Revisit

I was just re-reading a post yesterday that I had written just prior to the NHL season regarding the Washington Capitals Logo and how the eagle somewhat resembled the D.C. United’s Logo. Ironically, today the D.C. United unveiled new uniforms, which don’t feature a new eagle form or anything of the like. In fact, the uniforms haven’t changed much at all, if you exclude the large Volkswagen logo planted smack dab in the middle of the jersey.

That’s right, the D.C. United now sport the big VW on their uniforms and from what I’m gathering, the reception has been rather good. You can read more about the finer details by visiting the team’s official blog, Behind the Badge.

“We left our jersey blank for a long time because it was so important that the brand we associated with matched up and complemented our D.C. United brand,” said D.C. United managing partner Victor MacFarlane. “I’m pleased to say we’ve found that brand.”

Not being a passionate soccer fan myself, I suppose I’m unsure of how autos conceptually meld with soccer. I realize that the sport has a stronger following in Europe and Volkswagen is European, so I guess that’s something, but we’re in America, right? Anyway, I do like the jerseys and having one of the most well-established symbols on the planet, can only help the sales of merchandise and ticket sales.

In terms of co-branding, D.C. United’s team logo is obviously not the focal point. I presume that with soccer, this is more of the trend, or perhaps this is helping establish a trend where sponsors play more of a central role in the marketing. Perhaps this sport’s marketing will evolve to be somewhat akin to Nascar, where the focal point on the cars is the sponsor.

In any case, Volkwagon is a great brand, soccer is a far reaching sport, and the D.C. United has been one of the most successful teams in the MLS, so this should a great development. Per the agreement itself, the new arrangement gives Volkswagen licensing rights to the United’s jerseys, stadium displays, and preference for stadium naming rights when a new one is determined. The deal is reported to be one of the most lucrative to date for the sport in the U.S., at an estimated $14 million.

Volkswagen’s initiative was conceived in conjunction with their recent re-location of their stateside headquarters to my hometown of Herndon, VA, a suburb of Washington D.C. “We are very proud to be part of the greater Washington, D.C. community,” said Stefan Jacoby, president and CEO of Volkswagen’s U.S. division. “We always said when we moved to D.C. and when we moved closer to our customers, to be a real marketing organization, we want to be also showing our local commitment by partnering with a great organization in this area and we are happy that you waited so long for us.”

I have a feeling that the arrangement will work out well, and we should be seeing these jerseys around town pretty soon!

• Read the official press release
• Read more about Volkswagen

This week marks a biggie for rebranding aficionados, with the redesign of the Xerox corporate logo. There is already a lot out there on the topic, so I won’t totally reinvent the wheel.

Xerox’s perspective on the Logo Rebranding

“There has been a perception gap in the marketplace,” said Richard Wergan, vice president of worldwide brand marketing and advertising. “Xerox is still perceived incorrectly as a copier company. We do not make copiers.”

Wergan would not say how much the research for the new logo cost, but said it was a “significant multimillion-dollar marketing investment.”

From the Official Press Release:

The new Xerox logo is now a lowercase treatment of the Xerox name – in a vibrant red – alongside a sphere-shaped symbol sketched with lines that link to form an illustrative “X,” representing Xerox’s connections to its customers, partners, industry and innovation, and designed to be more effectively animated for use in multi-media platforms.

“Our brand is one of our most prized assets and the value it brings to our business is immeasurable,” added Ursula M. Burns, president, Xerox. “Our customers, our employees and our shareholders connect the most with what the brand stands for — quality, innovation, customer-focus and a values-rich culture. Today, we’re strengthening all our attributes and giving our brand a contemporary look that is more relevant for business today – a bit less formal, a lot more lively with links to our heritage and a nod to the future.”

From Business Week:

Making the Brand More Approachable

Designed in the 1960s by branding firm, Chermayeff & Geismar, the familiar block-capital-letter XEROX wordmark, most often seen around the world in red, did not lend itself to the three-dimensional world of Internet and mobile-phone marketing canvases. The new logo, created in FS Albert font, is accompanied by a symbol—a red sphere that is trying to convey a sense of the globe. The intersecting graphic ribbons encircling the sphere signify the worldwide connections between Xerox’s customers, employees, and other stakeholders. The new wordmark, with softened and rounded lower-case letters, is a far cry from the former imposing logo hatched in an era when U.S. Steel and IBM were kings of the corporate mountains.

The new graphic identity of the company is meant to make Xerox a more approachable brand without compromising its reputation for engineering. In fact, an internal document circulated between Interbrand and Xerox describes the new graphic font this way: “I am FS Albert. I am a modern and approachable font. My rounded corners make me more human and less technical.” The sphere symbol will be especially used on the Internet and will spin in other animated applications, says Maryanne Stump, Interbrand’s senior director of brand strategy. “The old Xerox logo and graphics just didn’t lend themselves to the new media landscape.”

During 18 months of research preceding this week’s launch, customers already made strong connections between the brand and attributes such as “dependable, traditional, and established.” The company’s challenge will be to reinforce those while improving impressions of the other characteristics, which currently separate Xerox from its rivals in a negative way.

Xerox, despite the ubiquity of its brand, operates at a brand-building disadvantage to rivals like Canon, Hewlett-Packard, and Toshiba in that those brands have strong consumer franchises to buttress their business-to-business images. “The research shows that this gives our competitors an advantage in communicating innovation and modernity,” says Wergan.

