I’ve been seeing a lot of unsuccessful logo redesigns and it pains my little heart (almost as much as the two restaurants by my house that BOTH have papyrus-

- in their signage. And one of them even stretched the font out. Eek.) It’s been on my mind lately, so, I have a minute that I want to snatch up and turn into a conversation on this phenomenon of losing your brand to a logo redesign, and its recent rise in popularity.

It seems to me that companies have become so concerned with keeping up with fads that they’ve forgotten tradition and equity. It’s important to be aware of changing customer habits and appetites. But don’t let that distract you from your roots, or the time you’ve spent building relationships to your brand. Sometimes a redo is smart. Sometimes it’s just you trying to be hip; and we’ve all seen enough old ladies in bedazzled tank tops to know that’s not always the best idea. Don’t just throw away your mark and try to follow the fad without thinking about the effect on your mark’s relationship to your people. Don’t be so vain as to forget yourself.

I think the rule of thumb that we are exploring here is this: Don’t adapt your brand to the fad, but the fad to your brand, and at that only when it is in line with what your brand is about. Be honest.

I want your input on the difference between the two. Let me give you a few examples:

SMART REDESIGNS are concerned more with their audience than the trend. Knowing your audience (who follows trends) will bring you to the trend, but it won’t be the awkward dishonest result that happens when a brand just jumps onto a trend without consulting their personality or target:

GOOD EXAMPLES
<<Syfy: Making a big change>>

I am impressed.

There were a lot of issues facing the Science Fiction – SciFi – channel.

1. They couldn’t own or brand the word SciFi. It can’t belong to them.

2. They understood that their product is, yes SciFi, but it’s also so much more. How to beat the stereotype that SciFi is only for trekkies. when really it’s for _____________ (I’ll let you fill it in when you see what they did to rebrand)

3. Logo.. while initially I thought ‘No! Don’t leave that mark because then it’s so much harder to communicate what you guys are about!’ I was wrong. I knew they wanted to appeal to greater, but still I thought – yeah, so they’re going to have to show me why I like SciFi. But they were smarter than that. It makes more sense that they appeal to something that I already know I like. I like to imagine. If I like to imagine, I like SciFi, and not vise versa. So this is the common denominator of their TRUE demographic.

It’s so simple that it may seem obvious, or even like “big deal”. But just like the pros make ice skating look like a breeze, a good branding job gives you a whiff of easy ‘contentness’. It’s like being in a midst of confusion and lies, and someone looks you straight in the eye and just tells you the truth. It feels good and you can feel the difference when it’s honest. It seems simple cause it’s right, but not because it was easy.

Evolving a brand is a bit different.  If you are going to go for a change, then CHANGE. If you realize your brand is not communicating and not hitting it’s mark, go big or go home. And SyFy didn’t forget their consumers. It’s obvious they took the time to know their consumer, and know what change would make them feel included in something greater.

<<Starbucks: Brand Evolution>>

Brand Evolution…

We know Starbucks is well branded. Here’s another hint why. They are constantly updating their logo to keep with the trend, buuuuuut, without losing their mark/focus. Their progression over time has been slow, almost imperceptible, and yet has kept Starbucks at the height of every new ‘fad’ wave. Because they stay on top of the wave, they seem to have made it much farther out into the ocean than other companies who are struggling to keep their heads above water. Again, decide what about a fad is relevant to your brand and you can adopt it, but don’t adopt your brand to a fad.

Here’s another simple example of a redesign to keep current, but keep your brand:

BAD REDESIGNS. It’s an awkward result when they go for the redesign without consulting their brand purpose, equity, or personality:

<<Animal Planet: What’s the purpose?>>

GAH! What is THAT!! They could have done with some finessing, and maybe they wanted to completely kick their old logo – but I fear it’s this love of the new, clean, edgy logos that drove them to this frenzied state. So many logos now play with the type design; they’re simple, they’re clean, no gradients, no jpg looking picture – but all vector based, and often all type. So animal planet felt left behind? This was not the answer…Grossssss. The font is terribly treated. The widths are all over the place. And what’s the significance of the M, which seems to be the only one that wasn’t squeezed? Note – squeezed, not condensed.

<<Kraft: Lost equity>>

Who here grew up eating Kraft macaroni and cheese, Kraft mayonnaise? Kraft something or other? Raise your hands. So, for a product with a primary target of mothers, wouldn’t it be valuable to offer Moms the stuff they loved growing up? How valuable do you think it is to Kraft to be the established brand in an oversaturated environment? So what do you think is the worst thing Kraft could do?

Lose their logo. Not just lose it, but redesign it to be a bland, boring, and something that looks just like worse, new, and nonreliable competitors!

It looks also suspiciously similar to Yoplait, only with worse weights, more complication, and too many colors.

Here’s Yoplait’s…

Granted, this was a corporate-level redesign. But isn’t it a bit confusing when you look up your food online and instead of the kraft logo that you know as well as the name of the popular girl from 3rd grade (some things never leave you), it’s this logo on the website? This is confusing! Brand discrepancy like this, especially when it’s poorly designed (do I smell Tekton in the tagline?…) .. is sad. Looks like they felt the old logo was getting too familiar, and started to get overlooked – which is a valuable point…

Said Mintel senior analyst Marcia Mogelonsky, While the old logo was certainly well recognized among consumers, “perhaps it was so easily recognized that it was becoming overlooked,” especially as store brands mimicked national brands in packaging elements such as design, typeface and colors.

so … wait. Didn’t they update it in the corporate office and leave the old logo on the shelf? Dang it.

It’s remniscent of the redesign fiasco that Tropicana is still smarting from. They appealed so heavily to current fads, that they completely forgot their own trademark and personality. They ended up with no personality at all, and a 20% drop in sales. http://adage.com/article?article_id=135735

<<Pizza Hut: Lost personality>>

Really? The hut that we all love? The pizza place with that great commercial on the beginning of the “Land Before Time” VHS? You caved too? It’s probably good that they tried to update. And they didn’t really forget their previous mark, as we’ve been discussing. But I had to point out how the new logo, at least to me, has so little personality, and even less charisma. Yeah the hat-looking roof was a big part of Pizza Hut’s previous logo, but they forgot to include the motion of their logo, the energy of it, in their new redesign, and I think that’s the mistake. The new one to me looks stagnant, boring, and washed up. Easy to forget and easier to dislike. The widths are all the same, but it doesnt feel balanced at all. Maybe it’s because the lines keep directing your eye back to where it started, and are all so horizontal that there’s no where else for your eye to go. So it just sits there, fat, heavy.. everything you are afraid their pizza will make you, but before, you could pretend it wasn’t true. Now it’s staring you in the face.

I’d rather see a slightly ugly logo that reflects the brand personality, than another web 2.0 logo that reflects nothing.

MORAL OF STORY/RANT:  Like anything, if you do it for the wrong reasons, people will be able to tell. Update yourself because you love your audience and want to keep a good conversation with them. But do it genuinely and with self-respect. Don’t just fling your brand at the next ’shiny new thing’.

As a bonus, here’s a few examples of these new trends I was referring to. These are well done and clever. Enjoy!:

For more good logos, check out:
logooftheday.com
logofaves.com
logopond.com
brandstack.com