The Logo's Job Description
After having attended ‘The Mighty Meet-up’, hosted by Fifthring earlier in the year and discussing crowd sourcing design websites and competitions, I have done a lot of thinking about the evolution of branding, logo design in specific.
We are currently in an era of design where less and less time and consideration are put into logo design with websites offering a ‘quick solution’ logo for as little as $100! The result is just that – a quick solution in a rapidly evolving field - which operates around extremely tight deadlines, seems perfect right? The more important question is are the big iconic brands of the world moving in that direction?
It seems more and more marketers devalue the specialized expertise involved in creating trademarks that reflect, enhance and enable positive business outcomes. For me a logo serves many purposes, however the most important has to be to provide differentiation between brands. Established brands often understand and value the process of having a strong brand, however smaller start up companies and local businesses often struggle to see the value in this, hence the booming work and presence in crowd sourcing design services. Trends change so rapidly in design that a logo needs to be timeless, of course, logos do evolve over time but generally with minor tweaks throughout the years to refresh the brand image and keep up with the organization which it represents.
All the ‘classic’ logos tell a story. Today's replacement logos say as little as possible. It's an interesting turn and an ever-evolving one. While the brand and the ‘brand experience’ reign supreme, it no longer seems to originate with an original logo, perhaps there will be a turn of events and once the market is saturated with generic, cliché, $100 logos the savvy business will turn back and look for something more unique.
One interesting observation of recent is the removal of type in logos amongst global companies (Starbucks, Apple, Nike, Mcdonalds to name a few). I have been trying to put my finger on the reasoning behind this, one huge advantage of having a symbol only logo is the benefit for global presence free of language barriers, perhaps there are further advantages.
What are your thoughts? What is the future for logo design and overall brand image? Does it move in trends? Has a logo's job description changed? Does our media-centric culture and highly exposed consumer negate the need for a story communicated from the top down?
