will really want to give it a try. While it is important for your logo design to hint at your industry, it is just as important that it give customers a reason to choose you over the competition.

The emperor may wear no clothes, but the king wears a tie… the King of Beers, that is. Budweiser is changing up their classic can design and adopting a sleeker, more modern brand. The main image on this new packaging design is not a crown, but a formal bow tie.

There is a reason Budweiser is called the King of Beers, marketing slogans aside. The company began brewing in 1876 and is now one of the most popular beers in America. The company that owns Budweiser, Anheuser-Busch, has a market share that is almost half of the American beer market.

However, there are problems with the beer’s brand as well. First, in modern times it is known by its nickname, Bud, more than its full name. This is a problem in the eyes of the Budweiser company. Second, it is now not so much the King of Beers as it is the over-priced city manager. More and more beer drinkers are choosing local beers and more interesting micro-brew choices. While Budweiser is not losing ground, it seems inevitable that the company will need to rebrand and re-build their image in order to keep their position as King of the Mountain.

The old can design did nothing to build the brand. It was busy and crowded, with more information than a consumer cares to see and no sense of branding. It simply feels working class, which is not the image that Budweiser is trying to build.

The new packaging includes a can design that is much more appropriate for the modern Budweiser brand. First, the bow tie is inherently classy. It also is placed with the full brand name, the brand’s attempt to encourage their fans to call their favorite beer Budweiser. Second, there is far less detail. The Anheuser-Busch medallion, the crown and other elements of the brand are still part of the packaging, but they are moved around to create a more streamlined feeling. The cleaner brand reflects well on the quality of the products.

In most rebranding processes, elements of the former brand are kept to create a feeling of continuity. In this case, the cursive font in which the name is written, the crown image and the distinctive red and white color scheme have been maintained. This will help the new packaging and logo design to be recognizable to existing fans of the brand.

Sometimes there are elements of design that are truly inspired. The pop tab on the top of the new Budweiser cans is one of these. The tab is bright red, helping the can to stand out amongst others, and includes the distinctive Budweiser crown. This helps to build the brand even further.

If there are any elements of your brand, your logo design or your public image that need modified, rebranding may be the answer. As the Budweiser packaging example shows, it is possible to rebrand without losing aspects of your brand that are still resonating with your audience.

It seems like I am writing about a new Cheer logo design every time I turn around. However, a constantly evolving identity is necessary in the surprisingly cut-throat world of home goods and cleaning supplies. Many customers are simply grabbing the bottle or box on the grocery store shelf that looks the most appealing. In order to be that brand, you have to be constantly changing your packaging and logo design.

I was never a big fan of the old Cheer logo design. I like the lower case lettering and the font was as friendly as could be. The multi-colored splashes coming out of the lettering felt clean and fresh, while also vaguely floral. Blue is, of course, a very clean color that calls up images of water. So, what’s not to like?

First, the way the letters are angled feels weird and even gratuitous. There is just no reason for it. Second, the 3D shine on the letters is obnoxious, especially when you notice that the colored splashes are as flat as can be. The new logo design is certainly an improvement. It features the blue seen in the old one, but made slightly darker and more modern. The letters are still in lower case, but in a different font, one that (gasp) lines up in a straight line. They feel like they are placed too closely together; a little more space would do wonders for this logo design. In addition, I think the E’s could benefit from being turned a little less severely. They feel like they are sitting at a different angle than the rest of the lettering.

I’m a little sorry to see the colors go. However, the new packaging is much more colorful, so it demands a simpler, monotone logo design. A multi-colored drop is now used on the packaging, with a dizzying array of facets and colors. It has the same general feeling as the old image, but in a new, modern and minimalist way.

The astounding thing: this is Cheer’s third logo design and brand identity in four years. I know that change is inevitable, but really? This might be a record for rebranding, even for a Procter & Gamble company.  The old logo needed to go, but the constant rebranding might be interfering with the development of loyalty to the Cheer brand.

If a bottle bearing this logo sat on your Target laundry aisle shelf next to all of your favorite brands, would you put it into your cart? I just might. The logo feels clean, modern and appealing. It will be especially appealing next to the bright oranges and yellows that still dominate packaging in this aisle. If you are selling products that are enclosed into packages, then designing packaging is an important part of the logo design process. It is important that your product packaging stand out on the shelf and help to differentiate your products from the competition. It is equally important that your packaging begin to build your company brand.

The Montreal Impact are a favorite team in Canadian Soccer, and they are about to make the fortuitous leap from the North American Soccer League to Major League Soccer. This is a huge opportunity for the team, one that certainly warrants a new logo design and a little branding work.

The old sports logo was… okay. It featured a fleur-de-lis in the background filled with blocks of the team’s blue and gray colors. The name was written across the shape in bold, heavily outlined letters that had a distinctive angling as well as generously placed lines that indicated speed. A soccer ball with movement lines further gave an impression of intense and fast movement. The name of the city in which the team is located was written in tiny white letters below.

What did this logo say about the team? Nothing, really. It had a great sense of movement, but no personality. Moreover, despite the significance of the fleur-de-lis symbol in French Quebec, it is perhaps not the most compelling figure for a sports team. After all, a mascot is supposed to intimidate, win, move… do anything but look pretty on a flag.

The new logo design, unfortunately, keeps some of the less effective aspects of the old. What we love: the shield shape, which ties into some of the older European football clubs. The color scheme feels more adult, and the logo has been generally polished to a gleam. What we don’t love: the fleur-de-lis is still there, now chopped off in three different places. The shield was a good place to start when planning an MLS soccer logo design, but in this case it is cluttered and even a bit of an eyesore. While we like the beveling in theory, this will make it difficult for the logo design to work effectively in a variety of formats. For example, it will lose its power when embroidered or printed on fabric.

The Montreal Impact logo is filled with significance. The four stars represent the four original nationalities of the settlers of Montreal, while the silver is present on the city’s coat of arms. A new motto is placed at the top, and the writing maintains that upward slant that gives a feeling of speed. I’m not terribly fond of the typography, but it is at least readable. This logo design may have a few obvious flaws, but its immense significance just might be enough to rally the public support that the team needs. Sometimes even a flawed logo design can do the job.

The Impact logo lacks, well, impact. While the new logo design is not perfect, it is certainly an improvement over the old. If I was the designer, I might leave the fleur-de-lis uncropped or remove it altogether.

Sports logo design is an interesting field because it tends to be flashy and expressive, almost to a fault. However, it is nonetheless very important for the future of a team that the logo and mascot be professional and crisp, something that can inspire the players and rally the fans.

What are the hottest brands in the US? A recent survey from the National Retail federation’s Stores magazine found some interesting answers. Tech-forward brands like Amazon and Apple were the first to come to my mind, and they have prominent places on the top ten list. However, most of us would never guess the number one: Dress Barn.

To be specific, the top-ranked brand is Ascena Retail Group, which was until recently called Dress Barn. It still owns Dress Barn, along with well-known clothing stores Maurice’s and Justice. An interesting aspect of Ascena is that it offers clothing and accessories for women throughout almost their entire lifespan; Justice markets to tween and young teen girls, while Maurice’s carries items from young women and Dress Barn aims for a more mature female audience.

Dress Barn, despite being the hottest retail brand in the United States, has recently been rebranding. A new logo design was introduced some time ago, with the name of the store in a single, lower case word (“dressbarn”) in friendly pink letters. This is an attempt to be a little more modern and hip, catering to the many 35- to 55-year-old moms who think they are still a little cool.

Sister brands Justic and Maurice’s similarly have clothing logo designs that were created to appeal very specifically to a small group of females, narrowed not just by age and gender, but by income, preferences, style and more.

Why are these brands so successful? Many marketing experts point to their highly specialized markets. Instead of trying to appeal to a wide variety of shoppers, a strategy seen in less popular retail stores such as JCPenney, the Ascena Retail Group has a very narrow and specific audience that receives their full attention. All of the stores’ products and all aspects of their branding and marketing are targeted directly to this market. This approach has proven to be very successful in modern retail. Indeed, the magazine acknowledged that focusing on a narrow and specific part of the market is a major marketing strategy for almost all of the groups that made it onto the Top 100 list.

The stores on the list that have a broader market are the ones that are slipping. Take, for example, Amazon. You tend to think of this online retailer as being “bigger” than Dress Barn. However, Ascena Retail stores saw almost 60% growth in sales, while Amazon’s slowed. This is how Amazon landed in the number two slot after being number one last year. Indeed, this is first year since the media-dispensing giant was opened that they have lost position on the list instead of gaining.

How does your business’s marketing strategy measure up? Are you still trying to be “everything to everyone” or have you developed a narrowed market and began marketing specifically to them. Your business needs to change along with the rest of the business world. If you are unsure about how to identify and pinpoint the precise group that is looking for your products, talk to a branding expert today.

You may not think that nonprofit organization needs to have professional branding, but in actuality nonprofits must be run with the same branding and marketing sensibilities as any other business. Although they are not marketing to customers per se, they must woo donors and government agencies that disperse funding.

A professional logo design and brand are essential to presenting a nonprofit, or any business for that matter. The Marin Institute is a nonprofit that focuses on being an alcohol industry watchdog and informing the public about the dangers of drinking. The name was appropriate when the organization was opened, but it has since become inappropriate for the organization because they no longer limit their activities to Marin County, California. In addition, the word “institute” implies that the organization is involved in research, when it in fact is not.

The new name for the Marin Institute is Alcohol Justice, a name that is much more appropriate for the organization’s activities. In addition, the change in name comes with a change in logo and a change in the overall brand. The old logo involved a skyline with a couple of the buildings modified to look like wine bottles and even a mug of beer. One of the wine bottles has a searchlight shining directly onto the name of the nonprofit, which is written in bold, official-feeling blue letters. I am surprised that they have not used a whisky bottle or glass in the logo.

The new logo design features the name of the organization in huge, upper case black letters that are as bold as they can get. The O in “alcohol” and the T in “justice” are drawn so that they resemble a person; the arced lines above the person’s head suggest that they are talking or otherwise broadcasting information.

The new charity logo design is better than the old, to say the least. It is less institutional and hints at the actual purpose of the organization. Moreover, it is more unique and easier to remember, which will help the Marin Institute to build their presence in communities all over the United States and expand their sphere of influence.

One criticism of the new nonprofit logo design is that the O’s don’t’ really seem to work well with the other letters; they are simply too round. One could argue that this was done to make them look more like a human head. Honestly, is your head shaped like a perfect sphere? Mine is not. A normal O, in an oval shape, would create a better overall logo while also looking more like an actual cranium.

Are you running a nonprofit organization that needs a better brand? Unfortunately, many in this industry miss out on opportunities to grow and help others for lack of a professional brand, including a nonprofit logo design. However, it is never too late to talk to a logo designer about getting a design that will help your organization to grow and expand. A professional designer or branding consultant can create a brand that will present your nonprofit organization in a way that is attractive both to individual donors and to the government agencies with which you work.

Northern Illinois University is, unfortunately, known for negative events that are really beyond the university’s control. It was home to a school shooting in 2008 that killed five and injured more than twenty others. Unwanted events can have a huge effect on a brand, necessitating the creation of an entirely new logo and brand.

The creative process behind the new logo design is perhaps as interesting as the logo itself. A professional logo design firm was used, but graphic arts students were also allowed to be involved in the process. The advice and submissions from students were narrowed down to two designs, which were perfected with the logo designers. Results from polls and focus groups were also taken into consideration. The final university logo was selected by the school, again with input from the logo design company.

If you are determined to create a logo by committee (which can be an arduous task indeed!), this is a great way of approaching it. The students did not dictate the new design so much as they provided inspiration and input. It’s a great way of getting a professional logo design that is relevant to the people it represents.

The new logo features a shield shape with an image of Altgeld Hall, an iconic building that is a landmark on campus. A wavy line indicates movement and divides the new school logo design between the name and image. The school colors of maroon and white are a part of the logo, although black is used for emphasis. This logo is sometimes seen with the name of the university written beside it, although the design can stand well on its own.

This is not the best logo design in America, nor even the best university logo design in America. However, it is a huge improvement over the former one, which was simply the school’s initials written in the school colors with the name of the university below. There was nothing about the old logo that was distinctive to the school, while the new logo is definitely relevant. The old logo design was stark and even threatening, which is hard a feeling that will help alumni, students and the community to move forward.

Developing a new brand and a new visual identity is a huge part of leaving negative events in the past. It allows you to present an entirely new image to the public, but also to go through a healing and letting-go process yourself. By involving students in the logo design process, the school was signaling that they are allowed to have a say in the way their university is defined. While a student logo on its own would not have been the best choice, working with a professional design agency provides the best of both worlds.

The new logo design will launch on the school’s website in just a few weeks, before the fall classes begin. The other divisions of the school have a year to make the switch to the new logo design and the new brand.

You know you have “made it” as a company when tech sites and the blogosphere are abuzz not over a new product or an interesting company scandal, but over a rumored change to a single product’s logo design. Of course, we all know that Microsoft “made it” a long time ago. Nonetheless, tech sites all over the world are speculating about a new Microsoft logo design, which is supposedly being launched along with the new Windows 7.5 operating system for smartphones. This project reportedly has the code name Mango in the Microsoft complex.

The current Windows Phone logo features the name of the product in the black lettering and font that is associated with the Microsoft company. The shape of the popular Windows logo is seen in a cool, glossy circle that looks like a button waiting to be pushed. The button even has a little gleam on it, giving it a three dimensional feeling.

The new logo design is, well, very similar to the old one. It cannot change too much without running into conflict from the parent brand, of course. The same font and lettering are used, along with the recognizable Windows symbol. The Windows logo design is there as well, but it is enclosed within a square, which gives a stable and trustworthy feeling that most of us would like to associate with our smartphone operating system. The new logo design has been seen in each of the four different colors and posted as such on a Japanese blog run by a Microsoft enthusiast.

Why is this so exciting? While Microsoft is constantly changing, most of the changes are internal—that is, those of us in the general public do not see them. So, when technology enthusiasts see suggestions of a changing brand, they cannot help but wonder whether there are other changes and new products in store. This is particularly true of Microsoft, a company that tends to keep their research and development very quiet until just before release.

Technological logo design is a very specialized field. First, the logo needs to feel official and to tie into the parent brand. Second, it should have some friendly aspect in either the font or the image. This is because so many modern consumers remain a little intimidated when it comes to technology. Last, the technology logo design needs to be relevant to its industry. Like all logos, it needs to show what the product and the brand is roughly about. These demands come on top of the usual needs of a logo design, such as appealing to a target market and being scalable.

As you can see, logo design is a very difficult field, and professional designers must consider a wide variety of issues every time they sit down to the drawing board. However, this attention to detail usually results in an attractive and appropriate design that perfectly represents the brand for which it was created.

If you are a movie channel watcher, you are probably familiar with the channel Cinemax. However, you will soon notice that the channel is looking a little different. Cinemax is completely rebranding, a process that includes introducing a new logo design.

But first, let’s discuss the old one. This television channel logo design has been in use since 1997—that’s right, fourteen years ago. It features the name of the company written in rounded lower case letters with the ‘max’ portion of the word surrounded by a black circle. This draws attention to the syllable, as does the way that the words are arranged. While the circle could be interpreted as a friendly element or even a spotlight, we think it was just a logo design trend of the time. In 1997, three major premium movie channels in the nation added circles to their logos to highlight the abbreviations that are used in the TV Guide and other listings, so Cinemax was not alone.

The new logo design is a huge change from the old one. It features the long rectangular shape that is often associated with movie screens in an angled orientation that gives a feeling of movement. The lower case rounded letters have been traded for blocky upper case letters that have a much more substantial feeling to them. This logo is simple, but it definitely feels fast and modern.

Cinemax is supposedly already using this new logo design, but the website for the channel still uses the old one. The social networking profiles and YouTube accounts use the new one. We aren’t sure about television because we do not have that channel. Either way, the usage of the new brand seems sporadic at best.

This is a very ineffective way to rebrand your company and introduce a new logo design. While there is always a transition period, it is best if this time go as quickly as possible. You need to introduce customers to the new brand by making blog posts, Facebook updates and other general introductions, explain a little bit about the meaning of the new logo if necessary, and then roll it out. When you begin using a new brand, you discard the old one as soon as the new one is complete. Cinemax may be known for television that breaks the rules, but breaking branding rules is a whole other thing entirely. This makes us wonder if this logo design will go the way of the one introduced in 2008—that is, a partial rebranding that somehow faded away before it got any traction.

If you are considering rebranding and wondering whether this is the right time for your market and your business, it is best to speak to a professional logo designer. These professionals can also help you make the right decisions about how to introduce your new design and also when to pull the old one. For most people, this process can be handled with a little common sense… but Cinemax is showing us that this sense is not so common after all.

Currently in its 109^th year, the Seattle Symphony is an established presence in the arts and music community of the Pacific Northwest. This week, the symphony unveiled a new music logo design and brand that is designed to promote its history while paving a way for the future. It is trying to be increasingly relevant within its community, and presenting itself in a new light is a part of this move. In addition, there is a new Music Director, who is bringing a new sense of style to the nonprofit.

The old logo design was very attractive and indeed, representative of the field of music. It featured a swirling letter S, which appeared to be hand painted. There were a few random smaller lines in the image as well. The name of the organization was written in upper case, serious letters beside the image. This logo felt artistic and yet serious, with a business-like gray color that was definitely cool and collected. While it was an aesthetically pleasing logo, it seemed almost corporate. It lacked the deep emotion that is usually associated with classical music.

The new logo is much more colorful and energetic. Lines come together in a pattern that is reminiscent of piano keys, but in a curved line that represents the letter S. The biggest changes are in the color—gray could not be more different from the new hot pink—and the font, which has left the serifs behind and is instead in bold, thick and plain lettering.

The new logo design comes with a new tagline: Listen Boldly. Indeed, this tagline is a great verbal representative of the new brand. It is an unusual phrase that will get attention because very few of us associate listening with acting boldly. It encourages people to be active listeners when experiencing the classical music that the symphony offers within the Seattle area.

One of the benefits of using this color pink, outside of its eye catching nature, is that it will stand out against a sea of logos, even if this hypothetical sea were filled with music logos alone.

However, is standing out important enough that boldness should be a core part of a brand? The answer to this question depends on the type of brand that you are trying to present. If you are selling a product that is different or edgy or even youthful, a bold logo design may be the right one for you. If, on the other hand, you are simply doing it as a device, as a means of gaining attention, then it may not feel right or work well over the long term. In the case of the Seattle Symphony, we are not sure which category they are trying to fit into.

On the other hand, we love the new fonts and we especially like the new tagline. It is important for people to get involved with community organizations such as this one. We hope that this logo design will inspire more people in Seattle to patronize the Symphony.

No one knows branding better than some of the multinational corporations running our globe. While small business owners are wondering whether to spend a tiny sum on professional design services, the Big Guys have huge teams dedicated to marketing and graphic design just for their business. One important part of building a brand is to keep consistency in the brand—that is, to make sure that customers encounter the same experience, including visuals, every time they interact with your company.

In order to achieve continuity and consistency, NBC is shuffling around its programming a little. The NBC Sports logo design is currently seen when sports programming just happened to be shown on one of the non-sports channels that the network owns. The main sports network is called Versus—are you confused yet? Apparently many viewers are having trouble associating Versus with NBC, which is not surprising as the brands have little in common. Therefore, NBC Sports will be the new name of the channel, and the network programming will be called… something else.

The NBC Sports logo design needed a few small changes in order to make this leap, of course. And by small, we mean miniscule. Itty-bitty. This is almost like those “spot the differences” puzzles that most of us did when we were children. So now we ask you, can you spot the differences? Here are the ones that we see:

• The word “sports” is in a different color and font. This new font was created especially for the logo, so it fits perfectly with the brand’s needs.
• The acronym “NBC” is also in a new font, although it is still bold.
• The word “sports” used to have a slight angle that is no longer present.
• The peacock seems a little larger compared to the lettering. Is the coloring a bit different as well? It is difficult to tell.

NBC’s Chief Marketing Officer had the following to say about the logo design: “The changes are subtle, but signal a big change: a new beginning for the NBC Sports Group.” The official rebranding date is set for January 2 of the upcoming year, but you may begin to see changes before then.

The NBC Sports Group was recently formed and aims to bring all of the sporting events involving the network under one central brand. Logo design and marketing will be a huge part of this effort, but changes in language are key as well. For example, all golf broadcasts on the channel will heretofore be called “Golf Channel on NBC.” Versus.com will be closed completely, probably relocating to the new brand website at NBCSports.com. Meanwhile, there are no changes planned for regional sports networks, so local ball lovers can continue to watch their favorites without any changes whatsoever.

Brand continuity is important in building your business. If there is an aspect of your brand that does not seem to fit the rest—the Versus of your company, so to speak—it may be time to make a long overdue change.

Celadon is a furniture store offering eclectic and modern home furnishings and accessories with a little bit of old fashioned flavor. It’s a fun business and brand, but the logo design was not so much. It featured the name of the company in a standard font that you can find on any Windows PC—Papyrus—and not a whole lot else. It felt like a homemade, quickly thrown together logo design, something that the owners put together in a few minutes when they realized they would need a design. At least we hope that they didn’t pay for this.

On the other hand, the old furniture logo design had a few attributes that were definitely reflective of the brand. It is not a standard font; instead, it is one of the ones that languish on the hard drive unused. It is simple and has a somewhat sophisticated and even exotic feeling. If you are not aware that this is Papyrus, you might think this is a decent enough logo.

The new logo, however, is magnificent. It is simple and sophisticated like the old one, but has a unique flair—no stock fonts and images here. The image is of swirling overlapping lines forming a loose square around the company’s initial. The full name is written below in a thin, rounded upper case font that feels light and yet traditional. This is generally a traditional and yet sophisticated font, which begins to build an entirely new brand for the furniture business.

One of the other things that we really like about this rebranding is the color palette. The old logo design used black and white—simple, sophisticated, and boring. The new one uses a dark charcoal gray, which is just as simple but a little more modern. In other words, the new logo takes the old brand attributes and improves upon them. It begins to build a more complete brand. This is important, because the South Carolina retailer is growing. They are no longer merely a local brand, but one that is branching out and adding a website component to their business.

This logo design is very communicative; you can tell a lot about the company simply by viewing it. However, it has managed to completely avoid one of the major errors made by many furniture retailers: developing a brand that is too gender-specific. In many cases, the people shopping for furniture will be couples. If you appeal too much to the women, you run the risk of alienating the men (and vice-versa). The Celadon brand will appeal equally to both genders, which suggests that their furniture will as well.

