Logos are the most publicly recognizable branding a brand can have, customers can easily identity a brand by its logo and usually associate trust with logos they can identify. Most major brands look to get their logos redesigned from time to time so that their brand’s logo look modern.
Usually a new logo is unveiled when the brand takes on a new approach or direction with its products or services. Its very hard to get this right and usually there is almost always mixed reactions to this change. And trust me when I say this iconic brands that shell out a lot of money and resources for a logo redesign can still get it wrong.UnderConsideration is a great place to keep an eye on some of the best stuff happening around this space.
Today we will be taking a look at some of these big brand logo redesigns and see which ones were received positively and which of them were a disaster. Let us know what you think of these via the comments below.
Logo Redesign Before and After
Tampa Bay Buccaneers
Bucs are a professional American football team based in Tampa, Florida. They play in the South Division of the National Football Conference (NFC) in the National Football League (NFL). The new look is a much more polished version and surprisingly looks good. More info.
Australian Institute of Sport
Australian Institute of Sport is a leading sports training institution in Australia. They worked with Landor Sydney to come up with the brand’s bold intent. Gold was selected as one of the core colours of the brand as it reflects the pursuit of gold for Australia. The new logo consists of five golden lines resembling tracks, curved into the shape of Australia.
Oxford Dictionaries
Oxford Dictionaries probably offers the most comprehensive coverage of English from around the world and is very likely the foremost authority on current English usage. Their new logo looks like a flipped version of Beats by Dr.Dre in a blueish color.
Fitness First
Fitness First is one of the largest privately owned health club group in the world, consisting of over 500 clubs worldwide with over 1 million members span across 21 countries. They recently unveiled their new brand positioning, strategy, visual identity and tone of voice by partnering with UK based TheClearing. This new look goes with a much more powerful 1F monogram.
Marriott Hotels
Marriott Hotels is trying to push its M to an iconic status by making it front and center with the new logo. They entrusted New York based agency Grey NY to create the new logo.
Epicurean
Epicurean sets the standard for today’s well-equipped kitchen with premier cutting surfaces and essential utensils. They pride themselves in their craftsmanship and innovative designs and aim to make their products using environmentally friendly and durable materials. The new logo certainly conveys the message that the product has something to do with kitchen. The new identity was designed by Duffy & Partners
Black & Decker
Black & Decker is an American power tools and hardware accessories manufacturer. They have recently moved away from the traditional hexagonal nut logo which was in use from 1921 and rebranded themselves as Black+Decker. The agency behind this new design is Lippincott
Netgear
Netgear is an American manufacturer of computer hardware and networking equipment. This new logo comes from Siegel+Gale and if you look closely you can see that the letter-forms has been extended which is most obvious around the E and T, the spacing between the letters has been reduced all of which gives the logo a much more professional look.
Visa
Visa is one of the biggest players in global digital payments and this logo redesign is telling me that even the big players can get it wrong. I am lost as to what was the real need for this re design.
Cadillac
Cadillac is a division of GM that markets luxury vehicles. The company was named after Antoine Laumet de La Mothe, sieur de Cadillac, the founder of the city of Detroit, and the Cadillac crest is based upon his coat of arms.
Made in Britain
Made in Britain aims to showcase products made in Britain, the organization behind it unveiled a new logo designed by The Partners. The new logo takes its inspiration from the Union Jack and also acts an arrow that points to the products made in Britain.
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS)
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences unveiled a new logo for the first time in the company’s history. The new logo spotlights the Oscar in negative space within a triangular shape which forms an A. Creative agency 180LA helped develop the new visual identity for the Academy. Check out their post on the redesign here.
South Australia
South Australia‘s new brand logo was designed by Ken Cato. The idea behind the logo was to covey a message SA is the the central doorway to the whole of Australia. If you look at Australian map you will see that the doorway represented with the logo is the state of South Australia.
State of Colorado
State of Colorado is known for its snowy mountains, craft beer and microbreweries had a logo refresh recently. Evan Hecox was the designer who came up with the new logo. Its said the logo was inspired by their mountains and the license plate used by the state.
