In another example of bureaucratic lollygagging and waste, one does not have much further to look than to the state of Kansas. In the past year the state has spent an insane amount of money for two high profile design projects that turned out to be flops (in this author’s opinion, of course).
The first undertaking was the development of a new slogan and tagline for the state’s tourism office. After spending an estimated $700,000 with the advertising agency Callahan Creek, located in Lawrence, the result was “Kansas: As big as you think.” The new logo is simply a font, Futura, stretched horizontally. A star with a flowing, ribbon like tail completes the new mark. While there were no doubt many committees, focus groups and voices vying for attention during the creation of this piece, I find it difficult to accept that almost three-quarters of a million dollars of taxpayer, yours and mine, went to this effort, and this is what we have to show for it.
Throughout 2005, the University of Kansas undertook a tremendous effort to unify all of the school’s existing marketing collateral into one identity. LandreyMorrow, a marketing firm from Portland, Oregon, was commissioned by the school to develop the new identity using the letters “K” and “U”. After narrowing the field of concepts to four designs, feedback was gathered from current and prospective students, as well as alumni (including this critic). The result of this $88,900.00 expenditure by the University was four finalist designs, all type-based solutions using the Trajan typeface. None were conceptual in execution.
Why the university, which has its own School of Fine Arts with talented design students and staff, didn’t commission its own resources is beyond me. Someone inside and familiar with the university would have been able to develop a more appropriate and unique solution to the problem, and at a far lower cost. What is even more surprising is that one of the finalist designs is the exact same mark as another, smaller college in Pennsylvania, Kutztown University. And what did they pay for their logo with similar scope of work? $20,000. Now that’s an example of money well spent in my book.
By: Ryan Hembree, principal | creative director
Most companies fail to realize is that just because a logo or brand is changed or updated doesn’t mean that more people will buy their product or service. The quality of the user’s experience with both it and the company’s representatives influence purchasing decisions. If a product or service is bad, then no amount of improvement with the company’s image will help. A good logo or brand design does not a company make.
The problem with adding dimensionality is more a technical issue than anything else. When shown on a television or computer monitor, these new logos look great—print them on paper in anything less than full color, however, and they lose their effectiveness. The new AT&T logo, when printed in two colors on billing statements, ends up looking unrefined like a first or second year design student’s project. Companies should consider testing the new identity in all forms before implementing them. One simple way to do so is print the logo or mark in black and white and then fax it to another machine within the office. If a mark doesn’t translate well after printing it in black and white or faxing it, then a redesign should be considered.
At first, this critic was very skeptical of the new Sprint brand. After all, the red diamond mark had been around since the late 1980s, when United Telecom merged with Sprint to form US Sprint (which eventually dropped the “US” part of its moniker in the 90’s). That logo was the perfect marriage of those two companies’ identities, as it incorporated a rotated square, taken from United Telecom’s keypad logo, and the tapered lines of Sprint. The typeface was changed from Helvetica (modernist aesthetic) to a more friendly Serif typeface.
The new Sprint Nextel logo is a logical evolution of the brand as it incorporates a similar sans serif typeface as Nextel (in title case, which is easier to read at small sizes), and is placed on a yellow background. The new Sprint Nextel mark is also a dynamic mixture of Sprint’s former tapered lines and the vertical bar that has become associated with Nextel’s walkie-talkie like capabilities. The new mark resembles both wings (suggestive of flight) as well as a forward pointing arrow. In television the mark is animated to suggest the bounce of a pin, which has been a Sprint signature for years.
While there are several good attributes of the new mark, this is not to say that the new logo is without a need for some improvement. While yellow and black is a color combination that Sprint can “own” in the cellular market category (much like Coca Cola owns red in soft drinks or UPS owns brown in shipping), it may be overbearing and tiresome if too much yellow is used. It will certainly will grab people’s attention, however, and does stand out from other wireless service providers (see example to the right).
In addition to being redundant (aren’t discoveries always new?), the new logo and tagline are not nearly as relevant as the old logo designed by EAT Advertising and Design. The old mark, shown here, resonates with two unique aspects of the city: 1) that Kansas City has more fountains than any city in the world except for Florence, Italy, and 2) it IS located in the center, or heart, of the nation. The old logo further reinforces this idea through a mark that can be viewed as both a heart AND a fountain. While conservative in its design, the mark is whimsical and innovative in concept.
When Gateway began offering flat panel televisions, the company changed its brand in order to associate the new products with its identity. The cow spot print box mark was dropped in favor of a single cow spot that formed a “power on” button. The green “Gateway” was maintained; however, the type was compressed into a more impersonal, slab serif type treatment. While this new mark may have seemed more “modern”, it lost the friendliness and warmth of the old brand, as well as its uniqueness.
Will the new Gateway logo and brand identity stick? Will they be able to convince their customers and share holders that they are the same, friendly company with consistent core values? Or is this constant identity flux indicative of a larger identity crisis, a lack of focus, a drifting business model? Will this thrashing about for a brand that works continue?