When is rebranding necessary for a smaller business? Any time that you are using a logo design made entirely of a stock font! All kidding aside, rebranding and developing a new logo design may be a good idea if you are planning any sort of expansion. After all, what appeals to one market may not work as well for a much larger audience.

MuchMusic has been a popular music television channel in our neighbor to the north since 1984, but most Americans have never heard of it. Called the MTV of Canada, the channel has followed MTV’s lead in showing a decreasing amount of music videos and an increasing round of reality television and popular shows. The television logo design has been much the same for 15 years, featuring a red and yellow globe with the name jutting out in a bold black and white rectangle.

The music logo design was somewhat cartoony, but it was definitely similar in tone to many other television logos that debuted in the same time period. It is bold, and has a simple graphic and bright colors. However, the market is constantly changing and logo designs are constantly changing with it. It is really kind of amazing that the logo survived this long.

The new logo has a rainbow cascade of bars of color, in modern, muted pastels. The letters are written in stark white that almost blends in to the bars of color. The lettering is upper case and adds a little boldness to the otherwise soft and feminine logo.

Is a soft and feminine logo design right for a music channel? That seems to be the question of the day. The new logo feels very similar to that from the Martha Stewart Show, which also utilized bars of light colors and blocky white lettering. This logo design is supposed to appeal to a market filled with pop culture-savvy young people, but it seems to be geared more to a middle aged market. We have to wonder who thought this subdued and feminine music would be the visual basis for a youthful brand.

On the other hand, the new logo design seems to have good points as well. First, the colors can be used in animations to create interesting on air advertisements. It will probably be just as recognizable in a variety of color palettes; as long as they are light colored and the writing stays in white upper case letters, people will recognize the brand. Second, it is minimalist in a modern art kind of way. This may allow the brand to represent a wider variety of music.

It can be scary to change logo designs, especially when the design has as much recognition as this one enjoys in its market. In addition, the new logo is in no way similar to the old one; it might as well be from another planet. It is sugary and fluffy where the old one was edgy and young. It does not exactly scream “rock and roll” or “adolescence.”

We have to wonder if a brand modification would have been better. Surely there would be a way to change the old logo design to make it more modern and relevant without losing the salient elements that have been a huge part of the core brand. It could have been made cleaner and more contemporary without turning into the girly and sweet design that is now being introduced.

Branding is becoming more and more of a factor when it comes to sports. There was a time when mascot design was at best simple and at worst scary. Game and sports channel logos were also simple, usually simply the name of the event in a relevant color. In the last few years, however, branding and logo design have become almost as important as the games themselves.

The Major League Baseball 2011 All-Star Game has barely ended, and the 2012 logo design has already been introduced. This year’s game was hosted by the Diamondbacks, so this team’s colors and motifs play a huge part of the logo. It has a distinctively Southwestern shape and letters that have pointy serifs and are curved to resemble that used in Arizona’s logo, which themselves resemble snake fangs with the curved extensions at the bottom.

The logo design for the 2012 All-Star Game is also relevant to its team. The crown at the top of the logo refers to royalty, while the stars refer to the game. The shield shape is the same shape as the video board in the stadium used by the hosting team. The color is royal blue—what else?—with a stripe of a lighter blue down the side. The writing is in an official looking font.

It’s not a bad logo design per se, but it is certainly bland. It definitely relates to the team that is hosting the event, but it lacks anything really cool or interesting. Most people watching the MLB game will not realize that the shape of the logo is similar to the video board, so this is meaningful in theory but functionally useless. The light blue stripe is apparently supposed to be a banner, but there is no shadowing or anything to set it apart from the rest of the logo design. This makes it fade into the banner and look more like a mere stripe. There is just too much royal blue. The entire logo seems to fade into the background, and all of the details get lost in the color.

One interesting thing about this logo is that it apparently has another version, one without the Royals’ colors that is used only by the MLB. This seems a little silly, especially considering that the entire logo design has the mark of its team.

The interesting thing about sports and logo design is that good design has become a necessity in almost every type of sport. It is not just the Super Bowl or the All Star Game that get the top-notch logo; even small local teams are using design to promote their bigger events. Similarly, elementary school teams have better mascots and team logos than even the pros had just a decade or two ago. Marketing is becoming an important part of sports. This is because marketing and logo design can actually create more cash flow for the team, bringing in sponsors, increasing awareness, and in the case of professional teams, bring in more profit from merchandise sales.

Music festivals are very popular in the United States, as can be seen in popular examples such as Lilith Fair, SXSW and the Vans Warped Tour. If there is anything better than seeing your favorite band play live, it is seeing a few of your favorite bands on one stage. There is a new music festival about to have their inaugural year in Orlando, called “Orlando Calling.”

Orlando Calling is beginning with a bang; big names such as Kid Rock, Bob Seger and Blues Traveler will be among many performing. The festival will also have a logo design and all of the branding elements that you expect from a professional organizer. The Orlando Calling festival is indeed going to be professionally organized, put on by Festival Republic, the big name behind some of the biggest performances in Europe and the UK.

The logo features a crisp blue background with a pattern of small arrows fading into the color. A rouch orange banner is placed across this with the name of the festival in angular and bold white letters separated by a star. Splatters of paint give the orange banner a weathered and somewhat retro look that contrasts against the somewhat techy background. The orange and blue colors have likely been chosen because of their contrast with each other as well.

Will this logo design be up to the task of representing a new festival? We sure hope so. The Humongous Citrus Bowl and the surrounding area have been dedicated entirely to the performances, which will occur over two days in November. The tickets cost an immense amount of money. However, we think that music lovers will flock to the performances. After all, the big names are going to be there as well.

Festival Republic is no stranger to branding and bringing in a crowd. They are responsible for one of the largest music festivals on the globe, the Glastonbury Festival which brought in an astounding 177,500 music lovers. Organizers are hoping that this will be the first of many Orlando Calling events and that the name will earn its place on the list of great American music events.

Branding and logo design are especially important in arts and design fields because people naturally expect companies in these fields to have a sense of style. However, it is also important that the brand appeal to its target market and present its sense of style in a very visual way. In this economy, many people are very selective about how they spend their entertainment dollars. A logo design needs to be compelling enough to convince them that this is a good use of their limited money.

Although many businesses, both large and small, are tempted to go cheap on design when the economy is bad, this is actually the precise wrong strategy. This is a time when winning customers over and presenting a great brand image is more important than ever. If you are not sure if your logo design is up to a task, talk to a logo designer about rebranding.

Hindsight is always 20/20, which is why we thought that this would be a good time to evaluate the success of the new Starbucks brand and logo design. We, like many people around the world, were a little shocked when the company changed their iconic logo design several months ago to one that is lacking certain recognizable parts of the brand, such as the name itself. However, this strategy, however ill-advised it may seem, just might be working for the international coffee giant.

The new Starbucks logo featured the famous Starbucks siren in a circle, with the circle more centered on her face than ever before. Many people have suggested that the company is gradually focusing in on the siren’s face as a way of downplaying the sexuality associated with this mythical creature. The name was removed altogether from the popular coffee logo design as well.

This logo caused a certain amount of outcry. Although Starbucks was in the process of rebranding to feel more local, this logo design did not seem to fit that brand. Many wondered how the coffee shop would fare in changing a brand and logo design that had been proven to be popular with customers.

However, in the end the new logo seems to have been a good idea. Starbucks recently raised their fiscal forecast for the year due to increases in sales and profit. Share values are steadily rising, and sales in the United States went up an astounding eight percent. Customers have gone up by six percent and the amount they spend per visit is up as well. Much of this increase is in the food lines, which Starbucks expanded as part of their change in brand.

The logo design is part of this increase in sales, but it is not the only reason. Starbucks has a higher-earning customer base than most fast food restaurants. These customers have been affected by the economic downturn, but not so much that they cannot afford a coffee and a Danish. Starbucks has begun to put more focus on this group even as they are increasing their spending.

The expansion of the Starbucks empire, which adds new stores at an astounding rate, is likely part of the increase in sales and profit. However, even existing stores are seeing more traffic, with a sales increase of five percent even in existing stores. Starbucks is also partnering with Keurig, a single brew coffee company, and slowing their growth rate to maintain the integrity of the brand.

Appealing to a more upscale market can be an important part of achieving success in the current economic climate. These customers are some of the only ones that are returning to their former spending habits. Chipotle, Whole Foods and other similar upper middle class brands are also seeing their sales rebound. If you want to see a similar turn-around in your own small business, developing a logo design and brand that appeals to this market may just be a necessary step.

If you are in your twenties or older, you probably remember the nineties. Nickelodeon is hoping to create nostalgia surrounding the era—similar to what their Nick at Nite programming did for the fifties a few decades ago—by creating a programming block dedicated to television shows from the era.

The logo for the program bears the name of the programming—The 90s Are All That. However, it seems to be a little confused with nostalgia from other eras. The circles in the numbers are reminiscent of records (as I recall, we already have CD’s in the nineties and were a few generations removed from vinyl) as well as bright colors that are more reminiscent of the eighties.

While this logo design may not be distinctly “nineties”, the name certainly is. Those of us who can remember the decade well may have used the phrase “all that” on a regular basis and with no irony whatsoever, although we’ll never admit it.

The main market for this programming is teenagers and the block will be shown mainly on TeenNick from midnight to four AM. If you want your nineties fix, you just might have to lose some sleep for it! Programs will include nineties favorites such as All That, Doug, Kenan and Kel, and the popular Clarissa Explains It All. Hopefully other shows will be resurrected as the programming gains popularity, especially Double Dare, which was one of the best Nick shows of the decade.

Some nineties programming can be seen occasionally on Nickelodeon, but it will be nice for Clarissa lovers to have a regular time and place. We probably won’t be losing sleep to view the shows of our youth, but there are likely many Americans who are willing to make the sacrifice.

This is a good example of the branding principle of knowing your market. While teens are likely to stay up late to watch their older brother’s former favorites, people in their twenties—the ones who grew up on a steady diet of nineties television—are often night owls. Meanwhile, the channel will not be losing teen viewing by showing these favorites at night. While the logo does not seem right for the era, it is bright and appealing in a hip-hop kind of way. Perhaps this is the look that the channel was aiming for.

The channel is already gaining in word of mouth. It is the subject of many blogs (including this one!) and has a lot of Likes on the dedicated Facebook page. It just may make a dent in the popular Adult Swim on Cartoon Network, which we suspect is the real reason for the awkward time slot.

The nostalgia of this brand will likely be a huge factor in helping it reach success. Several television shows in the seventies were set in the fifties because people like to remember their glory days. Nostalgic shows such as That Seventies Show have been very popular in modern times. Clearly a retro logo design and brand can be very popular with the right answer; we’ll see if they are compelling enough to make young adults stay up a few hours later.

A few days ago, branding research company Interbrand released a list of the top fifty green brands on the globe. Not surprisingly, Japan held their own in the top ten, with Prius maker Toyota in the first slot.

The brands were scored according to a complex yet standard score, with categories such as governance, operations, supply chain, transportation and more. The companies were given a score for each category which was added into a total score. It is not surprising that Japan is among the green brand leaders; an island with limited resources, Japan has more pressure to be efficient and non-wasteful than a vast country with endless supplies and space.

Toyota definitely is recognized both in the United States and globally as a green brand. The Prius was just the first of the company’s innovations in powering transportation with alternative fuel sources. The hybrid system has already become one of the front-running technologies in the fight to downsize carbon footprints. Further, this was not simply done in response to customer demand; Toyota has been instrumental in creating that customer demand with green branding and also has less visible green business practices that make them a model of capitalistic ecology.

Green branding and green logo design are important because these issues resonate with modern customers. Most people care about sustainable practices, recycling, and other green issues. If you have a green company that is being innovative in its pursuit of a healthier planet, you should make this the basis of your logo design and brand. To downplay your green activities is to hurt your business unnecessarily.

Green business practices can be a great way to differentiate your company from the competition as well. While many consumers care about the fate of our planet, corporations and small businesses have been slow to meet this demand. Making your green brand a part of your logo design and other visual elements can set you apart in a very positive way.

There are several ways of creating a green logo design for your green business. In many cases, these use earthy colors, often including green of course, as well as natural images. You can also tie into green technology or other parts of the ecology movement. There are as many types of green branding and logo design as there are green businesses.

Japan was hailed as the global leader of green brands, with the headline “Japan Dominates” on the project page, but it should be noted that the United States did not have a poor showing by any means. 3M was in the number two slot, with other American companies such as Johnson & Johnson, Hewlett Packard, Dell and Cisco. In fact, the US has a better showing in the top ten both in terms of total scores and numbers of companies that made the mark. No one wants to point to the big, wasteful USA as a green nation, but obviously our corporations are trying to make the necessary changes for a green future. Germany also made a good and largely unrecognized showing.

If you have never visited the Austin, Texas area, you may need an introduction to Maudie’s. This restaurant is one of the most popular in the metropolitan area, offering Tex-Mex cuising—that cheesy, delicious blend of traditional Mexican food and American ingredients that is so popular in the United States.

Maudie’s is somewhat of a local restaurant success story. It began as a tiny strip mall café and then spread into a restaurant chain. With six locations and growing, Maudie’s was ready for a little stylistic update, and professional logo design and branding services as well.

The old Maudie’s restaurant logo had a local restaurant feel and reeked of unprofessional design. It is similar to the logos you probably see in local Mexican restaurants near you. The font used for the name was faux-ethnic and had messy borders, while the word ‘Tex Mex’ was written in blocky red letters below.

The problem with this restaurant logo design is that it says very little about the restaurant. Maudie’s is a classic, Austin eatery with kitschy charm and a menu of Texan favorites laden with meat and cheese. This distinctive Texan identity was made the basis for the new logo design and brand.

The new logo design was inspired by vintage street posters as well as cantina menus. It features the name of the restaurant in retro angled letters. They are blocky and formed so that the color fill does not quite line up with the outline—a common problem in vintage printing. A stamp bears the image of a bull and says, “Hecho en Austin,” letting potential customers know that this is a local place and not a global chain. The colors are relevant to Tex-Mex food—bright and similar to those seen on the Mexican flag, but in modern hues.

The original Maudie’s has a cult following in Austin, so there was a very real risk in changing the general mood of the restaurants. The old restaurant identity was enhanced by a lack of design, done on purpose. The new logo design had to keep the charm that keeps so many locals coming back. The vintage poster motif was a great middle ground that adds a sense of style without taking away any personality.

The new identity will be an important part of the company’s expansion. In addition to gracing signage for the many locations, the Maudie’s logo is a prominent part of all restaurant menus as well as gift cards, table tents, posters, packaging, the company website and even t-shirts. It adds a fun and youthful feeling while retaining the Tex-Mex atmosphere.  The logo designer even helped develop silk screened artwork for the restaurants that will complement the brand.

If you are running a local restaurant, branding and logo design are important to your success. You are competing against not just the many chain restaurants, but many local establishments as well. Logo design is a great way of building a brand that will resonate with your customer base and your community.

Whole Foods is currently getting a little bad press from former employees—the phrase “faux hippy Wal-Mart” will be ringing in shareholders’ and executives’ ears for a while—but it also deserves a little positive press as well. The Whole Kids Foundation, opened by the natural grocery retailer, is a new charity from the store that aims to help combat obesity and unhealthy eating habits in children, improving the health of our younger generations.

The charity logo design features an image similar to the Whole Foods logo, with a similar font and the fruity, leaf-topped O in ‘Whole’. However, the entire logo design looks as though it has been filled in with crayon, tying into the young audience for this charity. The cool gray and green color palette feels natural and yet youthful, which also ties into the brand. It is easy to understand simply by looking at this logo that this is an offshoot of Whole Foods and that it deals with children.

Childhood nutrition and obesity are both somewhat of a hot topic right now. This is not just due to the fact that obesity rates are skyrocketing, but due to recent attention from First Lady Michelle Obama. Since the First Lady announced her interest in the subject, both Wal-Mart and Walgreens have introduced programs to help fight the good fight. Whole Foods, ironically, is emulating the company that they are currently being accused of copying. Ouch. However, it is also responding to a timely issue that many of the company’s shoppers care about.

Whole Foods has built their kingdom through branding. This grocery retailer was selling organic and all natural products back before most Americans had even heard the word ‘phosphate’. Indeed, branding remains an important part of Whole Foods’ success. Even with a media-happy, disgruntled former employee, the Whole Foods company seems unscathed by any amount of bad press. Because it is run by a company known for marketing genius, the Whole Kids Foundation is opening with a big bang, not just with a charity logo design but a Facebook and a Twitter as well as regular mentions on the Whole Foods corporate blog.

If your business is thinking about opening up ‘sister brands’, this is a good way to approach it. The logo design clearly ties into that of Whole Foods, but it has a unique identity that represents its market and its goals as well. It will represent the old brand even while building a new and distinct one. The Whole Kids Foundation maintains its own identity, but clearly is tied into the grocery store. It has all of the necessary “pieces” for success, including a Facebook page. In other words, this is a logo design and branding win.

Whole Foods has one of the better known logos and brands in the natural and organic grocery market. People all over the nation recognize this image, even if they do not have a store in their area. Soon, they will probably recognize the Whole Kids Foundation logo design as well.

Didn’t we just have a Presidential election? It seems like just yesterday, and yet candidates are already revving up for the 2012 battle. This means extreme marketing and publicity—you can’t turn on the television anymore without seeing a Presidential hopeful—and it also means we get to write about political logo design once again.

The latest political logo to hit the public is that of Republican/Tea Party hopeful Sarah Palin. We are going to leave our political beliefs on the sidelines and look purely at the design. It features the background of a flag, overlaid with somber blue tones, and the shape of the United States overlaid with the silhouette of the candidate’s home state, Alaska.

Instead of something direct like “Sarah Palin for President 2012”, the logo uses the shorthand term SarahPAC. The letters are pointy and authoritarian with the PAC letters bolder than the first name of the candidate. This is a diversion from the usual serif-laden, official-feeling fonts seen in other campaigns. It is a little friendlier and less formal, which is likely the image that Palin is trying to project.

The flag image is a little… obvious. However, the shape of Alaska is more unexpected. We suppose that this is an attempt at showing how vast the state of Alaska is; remember that Palin’s ability to govern on a national level was questioned in the last election. However, it may be too regional for a national audience. After all, she is not running for President of Alaska. It seems silly to put the United States in the background, which is where the darker colors place it in the eye of the beholder.

This is not the logo design of a candidate running for a national office. It says nothing about Sarah Palin, except the informal message given by the lettering. If this is representative of Palin’s 2012 campaign, she just may get stomped by another Republican hopeful, one that purports to represent the entire country and not just a sparsely populated home state.

Compare this to the logo of fellow Republican candidate Mitt Romney. Again, leave your politics aside, and leave the fact that the R looks like Aquafresh toothpaste aside as well. With serifs and general American themes, Romney’s logo design feels more Presidential. It is serious and gray, without any reference to the candidate’s smaller but more politically significant home state of Massachusetts.

No one votes based solely on a logo—at least we hope not. Even the most design-oriented among us base our political selections on more than a single image. However, the moderate swing vote is a major part of every Presidential election. Palin needs to start gathering support from this critical group with marketing. Her SarahPAC logo design will not stand up to this lofty purpose. It is distinctly local and seems to cry out that she wants to stay in Alaska.

If Palin does not get a new logo that proclaims her intentions to represent the entire country, that wish just might be granted.

When we look at national and international sports, it seems that most organizations update their corporate logo designs regularly in order to remain relevant to their fans and audiences. However, some sports organizations seem determined to hold onto their old school logo designs even when it goes against all good sense to do so. We know it seems un-American to criticize football, but one of these organizations is the NFL.

The NFL has a logo design that extends well back into the organization’s history. While there have been a few small changes to the design, it has remained functionally the same for several decades. There are several good reasons for this. The shield shape is imposing and implies going to battle, while the colors are as patriotic as they possibly could be. The level of detail is just right, so that the logo design looks good embroidered on a polo shirt or blown up larger than life on a screen. These are all important advantages, but they do not keep the NFL logo from feeling a little stale after too many years on t-shirts and television screens.

Some people have pushed to create a logo similar to that of the NBA, with a player as the central image. However, the problem with this is that everyone has their own personal favorite. For example, the Raiders would not approve if Joe Montana were made the model for a logo, nor would 49ers fans enjoy looking at silhouette of Jim Otto on their television screens every Sunday. No one will be able to agree on a silhouette, making this option next to impossible to execute.

Another suggestion is that the NFL keep the shield in some form, but make updates. The NFL has updated their shield before, but never in a way that changed its essential shape or nature. Going this route would allow them to keep a recognizable brand while creating an image that would take them into the future.

Last, some people think that the logo design should go in an entirely new direction. They could use another abstract logo or use one of the many symbols associated with football. The sky is literally the limit. Almost any change would have the same effect: a small amount of outcry followed by acceptance. Football fans are not known for liking change, especially when it comes to their favorite sport, but they are quick to get on with the game.

Many people enjoy the patriotic color scheme as well as the stars and other patriotic elements of the logo design. These, they feel, represent the fact that football is an all-American sport. However, we could keep these symbols while designing an entirely new logo. We also could maintain a feeling of patriotism without resorting to the obvious.

The old NFL logo design is simply not that great. It does nothing to represent such a well-known and well-loved brand. Almost any change would be an improvement at this point. This is one organization that obviously needs to be pulled kicking and screaming into the new millennium.

A new hockey team is coming to Winnipeg, an event which is very exciting in an area where hockey is as big as football. The team is getting a new name, new uniforms and a new logo design to represent them and their community to the rest of their league and even to the world.

The new team is named the Winnipeg Jets. This name and Canadian pride form the basis for the brand and all visual elements. The red, white and blue color scheme seen in the hockey team logo is used by the Canadian Air Force, while there are silver accents that add emphasis and also refer to the metallic color of the jets that the team is named for.

The two main images used in the Winnipeg Jets are a jet (for obvious reasons) and a Canadian Maple leaf. However, there are other fun elements as well. For example, in the round logo that will be used on pucks and other gear, the jet is pointing upward toward a notch, implying that it is headed north. Because Canada is the northernmost country on the continent, this is definitely relevant. One sports team logo shows the wings worn on an Air Force officer’s uniform along with hockey sticks and a maple leaf.

The Winnipeg Jets have a visual image that is patriotic and appealing to the avid logo base, but it is sleek and attractive as well.  We like the way that the color balance seems to pull our eyes into the logos, especially with the occasional pop of red.