Envato
Envato I am a recent addition to the Envato family and it has been such a lovely experience working with them. Envato runs a variety of digital marketplaces where you can get everything you need for you next creative project. We recently gave a make over to our logo, one of the many changes that are coming to our marketplaces. We opted for a flat and clean design for the logo redesign.
Optus
Optus underwent a massive re brand in 2013 that unveiled a new logo , mascot and brand identity. This new identity was designed by RE. They moved away from a corporate type logo to something much more fun.
Pandora
Pandora is used by millions of people every month to listen to music they love. When they decided to go with a logo refresh they handed it over to their internal design team which resulted in a bolder modern identity for the new logo.
MailChimp
MailChimp recently redesigned their logo to look more modern without drastically changing it. The design was conceived by graphic designer Jessica Hische.
Facebook’s Logo
Facebook did push out a small change to its f logo, when it decided to eliminate the light blue line at the bottom of its previous logo. This small change gave this logo a very flat look which is probably what they were looking for.
Instagram has a wordmark logo and the new redesign has a smoother and more fluid look to it. The logo was designed by Mackey Saturday, you can see more on this design on Dribbble
Firefox
Firefox also opted for a minimal change to modernize their logo. The Mozilla designer team was responsible for this redesign, you can find more info on this redesign on Mozilla designer Sean Martell’s blog
Philips
Royal Philips added a bit more color and a few curves to its existing logo for their logo re-brand. I believe this was designed by their in-house design team and you can learn more about this from a blog post on stocklogos.com
Mall of America
Mall of America worked with Duffy and Partners did a major redesign of the logo by added more vibrant and colorful ribbons. According to the company representative ” The fluid motion of the ribbons represents the Mall’s constant change and innovation, while the ribbons themselves are more literally interpreted as a representation of shopping and gift-giving. “. Read more on this redesign via their press release
eBay
eBay‘s logo redesign kept somewhat the old colors but took out the disorderly letter arrangement and opted for a clean minimal look which was more corporate in nature. Some felt that the connected and diverse nature that was represented with the old logo was lost with the new redesign.
Bing
Bing Microsoft’s attempt at a search engine got a new logo, which most likely was designed by the in house designers at bing. This new logo moves away from the traditional blue to an warmer orange color. Get more info on this redesigns from the designers at bing blog
Microsoft
Microsoft‘s logo was getting kinda dated and they pushed out a colorful and clean logo that incorporated the Windows colors, in the form of four square tiles.
Google took a flat approach to their logo redesign which looks really good across all devices.
Motorola
Motorola being a Google property opted for a re-design that closely aligns with the minimalist and flat design approach seen with the recent Google changes. You can also see the prominent mention of Google on the new logo.
Yahoo
Yahoo did something called “30 Days of Change”, during which they revealed a new variation of their logo each day. The final logo was something that the Yahoo design team and Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer worked on. Read what the CEO had to say on their logo redesign.
YP
YP is a North American based paid-advertising search directory operated by AT&T. With a logo from the print era this redesign ushers a new digital and mobile era for this brand. They moved away from the iPhone app like icon to a cleaner logo. The new identity was designed by Interbrand, read more about it on popsop
American Airlines
American Airlines logo redesign was a simplified, abstract take on the airlines’ eagle mascot which also doubles up as the tailplane. Read more about the re-brand here
Hooters
Hooters‘s new logo gives it a more modern look without removing the classic “naughty” identity of the brand but for some reason the owl in the logo look very clip arty to me. The new logo was designed by Atlanta based Sky Design to coincide with their 30th anniversary.
TGI Fridays
TGI Fridays has got a new logo that dropped the apostrophe and has got a more streamlined look. This design was conceived by Teviot.
Wendy’s
Wendy’s broke away from its old wild west shop sign look to something clean, friendly and very modern. This new redesign radiates freshness, a new strategy that was also reflected in their recent marketing strategy.
When updating your logo in the digital age, some key things to remember is to make sure the logo aligns with your brands vision and it scales well from print to mobile.
Some of the interesting trends in recent logo changes are flat and minimalist design, wider spacing etc all of which will help you logo transform gracefully between different medium. Also brace for criticism when you launch the new logo, most people don’t like change but change as they say is inevitable.
