Read how our new identity is built around the fundamental essence of football.
After dropping our new brand identity to a mix of “WTF?” (all positive, of course) reactions, we wanted to let you know what went down in our creative huddle. Because this isn’t just a wild style shake-up — it’s a decade-long story of evolution. Of refining and rediscovering our values and purpose.
This is a dive into our journey of redefining our game within the football universe. So grab a seat, and let’s take you behind the curtain.
After the thrill-ride of a decade in the digital football realm we realized that over time our ambitions evolved. Our vision changed. And we felt the need to reflect that evolution in our identity.
So we introduced a fresh brand identity that captures where we stand — and where we’re headed as Kickbase.
Why change?
Just as football managers tweak their game plans, we’ve upped our strategy. With evolving goals and new ambitions, we paused to think: What’s Kickbase’s next big play for the coming decade? Here’s the three key insights that shaped our next move.
01 OUR BRAND VISION
Before starting this process, we boiled down what Kickbase has always been for us and our loyal community — a pure adrenaline rush, the power of enhanced excitement. For every fan. Every club. Every player. Every action on the pitch. It’s how we understand what makes Kickbase Kickbase.
In our age of ever shorter attention spans, the real challenge is to keep fans on the edge. Enter ‘Seasonal Fantasy Manager’ and ‘Kickbase Challenges’. Designed to turbocharge football, making it endlessly immersive and always non-stop.
Kickbase already has positive impacts on the game we’re all obsessed with, making football even more engaging and immersive. Now, we’re doubling down, using our expertise to supercharge the sport’s future. To future-proof football.
And we don’t need to change football for that to happen.
All we need is a fresh lens on what makes football epic. By zooming in on every move, every player, every team in the league, to capture the game’s true spirit. Its essence.
That’s why we called our vision ‘FOR THE ESSENCE OF FOOTBALL’. The reason we exist. To fight for what makes the sport so great. Taking that 90 minutes — and enhancing every single moment of it.
02 OUR BRAND AMBITION
Back in 2013, we kicked off with a dream to craft the ultimate fantasy football experience. Fast forward, and we now engage with a growing community of millions of users. Through fantasy games, content creation and by hosting real-world events. We might not be in every living room globally — yet — but give us a decade. Because our ambition is to enable everyone who lives and breathes football to engage with it on a deeper level. Everywhere in the world.
03 THE BELIEVE THAT WE’RE MORE THAN ‘JUST A GAME’.
Years in, and we’ve built a content hub of podcasts, TV shows, and live streams. With our tribe of die-hard football fanatics expanding, we felt the nudge: It’s time our visuals caught up with our evolution. So, cue our new identity.
FOOTBALL: STATE OF ART
A decade back, Kickbase set football’s stylistic benchmark. But the world caught up. So, to show we’re still at the vanguard of its design and technology, it became clear: We needed to evolve. To put our foot down and show how we see the future of football.
Let’s jump into the visual details to explain what our inspiration was, what the thinking behind the identity is — and why Kickbase looks the way it does now.
The new identity is built around distilling the essence of football and understanding what makes the game so captivating.
Two essential layers in football combine. To win the game you need tactics, metrics, and the predictable. Conversely you need the creativity, the raw emotion, the unpredictable.
The world of football has changed over recent years and the audience now also enjoys talking about numbers and stats, expected goals and defensive coverage, as much as they love the experience of the game with all of its real emotions.
The dotted Kickbase grid underpins every part of the visual identity. It acts as the analytical layer. A database of what happened on the pitch and what impact it had. Every play and every move.
We underlined the metrics with our two custom created Kickbase Fonts. The constructed typeface “KB Volksans” for copy and stats. It blends in carefully without distracting, but is distinctive enough to act as our main font.
Whereas the second Font, “KB Pitch”, always brings the needed contrast of a loud but timeless headline font. The variations Still, Run, Sprint, all in different angles create the progressive movement we embody as a brand.
The rest of the identity is layered on top and is thereby heavily influenced by what happens on the pitch. Both the images and the variable typeface stand in contrast to the information-based layouts and represent the emotional, wild, and often chaotic side of football.
LOGO
Changing a logo can always be controversial. For Kickbase, it was a well considered and needed step. The old star was a symbol more than a logo. A symbol that in variations is seen all across the globe and also as logos for various other companies.
With our focus away from being ‘just an app’ towards the above mentioned ambitions, we felt it was time to represent that in our logo as well.
The new logo is a modern interpretation of the old star. The star is now more distinctive and loaded with meaning. It’s inspired by the shapes of football as it now can be seen as round as well. The center forms a play button, with ‘play’ being a core value of the brand. Additionally, an arrow is pointing towards a stylized K, referencing Kickbase. All this while being carefully constructed around our dotted grid system. Next to our wordmark Kickbase, we created a timeless but progressive combination that works in every size.
MOTION
Motion is a core behavior of the identity system. Everything was built around the motion on the pitch. The brand is constantly moving, information is updated and patterns indicate the movements on the pitch. Thereby the brand itself feels like it’s always ‘on’. Always providing the newest set of data and intel to know what’s going on. The motion behavior is inspired by old visualizations of digital data with a technical twist that mimics the world of computer games.
COLOR
To further underline the importance of ‘No downtime’ and ‘Always on’ the color palette was built around ‘Live Red’. A color inspired by the ever-blinking red light of a recording camera. A color that was part of the Kickbase brand since day one but lost its presence over the time. We decided to bring it back and give it the main stage. If it’s red, it’s live. If it’s live, it’s Kickbase.
While rethinking a lot of elements, one thing we always wanted to keep, is our love for black and white. Black is our foundational color and the different tones of gray help us to structure the content. This way we give the stage to the clubs and players.
COPY
With a more focused approach to every single moving part of football, the visual identity was built to reflect the new direction of an already established brand. The copy needed to be retooled to match that gear shift. Short, impactful messaging was created to reflect the ever-changing world in which we all exist. Rhythm, rhyme and a beat. Designed to be light, nimble and flexible enough to keep up with our dynamic brand. The copy is human, real and speaks with and for the voice of the football fan.
SYSTEM
With these elements, the brand articulates a new direction in football and a complex, yet reduced system was created. This allows the brand to live and exist in various spaces. From the app and social media, and events to its broadcasting channel Kickbase Studios, for which the new logo received special treatment. The identity announces that Kickbase is not just a major player in the football market, but is bringing an entirely new layer to the game. It sets Kickbase up as a future-facing company. One that’s dedicated to the future of football.
THE FINAL WHISTLE…
A wise man once said, “After the game is before the game.” That’s how we see it. It’s go-time: sleeves rolled up, always ready to go to work. To fight for the essence of football. Going all-in on unlocking Kickbase’s potential. And the potential of the game we all love.