One issue some people may have is that the logo design is a little subdued. It is a beautiful visual identity, but how will it hold up next to the more bright and flamboyant costumes in the league? Some might even call it boring. Also, many hockey teams are cutting back on the number of colors in their uniform and logo for simplicity’s sake. For example, we wrote not too long ago about the Nashville Predators’ change to a smaller color palette. This one has two separate hues of red and two more for gray in addition to the blue and white. That just seems excessive, especially when you consider that it is, indeed, a rather quiet, unassuming logo.

This is not the first time that the town of Winnipeg has had a hockey team named the Jets. There was a team in the town years ago that left for economic reasons. Since the Jets let, demand has built rapidly. Now that the fans finally have a hockey team, they will surely embrace them regardless of the logo design. However, having a great logo design will definitely give the hockey team the right image and a measure of confidence when going up against other teams in the league. Moreover, a good logo will lead to even more merchandise sales, which all sports teams need in order to financially survive.

The real question is: what will the new mascots look like?

If you think that getting a moment’s peak at a logo design for an upcoming video game is not a big deal, then you are obviously not a fan of the Resident Evil franchise. Fans of this game have been waiting eagerly for the newest release in the range, and now a glimpse at the Resident Evil 6 logo design suggests that the wait is almost over.

The video game logo was revealed in a closed conference at a Capcom press meetings at Comic Con, but it was leaked almost immediately.  The video which had the logo also had a date: September 15, 2011. This is a highly awaited game with millions of avid fans, so the information hit message boards literally seconds after it was released.

The new logo design appears to be a return to the full-on horror aspect of the original Resident Evil games. It features the name of the game in lower case letters with serifs, in a font similar to Times New Roman. The red color and the way that the letters are disintegrating, together with the fading behind the letters, gives a creepy feeling that is definitely frightening. The 6 is placed behind that, in gray letters that are also disintegrating.

This is a huge change for the franchise. The Resident Evil 5 logo design had the name of the game in capital letters with cracks coming out in the rock behind them. The letter is written in fire. While this is definitely a flaming, bold logo design, it nonetheless is not as scary and chilling as the new one.

Video game rumors have to be taken as what they are: rumor. However, this one has so many people reporting it that we are inclined to believe that it is true. Further, there are photographs that were taken during the press conference which seem to confirm the rumors. Gamers seem eager to believe the rumors and begin making places on their game rack for another package.

Video game logo design is an interesting field. The logo needs to represent the overall mood of the game, which in this case is a sense of horror and fear. The logo also needs to appeal to the target market. Considering the number of people blogging about just a glimpse at this logo design, we are guessing that the Resident Evil 6 logo design has accomplished this. Last, it needs to begin building a brand for the game. After all, the only way to build an acclaimed video game franchise such as Resident Evil is to begin with a logo design that appeals to the customer base.

You may think that video game logo design is very different from corporate logo design, and on an aesthetic level this is true. However, all logos must give the same attention to branding, marketing and the preferences of the customer base. Whether you are in need of a video game logo or any type at all, the needs are very similar.

Serena and Lily is a baby furniture and textiles brand that is expanding into the adult market. They are offering upscale linens and a wide range of housewares, all of which have been well-received by customers. However, Serena and Lily has one key problem: a distinctly juvenile brand.

The old Serena & Lily logo design just felt like a small child’s brand. The name was written in thin lettering with a classic feeling, surrounded by swirling lines that contributed to this feeling. This logo design feels a lot like a monogram on a baby blanket—an upscale, expensive baby blanket, but nonetheless. The baby blue color just emphasizes that impression.

The new logo has dropped the serifs for a different and yet similar font with a classic and pretty feeling that is very similar to the old. The wording is often—but not always—shown topped with a line drawing of a quail. This adds to the English countryside charm, as does the cool gray that has replaced the blue color.

We like this color and the logo in general. It maintains the overall brand while making it feel more adult. It is still pretty, upscale and classic, just more appropriate for a wide range of ages. However, we have to wonder if a complete rebranding was necessary. There is nothing inherently babyish about swirls; could they have been modified somehow to be part of the new brand? Also, why did the font have to change? I guess Serena and Lily simply wanted to make a clean break with the past, but some of the changes seem unnecessary. We think that a change in color and a few other modifications would have been sufficient.

This brings up one interesting point for people who are just beginning a company. You should think hard about whether your company will expand in the future, and whether your logo design will work just as well for the expanded business. Another thing to consider is whether the logo could be developed so it is easy to add subsidiary brands if expansion allows it. In other words, can it be a foundation for a lasting brand. It is never too early to develop the professional logo design and brand that will see your company through good times and bad.

One pet peeve that we have is that the quail image seems to be used inconsistently throughout the company. It is present on tags, but only occasionally in the catalog or on the website. It is not a major part of the marketing, either. We feel that there needs to be an “all or nothing” approach to this image.

The Serena and Lily logo change might feel a little unneeded to us, but the new design is definitely more serious and more buttoned-down. It has lost its babyish charm and dimples for sure. We like both the old and new identities, so we wish this company well as they expand into new and hopefully more lucrative markets.

Whipsaw is an industrial design studio that previously had a somewhat juvenile logo design. If you look at the simple black logotype, it is jagged and angular. It is not an unattractive logo, but it feels more like a store in the mall than a professional design studio. However, this identity is changing to one that is more professional and adult.

The new Whipsaw logo design features a logotype once again, but the font is very different. Upper case letters are used, and the lettering is very font except for a single detail: the A is an upside down V. The logo feels simple and modern, which bodes well for the brand. We especially like changing from a white background to a gray one; it just feels less severe.

What we really love about this logo: it is simple, clean and restrained. It is definitely a more grownup identity than the old, and the stylized feeling about it hints at the design background of the business being represented.

However, there are a few drawbacks as well. Something feels a little off with the letter spacing, and we suspect that this could be resolved by having the letters placed more closely together. While it is original, it is so simple that it may not stand out in the pack. Last, it may become just a little boring after a few weeks. The new logo design lacks the energy and spirit of the old.

Choosing an ‘age’ for your logo design can be a complicated thing. You have to think about the age of your market, but also about the age that they should perceive you to be. Are you a peer? An elder? A young, hip friend? Deciding this is one of the first steps to having a logo design developed.

Because your logo design is not a person, your audience will be sensing the age from factors other than crow’s feet and gray hair. The old logo for Whipsaw is a good example of a youthful logo design. It is jagged and feels unpredictable. There are also colors that can feel youthful as well as combinations of shapes. A professional logo designer knows how to combine different elements to give a logo the youthful feeling that you desire.

On the other hand, the new logo definitely seems to have gained a few years. The upper case lettering, plain font, and lack of an image all seem to consistently indicate a slightly older age. The black and white are retained from the old logo, but everything else has been changed. If we had to choose an age, we would say hip late twenties or early thirties. Whatever the reason, the new logo makes more sense for this company and will almost definitely be more successful.

We think this change in perceived age was purposeful. No one wants to hire a consultant who is still a kid. The new logo still has some edginess, but it is restrained and adult as well.

You might be a geek if you have heard of Node.js. We won’t get into exactly what this platform does, only to say that it has to do with making websites and applications load faster by getting them to ping the system as needed rather than constantly. Have we lost you yet? Okay, let’s move on to the new logo design.

The old logo design featured the word ‘node’ in lower case letters and the extension in capitals. The dot between is drawn as a cloud. The font is bubbly with official-looking serifs, but it is friendly and approachable as well. The black, white and lime green color palette is serious and youthful at the same time, which works well for this brand.

This logo was not a great one by any means, but it was solid. It seemed to make sense for a software developer. However, the design and the brand have been changed to a completely different logo. The new logo is formed of hexagonal shapes, like the sprockets made by Spacely in old Jetson’s episodes. The color palette has been kept, although the hues have been moved around a little bit. The dot is tucked away inside the e, while the .js is within another hexagon.

The Node blog claims that this logo was chosen because it represents the mechanical, connected, and modular side of the Node brand (among other things). It is certainly mechanical, and hexagons are a stackable shape that can fit together perfectly. This is not by any means the worst logo design we have seen this month, or even today. Nonetheless, it has been the subject of much criticism in the developer community, especially on Twitter.

While we don’t think that this logo design is worthy of the outright hate mail it has received, it is certainly flawed. Most obviously, the hexagon shape is completely overused here. There is simply no need for that many hexagons in a single image. The logo design looks a little bit like cogs, tying into that sense of connectedness and mechanics, but it also just looks overdone.

However, we have to give the designers some props for one reason: there are no logos out there like this one. The node.js logo has gone from looking like any other in its genre to being completely unique. That in itself is an accomplishment. While it may feel a little futurific (in a retro way, if that makes sense), it is completely original and will represent the brand well.

If your logo design a little too similar to the others in your field, you can develop a new brand without going quite this far. It is possible to be unique without being outlandish, timely without being trendy. A professional logo designer can help you develop a logo that will represent your company perfectly while walking those fine lines. You can be as original or as conventional as you want; your logo design is all about your company.

We love gadgets and new technologies; so do most people in the United States in fact. The popular technology website This is my next will soon be launching a sister site called The Verge that will offer more of that envy and general electronic goodness. It will be mainly a technology news site, but we are sure that it will have product reviews, cool new stuff, and all of the content that keeps us coming back to many other similar websites. The Verge will be launched by a former editor of Engadget, so you know it is going to be good.

The Verge seems destined for popularity. However, will it be popular because of its brand or in spite of it? The brand has kind of a retro feeling, with a V formed into a triangle. The triangle is made so that the shadowing of one side becomes the next sides main beam, which is a clever optical illusion. However, we doubt that this website will feature magic tricks, so it feels a little gratuitous. Also, the font and the image just don’t seem to go together. They feel like parts of two different logos.

There are few things that we like about this logo, but if we had to pick something we truly dislike, it would be the font. The font is retro in all the wrong ways; it feels like something off Laugh In or Sonny & Cher. It has that seventies psychedelic edge that it precisely wrong for a technology brand. After all, this website will not be showcasing retro gadgets; they will be covering new technologies just like every other website in their genre.

This brand is attractive in a hippie kind of way but it simply does not represent the new website well. We cannot say this with absolute certainty considering that the website is in the earliest stages of release, but it is hard to imagine a technology site that goes well with this logo.

Moreover, it is just not that original. The logo font, named ITC Serif Gothic, was taken directly from famous seventies designer Herb Lubalin. The image has been used in some form many other times. We know that there is nothing new under the sun and that most motifs have been borrowed from someone else. However, most logos have at least some originality, either a brand new detail or at least the way the design is executed. The logo is even more amusing when you consider the website’s aim to cover ‘not just what technology means now, but what it means up ahead’ as the founders put it. This wording is ironic when paired with a brand that seems stuck several decades in the past.

One benefit of this logo design is that it is very unlike most of the technology and gadget logos that we have seen. It may not be one of a kind, but it is certainly so within its field. For now, we hope that will be good enough.

With so many options available to consumers, it is more important than ever for restaurants to have a compelling restaurant logo design. It is even more important for chain restaurants, which are becoming less popular as local eating catches on all over the country. Red Lobster intends to keep their place at the top of the seafood restaurant food chain with a new brand, logo design and advertising campaign.

The new logo is not a huge change from the old one—in fact, people who do not frequent Red Lobster on a regular basis may not even notice it. However, even overlooked changes have a subtle effect on the market. The lobster is still the “star” of the logo, seated at the top of image and featured boldly in advertising and signage. The most noticeable change in the crustacean is that it has been made a little more simple and modern, without the line shading of the old one. A subtle gleam now comes from the shells, making the animal look a little shinier and healthier, like something you might want to eat.

The font has been changed as well. It is still in upper case letters with serifs, but it has been made simpler and more modern as well. If you look closely, the new wording is arched a little bit. A more noticeable change is in the background color, from a calming sea blue to a sleek black. The red of the lobster is brighter against this background, and the letters no longer need as much detail to stand out. The old restaurant logo design was somewhat shaped like a street sign; the new one is generally plainer and (we think) more appealing. It also leaves room for a tagline emphasizing the freshness of the seafood selections.

Red Lobster now feels less like a wind-blown lobster joint in Maine and more like a gourmet restaurant. This may be a good move for the chain. No one is fooled by the faux-local logo anymore, so it is time to move on to a new brand.

The new logo design was tried out in a newly opened restaurant in Tampa Bay, Florida and only last week replaced the images on stores all over the nation. The new advertising campaign will focus on the people behind the brand, employees all over the nation striving to provide great food and great service. It is similar to the campaign used successfully in the past by sister brand Olive Garden. The tagline used in the ad campaign will be different from the one on the logo: “Sea Food Differently.” This is intended to communicate the changes that the brand has made recently, offering more gourmet dishes and less fried selections. Different fresh fish selections will be offered daily in a similar fashion to traditional, privately owned seafood restaurants.

Like the logo design, the ad campaign wants to present Red Lobster as a somewhat upscale brand for foodies, one with dedicated employees and a somewhat authentic seaside experience.

Medical logo design was not so important in times past. In fact, branding was a small and often ignored part of running a medical practice or any type of medical business. Now, however, medical branding and logo design are becoming increasingly important. Patients are becoming more logo-sensitive due to the huge prevalence of branding around them. Moreover, the expectations for medicine are getting higher. People view themselves as customers of medical services and want the same friendly service they would demand from any other business.

Medi Clinic is a South African line of private hospitals and medical practices joined under a single brand. They recently re-designed their logo and had a new brand developed. Why should you care about a foreign practice’s logo design? One reason is that it is a good example of the changes we are seeing throughout the global medical community.

The old image was somewhat of a classic medical logo design. It featured friendly elements—the blue color and the circle to be specific—along with a very official font with serifs and a caduceus. It is typical of many medical logos seen around the world. However, “typical” is not what you want to be when you are trying to build a brand. Hence, a new logo design was developed.

We see the same blue color, although it has been changed slightly to be more modern and less official. There is a whole new font as well, one that is thick and bold without being too official. It is close to the rounded, sans-serif fonts so popular in other industries, but it keeps an authoritative edge. After all, people want to feel that their doctor is a little more experienced and professional than the local shopkeeper.

The image has been changed as well. A square adds the authoritative feeling that is necessary to a medical logo design, but it is hand drawn and left open to make it a little more friendly. A tiny circle, really a dot, inside adds detail and also a friendly feeling. Because the square is larger and darker, the message seems to be that this is a traditional, scientific, factual brand with a little friendliness on the side. A new tagline seems to back up this feeling: Expertise You Can Trust.

Medi Clinic is undergoing a time of change, expanding within South Africa and also to other countries including far flung nations such as the United Arab Emirates and Switzerland. That is quite a spread, which makes this simple, graphic logo design somewhat of a necessity. This logo needs to resonate with a variety of customers. In this case, we think it is up to the task.

If you are running a medical practice that is in desperate need of a brand, there has never been a better time to get one. Professional logo designers are creating attractive and relevant designs for businesses just like yours every day. Don’t get left behind; talk to a logo designer about your own medical brand today.

Some people are really into the Campus Crusade for Christ, while others seem to never have heard of it. There are surprisingly few people who lie in the middle ground, who are aware of this organization yet have no opinion about it.

The old brand and logo design were effective and represented the organization well. When Campus Crusade for Christ first began at UCLA in 1951, it used a shield design with a cross intersecting the shape along with a book and a torch, both of which are relevant to Christianity. The new christian logo is in a calming, trustworthy blue and uses the same general shield, but modified to have a hand-drawn feeling that is youthful and unconventional. The name of the organization is written in rounded letters with serifs in the same blue along with a calming gray. The logo overall feels good, but it has one key flaw: it uses the word ‘crusade’.

Unfortunately, this word has very unpleasant connotations. Most people associate crusades with religious wars and intolerance for other viewpoints—hardly the impression that this organization wants to make. With a presence in more than 1000 US colleges and universities, a lot of individual ministries are dependent on public perception. Changing the name is an obvious step. Therefore, the Campus Crusade for Christ will soon be known simply as Cru.

This new, fresh, youthful name needs a fresh and youthful logo design to match. The new Cru logo design just might meet this demand. The name of the organization is written in lower case, rounded lettering that is friendly and informal—exactly what many college students want from their religion. A cross is formed by intersecting lines that are bright and appealing. The lettering may feel a little generic to people in the logo design industry, but it works well with the image and will be effective among its target market.

The name may be related to the unpleasant word ‘crusade’, but it is only loosely so. It is also a common nickname for the ministry, which will help the brand keep brand equity with college students who have already bought into the brand. However, it is a response to a recent study finding that twenty percent of college students are turned off completely by the name. Further, because the program is no longer limited to college campuses, this new name opens new horizons for Cru and allows them to continue expansion without becoming something of an oxymoron.

Another benefit to the new logo is that it is short and sweet. The old name was long and unwieldy and may have difficulty being placed on a christian website. Because the image from the logo was not self-explanatory enough to be used alone, the result was a rather clunky logo and identity. This identity is young, fresh, and thanks to the cross image, still relevant to Christianity. It maintains its core identity while presenting an image that will appeal to many people outside the fold. And, after all, isn’t that the point of a rebrand in the first place?

Sometimes a company must rebrand because they have outgrown their old corporate identity. This is the case with internet retail giant Overstock.com. The name suggests that the business specializes in overstock merchandise, and this was once the case. However, Overstock.com now offers many things in addition to overstocked items, such as refurbished electronics and free trade merchandise from exotic locales. Indeed, more than half of the products offered today are not overstocks, so the Overstock name no longer fits.

This change in the company is occurring at the same time that .co web addresses are being introduced, which is very auspicious for the company because it will be able to get just O as a domain name. There are many businesses with O as an initial that might like to take the name, but Overstock obviously acted quickly. The new Overstock.com is O.co.

The new name is already being used—just type O.co into your address bar and see what happens! The O.co name is also adorning the new O.co Coliseum in California, home to the Oakland Raiders and the Oakland A’s. Last, the O.co name is part of a new logo design created to help the company make the switch between names.

The new logo features the familiar script O and red color that is associated with Overstock.com, but with the new name. The text “also known as Overstock.com” appears below to make sure customers make an association between the two brands.

One key problem with the new O.co brand is that people tend to associate the letter O with Oprah Winfrey, who uses the letter for her magazine and also for her logo design. It will be difficult for many people to make the mental switch, although keeping the old Overstock.com logo will make it easier.

This is actually a return to an old branding scheme for Overstock.com. Many people may remember that Overstock marketing materials and advertising referred to the company as “the O” as early as 2004, most memorably in the tagline, “It’s all about the O.”

This company should have introduced a new brand years ago, when overstocked items began to make up a minority of items offered. Indeed, many people may be avoiding the website because they perceive it as being full of factory seconds. O.co is simpler and leaves the company plenty of room to grow. This rebranding was long overdue. We are happy to see it finally happen!

One of the benefits of rebranding is that Overstock is going to get the chance to build their corporate image once again from the ground up. Most customers have few or no associations with the letter O—except, as we mentioned, Oprah Winfrey—which means that the brand name is a blank slate. We suspect that a new logo design and a new marketing campaign will be coming soon for O.co, but that the company is waiting until customers get used to the name change. We look forward to seeing what new branding changes this company has in store.

Marsh & McLennan Companies, an American company specializing in risk management and insurance for corporations as well as professional consulting services recently rebranded. The new logo is beautiful, but it seems a little familiar to those of us in the design world.

The new logo is crisp and modern, in blue colors that are both trustworthy and professional. The image is geometric and feels three dimensional and faceted, drawn to create a letter M from various shapes. The name of the company is written to the right in plain, rounded, sans serif lettering, which seems to be somewhat popular in the business world right now. It is a great logo design for this field and would be unique… if it were not very similar to the logo for the City of Melbourne.

As you can see, the City of Melbourne logo design has a lot in common with the Marsh & McLennan Companies one. It has blue colors angled together into a multidimensional letter M. Indeed, if imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then this city should feel extremely flattered, because logos from all over the world seem to borrow from it.

There are notable differences, of course. The Melbourne logo design has a lot of green in addition to the blue, and the facets are angled so they seem to come from the upper left corner. The Marsh & McLennan logo, on the other hand, is almost perfectly symmetrical and uses only blue hues. We aren’t accusing anyone of plagiarism, merely pointing out that the City of Melbourne logo seems to be the foundation for a new design fad.

The new Marsh & McLennan aims to create a sense of “interconnectness and cooperation,” which is a popular theme nowadays in business. This may be the reason that we are seeing so many similar logos; companies are trying to portray the same ideas.

While this logo design may not be completely, 100% unique, it nonetheless is an improvement over the former Marsh & McLennan logo design. This logo design featured a blue square with the letters MMC at the outside right edge. It is too serious and corporate, and does not have the symmetry and beauty that modern customers like to see in design. It is not a customer-friendly logo design and it says little about the business—except perhaps that it is boring and overly corporate.

This logo design is a great one, which is very important for a company of this size. While you have probably never heard of Marsh & McLennan Companies, this corporation owns many businesses, all of whom will be using a version of this logo design. It will be a logo not just for the parent company, but for all of the smaller businesses that are owned by it. This is ideal for building a cohesive brand but very difficult in actual application. It can be difficult to find an image that works equally well for a variety of seemingly disconnected brands, but in this case it has worked out well.

Sometimes a logo design must be changed not because it is outdated or not relevant to the audience, but because the company itself is changing. The recent redesign of the Wendy’s/Arby’s Group logo is a good example of this. The awkwardly named holding company was formed in 2008 when the company added Arby’s to its lineup. It is now dropping the Arby’s name because the company has dropped Arby’s altogether.

Arby’s was sold last month to a new company, leaving Wendy along once again as the face of the corporation. Hence, the new logo design. The old logo feature a red stylized W with a yellow strip to create the implication of an A. It was not the best image, but it was fine as far as fast food corporate logos go. It was red and yellow, which are typical fast food colors, and featured the name of the holding company in modern upper case lettering. A tagline was placed below: Serving Fresh Ideas Daily.

The old logo design was… okay. We wish we could say the same about the new one. It is a return to the core Wendy’s brand, but the execution is just not what we expected from a company of this size and clout. It features the familiar Wendy’s image, with the new name and tagline below.

In theory, this seems like a good logo design idea, but in reality it just does not seem to work. The font feels lazy and thoughtless. The shape of the letters is French-fry-like, although we don’t know if this was done on purpose. The use of capital lettering for ‘The’ and ‘Company’ while both upper and lower cases were used for ‘Wendy’s’ makes it seem like Wendy’s is the least important word in the name, which of course it isn’t. It would make more sense if ‘Wendy’s’ was in capital letters while the rest were mixed case.

This is not a font that has been used before in the Wendy’s corporation, so there is no reason for it. It is completely gratuitous. That would be easy to overlook if it made the restaurant logo design more attractive, but it doesn’t. The picture of Wendy at least relates to the corporate history, although this too does not work well in a corporate logo. Ditto for the tagline; it was once a Wendy’s tagline.