The Business Week article goes on to talk about Xerox’s blunder in allowing Microsoft and Apple to swipe their forerunning ideas to our modern day personal computing. I found this somewhat ironic as the first thing I likened the new logo to, was the Xbox logo, a sub-brand waving under Microsoft’s banner.

Here’s a comparison:

My Thoughts:Anyway, I pretty much agree with what has been stated. The Xerox brand was overdue for an overhaul. The type was very old school/corporate, with less than ideal all cap readability. The switch takes the font from a thick and thin sans to a thicker sans with a darker toned red. I do like the type selection, FS Albert font, which has an organic playfulness to it that was desperately needed to liven up the corporate message.

Visually, the type maintains its consistency with each character equi-distant from baseline to cap line; but it’s certainly more readable now. The all lowercase definitely does bring about a more modern trend and the gradation on the ball definitely makes this web 2.0 or business 2.0, whatever you want to call it. I’m not a fan of gradation logo elements, but overall this logo is a notable improvement.

The design firm said, “The sphere symbol will be especially used on the Internet and will spin in other animated application.” Hmmm, spinning, gotta wonder about that…

I just read an article on USA Today which says that the NFL will be releasing a new logo next year. The logo will replace a design which is nearly 40 years old.

The redesign will not deviate from the established shield shape, but will be switching some of the interior components. The amount of stars will be reduced from 25 to 8. The original number of 25 is said to be arbitrary, but the new figure of 8 is representative of the 8 divisions which compose the league. The stars will be larger scale and will certainly improve the scaling down and reproduction of the logo for merchandising purposes.

Next to the stars is the redesign of the football, which is said to more closely mimic that of the Vince Lombardi Trophy—which was my first impression as well. Although I do think the illustration is an improvement, it’s my opinion that the more vertical placement creates an awkward interaction with the shield spire above it.

Moving on to the type, the new face shifts from a stylized serif, noticeable on the L, versus a slab serif. The change simplifies the type and makes it crisp. The increased white space surrounding the type also helps make this version more readable than its predecessors.

Finally, color. The new blue is darker and bolder which coupled with the current red, makes the mark very bold. For football, a bold impression is the key.

Other sports articles:

• Washington Capitals Logo Design
• Capitals Logo Follow-Up

The Web 2.0 Expo is a conference for web professionals, marketers and entrepreneurs. It is a new event that brings Web 2.0 to life by featuring workshops, networking, and keynote speakers. Speakers included the top brass for Amazon, Google, and Yahoo!.

I personally did not attend, but learned about this via the web. What caught my attention first on the website was the amount of Web 2.0 sponsors featured on the sidebar. All of the big names were represented, but the one that caught my eye was a company called LongJump.

Web 2.0 logos as a whole do not hold my attention, so when I see one that stands out, it is somewhat refreshing. As a commentary which I may expound upon later, the Web 2.0 logos are too dependent on type and not enough on concept.

Per the topic of discussion, the LongJump logo has concept, but after visiting their site, I’m still trying to figure out how that meaning is supposed to convey to their product. The website does not tie-in the meaning of the metaphor. There is no repetition of this concept elsewhere that I could find or discern.

Regarding the logo itself, I found it to be clean and simple. The figure evokes an athletic silhouette much akin to the famous Air Jordan Jumpman logo by Nike. The color association of the illustration and the word jump was a nice connection. The bold upper case sans-serif is very modern Web 2.0-like, catering to its application savvy market. The kerning was a point of interest to me. Most 2.0 logo’s don’t play with type and I found extended kerning to be an appropriate solution for this particular illustration. It gives some breathing room for the solid figure, but it also works well with the jumper who is performing a horizontal jump.

Speaking of which, I am not a track star, but this jumper appears to be more of a hurdler than a long jumper. I have included a picture of U.S. gold medal Olympians Edwin Moses (hurdles) and Carl Lewis (long jump) to demonstrate these different postures. Perhaps the designer made a determination that the hurdler is just more aesthetic, but it is a detail worth mentioning nonethless.

Here’s my follow-up to Washington Capitals Logo Design.

It has been a few weeks since the Capitals Draft Party and now that I have seen the logo, the buzz is over with, and I have time to think about it, I have come to the same conclusion. The new logo is a bit more modern, but still needs work. The uniforms are flat and do not have the mezmorizing quality that the original franchise sweaters had with their red, white, and blue stars.

Listed below from left to right is the Capitals new sleeve eagle logo, the Pontiac Firebird logo, and the D.C. United logo. I did not see the negative space Capitol in my initial analysis, but it’s probably better that I didn’t. The form is contrived and does not add to the design. It is clever, but I fail to see the meaning that it adds.

My initial reaction to the secondary logo evoked thoughts of Smokey and the Bandit, so there wasn’t enough difference I suppose for me to get excited about.

Another point, which might be valid is the fact that Washington sports already have this form represented in the D.C. United, who feature the same poised eagle.

I suppose birds of a feather flock together.

Addendum: 7/10/07

I sorted through my papers to find one of the handouts from the Capitals Draft Party. I must say, the materials the Capitals PR put together were very nice. The event was promoted very well! Here is the card, you can click on it for more detail.

Anyone who wants to delve further into the Washington Capitals uniform subject further should check out capsjerseys.com.