Why BP Paid $211 Million for a Logo
How much would you pay for a logo? Typically, an average logo will cost around $2,500 depending on what add-ons are included (revisions, branding manuals, cards and letterheads).
BP is not alone in spending big money on its signature mark. Accenture paid $100 million for its rebranding. Posten Norge, a Norwegian postal service, spent $55 million on their new logo. To the dismay of Londoners, Wolf Olins charged $625,000 for the infamously bad 2012 Olympic Games logo.
This all seems absurd at the surface. Beyond a certain standard one logo cannot be objectively better than the next, so why spend such an astronomical amount?
Instead of asking how much branding costs, ask yourself how much bad branding costs.
Actually, there’s a tremendous amount of risk involved. Tropicana lost out on an estimated $137 million when its rebranding resulted in a 20% drop in sales. To fix the problem, they must not only finance a new design but also replace the signs, packaging and materials featuring the old one. What’s more, flip-flopping sends a very amateur message, so they also must recover consumer confidence with extensive marketing and advertising.
BP spent $211 Million on the pixels below, and its brand-wide implementation. Did they get their money’s worth?