Because fast food companies seem to be in a constant state of buying, selling and changing hands, we doubt that this logo will have a long life span. It certainly will not work when another company is brought into the fold. Wendy’s should be looking at what works for other fast food holding companies. For example, Yum! Brands was able to put a stop to the constant rebranding process by designing a corporate brand that does not relate to any of the fast food brands it represents.

We can’t blame this entirely on the designers, either. There is a good chance that they were told to produce a logo like this and given very little to work with. While this may be exactly what The Wendy’s Company wanted, it simply is not that professional.

Why do coffee companies need a great logo and professional branding services? Because, at the heart of the matter, they are all competing with the global giant Starbucks. Starbucks is present in nearly every city, town and borough of our nation and in many outside the nation as well. It is the most recognizable coffee brand in North America and thus the brand to which all others are compared.

49^th Parallel Roasters is a Vancouver, BC coffee roaster that is attempting to compete with Starbucks and other giants in the industry. They recently redesigned their logo. The original logo had a circular shape reminiscent of a globe along with a swoosh-like line at about the 49^th parallel. The word “49^th” was placed inside this shape (rather awkwardly, if you ask our expert opinion) with the word “parallel” layered on top of this, directly above the parallel line. The words “Coffee Roasters” were placed below in a font that, well, seemed to have little to do with the rest of the logo design. It was not the worst logo we have seen, but it doesn’t scream “global competitor” either.

The new coffee shop logo is a huge improvement. It is retro and modern at the same time, with a sleek and upscale look that will appeal to buyers of fine coffee. The blue color has been changed to a more aqua tone that is reminiscent of Tiffany, oozing quality and retro charm. The logo is now a true circle with information about the coffee inside. It feels like a stamp, implying quality once again.

This logo is professional and attractive, yet it does a great job of differentiating the company from the competition. It has a retro feeling that will appeal to many coffee drinkers. It also names it town and the Pacific Northwest as points of origin to give it a more local feeling.

One thing that we love about this coffee logo is that the deep brown so often seen in coffee related logo design has been given secondary status. The brown is simply overdone and obvious. We love the blue, and we think that it creates a calming brand that modern people will appreciate. This logo just feels high quality, which says only good things about 49^th Parallel’s products.

Infusing your brand and your coffee website design with a small, local feeling is very important to modern businesses. More and more, consumers are giving preference to local companies and trying hard to patronize them over their global or national competition. While it used to be important to look “big” in your logo and brand, just the opposite is true now. In fact, we are seeing companies such as Starbucks rebrand to give themselves a smaller, local feeling.

Competing against global corporations with seemingly unlimited marketing budgets is one of the key challenges for modern small businesses. However, your business has the key advantage of being a smaller, more personal establishment. Make sure your logo and your brand show this advantage.

Sometimes rebranding and developing a new logo design does not have to mean drastic changes. In many cases, only a few small modifications are necessary in order to develop a newly relevant brand. The logo design for on demand book publisher Blurb is a good example of this concept.

The old logo features a rectangle that has been modified to look like an open book. The blue is clear and calming, like the color of a summer sky. The white lettering is friendly and lower case. In fact, if we had to critique any element of this logo, it would be the font. The letters are too thin and don’t seem to fit together well. We like the way that the angle at the top of the letters matches that of the angle in the book image, but this font simply does not feel right.

Some other logo designer must have felt the same way, because the font is precisely what has been changed in this logo design, along with the spacing of the letters. The letters are rounded and more modern, with no angular or point elements. They are gentler and more approachable, in keeping with the calming blue color.

We could be wrong, but it seems that something has slightly changed with the book shape as well. The angle seems a little different, although this may just be an optical illusion created by a very different font. Either way, this is a job well done. It maintains the core identity but makes relevant and aesthetically pleasing updates that were badly needed.

Blurb is a self-publishing company founded in 2005, but it is a little different from other similar businesses. In many cases, self-published books are of generally lower quality than their traditionally published counterparts. Blurb offers extremely high quality publishing services that are appropriate for a coffee table book or other graphic-heavy tomes. It offers premium paper and traditional binding, and it does so at an affordable cost. Blurb is an excellent option for artists and designers looking to put their portfolio in a permanent, attractive form. It can also be used to create lovely mementos of weddings and other events.

This rebranding comes with a marketing campaign, one that includes ads that the SF Egotist has called the prettiest since Gutenberg. The website banners and other media use the same artsy style. So far the business model has been successful, with 1.5 million customers.

If your logo design feels just a little “off”, rebranding may be an option. As we have seen in several modified logo designs this week, it is certainly possible to keep the good elements of a brand while replacing the less attractive ones. In order to succeed in a competitive world, every business needs a visual identity and professionally designed logo that is not just good, but perfect. If you aren’t sure whether your logo meets those high standards, talk to a professional logo designer.

You may never have heard about Zee TV, but here’s why you should care about its TV Channel logo design: It is one of the most popular television channels in the world. Although it is a relevant newcomer to the global network scene (Zee TV was established in 1992), this leading Indian channel now owns 25 separate channels in a large number of countries. The new media logo design for Zee TV will be seen by hundreds of millions of loyal television viewers, making it much more momentous than most of the channels we cover.

Like the channel, the Zee TV logo design must have been born in the nineties. It is bright to say the least and virtually assaults the senses with a superhero-like Z in front of an angled bright yellow square. The combination of purple, yellow, and blue is almost too much. On the other hand, it is an eye catching logo, and it will be equally recognizable whether placed in the bottom corner of a tiny television screen or blown up on a billboard.

The new Zee TV logo is definitely different, both in style and in mood. It features the same aqua blue as the old logo, but the yellow and purple are now gone. The Z is thicker and sits squarely in the logo design rather than diagonally. The Zee is blocky and square, giving a solid and stable image to viewers. The slightly rounded corners soften this impression, and the wavy line flowing through the letter adds a little movement.

According to the press release that accompanied the logo change, the wavy line flowing through the letter Z is supposed to be an upward “flourish” signifying the “upward movement of desires and wishes.” As if that does not seem to be reading a bit too much into a single line, it also has been called a rainbow of hope.

Both logos seem overdone to our American eyes, but they are not really made for our American eyes. They are made for a culture where color is embraced in daily life. Although Zee TV has many channels that offer programming in several nations, their brand is aimed at South Asia. Thus, the logo design needs to be created for this unique market. If this channel were trying to woo the American or European markets, it would not work well in competition with the more serious, business-like network logos that we are used to.

This logo redesign is interesting mainly because it reminds us that the American market is not the only market out there. Zee TV is as popular as Discovery and other well-known American channels, but in a different market. When you are creating a logo design, you must consider the tastes and sensibilities of the market you are trying to reach. This is an especially important consideration for companies that plan to go global at some point. The logo design that works in your current area may need redesigned in order to be successful in another.

The Kickin’ Chicken is not one of those older restaurants catering to serious people. It is young and hip with a full bar and dishes catering to this market, such as hot wings and chicken tenders. Opened in 1997, The Kickin’ Chicken has since expanded into the world of franchising. As those of us familiar with the market know, franchising is basically the selling of a brand, so the brand has to be top notch.

The old Kickin’ Chicken logo, unfortunately, is far from the top. The laughing chicken is a pleasant image, but what is it doing with its right hand? Examining his nails? Further, the way the wording is oriented just doesn’t work for us. The writing is too thick and the colors too colorful for a modern full service restaurant logo design, and especially not for a franchise.

The new fast food logo design seems to have addressed most of the objection to the old one, and it did so while maintaining the laughing chicken image for which the store has become known. The color palette is a little more muted and sure to appeal to a modern audience. The upper case lettering has been stripped down to its basic form, while the word ‘The’ is in cursive letters that give a slightly retro feeling. ‘Since 1977’ is written below in the same cursive lettering.

The old restaurant logo design was not bad for a small, local restaurant with one or two locations, but it clearly was not good enough for a franchise. The new Kickin’ Chicken logo is better, and we like the way that the lettering lines up. It comes with new menus, new signage, and an entirely new corporate identity for the brand. The color palette makes the brand surprisingly sophisticated for a restaurant that specializes in fried chicken products. The new chicken has a lot of personality that seems to come through in the other materials for the brand.

Sometimes even the most dated, unattractive brand has elements that are worth saving. We can see this in the Kickin’ Chicken brand. With just a few updates, the brand suddenly feels relevant and modern. This logo obviously was created by a professional logo designer with experience in branding and corporate identity, and we bet that the investment in professional design services will pay off in new franchises all over the United States. The new identity makes the restaurant feel like a more modern alternative to Kentucky Fried Chicken and Church’s.

The new brand is not just good enough for today; it has the staying power that a franchise needs. It is a brand that people will pay for. Considering that people are being asked to pay for the brand—that is, after all, the point of a franchise—the change is welcome. Franchise logo design is a challenging field, but this shows what a good execution looks like. If you are thinking about franchising your business, consider examples such as this one when developing your own logo design and brand.

TechCrunch is one of the most popular tech blogs, owned by AOL and boasting more than twelve million unique visitors per month (!). It is at the top of the technology blog industry and covers anything related to its field, including gadgets, new business, software and more. In other words, it is a one stop shop for geekdom. Now, TechCrunch is introducing a new website design and hi-tech logo that are a better fit for a brand of their renown.

The old logo design featured the name of the blog in thin, rounded letters—a motif that we have seen a lot and even enough of! The first word was a clear, bright green, while the second was black and serious. The color palette was spot on for this type of business, but the logo design was simply not distinctive. It could have been the logo for any technologically related business, or even one in another industry.

The new logo design is already causing outcry, but we rather like it. It features the initials of the company in the same green color, but with pixilation to refer indirectly to the industry. A simpler version can be seen at the blog in a single green color, while the name of the blog is still sometimes used, although it has been made thicker and bolder.  We aren’t thrilled with the chunk missing from the upper left corner of the C—it just feels gratuitous—but overall, this is a distinctive and relevant logo design.

This new logo not only ties into the tech industry, it uses the popular mosaic motif. It feels modern and timely, certainly more so than the previous logo design. Because there are different versions, it will work well in a variety of formats. In fact, there is even a Tetris game available on the TechCrunch website that allows you to fit together letters in this classic, geek chic game.

Tech Crunch likely anticipated that readers would not have a favorable reaction to their change in brand, especially when you consider that the blog post introducing the new brand was called “Redesigning TechCrunch: We Picked This Logo Just to Piss You Off.”

This logo design is interesting because it is neither an image nor a wordmark. It is rather clichéd, but this appears to have been done on purpose with a tongue in cheek attitude. This attitude is typical of the blog and a vital part of the blog’s appeal to the young and tech-savvy audience. Retro logos can come off feeling forced or simply not capturing the salient aspects of a modern brand. The new TechCruch logo avoids those key errors.

Why rebrand a successful business? You have to admit that the old logo design left a lot to be desired. It simply was not relevant to the industry or the blog itself. The new logo design is interesting and creative; you will either love it or hate it. Either way, it is a better representative of the blog and will help to build its brand even further in the future.

Women and children are treated as second class citizens throughout the world, a fact that is simply not recognized by many people in more tolerant nations. Half the Sky is an organization dedicated to bring attention to the situation. Based on the book with the same name, Half the Sky is a media project that will include a Facebook game, PBS television series and several short films. The project now has a logo design that is intended to represent the project and its efforts.

This logo features the words ‘Half the Sky’ in lower case in a simply but thick font. This wording is placed next to a view of a blue sky cut into halves, tying into the name. The two halves form an equal sign, referring to the equality being sought by the project.

This is, on the whole, a good identity for this media project. It is direct, to the point, and recognizable. The image portrays many of the organization’s goals and certainly represents its name. However, there are a few things that we don’t like as well.

First, the way the lettering aligns with the image seems a little off. If it were completely even, it would give the logo design a more unified feeling. The two lines of wording don’t seem to fit neatly together, although this may be due to the difference in height between the lettering and the two dashes on the equals. Last, we have to wonder how this logo will work in very small applications, such as embroidered on a polo shirt or printed on a business card. Is there a simpler version that will work for these applications? We sure hope so. As is, it would look horrible if printed in one color, so we hope the organization/media project has a huge materials budget.

A few things that we love about this brand: it is distinctive because, in general, most logos do not use photographs. A vector-less logo is certainly a novelty, and it suggests that this project is more than just a business venture, which is accurate. It is somewhat simple and even restrained, which makes the message all the more powerful. This logo design is going to be used internationally, and the images of an equal sign and a blue sky are recognized universally. It can be difficult to create a simple yet effective design that works well all over the globe, so this design deserves praise and props.

The name of the organization is that of a New York Times bestselling novel on the same subject, but also on a Chinese proverb that “women hold up half the sky.” While there are usability issues with this logo design, it is important to remember that this is not merely a logo. It will be used in a television show and on a Facebook page, in both animated and still formats. It is a graphic representation of a concept and a story.

The world of logo design is rapidly changing. We never considered that the future would hold photographs used in logo design. However, we are seeing this motif more and more, and in many cases it works beautifully.

There are few logo changes as surprising as the one that we cover in this blog post. The distance between the new logo design of Golf Galaxy and the old one simply cannot be measured, except perhaps in galaxies. The implications are huge, and the new Golf Galaxy brand is sure to be worlds away from the old one.

The old Golf Galaxy logo is cartoonish and even a little silly. It features the name of the establishment written in a bold upper case lettering that is slightly angled. Around the writing there is an orbital ring with a golf ball instead of a planet. What does this golf logo say about the brand? Obviously there is a sense of fun. It ties into the name of the chain, although it does so in a way that adds to the less serious feeling. The colors are bright, albeit a bit out of date. The forest green and burgundy are both colors we saw a lot of the last time we were on a golf course, so it is forgivable. Obviously these colors are still in style among the golf crowd even if they don’t appeal to the rest of us.

The new logo is far more serious that the old. In fact, it is simply writing, in the most basic possible font, against a navy blue background. The navy blue background is relevant to the galaxy part of the name because it is the color of a night sky. The writing is almost nondescript; the only memorable aspect is the difference in size between the first and second word of the name.

We are interested in finding out what this means for this store, not because we shop there but because it seems like this immense of a change in brand should come with a serious change in decorations, product offerings and service. Comparing these two brands is like comparing McDonalds and the Russian Tea House; the similarities are so few that they are hard to identify in the midst of the glaring differences.

One thing that we noticed is that Golf Galaxy is offering a wider range of services to complement their superstore range of golf equipment. Customers can book an appointment with golf pros including PGA and LPGA veterans. Computer swing analysis, club fittings, golf course simulators, and even indoor putting greens are available for the golf lover. This is a place where customers will have every possible tool for improving their golf game available. In other words, the store will live up to their name.

If you think your business needs a new brand or logo design, keep in mind that it does not have to be this drastic. As we have blogged before, a logo design change can be as subtle or as extreme as you want to make it. Working with a professional logo designer will help you to make the decision that is right for your own business brand.

Monday Night Football has been through several changes in the past few years, changes in format and even in television station. Now the popular program is in for a new and equally important change: a change in brand and logo design.

There was nothing really wrong with the old sports program logo. It is simple, memorable and bold.  There’s not a lot to criticize because there’s not a lot to it: simple black letters with the ESPN logo and the NFL logo tucked neatly beside it. The only downfall is that it lacks character.

The new logo design has character in excess. It has a basic shield shape that ties in with the NFL logo beautifully. A black bar across the shield bears the name of the program in shiny metallic letters. The bottom part of the logo is created to resemble a football, while the ESPN logo at the top is flanked by bright stadium lights. Shiny chrome surrounds the shield.

One of the elements we really love about this logo is the texture. The rubber texture of the bar and the brown pigskin football below offset the metallic elements nicely. The lights are gleaming and lifelike. This logo design was created to look more like a photograph of a three dimensional object than a drawing. The subtle lighting coming from the right side enhances that perception.

Before you run out looking for a 3D logo of your own, consider the disadvantages of this logo, which are more practical than stylistic. Can you imagine this beast of a logo scaled down? A lot of the detail will be lost, and the result will be less than attractive. Consider it printed without color or high resolution on newsprint, or worse yet embroidered on a polo shirt. It just won’t work. We suspect that a simpler version of this logo will be used for those purposes. However, on television screens across the nation, which is where this logo will spend most of its existence, it will work just fine.

The style of this logo design is perfect for the program: bold and manly. It fits the brand well and has the professional details that a brand of this prominence deserves. The old logo was okay, but it could have been created by anyone on any computer’s stock Paint program. The new logo certainly surpasses the old. It just screams ‘American’ and ‘football’.

We usually put a lot of thought into how a logo design will work in various media, and that is generally a very important consideration. For Monday Night Football—not so much. This is a made-for-television logo and it looks like one. The field of television program logos is a unique one with an entirely different set of considerations than other fields of logo design. And, if the logo does not work, there is always next season.

The Monday Night Football brand is strong enough to withstand some experimentation, as long as the core audience of red-blooded American males is not offended.

If you like a little design with your cup of coffee, we have a great combination of the two in this post. Tassimo, maker of single serve coffee machines, has changed their logo to appeal more to the modern customer. We think that it is a positive change that will do wonders for the brand.

The old Tassimo coffee logo was quite good for its time. In shiny, metallic gold, the logo features the name of the company with the first letter in a top view of a cup of coffee. We like this for several reasons. First, it avoids the cliché brown color that many coffee product makers seem to include in their logos. It is good to use a relevant color scheme, but this color is so common it ceases to have meaning. Second, the standard side view of a coffee cup is not used here. Honestly, that is so done. The top view is a little less obvious while referring to the same object.

Gold is a color associated with quality and value, making it a good choice for this rather expensive coffee accessory. Accessory, you ask? Well, for most people a regular Mr. Coffee will do just fine. Spending extra money on a single serve machine and the over-priced pods that it requires is an extra coffee cost.

The new logo design is rounder and friendlier than the old for several reasons. First, consider the font. It has thinner writing that is as round as it can be, giving a modern and yet customer friendly brand. The circle is also incorporated into the new Tassimo image. Several round transparencies in different colors are overlaid to create a flower design, which may not relate directly to coffee but nonetheless is friendly and modern. If you look carefully, these shapes are not perfectly round, but rather are the exact shape of the Tassimo T Discs that you plug into these single serve coffee machines. The letter A has that exact shape as well.

The old logo design had a black background, which was seen at the time as sophisticated and urban. However, many of the most popular logo designs of our era are created to work on a white background. White is the new black, in part thanks to Apple, and this new logo ties into that trend. To the modern customer, white means high quality, simple, and sophisticated.

One of the unique demands made of the Tassimo logo is that is needs to work well with a variety of logos. The T Discs are made by a variety of companies, each of whom want their logos on their products. This logo design and the packaging that go with it are versatile enough to meet this requirement. Tassimo has already introduced their new look in Europe, where it appears to be catching on beautifully. They are beginning to change over their US products, so look for this logo on a grocery store shelf near you.

We write a lot about logo evolution, and many people may wonder why. The answer is simple: even the best brands must change to be more relevant to an ever-changing market. If your brand and logo design are going strong, rebranding can be a scary process because you don’t want to lose the value of your current logo design—also known as your brand equity.

The change in the Cerner logo is a good example of this. Now, we have written before about more notable logo evolutions—such as the changes over time in the Apple logo or the Starbucks logo. Cerner is not as large or easily recognized of a company, but we are interested in their change in logo design and brand because it is a perfect example of good logo evolution.

Cerner is an IT services company specializing in healthcare organizations. We have never really thought about who maintains the computers at our local doctor’s office, but this is likely the company because they are the top of their field. The old logo features a C—or is that a circle?—with two bars flowing out of it. The new logo design features basically the same thing, but in a better way.

We still see the same basic shape in the new logo image, but with notable changes. The C is now obviously so; there is no more mistaking it for a circle. The bars are connected to the circle, giving it a feeling of movement and continuity. A friendlier font is being used as well as more modern, friendly colors. The old blue was business-like and serious, while the new blue is a bright, serene sky blue. The addition of lime green creates a more interesting and memorable logo while bringing attention to the bars in the image. Green also indicates health and growth, which is a positive connotation for a company in the health care field to be sure.

What makes this a logo evolution and not a flat out change? As you can see, the form of the logo design is the same, with the image on the left and the company name on the right. The old company logo was often seen with the tagline below, but the new one (so far) is left plain. The blue color is kept, but it is a more modern shade, and a little green is added. The image is largely the same as well, merely updated to be more appealing to a modern, professional audience.

If your logo design is an atrocity, or even just a little bland like this one, a logo evolution can be the right choice. You can keep the recognition of your brand and make necessary changes without compromising the integrity of your business. An out of date logo can do a lot of harm to a business, so it is better to make small changes as they are needed rather than waiting until your brand needs a complete overhaul.

The Hershey’s candy logo has not changed in, well, decades, but they are constantly changing up the designs of their smaller brands. We recently were watching Food Network TV Channel Logo and saw a new logo design for the much loved Hershey’s Kisses. A little digging around on the internet revealed that, indeed, these bite sized chocolate treats have kissed their old logo goodbye.

The old Hershey’s Kisses logo design featured the familiar rectangular Hershey’s logo along with the word Kisses in a beveled upper case writing with subtle serifs. The familiar Hershey chocolate brown and white are the main colors, along with bevels and shadowing in a silver color that relates to the familiar silver wrapper used in the candy.

This is not an inherently bad logo, but there is certainly room for improvement. The beveling and shading is not used very often in modern logo design, and it just feels a little messy. It also has key reproduction problems; the beveling will make it difficult to reproduce in very large and very small formats. Scaling is an important part of modern logo design, especially for a logo such as this one that will be used in a variety of places.

The new logo design is certainly more modern. The font is similar, but the beveling, shading and gray accents have been disposed of altogether. The lettering feels rounder and friendlier, although this may be a result of losing the gratuitous details. It also feels more modern, but the design still ties into the Hershey’s brand with the brown and white color scheme. The simpler design will be easier to use on packaging and promotional materials, making it a generally more usable design. It is a better logo to be sure, but there are still a few issues.

First, the way the Hershey’s logo is justified against the word ‘Kisses’ feels unnatural. We think it would look better if the rectangle were pushed to the left completely. Also, the little rectangles below the design that contain the words ‘brand’ and ‘since 1907’ just don’t seem to complement the design at all. Not only to the shapes feel like they are disconnected from the rest of the design, the fonts don’t fit the other ones used. The lettering is too thin. Considering that these words say little about the brand or the candy itself, we have to wonder if they are truly necessary.

One thing we wish the new logo had not lost is the little Kiss shape hidden between the K and the I in the old design. While it is unlikely that the average candy lover noticed this little detail, it was still a fun addition. However, retaining the kiss would have severely limited the ability to change the font, which is a major part of the redesign. The font maintains the tiny serifs that are reminiscent of the tops of the kisses, so it is still directly relevant to the product itself. Even the strongest brand needs an occasional update, and this one is very appropriate and well-designed.

What do you know about Georgetown? No, not the University; the destination. Unfortunately, most of us know very little about this historical area near Washington DC, and part of that deficit is likely due to a lack of destination branding for the area. Few of us are planning to take our next vacation there, but this may be changing soon.

Having a professional destination branding logo design and logo design is essential to drawing tourists. Luckily, someone in Georgetown got the memo, because the neighborhood now has a new logo design and newly redesigned website designed to draw in tourists, along with their wallets. The new logo features the red, white and blue of the American flag, referring to the area’s historical significance in our nation’s history. A red star also refers to the patriotic nature of the area.

Because the name is familiar to many people in the United States, it takes center stage in the design in a modern, sans serif font. The same font is used below for the new tagline: Come Out and Play. The curlicues formed of dots are meant to look like the work of an old-time calligrapher, while the star is representative of the star-shaped bolts that are common in the Georgetown neighborhood. Because these shapes also have obvious patriotic connotations, the star is an excellent choice in image.

The committee behind the development of this logo says that they considered a variety of elements, including more traditional “historical” fonts, but this design was selected because it represents the past, present and future of Georgetown best.

About the ‘Come Out and Play” tagline: it is an unlikely choice for this neighborhood, and we are little surprised that something more historical was not chosen. On the other hand, the unexpectedness may in fact become a huge part of the newly designed brand. You may think of Georgetown as a place to explore history, but this tagline suggests that it is also a place to have fun. Most of us want to have a little fun while on vacation, so this is a tempting suggestion.

Georgetown’s website has been criticized for being, well, awful, so we were glad to see that the new one is much more pleasant and easier to navigate. In addition, it has a real-time tool allowing people to find parking, which apparently can be a huge issue in the neighborhood. This website promotes the neighborhood while making it a little easier for visitors to get around, which gives the new Georgetown a huge advantage over the old.

We hope this brand is effective, because a lot is invested of it. In fact, it took a year of working with consultants for the neighborhood to settle on the perfect logo and image. It can be difficult to measure the success of a destination brand, but an increase in traffic and the resulting increase in revenue will certainly indicate that the neighborhood is moving in the right direction with this new logo design and website.

If you are not aware of the Disney Vacation Club, it is basically a membership club for timeshare owners at a Disney Vacation Club Resort. Members are awarded points based on the size of their share and money spent at other Disney parks and resorts. They receive rewards of some kind for their loyalty to the Disney brand.

The Disney Vacation Club obviously had a vacation logo that worked; the vacation club has grown quickly and now includes more than five hundred sites throughout the world with timeshare owners from more than one hundred countries. This is a true international experience… but it is not well represented by the old logo design.

The Disney Vacation Club logo shows a tropical vacation scene with mountains, palm trees, and an ocean with waves. The sun is in the shape of Mickey Mouse, adding a little bit of the Disney brand albeit in a somewhat nonsensical way. You can see longitude and latitude lines, which indicates a global presence subtly. The Disney logotype sits above the travel logo, while the rest of the name is placed below in upper class letters with serifs.

While the image tries to be playful, it really is not. The scene just doesn’t work for some reason. Maybe it is the latitude markings? Further, the blocky font with serifs feels too serious. Consider: these vacations are aimed at families with children, or at least adults who want a youthful experience. There is no need to get all official. This logo design was meant to change the way that people think about a Disney vacation, but it just doesn’t.

The new logo is at least a little more interesting. The main logo image is of a globe topped with Mickey Mouse ears. This device actually works well and is very attractive, but we are a little confused by the heavy silver around the shape. It just doesn’t make sense. Another criticism is of the play of light on the image. It feels a little too Web 2.0 for us. In a few years, even in a few months, this device will be out of style, and then Disney will have to be back at the drawing board. Ryan March, editor of the Disney Vacation Club Disney Files magazine comments that “…it’s hard to go wrong with shiny,” but this seems to go a little far.

All criticisms aside, no one can deny that the new logo design is more attractive and more appropriate for this global vacation company than the old one. While it is not perfection, it is certainly progress. The new logo seems to suggest that this business will help you see the world, Disney-style. That is probably very close to the intended message.

Is your small business bogged down by a logo that is unattractive or simply does not represent you well? If you need a change in brand or a change in logo, contact a professional logo designer. There is no better time than today to get started on a new business image.

Destination branding and travel logo design is important whether you are running a quiet country inn or a top rated resort in one of the most beautiful areas of the world. Most of your visitors have never been to your establishment or even seen it. They are becoming customers based on your brand.

This is why brand naming, logo design and branding are so crucial in the industry. Recently, a hotel in a popular tourist destination was rebranded. The Hotel H?na-Maui has been officially changed to the Travaasa H?na. This will make it the second Travaasa destination, joining the Travaasa Austin.

The resort in H?na has been open since the forties, offering luxury accommodations and a spa in this somewhat secluded yet popular destination. H?na is home to famous Hawaiian waterfalls, which many believe have healing properties. The resort also features Hawaiian culture programs and gourmet dining with locally sourced foods.

The new brand will bring a few changes to modernize an already compelling brand. The distinctly Hawaiian aspects will be maintained, but new fitness and spa activities will be added. In addition, a greater emphasis on Hawaiian culture and local elements will be added.

The Travaasa Destinations brand has a very simple logo design that features the stylized image of a road leading into a wavy shape representing change. In other words, it presents a journey toward meaningful change. The V and the A are subtly angled so there is a straight line between them, which appears to be a road as well. The seal shape gives a feeling of official approval, but the serrated edges have been rounded so that could also be interpreted as petals of a flower. The cool blue is calming and suggests a worry-free trip, while hot pink brings attention to the word ‘destinations’, which differentiates the brand from hotel chains.

Indeed, Travaasa H?na is not offering your average hotel stay. The 47 cottages and 23 suites have no radios, televisions, or even clocks, so that guests can enjoy the sounds of nature and feel more encouraged to participate in cultural programs and spa activities.

This destination and its brand are certainly different from the average tourist experience, so it is important that the logo design and other visual elements portray this. People looking for a unique vacation experience based on health and Hawaiian culture will know that this is a place to find it, while standard tourist types will avoid the spa and avoid being disappointed by a kitsch-less, television-less experience.

Your logo design is more than an image that represents your business. It shows people what to expect from you. It brings potential customers to your door while keeping uninterested parties from being disappointed. It is a visual representation of your company that shows customers what you are all about.

How does your logo design and brand measure up? If you are in any industry, branding is crucial to the success of your company, but no industry is more image-conscious than the hospitality and tourism industries. Having a great logo is an important part of that brand.

You probably are familiar with the MTV logo design and brand, but you may not be familiar with its many incarnations. MTV runs several different TV channels that have a modified version of the MTV brand. One of these is Tr3s, which is the shorthand name for MTV, Música y Más. This bilingual channel for the American Latino community will be rebranding its web presence, partnering with ourstage.com for a website that will introduce new Latino artists and give the undiscovered a chance at stardom.

The new website, which is at ourstage.tr3s.com, will feature original music from less well-known, allowing users to vote for their favorites. Every month, the top-rated musicians will have the chance to be featured on Tr3s’s channel, which can be the opportunity of a lifetime for an unsigned musical act.

This is a great branding move for both companies. Although we are not familiar with Tr3s, it is probably struggling to keep up with digital music the same way the English language MTV is. Modern people have an almost endless supply of music at their fingertips through online music websites. We are not dependent on music television channels to show us our favorites or to tell us which musicians we should like. The internet allows us to make our own decisions.

Ourstage.com is a part of this phenomenon. It allows virtually unknown artists to put their work into public view rather than depending on a studio to discover them. They can be discovered by their future fan base instead. This method also gives them a greater chance of having solid sales when they do get a contract and put out a CD. After all, the people who supported them with votes will likely support them by buying their music and attending concerts as well.

What will ourstage.com get from this? First, they are now going to be the go-to place for unknown musicians. Second, this will give them a major PR boost and also bring the huge Latino market to their site. Websites like this need a lot of traffic and interaction to maintain their place at the top; a partnership with Tr3s will certainly supply this.

Tr3s is also placing themselves at the top of the market by being responsive to their fans and offering an interactive experience that allows fans to have some input into the programming. This has been a highly successful model in the past; consider the popularity of American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance. People develop favorites and follow them religiously, even inspiring a little fanaticism.

Fans can vote for their favorites at the new website. A group of fan favorites will be selected and then the winner chosen by a group of industry experts. The winning act will be featured on several Tr3s shows, including ‘Lo Que Te Pica’ and ‘Music My Güey’, as well as written about on industry blogs. This is a huge branding opportunity, but also a huge opportunity for both fans and musicians. Co-branding is one of the most successful brand strategies, and this collaboration seems built for success.

The Tiffany logo design and brand is among the best recognized in the United States, especially if you talk to females. We see a lot of proprietary fonts, but Tiffany blue is actually a proprietary color. They have created a strong brand from women’s love of jewelry and men’s belief that something shiny can be a sign of love.

Tiffany & Co is launching a micro-website called, “What Makes Love True?” This website is promoting the Tiffany brand, claiming to be a ‘Tiffany guide to matters of the heart’. The website opens to a picture of a sophisticated couple walking together. Four squares in the upper left corner allow visitors to check out Love Stories, Tiffany’s New York, The Art of Romance, and Love Is Everywhere. The Love Stories section allows users to share real like love stores, while Tiffany’s New York has a list of romantic places in the Big Apple. The Art of Romance offers tips for men as well as free downloads of classic love songs, and Love Is Everywhere is an interactive feature in which website viewers can share their own romantic encounters in New York City.

This website is intimately connected to the Tiffany brand and logo design. First, from the time you open the home page you are treated to Tiffany blue squares, as seen on the jewelry boxes, along with the recognizable Tiffany font. Everything about this website is smooth, sophisticated, and tied into the city of New York. New York City is a huge part of the Tiffany brand.

Tiffany already has a well-recognized logo design and brand—in fact, they are one of the most recognized brands in the United States, especially by women. This website will help the company continue to be relevant to a younger generation.

The website also represents somewhat of a change for the company. There was a time when the company was linked to luxury, sophistication, and wealth. The new website design is clearly trying to link the brand to love. There are still stylish and sophisticated elements, however. In addition, the Tiffany’s/New York connection is being strengthened through this website. There is no way to interact with this website and not get that.

Jewelry Logos has traditionally been an industry in which branding is very important. Consider: we cannot eat precious metals or gems, and they indeed do not contribute to our lives in any material way. Yet wars have been fought over the ingredients of jewelry, as most of us are convinced of its worth. Precious metals and gemstones are presented as rarely and inherently value. In the last one hundred years, they have become symbols not just of wealth, but of love as well. Tiffany has been a large part of the push to tie jewelry with affection and romance.

Tiffany is not just building their industry’s brand with this website, they are building their own brand and showing people all over the world why they should be the preferred choice in symbols of love.

Have you read any Hearst titles lately? You probably have; Cosmopolitan, Town & Country, and Popular Mechanics are just three. It would seem that this magazine conglomerate has success in spades, but they like so many print magazine owners are seeing readerships fall almost by the day. The fact is, most of us are getting our news and lifestyle tips from the good old internet, which has had a disastrous effect on the paper print industry.

Hearst Magazine’s response has been to create a new website, at my.hearstmagazines.com, where people can flip through and read all of the company’s magazines. Wow! If you are a magazine reader, this is quite a jackpot. The company is also publicizing their magazines through an ‘Unbound’ campaign.

It is rare that we see media conglomerates run marketing campaigns. Sure, you might see advertising for one of their brands, but not for the conglomerate itself. After all, once a company gets to a certain size, the market is saturated with their products enough that it is almost impossible to forget about them.

On the other hand, this may be the marketing wave of the future. Hearst Magazines is not a household name the way their magazines are. If they want to maintain their position as one of the largest magazine and media companies on the globe, they will need to keep customers buying magazines. A marketing campaign might be just the way to accomplish this.

Several ads are being run for various Hearst magazines that include QR codes and other invitations to the new website. The new campaign is called Unbound because it is placing new emphasis on the digital versions of their magazines. At the website, viewers can choose to view the magazine’s content on the magazine’s website or to download versions for a variety of readers, or even to subscribe to the paper version. The unbound certainly refers to the many digital ways of accessing the magazines, although paper versions are still available and will likely remain the most popular choices for a while.

The media company is also planning new ways of getting their brand and logo design into the public eye. While there was a time when magazines were presented as independent entities, with their owners staying far in the background, media companies now seem eager to present their magazines as part of a product ‘family’. This is an interesting change in the industry.

Adapting to digital media, and ensuring that your customers know about modern, digital options that you offer, is one of the huge challenges facing many companies, including this one. Hearst Magazines is busily working on presenting a variety of options for their tech-savvy readers. Tablets, smartphones, and e-readers are all viable ways of accessing the magazines’ content, and the company is working on newer options including different ecommerce components. A spokesperson for Hearst Media recently stated that the company plans to be around for generations, and this seems like a possibility given their willingness to adapt to change.

Branding and logo design seem to pop up in a variety of unusual places. There was a time when only large businesses needed a professionally designed identity; small businesses, schools and government organizations were exempt. Obviously these days are past! Now, apparently even churches need logos and branding and church websites. One church is even aggressively marketing itself with an ad campaign that matches that of a huge multinational corporation. Check out these top 10 church identities.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints has taken a few public relations blows lately. Polygamist members of the FLDS, a more extreme sect of the religion, have brought negative publicity. Shows such as Big Love and Sister Wives present polygamy as a mainstream Mormon choice, although the church hierarchy begs to differ. The Mormon Church’s well-known support of Proposition 8, banning gay marriage in California, has garnered a lot of public criticism as well. It is unusual to see a religion aggressively marketed like this, but then it might be just what this religion needs.

The ad campaign, which ran in several different cities, featured billboards and other signage showing people of all races and walks of life, each under the headline: I’m a Mormon. This ties into a new line of videos both on the church’s website, Mormon.org, and YouTube. In much the same manner as the billboards, the videos show diverse people such as a female Hawaiian surfer and a lawyer raised in the projects, all professing a common faith.

Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints spokesman Michael Purdy states, “There’s undoubtedly a national conversation going on about the church and its members, and we want to be part of that conversation.” Fair enough.

Kevin Kelly, who is both a Mormon and an associate professor at the primarily Mormon Brigham Young University, hopes that the campaign will help to dispel some of the misconceptions about the LDS church and its members. “We would like to overcome some of those stereotypes,” he adds.

New York City is one of the targeted areas for this campaign, especially Times Square. Not coincidentally, Times Square is currently home to ‘The Book of Mormon’, a musical that pokes fun at certain stereotypes applied to Mormon missionaries. The church is hoping to present themselves as a diverse group of people, rather than a group of ultra-traditionalists that sends out hordes of naïve, barely pubescent missionaries as portrayed in the award-winning play.

The musical is not the only reason that the church needs to improve their image as soon as possible. Two different Mormons have announced their candidacy for the upcoming presidential election. Unfortunately, one-fifth of Republicans and more than one-quarter of Democrats expressed in a poll that they would be reluctant to vote for a Mormon candidate. If there is to be a Latter Day Saint in the Oval Office, the church will need to convince Americans that they are more than a group of stereotypes. This ad campaign may be a little unusual simply because we are not used to seeing ads for religions, but it is a good start in building the church’s image.

As far as mascot design go, the one mascot for the Nashville Predators was one of the most genuinely terrifying creatures we have ever seen. This saber toothed tiger has orange luminous eyes with no pupils and gleaning teeth that so sharp even the shadowing has points. This logo is certainly imposing. Unfortunately, it is also too complicated. The little details are fun and add to the fear factor, but they don’t reproduce well in large and small sizes. Even the scariest hockey mascot needs to look good on a jersey, after all. This is one of the most important principles of mascot design.

Hence, we see the new mascot. It is almost as scary as the original and keeps the exact same outline. However, the new Nashville Predators mascot sample has been simplified. The teeth have more realistic shading that will also reproduce better, and the gold band around the creature has been matched with a gold band running through the design. Many of the details have been cut; in fact, while the old logo design and mascot used seven colors, the new ones use two. This will mean a huge saving on printing costs in addition to the more recognizable image.

The wordmark or the team has also been redesigned, although much less drastically so. The new wordmark is pointy, italicized, and bold; in other words, it is almost a caricature of what a team wordmark should look like. However, it is appropriate for the aggressive sport of hockey logo and even more appropriate for this team in particular, seeing as how it has fangs.

As we were reading about this new logo, a question kept popping up in our heads: why Predators? It is a mascot name that we have never heard before, and the saber tooth tiger, while fierce, seems an unlikely choice for a hockey team. It ends up that there is significance to this choice of animal. About forty years ago, the skeleton of a saber toothed cat was found during a building construction, and it became somewhat of a local legend in Nashville.

How will this new mascot and logo go over with fans? It should be noted that the same mascot has been used since the team joined the NHL in 1997. While Nashville does not seem like an obvious hockey town, the Predators have done well almost every year and been to the playoffs a few times, rallying a fair amount of local support. We think fans will like this new design because it is very similar to the old one, just a less complicated version.

Mascot design is important because it rallies fans and communities. It gives the teams a name and an image with which to identify. It is crucial in most modern sports to have a great, professionally designed logo and mascot. After all, no one wants to feel embarrassed over their team’s design elements. However, the old mascot had a fatal flaw—difficulty in scaling—and the new mascot addresses that beautifully.

Gogo has only been in operation for a few years, but they have changed the way we travel. No more paying ten bucks to watch a lousy Disney movie or flipping through the in-flight magazines. When we fly now, we watch movies on our laptops, update Facebook statuses, and surf the internet, thanks to in-flight internet service. Gogo was one of the first businesses to offer this service and is currently available on several major American flight carriers.

However, even the most successful businesses must modify their brand occasionally to meet the needs of a changing customer base. These changes in brand come at a time when Gogo is expanding their services as well. No longer offering just internet, the service is now expanding into new in-flight entertainment options such as discount shopping and streaming media. This makes the old logo design with the old tagline—inflight internet—a little inappropriate.

Gogo may not be secretive about their changes in services, but the travel logo design is still top-secret—except, as you can see, it has been leaked at several different websites. While the old logo bore a sphere representing the globe and a green streak to signify an airplane, the new one has a cloud with an arrow, which is a more original way of giving the same message. The writing remains lower case, but the new writing is cursive and more modern. The colors are also more modern. In all, this new logo has a web 2.0 feeling that will likely appeal to the modern traveler, while the old design was simply too dated to work well.

The brand new tagline is significant as well. Instead of a tagline advertising internet, the company now boasts, “In air. Online.” This is a better representation of the newly expanded range of services. However, it is less direct than the old tagline, which was very descriptive. We hope customers can figure out what the new tagline means!

We like the new logo better just because the old one was so, well, weird. It had a very dated, Atari-era feeling. The colors were completely irrelevant to the industry and also a bit out of style. The black globe was just weird. The new logo is more relevant, friendlier, and more approachable. While the old one fairly screams, “Unfriendly technology!” the new logo is amicable and welcoming.

One of the stranger parts of this rebranding move is the way it has been carried out. Instead of unveiling their new brand and logo design with fanfare, the company has instead leaked it out to a variety of sources. This leak usually comes with a link to new website… which is using the old logo still. It’s a little baffling, and we suspect that it simply was not thought through. On the other hand, everyone is talking about this logo design, even before its official introduction. That’s a lot of free publicity, possibly enough to make up for any confusion.

Related articles

• Big Ten Network Becomes BTN
• A Softer, Friendlier Logo for Milliken
• Nike Swoosh’s 40th Birthday

There are many notable museums in New York City, which can make it all the more difficult to differentiate a museum or other art brand. That does not make it any less important; tourists and residents alike need to know why they should spend a day at your museum rather than all of the other cultural attractions in the Big Apple. A professional and creative logo design is essential to creating a successful brand of any kind.

The Museum of the Moving Image in NYC has been through a lot of changes this year, many of them geared at differentiating the museum from others in the area. A new addition has been made and a new visual identity and signage represent the museum to the community.

Not a lot about the museum has changed—not on the surface at least. We still see black and white as the main colors, and upper case letters without an image. However, the changes are more notable than they at first seem, and they create a very different brand. The old logo design features very plain writing, almost nondescript, with little character or brand. The most interesting part of the logo is the way the word ‘moving’ has been angled so it appears to be coming out at you. That is clever, but it just is not enough for a museum with this rich history.

The new logo is blockier and ultra-modern. It is an imposing presence. If you look at the left side, the writing is aligned to form the museum’s nickname—MoMI—vertically. The font is very square and has a space age presence that will go well with the contemporary new addition to the building. It also will match the inside of the building, which is angular and stark white with a lot of glass accents. Opened in  1988, this museum was ready for a refurbishment.

Why the futuristic logo design and font for a museum showcasing the history of film? Well, this museum is not just about the films we loved in the past, but also about celebrating the evolution in technology and equipment that is allowing newer and more interesting effects in cinematography. It represents not just the past, but the present and the future of the industry. Moreover, the logotype is based partially on the shapes seen in the architecture, a device used by several museums throughout the world. After all, the unusual building is part of the museum’s brand, so why not make it part of the logo as well?

Online, the logo seems to come alive. Instead of being plain black, the letters are filled with colorful and abstract images. The letters are thick enough that this creates a beautiful show, and it can be personalized to showcase different films and actors as well. In short, this is an attractive new logo that ties into the museum building and brand, while allowing for more recognition and interesting animation strategies. It is simple enough to remember, but complex enough to be interesting. Who could ask for more?

Business owners are people first and foremost. You are more than your logo design and branding, more than your profit and loss sheets. You have a personal life, and you probably have strong religious and political beliefs as part of that life. You bring these beliefs with you into the workplace. However, at what point can politics in business be too much? Can politics kill a brand?

We are asking this question now because a major corporation, Dole, is attaching their company publically to the far right of the political spectrum. Dole recently attended the RightOnline conference and was one of the major sponsors. In addition, one of the company’s executives gave a talk that identified her as a representative of the Dole brand and criticized some of the President’s policies. To give you an idea of the ideology of the event, speakers included Glenn Beck and Michelle Bachmann.

So, can politics kill a brand? Last summer, superstore Target almost was the subject of a huge boycott after funding an anti-gay rights candidate. The left wing organizations HRC and MoveOn.org publically criticized the retailer, and the publicity came very inauspiciously at a time when the retailer was planning to expand their presence in gay rights friendly San Francisco, CA. While it did not kill Target, it certainly was not the type of publicity that the Target corporation wanted during their busy Back-to-School season. It probably cost the business in profits and compromised their expansion plans.

Dole is not merely sponsoring a few pet causes; they seem to be embracing a right wing identity for their brand. They were the only ‘consumer products’ sponsor of the conference. In addition, they are a sponsor of the Christian group Focus on the Family and even have been a corporate partner in contest run by the nonprofit group. There is also a libertarian slant to certain areas of the website dealing with the economics of food.

You don’t cease to be human just because you are the head of a brand. You are still entitled to have political opinions and to make political donations. However, you have to be cognizant of the fact that many of your customers, about half of them in most cases, will disagree with you. In a nation that is more polarized than ever, many people will in fact avoid doing business with a corporation that gives money to causes they find distasteful. In fact, you have probably made similar consumer decisions.

Polarizing groups are, well, polarizing. You may gain some new brand fans, but you will likely lose just as many. Also, even people who agree with your political beliefs may find politics a personal and uncomfortable subject and avoid your business as a result. In general, mixing politics with business is not a wise decision when it comes to branding or profit. You will lose more than you gain from the situation. Don’t let your brand develop unpleasant connotations in the eyes of your customers; instead, keep polarizing subjects as far away from your business as possible.

You may not watch the Big Ten Network, but many Americans do. In fact, there is actually a Big Ten Network beamed into around 80 million homes, allowing fans of the conference to access information and games at any time, 24 hours per day since August of 2007.

This network is gaining popularity, which is a good reason to put a new focus on branding. It has shortened its name to BTN and is the proud owner of a new network logo design. This media company logo is intended to present Big Ten Network… er, BTN… as a professional sports network on par with any other and a representative of the twelve schools in the conference. We suspect that the use of initials is partly to deflect from the word ‘ten’ as this is not the actual number of involved schools.

The new name feels more like a network name—think of ABC, CNN, etc—and the logo is reminiscent of a sports network as well. The logo is extremely flexible, which is important. The subdued color scheme is not a central part of the brand, so it can be modified to create BTN logos in different school colors. The BTN President, Mark Silverman, has stated that this will make it easier to add other products to the brand. No specific products were named, but it is clear that the franchise will be expanding.

This change in brand name and logo design feels like a good move. While the logo is not mind-blowing, it is typical of sports networks. It can be used effectively in the network’s graphics and animations, as well as on the website. The logo has a simple color scheme in blue and white, which can be changed according to the school being referenced. The square shape is bold and substantial, but it is angled slightly to give a feeling of movement that is crucial for a sports network logo. The star adds a little sparkle while also adding interest.

The newly shortened name is within the square, while the original full name is below in blocky, collegiate letters. We suspect that as the network gains popularity, the full name will be gradually phased out and the initials embraced as the official name of the channel.

This network is rebranding at a great time: as the channel gains popularity, but with a substantial following already. This logo and name change is a good middle ground. It is distinctly sporty, but specific to the schools involved. It shows both the new and the old name so established fans can begin to make the mental switch.

Rebranding is a scary process, but as you can see, it often results in a more viable brand with the flexibility to allow growth. A growing company needs a brand that can accommodate changes. While the new logo is not very specific to the conference, it can easily be modified more in the future as the BTN brand continues to grow.

The wedding website “The Knot” may seem like a recent concept, but it is already fifteen years old. Begun in 1996 with seed money from then-giant AOL, the online wedding brand has a recognizable logo design and a model that has been copied multiple times by many competitors. The brand now includes weddingchannel.com, The Nest, and The Bump, following women from marriage to the baby carriage. Starting last week, The Knot is a NYSE publically traded company under the trading symbol XOXO.

Why has this website worked well? How can you duplicate this success within your own brand? Here are a few of our thoughts on the subject.

• Diverse sources of revenue. Many people begin a website on a niche topic such as this one with no idea of how it will earn money. The fact is that advertising is not always enough. The Knot has monetized its business in several ways, including online gift registries and partnerships with retailers such as QVC. The site also sells its own branded merchandising and has normal advertisements. These revenue sources have created enormous success for The Knot and show a diverse number of ways that a non-commerce website can get revenue.
• A large and steady amount of traffic. Even a monetized website needs to have a large amount of traffic, in order to make the significant amount of income that The Knot currently enjoys. There are several ways that the website has accomplished this. First and most important, it has a brand, a strong brand that can be recognized by young women all over the country. This brand solves a very common problem by offering a one stop website with information and resources for planning important milestones. While advertising has been a part of the equation, people have to like what they see enough to engage with the brand and return often.
• A professionally designed logo and visual brand. The visual aspects of the brand are also important, because these design elements make the customer base trust the website. The Knot’s logo design has a sky blue background that is clear and serene, relating to the happiness of these occasions. The name of the website is written in a continuous, lower case script, which gives a friendly and approachable feeling. There is no image, which may be the reason that the brand has been so versatile. It has changed with ease into a brand encompassing a variety of life stages.

Success depends on luck to a certain extent, but luck is not the sole factor or even the most important one. Online businesses such as The Knot must be designed for success. They must have a plan for attracting traffic, earning revenue from that traffic, and keeping their audience interested and engaged. This is a formula that can be seen in a variety of online brands, especially those that survived the notorious dot-com bust. There is still potential for earning money online, but you must follow proven paths to success.

While McDonald’s is clinging to their Ronald McDonald character, a topic that has been on the news due to outcry from childhood obesity activists, rival Burger King is rumored to be developing a new logo design that downsizes the actual King. This is just one of many changes that are purportedly planned for the fast food giant.

The Miami Herald broker the news this week and Whopper lovers around the country are already getting nervous. This is not just a slight change in brand, but a complete overhaul for the restaurant (if you want to call it that). The chain is going to change their logo, their marketing, their menu, and even the appearance of their stores.

The menu will offer not just old favorites—including the Whopper—but healthier choices as well. Some of the ideas emerging are mango and berry smoothies and Asian chicken salad with fresh edamame and low-cal vinaigrette. The stores will be modified to feel more modern and streamlined, with red and black as the main colors. The King will be cut out of advertising, and even the word ‘King’ perhaps made smaller in the logo design.

These modifications to the fast food brand come after a change in ownership. Although Burger King has a well-recognized brand and logo design, it is very similar to many other fast food restaurants, such as McDonald’s. One way for the company to ensure future success is to differentiate itself from the competition. Presenting itself as a more sophisticated, more adult choice via streamlined visuals and the loss of the cartoon-y king will definitely accomplish this, especially when you consider that McDonald’s is determined to hold onto their clown.

One change in store is a modification of the target marketing audience. Burger King, like most fast food, has a target audience of mainly men. However, the new brand will reach out to females as well. Because most men consider the preferences of the women in their lives when choosing where to eat as a couple, this may be the winning blow in the battle between Ronald and the King.

Burger King is putting their money where their mouth is, so to speak. The new owners are replacing some of their management and moving their advertising budget to $320 million annual advertising budget to another firm.

In addition to adding new, female and diet friendly selections to their menu, Burger King will also be placing a greater emphasis on food quality. Jonathan Muhtar, BK’s VP of global innovation states, “As we develop new products, we’re focusing on best in class and quality.” Considering the notoriously low quality of most fast foods, this goal should be well within the company’s reach.

Differentiating your business from your competitors is one of your greatest branding tasks. This new Burger King brand should be interesting, because there are only so many ways you can present fast food and most of them are already being used!

If you haven’t heard of Milliken, you probably will never need to. However, regardless of your interest in the company, there is one good reason to care about the company’s logo design. The Milliken logo is changing, and the change is in many ways representative of a current change in the logo design industry: from substantial, blocky logos that signify power and strength to curvier ones that are friendly and calming.

You can almost feel the years breeze by just looking at the two logos. On one hand, we have the blocky Milliken logo design from before. In all capital letters and simply black, it seems to be the most serious logo we have ever seen. Three nested triangles make a letter M, and lines throughout the M add yet more of a business-y feel. This logo may be serious, but it is also strong and masculine. It dominates a page and lets all viewers know that this company is in a no-frills, no joke kind of industry.

On the other hand, there is the new logo.  In a clear blue, it feels trustworthy and calming. It is personal as well, with the script resembling a signature. The writing is rounded and bubbly, giving a friendly feeling.

Milliken is a no nonsense kind of business—they create carpet and floor covering, specialty materials, and chemicals. This is not a small business by any means, but an employer of 7000 people in 39 sites around the world. These facts may make the old, more serious logo design seem more appropriate.

While the logos may seem like night and day, the new logo is as large a part of the business as the old one. You see, the logo is based on the signature of the late Roger Milliken, the second president and son of the founder of the company. He was known for sending hand written notes to people, including employees. Many employees of that era have saved some of his thoughtful notes all these years. This personal touch is one of the factors that defined Milliken.

Roger Milliken’s signature is a personal touch that has defined the company for years. As such, a logo design was created from it; in fact, an entirely new font, called “Thank You”, was designed from it.

Not only does this new logo feel personal and relate to the company history, it also has a creative side that is a good match with the goals of the company. After all, this company is not just a producer but an innovator as well. The logo design also gives the company a chance to share their lore and even to make it part of the brand. If the personal touch of Roger Milliken can be replicated throughout the company, it will be a pleasant place to do business indeed. The newer logo is still serious and corporate, but it is a more modern and more approachable choice.

What comes to mind when you think of the word ‘plastic’? Few people think of the color green, but this is exactly the association that you will be making soon.

Bioplastics are a type of plastic that is more environmentally friendly. First, instead of being created from fossil fuels, they are created from agricultural products such as vegetable oil and starch. Second, they are completely biodegradable. You can throw them in your compost bin and just a few short months later be harvesting tomatoes out of the remains of your Pepsi bottle. In other words, these plastics are completely sustainable, which is why they are called ‘bioplastics’.

Many people have mixed feelings about using plastic in their daily lives. On one hand, plastics are among the most convenient and versatile materials on the earth. On the other hand, many people are concerned about the ecological impact of them. Until bioplastics came along, plastic had to be made from a dwindling reserve of petroleum products and the waste could not break down under natural conditions. Obviously bioplastics solve a huge problem and thus deserve their very own logo design.

The new logo features a hexagon, a shape commonly associated with chemistry, as the blossom of a flower. The mix of nature and chemistry is clever. The green color is a common sense choice as well. We are not too sure about the gradient; it doesn’t feel natural for some reason. However, on the whole this is a great logo that will represent its company well.

Where will you be seeing this logo design? First, you may be seeing it on Pepsi bottles in 2012, when the company aims to introduce bioplastics as the new plastic bottle for their products. Second, you will be seeing it on all Cereplast bioplastics. Cereplast is indeed the rightful owner, having bought the logo fair and square from graphics student Laura Howard. Ms. Howard’s work was chosen from 1,500 different submissions on Earth Day in a contest modeled after the 1970 contest that led to the creation of the now familiar recycling symbol. We know: contests are bad. This one, however, was held for the sake of tradition, so we will forgive them.

Although Cereplast owns the logo, we are assuming that, as with the recycling logo design, this image will be used on all products made of bioplastics as a public service announcement of sorts. After all, customers need to know which plastics are more environmentally friendly. Bioplastics can also be composted, which is an important reason for them to be labeled. If Cereplast decide to keep this out of the public domain and use it only for their own company, that really sucks. Still, we understand. It’s a great logo, and no company wants to pay $25,000 for a logo design that everyone else will be using.

Who ever would have guessed that plastics would someday have their own logo? The world is a changing place, and even the most mundane products need a logo to represent them and their cause.

The Nike Swoosh is one of the best recognized logos in the world. It also boasts one of the longest terms in continual use. Whether you are wearing thirty year old Nikes or brand new ones, they probably have the familiar curved checkmark.

The humble story of the Nike Swoosh has become a near-legend. A Portland State graphic arts student was paid $2 an hour—not a bad wage in 1971, but not a great one either—to design the legendary logo. The owner of Nike, Phil Knight, wanted a shape that would signify movement but without being similar to the sports logos of the day. He was a little underwhelmed by the resulting Swoosh but decided to use it anyway. The student wanted time to refine the work, but Knight needed a logo immediately. The final bill was $35.

Why did Phil Knight originally dislike the Swoosh? He was very enamored with a competitor’s logo—the Adidas stripes—and was not sure the humble Swoosh would be as popular.

The Swoosh has gone on to be one of the most famous logos in global business. The Nike corporation earned more than $19 billion last year in sales, many of those dollars coming from merchandise bearing their recognizable Swoosh. Clearly this design has been an integral part of Nike’s success.

In 1983, the company decided to reward the graphic artist for the longevity of the logo she had designed. They threw a party in which the logo designer was given a gold ring bearing the Nike Swoosh and a certificate for a large amount of Nike stock, which the designer still has not sold.

We’ll forgive Nike for hiring a student rather than a professional designer; at the time, logo design was much less affordable than it is now. And, after all, the ends justify the means. The startup company had a logo at last, one that would become a core part of their growing brand. As the Swoosh approaches its 40^th birthday, we are sure that Nike considers their $35 money well spent.

How has logo design affected Nike? It is difficult to see the company achieving the same success without good branding. The Swoosh logo is a huge part of that brand. Sure, there are other components of that brand (the Just Do It tagline, for example) that have contributed to the company’s success, but the Swoosh has laid the foundation for the brand.

Logo design is a valuable part of building a brand, and a logo design that does its job is worth more than its weight in gold—just ask the designer of the Swoosh, who has a gold ring bearing her famous design! Is your logo design good enough to be the face of a successful, growing business? Does it represent you perfectly and give you the edge you need? Will it look just as good in forty years? If not, it may be time to find out how good design can change your business.

Why is there a museum dedicated to design? Design, including logo design, clothing design, landscape design and more, is a field that is highly visible in the United States, even ubiquitous. However, this does not detract from the art involved in design. Design can be functional and commercial, but a great deal of artistry and talent are involved. Good designers are born, trained and learn their field over the course of a lifetime. We think that design definitely deserves a museum.

Of course a museum focused on design needs a logo that is a good example of the profession, and the logo for Design Museum Boston does not disappoint and could be included in the top 10 museum logos. It uses the popular mosaic motif, with parts of the mosaic missing at the bottom of the image. Plain letters in rounded lettering without serifs create a friendly and yet professional feeling. Benton Sans is not the most creative font, but it is a good choice when you really want viewers to look at the rest of the logo.

Mosaic designs usually represent many parts coming together to form a whole. This is appropriate for any community organization that is funded by donations and grants, but especially for Design Museum Boston. This museum is not your average tourist spot.

This museum needs a solid brand more than most because it does not have its own facility. Rather, it is “a decentralized network of physical and virtual exhibits” that has exhibits in traditional museums, public parks, and even websites. Because design does not by nature exist in a vacuum, but rather is a part of everyday life, this museum will be a part of everyday life as well.

One of the things that we really love about this logo is that the motif can be used in a variety of ways to create continuity in the brand. For example, as you see in the Donate button from the organization’s  website, arrows and other shapes can be created using the same colors and mosaics, making them a recognizable part of the museum’s identity. This is particularly important because the exhibits will not be grouped in the same space. They need to be group stylistically instead.

We predict that Design Museum Boston will be an enormous success. First, the logo design and visual identity are very good—good enough to make an impression even on the design-loving crowd that this museum’s exhibits will draw. Second, this is an unusual concept that represents design well, but also helps to keep down overhead costs such as rent and electric. Last, design is an important part of our culture. It makes our surroundings and indeed our lives as a whole meaningful and aesthetically pleasing.

In a design oriented world, amateur work stands out more than ever. Is your company’s logo ready to stand beside the many great logos of your competition? Does it represent your company in a meaningful and beautiful way? If not, it may be time to talk to a professional logo designer.

Like all industries right now, the fashion magazine business is having hard times. Most women have their faves, but with household discretionary budgets dwindling, magazines have to be especially aggressive in marketing themselves. W Magazine, long known as a fashion industry giant, is rebranding their publication to remain relevant in the ever-changing fashion world.

This rebranding strategy comes with a new brand, a new tagline, and a new logo design. The new tagline is ‘Fashion’s After Party’. This is not so much a change of brand as it is a clarification of the current image. W is one of the edgier, more fashion-forward magazines in the industry, eschewing most of the celebrity gossip and love life advice for several hundred glossy pages of pure fashion. W also covers fashion events more heavily than other fashion magazines. These factors make the tagline appropriate and truthful.

The new fashion logo design is identical to the old, but italicized for a pointier, edgier look. The slant of the letters creates a feeling of movement, but also a lot of pointy edges. The result is an edgier feeling that is definitely appropriate for the magazine’s brand. The magazine has also adopted a new marketing campaign designed to portray themselves as the after party of the fashion industry, with black and white photos and handwritten notes below. These photos can be seen on billboards and taxi roofs around New York City.

This slight change in brand comes just a year after the magazine changed leadership. He expressed that he spends a lot of time at various fashion-related parties, which tend to be stuffy and formal, but that the real fun happens at the after parties. He intends for W magazine to capture this fun, informality while maintaining its fashion forward image. The new brand is also being promoted by the magazine sending free champagne (Dom Perignon, of course) to celebrities, designers, and other notables in the fashion world. We still have not received our bottle…

If rebranding is a scary step for your business, a brand modification such as this one may be the answer. Nothing about W has changed except the logo design, and even that change is minor. The company is simply clarifying what sets them apart in the world of fashion. This will not alienate current readers (although it may make them more excited about their favorite magazine once again) but there is a good chance that it will attract a large number of interested readers. The magazine does not have to make any drastic changes to live up to their new image; the logo design and tagline describe who they really are.

This can be a good strategy for businesses in other industries. Rebranding may actually lose customers (although professional designers take care to minimize this by creating a brand that the existing customer base can embrace) but a slight modification in a brand can invite new friends while keeping the old.

Logo design and branding can accomplish a lot. They can build a business or utterly destroy it. They can inspire customers to become patrons or turn them off entirely. However, the United States government is hoping that logo design can perform a new and interesting role in combatting obesity.

Obesity is one of the greatest health concerns facing the American public, having risen to dangerous and even embarrassing proportions. Health experts estimate that the generally excessive weight of our population may double or even triple our annual health care expenditures. It is impossible for a society to be successful in the long-term when its average citizen is unhealthy. There are good reasons for the government to care about the weight of Americans.

The new logo features the name of the new USDA Food Pyramid website along with a plate broken into ideal portions. The cool green background is modern and nonthreatening; in addition, this color has been found to make people less hungry, which is probably why it is so conspicuously absent from fast food restaurants. After all, this logo is not intended to make Americans want to reach for a snack.

The plate is divided into sections that are intended to show the proportion of your diet that should be made up of the different food groups. These sections are brightly colored to be eye-catching and also to contrast with the lime green background.

There’s no doubt that the logo is going to gain some attention, but it (and the newly designed website) has already been the source of criticism and controversy. Nutritionists and other health professionals have protested that it does little to address the major cause of obesity: the huge portions of food consumed in the United States. There are no guidelines in the logo design as to how many ounces a portion should be. However, it should be noted that the logo is intended to draw people to the website, not to present comprehensive dietary guidelines at a glance. Also, there is some conflicting information on the website, but that has nothing to do with the logo or the general brand.

Hopefully this logo will be more effective than its predecessors. The first food pyramid was released in 1992 to inform the public of what exactly good nutrition entails. That was not effective, so a new, revised pyramid was released in 2005, including more detailed information about food choices along with a little stick figure to represent exercise. This was still ineffective; hence the new design.

Is a lack of dietary awareness and education the reason for America’s obesity epidemic? If so, this logo design just may be successful in cutting back on the growing number of overweight and obese Americans. However, there are likely other factors that contribute to the unfortunate trend. Sedentary lifestyles, the low cost of unhealthy foods and other causes will not be affected by a logo. We believe in the power of good graphic design, but even the most avid design enthusiast will acknowledge that field cannot do everything.

What comes to mind when you think of Salem, Massachusetts? For most people in the United States, this town conjures up images of witch trials and famous hauntings. However, instead of embracing their dark side, Salem has seemed determined to hide it.

Consider, as Exhibit A, their former logo. It features an old-fashioned boat with sails set against a bright sun, with the name of the town written in stodgy capital letters with serifs. These elements, combined with the blue colors that dominate the logo, create a distinctly nautical feeling. This would be a fine identity for a town that had a less notable history. For Salem it feels undistinctive, especially when compared to the area’s notable history.

Many of Salem’s visitors—in fact, probably most of them—visit Salem, Massachusetts because of its somewhat dark history. That’s why we were so happy to see the new logo design. The town has introduced a new logo and a new tagline that are better representatives of the area’s unique flair. Instead of blue and yellow colors, a sophisticated and understated black is used. We still see a sailboat on the water as the logo image… or is that a witch’s hat? The new logo seems to say: this is a quiet, nautical New England town—maybe.

The font was obviously chosen to ‘go with’ the image, although it is not a particularly distinctive choice. Even so, the logo design for Salem is overall an improvement over the past one. It ties into the main reason that people visit Salem and gives a shout out to both the seaboard activities and the witch trials. The tagline also refers indirectly to the town’s past: Still Making History. This is a better brand for Salem. They had some interesting things happen in the past, but it is a relevant place in modern times as well.

We can see why Salem was attempting to build an image beyond historical tragedies. After all, the witch trials are considered a somewhat embarrassing episode in early American history. The town happens to be placed in a beautiful maritime area with historical significance beyond the witch trials, and there are more than 40,000 permanent residents who, we assume, have normal, modern lives.

Nonetheless, a tourism brand and logo design should give some reference to the factors that set the destination apart. The majority of Salem’s tourist activities in some way have to do with witches and the occult because those are main reasons that people visit the area. October is the busiest month, and the locals seem to be embracing the past that the tourism council has until recently ignored. The high school’s mascot is a witch, and police uniforms bear a flying witch. You can’t just pretend that this rich and interesting history doesn’t exist, not if you want to keep tourist dollars flowing into the town. The new logo design shows the town as a diverse area without ignoring the unique brand.

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With marketing and branding becoming an ever greater part of American life, we are seeing logos in increasing unusual places. One of the more unusual will be seen next month, on space shuttle Atlantis’s fuel tank.

The United States flag and the NASA logo fly proudly on every space shuttle, but the commemorative logo design is a new addition. In fact, this is only the second time that a space shuttle has had special decoration, out of a long history of 135 missions. There is good reason to add a new logo to Atlantis; this will be the last US space shuttle mission after the program’s thirty year run.

The logo was chosen from a large number of images submitted by NASA’s present and former employees. It features a space shuttle blasting out of a circle, representing the earth. Several decorative bars are arranged in a diamond shape behind the space shuttle image, including one that resembles the American flag. Two sets of stars represent the fourteen astronauts lost in two separate space shuttle disasters as well as the five space shuttles in the program. The bars create a feeling of movement while the diamond shape implies quality and excellence.

The deep colors are reminiscent of outer space and the night sky, and they also will be easy to see against the stark white of the shuttle. The new logo design also relates to an old tagline that was used for the space shuttle program when it began in April of 1981: The Gem of the Galaxy. This tagline is being resurrected for the final mission of the space shuttle program.

This logo will be displayed on the fuel tank of the space shuttle, which is located near the nose of the aircraft. It will also be available in medallions, patches, t-shirts, and other accessories created to celebrate the event. This is a fun way of celebrating a rather sad occasion: the end of America’s space shuttle era, which comes at a time when NASA and other exploratory programs are being closed due to budget matters.

If you are interested in watching the final American space shuttle flight, it will occur on July 8. The hand-painted logo is on a 3 by 5 foot panel that has not yet been added to the space shuttle, but it will be completed the week before the launch.

Those of us who grew up with the space shuttle program, witnessing the Columbia disaster and generally worshipping the astronauts who manned the many missions, will be a little sad to see the end of this program. There is no occasion more deserving of a commemorative logo design. While we are normally against websites”>crowdsourcing, the NASA employees clearly understood their ‘mission’ to create a logo worthy of this event and did a fine job.

Special event logos can be a great way to celebrate milestones, but it is important that the designs be professional and appropriate for the situation. If you are wondering a special logo is the right choice for your business, consult a logo designer.

Government logos are rarely impressive, or even adequate, but the logo for the United States Department of the Interior is downright atrocious. Designed to look like a seal, the logo design features the date that the department was begun (we already knew it was old!) and a buffalo standing in front of blue mountains and a glowing sunset. Could it get any worse?

The US Department of the Interior seems to be betting that the logo truly could not get worse. From the colors to the image, every element seems almost randomly chosen. The department obviously needs a new logo. However, instead of turning to a design professional, the bureaucracy is instead crowdsourcing the design.

Crowdsourcing is somewhat of a trend right now, an unfortunate trend that is lowering the standards of logo design by the hour. It is even more unfortunate when you consider that a good, professional logo design could usually be bought for even less money. In this case, the government agency plans to award a large sum of money to the winner. This money would be better spent in actually purchasing a professional logo. It could only get worse if the government decided to let citizens vote for their favorite from a number of finalists, which is fortunately not happening.

This logo may be no worse than its predecessor, but we predict that it will come and go quickly. While the old logo is not a beautiful specimen, it is similar to the old seal-type logos that are often seen in government agency logos. The buffalo makes little sense, but it is not completely random; most of us associate the animal with Midwestern America, which is certainly the ‘interior’. The new logo? Who knows what it will represent. If it is like many logos created in the same manner, it will be hastily created by someone will little experience in the field.

Not only does crowdsourcing add to the total design bill while lowering the quality of the product, it asks designers that are not winners (the majority, that is) to work for free. In a democratic nation that is currently in the midst of a recession, this is a bad choice—almost unforgivable. When you add in the fact that many designers in crowdsourcing sites are from third world countries, the political situation gets even more precarious. Crowdsourcing was, plain and simple, a bad choice for this logo, even more so than usual.

The end logo design will probably not be a good representative of this government agency, and that is truly unfortunate. Unfortunately, the real tragedy will be the numerous designers who are exploited in the making of the logo. Hopefully, awareness of the dangers of crowdsourcing will increase so we don’t see more government agencies turning to underpaid amateurs for the logo designs and images designed to represent them. There is no reason that the prize could not have been used to pay a qualified designer, with a better product and a less exploitative process.

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We write a lot about Google’s special event logos, but they really seem to outdo themselves every time. The company has moved from making simple, celebratory holiday logos to creating interactive designs that show the full range of Google’s creativity. The latest, Les Paul logo, will surely go down as one of the company’s most interesting, especially to music lovers around the world.

The Google Les Paul logo design interprets the Google logo as a guitar. That is interesting in itself, but the real magic lies in the interactive features of the logo. In honor of what would be the famous musician’s 96^th birthday (Paul died two years ago this August), the guitar logo could actually be played with a computer mouse. Users could record songs of thirty seconds, play them back and share them with others via a unique URL for each song. Because Les Paul is considered the inventor of the electric guitar, this is not just creative but highly relevant to the event as well. It will go down in internet history as one of the more interesting Google logos, joining their John Lennon and Charlie Chaplin logos.

Because the Les Paul special edition logo design was so popular, Google extended the run and allowed it to be on the home search page for two days. However, this is not the first time that a special edition Google logo has been successful. In fact, the company seems to create so many holiday logos and other event logos that we only occasionally see the original Google logo anymore. The Google logo seems to lend itself especially well to variations. This is probably due to its simple, logotype design, it’s recognizable shape, and its distinctive elementary school color palette.

Each of the elements of the Google logo are recognizable on their own. However, most brands and logo designs are not so flexible. Many small business owners may see the success of special edition Google logos and wonder whether they should work on a few of their own. Unfortunately, variations on a logo rarely work. Google may be a notable exception to this rule, but it is nonetheless an exception. In most cases, switching up you logo will only create confusion and make your brand less recognizable to your customer base.

If you are wondering whether your logo is versatile enough to withstand routine ‘special editions’ and holiday varietals, you should talk to a logo designer. Even Google’s logos are professionally designed and programmed. Google may be willing to play with their brand, but they are very strict about protecting it by only allowing the most professional work to hit the public website. This attention to detail and branding is one of the factors that have built the Google brand to its current place as the top search engine on the globe. Your business deserves no less.

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Have you heard of Current TV? Have you watched it lately? For many Americans—too many for owner and founder Al Gore—the answer is no. However, the TV channel is hoping that a new visual identity will attract interested viewers and place the channel on the same level as other cable favorites such as CNN and Lifetime.

Current TV is very different from other television stations. Instead of running programming by the half-hour or hour, like other stations, it features smaller ‘pods’ that represent a variety of topics and viewpoints. The result is an eclectic mix of programming that viewers can tune into at any time. Launched in 2005, Current is basically a cable version of YouTube. Despite this interesting take on television, very few people watch the channel.

However, a few aspects of Current TV are changing, factors that just may elevate the brand reputation in a very shirt time frame. First, Keith Olbermann of CNN fame is moving exclusively to Current. Olbermann brings with him a sizeable following as well as a recognizable fame. Second, the brand is currently in the middle of transitioning to the traditional thirty and sixty minute time slots at least part of the time; it ends up that most viewers are not comfortable with alternative timing. Last, the brand is adopting a new logo design and visual identity that, management hopes, will woo new viewers and present the brand as a viable choice.

Remember when Howard Stern moved to satellite radio and gave it instant street cred? That’s what Current is hoping will happen here. However, the changes in the logo design are certainly interesting. The new Current TV logo design retains the serious, square feeling of the old one, but loses the informality of the lower case letters. Instead of three dots at the end to give a feeling of constant movement, the logo itself moves, fluttering as though it is a flag. This will certainly make it easy to create the relevant on-air animations that are so popular in the television industry right now!

The Current TV logo also loses the lime green accent, although it gains much more. The new logo design is not color-dependent. While we usually advocate choosing a color palette as part of the logo design process, television stations are a unique situation. They must work well with a variety of programming. The simple black and white are flexible enough to avoid clashing, and it is eye-catching while creating a simple, recognizable image. Because the image is in motion, this is extremely important. Many TV stations incorporate a variety of colors to ensure that at least one of them match; avoiding color altogether is simpler and just as effective.

The old logo is also extremely square—in fact, it is constructed of the small shape, like pixels or building blocks. The new logo design uses bars above and below the lettering to create a rectangular shape and maintain the serious feeling. The implication is that the seriousness of the programming will not be changing despite the change in brand.

If you think the logo design and branding process is trying, consider it from the perspective of an actual designer. A designer’s logo must be the best example of their work, showing their timeless style and their knowledge of trends in the same image. A logo representing a group of designers or the design industry as a whole must be absolutely flawless.

Consider the San Francisco Design Week 2011 logo. Do you think it is flawless? We don’t think so; no work of art is perfect, even icons such as the Mona Lisa and Beethoven’s Fifth. However, it combines classic good logo design with many of this year’s hot logo design trends. Considering that SFSW is a project of numerous professional design organizations and represents West Coast design as a whole, the bar has been set rather high for this design.

What is classic? We like the jewel toned colors, along with using a logotype instead of an image. The trendy elements are easier to pick out: the grading of the colors, the use of transparency in parts of the design, and the rounded letters. The transparent parts of the logo could be taken as backlighting, but they actually represent a phenomenon for which San Francisco is known: fog. Only SF insiders and regular visitors know about the intense fog that blankets the city at times, so the subtlety of an inside joke is added.

We have to give San Francisco Design Week a shout-out for avoiding clichés such as cable cars, the Golden Gate bridge, and the well-known San Francisco skyline. Cliché is never a good logo motif. Fog may be a little less concrete as a concept, a little more difficult to render in a visual form, but it is appropriate and, in this case, well-done.

We normally are critical of trendy logos, but event logos are temporary by nature. SFDW had a different logo design last year, and the event will have a new logo design next year. It’s important to avoid full-on faddishness in a professional design event, but a little trendiness is appropriate for the occasion.

If you are interested in seeing how logo design trends can change from year to year (a good reason not to go with an overly trendy logo for your own business), check out last year’s San Francisco Design Week logo. In monochromatic red, the image features words related to design scrawled around a square created from negative space. The name of the event is written inside the square in a simple font that contrasts with the handwritten edging. Contrast and bold hues were trendy last year; this year, the colors are softer and the shapes more rounded.

Trends in logo design may not always be the best choice for a small business, but they are fun to watch. If you need a logo that is both timeless and timely, talk to a logo designer about the best way to approach your brand.

Starbucks fans want to know if the company has lost its mind. Many of them are upset with the new starbucks logo which brings forth the siren that has always been there, but eliminates the circles and the ever famous name “Starbucks”. Many say the name itself is the drawing card. Now they claim the new logo is plain looking and doesn’t do the company reputation justice.

As more and more companies are striving to fit into changing times. They feel that keeping up with all the aesthetic changes that happen around the globe is important. Fashion changes all year long. Shoes, make-up, clothes, hairstyles, computers, cars and electronics are always getting more modern, more streamlined, new generation looking, and old is out. At least that is what their advertising and marketing departments tell them. They are told they need to go with the flow, keep up with the changing times.

Remember, it wasn’t all that long ago that long ago that GAP thought they were doing the right thing by changing the GAP logo to what they thought was a more modern type only to have fans relate how disappointed they were with the new one, that they very quickly went back to the old one. Sometimes it is better to follow the old saying “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Many are wondering if this is the trend for Starbucks.

The Clorox Company changed their eco friendly logo not to long ago, but it was subtle changes that gave it a more modern look but kept the blue diamond with an added shade of green. Kraft Foods new logo reflects a friendlier look, not as harsh as the blue bold letters inside the bold red oval shaped box of before. It has that famous “swoosh” that is showing up in a lot of logos lately that ends in a colorful splash.

It has been stated that Walmart’s new logo was brought about to represent new changes on the inside of the their stores. Almost all of the stores have been rearranged with new product lines, upgrades on old product lines and discontinuation on some. Instead of the bold blue WAL*MART it is a much gentler WALMART* The asterisk on the first represents the star that used to be in the middle, the asterisk on the end represents the yellow sunburst at the end of the new logo. The Font on the new logo is thinner and softer looking, but it is still Walmart.

What will we see next year, or even in the next few months? It’s hard today. Most larger corporations are in constant competition with others and feel that they have to change something when other companies do in order to stay on top. Sometimes it is just little changes that are needed, and sometimes there are no changes needed. It really depends on the companies reputation as far as their  products and services go. If they provide what they state they will, and have done for years, then keeping the same logo may suffice. If the company is changing then maybe it is time for a new logo.

Logo designs are very important, not just for internet businesses, websites, but for any business that wants to keep its products and services in the public eye. There are many brand names out there. Brand name clothes, computers, televisions, shoes, and yes, even brand name gourmet foods. The advertising departments of these companies have spent many hours, hired trained people, and spent a good amount of money to come up with the right logo’s to help get these products and services known.

Although many of these companies offer high quality goods to their clients, it wasn’t the goods that first attracted the attention of their clients. It was their logo design. People saw an interesting logo being splashed all over the place and decided to see what all the hoopla was about. Once they found out how good they the products were they became life time customers. It became second nature for them to look for that logo no matter where they moved to or traveled, because they knew they could count on the company to supply the same quality goods they got in other locations.

As companies grow they change. Sometimes they change the way they provide services. Sometimes they make their services better, add to the services they already provide, or tweak the already good services they have. Sometimes they change their products. They may add a new designer, carry a new line, discontinue an old line, or offer a wider variety. This is a normal growth activity in any kind of business.

As companies change, they often feel that they need to change their advertising too so they will appeal to a larger, more diverse audience. For some companies, a change like this is great, but should only be done after careful consideration. For others, it isn’t the wisest thing for them to do and can actually hurt their sales, profits and even their popularity. When people find something they really like, even a small change, like a different logo, unless that logo is great, can make them start to worry about the services and goods the company provides.

For example, in October of 2010, Vanity Fair did an article about the GAP Logo Issue. It seems that they decided their logo design was too old and they needed something newer, more modern, sexy and cool so they designed a new one. Wow!! The new one was born but only lived for a week. Some of the comments made suggested that the new logo looked like “an emblem of some failed low-fair spin-off of a major airline”. Another comment compared it to the tee-shirts with rhinestone letters that you find in a thrift store that is neither vintage or cool. GAP sent it to Facebook for reviews, and within a week they reverted back to their old logo.

There was a lesson to be learned here. If something works and works well, don’t change it. In other words, if your sales and profit charts show you that your logo is still bringing in new clients, keeping the old clients and everything keeps rising, then “don’t kill your logo”.

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Is it hip to be square? Many of us remember an old rock song declaring so, but the Science Channel begs to differ. Starting this June, the Discovery channel Science will be adopting a new visual identity to replace their former square logo design.

The old logo design was square, but only in shape. The letters were round with a distinctive New Age feeling, and the lettering inside the square was off center and distinctive. This just feels like a science logo, reminiscent of a museum. However, the channel is changing to a new logo that also has science-y leanings.

The new Science TV Channel logo design comes with a nickname: Morph. It is an appropriate name for this shape, a kind of formless blob in a shiny dark gray. The name has been changed as well, dropping the ‘channel’. The new, single word name is written in lower case letters that are more science fiction than pure science. The first three letters are written on the Morph, suggesting another new nickname for the channel.

The ‘Morph’ nickname is significant because its shape will change constantly, rather like the drop of mercury that it resembles. The desired impression is that the channel is constantly changing and transforming itself just like the image. This is a risky move because it will make the logo more difficult to recognize at a glance, although the premise behind it is bold and appropriate for the brand.

The animations that are part of the marketing campaign are fun and have a definite cool factor, suggesting that Morph just might be effective.  This is important for the Science Channel—erm, Science—as it is going up against stiff competition. The better known Syfy is also more popular, offering similar programming. Science will have to offer more than a great logo design in order to compete, but a great logo design is definitely a good start.

According to the press releases, Science is supposed to be written in all upper case letters, a move that contradicts the logo (as it has all lower case lettering) and seems a little much. We seriously doubt that anyone outside the Discovery Networks (owner of this channel) will adhere to these guidelines due to their downright silliness.

If we could change one thing about this logo design, it would be the font used within Morph. There is no reason Science, SCIENCE, or the Science Channel (whichever you prefer) could not have used the same font used in the wording below the image. This would have created a better sense of continuity and made the font a more complete part of the brand.

All criticisms aside, the new logo is a bold change from the old one. It suggests a lot of changes for the channel, which the science nerds among us will enjoy watching. Many channels are rebranding right now—this channel’s chief competitor Syfy recently rebranded as we reported a while back—and it is important not to be the channel left behind.

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We are always arguing that professional logo design is within reach of everyone, and a new logo seems to agree with us. However, this is purely accidental, as the logo and the ‘it’s all within reach’ tagline are both part of a new brand for Gannett Media.

You probably have not heard of Gannett Media, but you have probably heard of one of the many newspapers and television channels that they own such as USA Today (and about eight other newspapers). Gannett Media in fact has one of the newspaper circulations in the United States in addition a large number of websites and local television stations.

The old logo is reminiscent of old school media designs, in black and white with connected letters to refer to the connections media makes with the people who access it. The globe is also a common image seen in media logo design. The new logo is a definite improvement, with plain lettering in a font that is distinctive but not particular to any field. The blue is corporate and rather universal as well. A super-corporation such as this one that encompasses many smaller brands has to be rather generic.

Further, the company has adopted a new tagline: It’s all within reach. This refers to the many different media owned by Gannett as well as the way these media put information in the hands of the people who access them.

This logo is intended to be used in a ‘business to business’ context. It will only rarely interact with the general public. If it seems a little ‘corporate’, well, it needs to be so.

There’s not a whole lot to say about the new identity, but Gannett has somehow found a way. This logo design has received national attention not so much for the design itself, but for the 100 pages of guidelines for its usage. In addition to this novel of regulations, there are branding videos and other information available on the internet. Obviously Gannett is very invested in this logo and intends for it to be used only in a company-approved manner!

This seems excessive, but it is actually not that unusual. While people outside the branding and marketing world may raise an eyebrow or two at the amount of rules for the use of this very, very simple logo design, it is important for companies to protect their image the way they would protect any other asset. Gannett’s logo will be used in a variety of applications, including in the logos of the many newspapers and media brands that the company owns. A few rules are necessary. 100 pages? Maybe not, but vigilance never killed anyone.

How are you protecting your logo design and brand? Good logo design is certainly in reach of businesses large and small, but these designs only work when they are used consistently and in the intended manner. You don’t probably need a 100 page book to guide your brand, but you should talk to a logo designer about how to make your design as effective as possible.

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The Travel Channel is one of the best known cable networks in the United States, but you would never know it from the logo design. The old travel logo left a lot to be desired. While a globe is definitely relevant to any kind of travel-related business, the lower case T had nothing to do with the business. Further, the orange color did not seem like a great choice because it tends to be a youthful color (think of its use in Nickelodeon). The writing below the image is as generic as could be, with no character and no identifying characteristics.

The new Travel Channel logo may not be perfect, but it is an improvement over the old. Instead of an image that makes little sense, the new logo has a text-only design that suits the adult feeling of the channel. However, ‘adult’ does not have to mean overly serious or corporate; lower case lettering and a sky-blue color have created a clean, informal feeling that will appeal to the armchair traveler. Further, the blue color is reminiscent of blue skies and clear seas, two things that people like to see while on vacation.

The new font is not exactly the most original that we have seen, but it is rounded and modern in feel. We are a little tired of the lower case, sans serif typefaces, but obviously America is not because a new one seems to come out almost every day. It has a few interesting aspects—we like the general shape of the T, and the way the bottom of the E mirrors the serifs on the T and the L. The capital letters in the word ‘channel’ offset the first word nicely.

Since its beginnings in 1987, the Travel Channel has been through many identities and just as many owners. It was recently bought by Scripps media, which may be the reason behind the new brand. The new logo design has been showed in certain advertisements, but it has only recently been introduced officially on the channel website.

The new logo is probably not really noteworthy on its own, but it is a huge improvement over the former identity. The logo design seems to be part of an entirely new marketing campaign, so we will wait eagerly to see the brand ‘filled out’ a little. While the logo itself seems a little bland, it could be part of an otherwise interesting branding move. For instance, the logo is plain enough to be shown with good recognition above a photo of a more exciting place.

As with all rebranding, this change may signal new and exciting moves for the Travel Channel. Programming such as Man v. Food is fun, but not really relevant to the name and the intent. We look forward to seeing other changes that the Travel Channel makes so we can more fully weigh in on the progress of the new brand.

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Google logos usually don’t change very much; you might see a few alterations on the serifs or a slightly different hue, but very few major revisions. This is why we were shocked to see the latest incarnation of the Chrome logo design.

The original Chrome logo design was shiny and three dimensional in a Web 2.0 kind of way. It used the Google color palette and clearly tied into the brand while maintaining its own identity. In addition, the old Chrome logo looks like a child’s toy—especially to those of us who remember Simon of the eighties. It just doesn’t seem like a design meant to be taken seriously as a technology brand. Is this really the impression that a global leader wants to promote?

However, one of our main issues with this logo was its excessively trendy style. The problem with choosing a very fashionable logo design is that it will look dated after just a few years—if that long. The Chrome logo lacks the timeless appeal of the other designs associated with the Google brand.

Sure enough, the once-trendy Chrome logo already looks a little too old school. But that’s okay because it is already beeh replaced. The new logo design keeps the salient elements of its predecessor, but puts them together in a sleeker, more modern package that will be palatable to the modern audience. As you can see, the same circular shape with three parts is kept, along with the same primary colors. However, instead of a shiny, three dimensional ball, the new logo design is flat and simple.

If you look closely, there is still a little light playing on the logo and a little subtle shadowing, but these elements have been made much less obvious. That phrase—less obvious—indeed could be used to describe the simpler new logo design in general. It is basically the same design as before, but with a more basic framework and less dimension.

The changes made to Google Chrome will also be made to its open source counterpart, Chromium, which has an identical logo except that it is in shades of blue rather than in primary colors. This will help to promote brand continuity between Google’s many ventures. In fact, it could be argued that the new logo serves much better as a part of the Google brand than the old one ever could.

It’s rare for Google to change their logo design, especially just three years after the first was introduced. However, Chrome was due for a little brand refresher, and the results speak for themselves. We predict that the new logo is an improvement, and also that it will last longer than its predecessor.

Rebranding is the best plan if your logo design is feeling a little dated.  A professional logo designer can help you develop a design that is attractive while resonating with your audience. Isn’t that what all businesses, large or small, need? Consult with a professional if you are ready for a change.

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Your font, or logotype or text based logo, is an important part of your logo regardless of the exact kind of logo design you prefer. However, font choice is very important for businesses that choose to use a type-only logo. With no image, these logos can become boring or unsightly if they are not designed by a skilled professional.

We are happy to say that many modern typeface logos are beautiful and distinctive. In fact, we recently ran into a good example of this category: Type F, a new website from former supermodel Tyra Banks.

The stylized F is what stands out most in this logo, and we originally assumed it referred to fashion (considering the founder). However, according to Miss Banks it refers to the word ‘fierce’. We love the ribbon—fashioning a ribbon into a letter F without rendering it illegible is quite an accomplishment. The simplicity of the word ‘type’ allows the letter to really pop. The way the ribbon F splatters a little is odd, and it seems to add a little confusion because it does not match the rest of the design. However, it seems to work well in this case.

If we had one real criticism of the logo, it would be this: it does not seem to have a message. The most effective logo designs communicate information about the brand. Other than a superior sense of style, the Type F logo does not seem to say anything. However, the website itself seems to be rather up-in-the-air at this point; according to a recent press release, it is “a revolutionary fashion and beauty website that listens to what women want and gives them the answers they are looking for, when and where they want it.” Also, the logo design is similar to the icons you see for various computer programs, which could cause some brand confusion.

This logo design works well in full color on a computer screen, and we are curious as to how it will appear on paper, in television advertisements, and other media. At some point it will likely be rendered in black and white, which may dilute its power significantly.

Fashion logo design is uniquely style oriented. More so than in any other field, the designs must be attractive, distinctive, and professional. This logo design seems to meet those criteria well. It will be interesting to see how Type F evolves and whether it lives up to the promise of its brand. Also, fashion and style brands tend to be overly simple; we like the way this one is colorful while still being chic.

This logo design may be the beginning of a new trend in logos, with its bright color and its mix of fluid elements and splatter style. It’s nice to see something new in graphic design, so we look forward to the evolution of the brand.

How does your logo design match up? Are you using a logo design that is unique, interesting, and professional? If not, it may be time for a change.

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Ehow, the popular ‘how-to’ website, has had the same logo design for so long that many people will be shocked by the latest news from the internet giant. That’s right: the website will boast a new visual identity and logo design that is so different from the original, it will have you asking E-who? E-what?

Origami is one of the hottest trends in logo design, but it is one motif that is hard to pull off effectively. The whole point is that the logo look like folded paper art, but it should not be distracting from other elements of the brand. Further, origami motif should make sense in the context of the brand.

eHow is a website with a brand that makes sense with origami. First, it is a ‘how-to’ sort of website with millions of hits per month, mainly from Google and other search engines. Second, it is a modern type of business, which makes this modern design motif make sense. The color is very attention getting and bright, while the use of the origami motif only for the word ‘How’ sets it apart from the less important ‘E’.

However, the origami logo design, on second glance at least, seems a little forced. This may be due to the rounded letters of the word. The H has multiple folds, but the O and the W have just one each, and the fold on the O feels a little random. Despite this, we really like the logo design.

Further, this logo is a much better representative of the brand than the former one was. Blue and black is a little cliché and does nothing to grab attention—or the imagination. The logotype feels like a stock job, and the checkmark makes little sense in the context of the brand. The new logo may be imperfect, but it is a definite improvement.

With 2 million articles that are viewed by 80 million unique users every month, eHow needed a logo design that reflected their growth and change over the past 12 years of existence. In fact, the logo design is not the only change that the corporation is adopting. The entire website will be overhauled to feel more professional and attractive, while articles will now have helpfulness ratings that allow users to rate the articles they read and also to choose how-to articles that others have found useful. In addition, the categories are being re-developed so they are easier to navigate.

One major change for eHow over the past decade-plus is the increase in competition. Many competitor website have sprung up, offering a similar model. This makes branding crucial for the business. Their visual elements must show people why they should choose eHow over everyone else. This logo design will likely be an asset.

Is your business struggling to deal with competition, maintain or build its brand, and remain customer friendly? This is a good example of rebranding done right. You can achieve the same effect for your own small business if you consult with a professional logo designer or branding expert.

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The app market is getting hotter than ever, which makes branding and logo design even more important for this industry. However, this is a market with unique needs. An app logo design must be more than professional and expressive—it must be fun and enticing as well. People must feel compelled to click on it when browsing the app store, where choices abound. If you are looking for a good example of this principle, consider MunchaCruncha.

MunchaCruncha is an app that allows users to find a meal deal anywhere in the Melbourne, Australia area with their smartphones. You can search by price, location, type of food, and more; the deals are uploaded and categorized by the restaurants themselves. While it is not available in the United States just yet, we suspect that the business model and brand will soon spread to our side of the Pacific. Anyway, it is easy to see a logo design for a business such as this one being cliché or even boring, but instead just the opposite has happened.

The MunchaCruncha logo is awesome—it is one of the best we have seen this year outside of the masterpieces leaving our desk every day. It was designed by Lucas Melbourne. The red background stands out easily and also is related to food service, which tends toward red and yellow colors. A monster seems like an unlikely choice for a logo character, but it is friendly and (thanks to Cookie Monster) feels related to eating. Further, supplemental materials show the monster carved from a variety of foods, showcasing the variety that this brand offers.

One thing we love about this logo design is that the designers were not afraid to be bold. From the red background to the monster itself, originality was embraced here. Luckily, in this case the fun brand will entice app viewers into becoming customers. Indeed, it is easy to fall in love with the little critter. There just aren’t enough monster logo designs out there!

This year seems to be the year of the boring logotype, which is another reason we think this logo design is outstanding. The logotype is rounded and friendly (appropriate for both the brand and the times), but the upper case letters give it a comic book quality and add a touch of seriousness at the same time.  The writing is simple enough that it can be modified easily to make the C look like it is biting into the rest of the word ‘Crunch’ without being too busy or, alternately, cheesy.

2011 is the year to think outside the box when it comes to logo design. We are seeing many logos that are the same old-same old, but an astonishing number that are unique and thought-provoking as well. Customers are not only willing to give an unusual or highly personal brand a chance; they are actually eager to do so. If you wonder how you can make your brand stand out from the pack, talk to a professional logo designer today.

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Is your business ready for a logo design change? Many of the companies that have been successful in the recession have been so by reevaluating their brand strategy and aligning it with customer needs. Clear Channel is one business that is staying modern with a minor ‘brand refresher’.

Like many logo designs, the Clear Channel logo was holding the company back. The upper case lettering had serious serifs and was generally just a little too corporate. In addition, the image in the logo design was, well, lame.

The new logo type is better suited to the modern audience, a sans serif font with friendly rounded elements and a more natural capitalization scheme. The image has been changed little. The new Clear Channel logo image appears to be a magnified version of the former. It has a less obvious letter C and a lighter colored palette, but the swirl and the general shape are the same.

The new logo design could be seen as an evolution of the old one, but making the letter less obvious may be a move in the wrong direction. All that is left is a rounded swirl, which gives a feeling of movement but is too vague to be the sole representative of a brand. This swirl is fit within a rounded square that is similarly vague, yielding a logo image that says absolutely nothing about the brand.

Further, it is difficult to see exactly how this relates to the industry at hand. What exactly does the image represent? Clarity? Reliability? It’s hard to tell—and we are willing to bet that customers won’t see it any clearer. A simple typographic logo design might have been clearer and more effective at the same time.

There are a few positive elements, of course. We love the change in color; black was too serious and corporate, while the shades of blue are a perfect complement to the brand. We also like that the new logo design and visual identity are related to the old. In fact, most people will never notice that there has been a change. However, this visual identity is much more modern than the one it replaces, despite its faults, and will be a better representative of the new brand.

This is not your average rebrand; the stakes are much higher with half a million displays spread over thirty countries. Many, many people will see this logo, and it will have to resonate with a greater variety of cultures and backgrounds as well. Five thousand people all over the globe work for this company, and the customer count probably reaches into the millions.

We can nitpick forever, but this is a much better logo design that will likely resonate with its customer base. And, design considerations aside, that is really all that matters. People will see this logo design, associate it with Clear Channel, and begin to build brand loyalties. While we have mixed feelings about the methods, the results will probably be overwhelmingly positive.

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We have to say it: we really love the new brand positioning from Chrysler. The television commercial that aired during the Super Bowl was nothing short of brilliant—it made us actually want to be from Detroit. However, the new ‘Imported from Detroit’ logo design that is the next installment in this marketing campaign is not so high up on our list of favorites.

The logo, which has been created especially for this marketing campaign, features the standard Chrysler logo with a fist in the middle. The fist comes from a 24-foot Detroit sculpture of boxer Joe Lewis’ forearm and hand. This sculpture has become a landmark in the city, so it is an appropriate representation of Detroit pride. However, the Michigan logo design looks like a teenager spent a day with Photoshop; there is no art or nuance to it, just a car logo and a fist.

However, many people obviously disagree with our view of the logo, because the company has been selling t-shirts and other apparel bearing the design—and they are selling like hotcakes. We are glad so many people are buying this apparel, because a portion of the profits are donated to Detroit area charities to help the area survive the economic recession that has hit them harder than many other areas of the country.

The intention of the commercials (and the marketing campaign in general) is to create a ‘Detroit’ brand that will make people want to buy their cars. The use of the word ‘Import’ suggests that this city is very different from other areas of the nation, that it is a tougher place with more traditional working class values. We happen to love the commercials because they take a negative perception of Detroit and show a cooler side of it. This comes at a time when Chrysler is desperate to come back from bankruptcy that is in part due to Americans’ love of imported automobiles.

Will this commercial get Americans to back ‘Team Detroit’, not just in sentiment but in actual shopping behavior? The clothing sales are encouraging, as the garments are hardly bargain priced.  It is rare that people literally ‘buy into’ a marketing campaign. These sales show that Americans are ready to embrace Detroit pride and proudly bear the logos associated with the marketing scheme.

If American cars are going to keep up with imports, they have a long road ahead of them. First, they must prove that they are as safe, fuel efficient, comfortable, and reliable as the imports that Americans are favoring more and more. Second, they must become more innovative—Asian brands in particular are favored for coming out with new technologies almost every year. Last, they must show that they are not only equal to the imports, but actually better. Branding and logo design will certainly be an important part of that equation. We consider the new marketing campaign (even with a questionable logo design) a good start.

If you are going up against tough competition, it may be time to look at your brand and evaluate how you can differentiate your company as the best choice.

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Tourism is an important of any country’s economy. Branding and logo design are crucial to enticing new vacationers and building a reputation as a great place to visit. That’s why it is so surprising that the United States is, well, getting our backsides handed to us when it comes to national tourism logo design and branding.

Designed by HankFisher

What does out official tourism logo design say about our nation. First and foremost, that we are, well, the United States. There are colors and shapes reminiscent of the national flag and a rather generic circle that is supposed to balance the official feeling of the traditional lettering with serifs. This logo feels more like an official seal for some little-used government agency than a tourism logo. It’s patriotic, but overly so; after all, a tourism logo should relate to visitors rather than citizens.

Designed by FutureBrand

For comparison, consider the new logo design of Peru. A bold spiral relates to the patterns seen in the indigenous designs and architecture that are a major draw for many visitors. The font is completely unique and carries a mixture of artistry and indigenous charm. The color is warm and inviting. This logo makes you want to visit Peru, even if the idea had never occurred to you before.

That’s what a tourism logo is supposed to do.

France Tourism Logo

Okay, it’s easy for Peru to have a better logo, it could be argued. They have all that South American charm and a substantial history to draw on. Consider, then, the tourism logo design from a country more like ours, like France. Like the American design, France official tourism uses the colors of the national flag. However, the France Chic logo design is also interesting, artistic, unique to the country, and more than a little romantic. When you look at it, you immediately understand a few good reasons to visit the European nation.

Mexico Tourism Logo

If you need a North American example, consider the logo design of our neighbor to the south. Mexico’s tourism logo may not be as exotic as that of France or Peru, but it is still a solid design. The mix of upper and lower cases combined with the bright color palette set the right tone. Designs with Latin flair within the lettering relate to the country’s history while maintaining the bright, open feeling. This logo design does not say a whole lot about the nation, but it definitely piques interest.

Egypt, Spain, the Bahamas… it is not difficult to think of a nation with a tourism logo design worse than ours. However, even our insignificant little logo is a huge improvement. The United States puts very little cash or energy into marketing our country as a place to visit. Our logo is a mess, our tourism website is a mess, and our tourism industry is generally left without the government leadership or support that is needed to truly move forward. We may not be losing a huge amount of money to Australia or India or any one of the many countries with well-run tourism programs—not yet, that is. However, with marketing becoming a bigger part of why people make the choices that they make (not to mention that tourism is a $120 billion per year industry), we can’t afford to neglect the issue any longer.

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Google must have one of the most versatile logos on the globe. Seriously, it seems that every week we are writing about something amazing. From John Lennon tribute logos to designs created out of colorful bacteria, we thought we had seen it all. A few days ago, however, Google rolled out a logo design that you can control with your mobile phone.

The logo design was inspired by Jules Verne and featured a Google logo made from submarine windows. Viewers who had an iOS mobile device, such as an iPhone, iPad, or an iTouch, could use their phone to control their views and look around inside the clear synthetic ocean. Interestingly, the feature did not work with Google’s own Android phones.

If you have an older phone or a newer Droid, you could still explore the gyroscopic picture by using a conveniently located joystick to the right of the search bar.

Unfortunately, special edition Google logos only last for a day, so it is no longer possible for you to get your very own ocean view. Nonetheless, it is a striking example of how collaborative modern technology can be. Apple has created their latest round of mobiles with gyroscopic support that allows users to view different parts of a picture by simply moving the device. This logo design was not just a celebration of Jules Verne’s work; it was an exhibition of this new Apple feature as well as a show of Google’s programming prowess.

Google is clearly ready for new advances in technology and ready to maximize their use in building the already huge Google brand. Can your business say the same? If not, it is time to take that crucial step into the future.

Marketing and branding are not what they used to be. There was a time when even having a website made you a ‘modern’ company, but new technologies demand so much more. Social networking, fully featured websites, and even useful smartphone apps are all a necessity in the modern business world.

When it comes to your customers, the golden rule is: the more interactive the better. Consider how popular this one day celebration of Jules Verne was. Not only does it show that Google is still a technological leader, it encourages viewers to try out one of Apple’s more interesting new technologies. Both brands were benefited while consumers were able to have fun with a cool ‘toy’. People should be able to get to know your brand and interact with it through the media that they use every day.

While many people are confused by the new technology, it is a fact of life that must be dealt with. Using the latest technology in your marketing doesn’t just reach out to customers; it shows them that you are an intelligent and clever business owner. You don’t have to be a technological expert to use technology in marketing, however. There are many qualified, trained consultants that will happy to do the heavy lifting for you.

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Every Olympic Games has a mascot or several—don’t even get us started on the terrifying ones from London 2012. The Sochi 214 Winter Olympics are no exception.

However, many in the sports world are feeling a strange sense of déjà vu when they see one of them. And one man, the creator of the Misha mascot for the 1980 Moscow Olympics, is feeling like a lawsuit.

The Russian public voted just a few days ago for their favorite mascots, using a text and/or phone format similar to American Idol. There were nine choices, each relevant to Russia.

Around one million people in the country participated, choosing a snowboarding snow leopard, a white bunny rabbit, and a polar bear.

However, many Russians remember another Olympic polar bear mascot: Misha. No one remembers Misha better than his creator, Viktor Chizhikov. In an interview with Russian radio station Ekho Moskvy, Chizhikov stated, “This polar bear, everything is taken from mine, the eyes, nose, mouth, smile. I don’t like being robbed.” Indeed, while the bears are obviously a different color and came from different eras, the stance and facial expression are strikingly similar.

Chizhikov isn’t the only one crying foul over the Olympic mascot. The United Russia political party also has a polar bear symbol that they claim is dangerously close to the Sochi mascot.

24,000 choices were whittled down to the nine presented to Russian voters, so it is amazing that the one choice that may not be ethically available made the cut. Many Russians felt unhappy with all of the choices they were given, with major news channels in the area calling the selection ‘mediocre’. However, these mascots seem very appropriate for the 2012 Sochi Olympics and certainly no worse than many we have seen in the past. That is, if they all can legally be used with out a logo trademark infringement, which remains to be seen.

This is not the only Olympic Games to have trouble with logo design and branding this week—the London 2012 games logo is being protested by the Iranian government for purported and has been a sore spot for aesthetic reasons with residents of the UK.

Mascot design is an important part of any sporting team or event, giving players and fans a personality to rally around. The Olympic Games are supposed to be a symbol of international and national goodwill and sportsmanship, so it is disappointing to see their image tarnished by squabbling over fine points. Hopefully a compromise can be worked out that leaves the games with good mascots and no one with hard feelings.

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Soccer is not nearly as popular in the US as other American sports, but around the world it is the game of choice. People jostle and bribe to get their city named the host of major soccer events in a manner similar to that we see with the Olympics. It’s not hard to create a soccer sports logo design and brand that the world loves.

The FIFA U-17 (for those who don’t play soccer, that means for players under the age of seventeen years) World Cup is one event with a logo design that soccer fans will be able to identify with easily. Hosted in Mexico City, the games are being held in the city’s historic Estadio Azteco, an arena with extensive soccer history including hosting two separate FIFA World Cup games. The logo design character is perfect for this setting. It is distinctly Aztec, distinctly Mexican, and also relevant to the game it represents—a tall order even for the most professional logo designer.

The logo design features a stylized version of the Angel of Independence (a popular symbol in Mexico City) and the Estadio Azteca to the left, with a blooming tree and a soccer ball to the right. It is a little unusual for a logo design to be this ornate, but it is consistent with indigenous Latin American art. The two images are tied together with similar color schemes as well as a similar style. The rectangular shape is also unique, but in this case it makes us feel as though we are viewing a film in widescreen format. In other words, this logo design is unconventional, but it works well.

While this image might not work well as a corporate logo, it is perfect for an athletic logo design for this particular event. It has a sense of tradition and a feeling of movement that are consistent with the core values of the game of soccer as well. It won’t work well in smaller media such as stationary, but in banners and t-shirts it will look magnificent. We haven’t yet been able to get information on whether there is an alternate simplified design, although we suspect there indeed is one.

The FIFA games will kick off in May with the official draw, with representatives present from each of the twenty-four member teams as well as dignitaries such as Miss Universe. The spokespeople are promising a party of fiesta proportions, and we bet it will be a fun time for everyone involved. Great soccer and great parties seem to go together.

Sometimes a particular brand is so unique that it requires “breaking out of the box” a little. This is a good example of one of these brands. However, taking this route can be a gamble because when unconventional logos fail, they tend to fail epically. If you are unsure about the type of logo design that your company, association, or event requires, talk to a professional logo designer today.

If you live anywhere with a sizeable teen population, you have seen the familiar seagull associated with the Hollister brand. The Hollister logo design, which can be seen at any mall near you, is one of the better logos in the teen clothing market. It is simple, versatile and stylish, yet undeniably popular with its audience. This makes it a prime target for copycats looking to reach the same market.

It’s rare that something as mundane as a seagull is the subject of litigation, but that is exactly what is happening right now. Abercrombie & Fitch, Hollister’s parent brand, recently filed a suit against Florida novelty clothing company Surf Style claiming that the company unfairly used a seagull image on certain garments that was dangerously close to their seagull logo. The company claims that using the seagull image on cheaper goods dampens their own image and wants monetary damages for the injury to their brand. In addition, they want for Surf Style to destroy all remaining merchandise bearing the seagull image and to agree never to use it again.

If you have seen the price tags on Hollister items lately, you will be quick to recognize that Surf Style’s offering are almost certainly cheaper. Indeed, Surf Style acknowledges that they have used seagull images on their wares (which are generally novelty items such as souvenir tees and shirts bearing humorous statements), but they feel that this is within the boundaries of fair use. The company is associated with beach wear and seagulls are, after all, known to frequent beaches.

Is this trademark infringement or simply two brands using a common beach symbol? The law holds that Surf Style can be held responsible for copyright infringement if their goods are likely to create confusion with the Hollister brand, which is exactly what Abercrombie & Fitch claims is occurring. On the other hand, can a company really “own” the image of a seagull? Surf Style doesn’t think so; their lawyer recently put out a statement that “… Abercrombie is trying to spread its net much larger than the law will allow.” Abercrombie, for their part, stated that they do not comment on current litigation.

We were unable to find any seagull apparel on Surf Style’s website for comparison, so it impossible for us to make a judgment on whether the company is guilty of copyright infringement. However, the success and popularity of Hollister practically guarantees that someone, somewhere is going to try to copy their logo design to some extent, whether they stay on the right side of the law or not.

A logo design is one of a company’s most valuable assets, and infringing on another’s company can cost your business in big ways, both literally and figuratively. Unfortunately, many businesses make the mistake of modifying a copyrighted design for their own use. The only way to ensure that your logo design and your brand are completely and legally yours is to have them developed by a professional, ethical logo designer.

IFC, or the Independent Film Channel, is a great cable television channel option for lovers of art films and other independent work. Since 1994, the channel has offered an eclectic range of programming, and the brand has since expanded to include a production company, a film distribution company, and even a theater in New York City. The company is large and diverse, but all of their work is centered on bringing high quality alternative programming to Americans.

A growing company needs a brand that fits it, and so we have seen many incarnations of this television logo design. The company began introducing a new brand last year and has just completed the finishing touches of rebranding. However you feel about the new logo design, it is as original as the company that it represents.

There are many things we love about this logo design. First, it is general enough to represent the channel’s wide range of offerings and endeavors. The old logo design featured an “I” stylize to look like the edge of a film strip. However, this is less appropriate for a company with not just films, but popular shows and even a theater. Second, the new logo and brand include a tagline that just may end up to be this year’s best: Always On. Slightly Off. If you look closely, the thickness of both the letters and spacing is a little off, a visual incongruency which the design company created on purpose to represent the slightly off kilter brand. Color is another plus: the new logo design has a clear blue that adds to the brand and creates contrast at the same time.

A last benefit is that the logo is bold. You can’t miss it. The solid black letters are easy to see and tie into the former logo design. Unfortunately, this means that you can’t miss the few, small errors either. There are a few elements that are, well, iffy. The small errors may be placed on purpose, but this does not make them any less jarring. We know they are trying to create a logo design that is as anti-establishment as the channel, but it does nothing for the aesthetic appeal of the logo itself.

Does a lack of professionalism constitute a style? Creating a bad design to get a point across is as effective as creating a really awful movie to contrast with good ones (Blair Witch Project, anyone?) You might make your point, but you might lose some potential viewers as well.

We don’t think the little imperfections will scare people away from the IFC logo design and brand—except perhaps for a few graphic designers, as we’re a sensitive bunch. The logo certainly is effective at portraying the brand, which makes it an automatic winner. However, we wonder if a logo could have been created that shows off the unconventional channel’s personality without just plain bad design. Unfortunately, we may have to wait several years until the IFC’s next rebranding in order to find out.

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