• GR4W 
  • Subscribe

The inside scoop about the Logo Design Business.

Learn More

Archive for March, 2010

12 Most Exciting Logo Mergers of the Corporate World!!

Categories: Logo Design Resources, Logo Design Tips, Logo Designers, LogoBlog
Written By: Nora Reed
 
A logo design is a reflection of a company’s corporate identity. That is why when companies merge, on several occasions their logo designs undergo similar treatment. When two or more corporate brands decide to unite, either through a merger or an acquisition, it often gives birth to a new corporate logo.

But logo design merger of two corporate brands is not an easy activity to execute. The companies involved must ensure that the logo merger can successfully elucidate what is different about the newly created brand.

Have a look at 12 of the most impressive logo mergers of corporate brands:

 

1. Commerzbank Merger with Dresdner Bank:

Commerzbank, Germany’s second largest financial institution, merged with Dresdner Bank. The logo design of the combined corporate entity encompasses the name “Commerzbank” along with Dresdner Bank’s “triangle shaped ribbon” logotype in yellow.
 

2. Citigroup:

Citigroup is an American financial services company. Citigroup was formed by the merger of Citicorp and Travelers Group in 1998.
 

3. Regions-Union Planters:

Corporate merger between Regions Financial Corp and Union Planters Corp gave way for a new logo design holding the brand legacies of both the companies. It includes the Regions trademark green color and name with Union Planters three-leaf delta device.
 

4. Unnim

Unnim was formed as a merger between four small Spanish banks Caixa Terrassa, Caixa Girona, Caixa Sabadell and Caixa Manlleu.
 

5. ExxonMobil

ExxonMobil, an American oil and gas corporation was instituted on November 30, 1999, by the merger of Exxon and Mobil.
 

6. Glaxo Smithkline:

Glaxo Smithkline, popularly known as GSK, was formed in 2000 by the merger of GlaxoWellcome and SmithKline Beecham.
 

7. Century Link:

Century Link is the merger between two telecommunication companies, CenturyTel and Embarq. The merged logo design has cleverly included aspects of both the previous company logos.
 

8. J P Morgan Chase:

J.P Morgan was formed in 2000 when Chase Manhattan Corporation merged with J.P. Morgan & Co.
 

9. HBOS

HBOS was set up in 2001 following the merger between Halifax and the Bank of Scotland. The HBOS logo design incorporates features of both its merging company logos.
 

10. Chevron

Chevron Corporation is an energy company formed by the merger of Standard Oil of California and Gulf Oil in 1984. The Chevron logo design includes a logotype similar to Standard Oil of California but with a change of colors.

 

11. Towers Watson

Towers Watson is the result of merger between Watson Wyatt Worldwide and Towers Perrin. Interbrand was given the project to create the new logo merger.
 

12. Tata Docomo

India’s most successful corporate giant "Tata Group" partnered with Japanese telecom company "NTT DOCOMO" to create a new cellular service in India, "Tata DOCOMO".
 
After witnessing these logo mergers, do you think that a logo merger is necessary for corporate fusion?
 

30 Expressive Logo Designs – Emotions and Sentiments!!

Categories: Logo Design Inspiration, Logo Inspiration, logo designs
Written By: Nora Reed
 

I believe a logo design to be successful if it has the ability to stir feelings and emotions of a customer. Nowadays, a product is not considered merely as a commodity but a thing of pride and possession. The best of corporate brands are ones that generate feelings among their customers.
The best way to create an emotional bond between your company and your customers is to create a logo design that can touch their intrinsic feelings. We all experience strong feelings that accompany either positive or negative emotions. A day without feeling emotions is impossible to imagine. Just by adding a smile in your logo design, you can express care and affection for your customers. Some of the most widely used expressions in logo design are happy, sad, laughing, crying and angry emotions.
The real art is to integrate a suitable emotion within a logo design in an appropriate manner. Following are 30 inspirational logos that incorporate an emotion within their logo design:

 
 

  Return to joy

Return to joy emotion
 

  TIPYO

TIPYO
 

  SAD Emotion

SAD emotion
 

  U 2 Brust

U 2 Brust
 

  File Drama

File Drama
 

  Gepapelle

Gepapelle
 

  Sumo Shirt

Sumo Shirt
 

  Electric Smiling

Electric Smiling
 

  Dermato Logic

Dermato Logic
 

  Pozzitiva

Pozzitiva
 

  Good Will

Good Will
 

  The Happy Cup

The Happy Cup
 

  Smile Pathway

Smile Pathway
 

  Kids Style

Kids Style
 

  Blink

Blink
 

  Answer the cry

Answer the cry
 

  Laugh Attic

Laugh Attic
 

  King Hams

King Hams
 

  Mouserious

Mouserious
 

  KOAL

KOAL
 

  Father joy

Father joy
 

  Mobile Ceria

Mobile Ceria
 

  Nerd smile

Nerd smile
 

  SWAY

SWAY
 

  Osmocha

Osmocha
 

  Crazy Tomato

Crazy Tomato
 

  Angry Teeth

Angry Teeth
 

  Wild Man

Wild Man
 

  Funkyen

Funkyen
 

  Zvon Cafe

Zvon Cafe
 
 

Logorama wins Oscar – A Victory for Corporate Logos!!

Categories: Logo Design Tips
Written By: Nora Reed

The 82nd Annual Academy Awards unfurled with scenes of great enthusiasm and amazing shocks. People witnessed the best ventures of the film industry being awarded for their performances. Among the Oscar winners was the award for “Best Short Animation Film” earned by “Logorama”. The 16 minute short film based on corporate logos took over six-years to produce.

 
 

Logorama Cast and Crew:

The film, directed by the trio, François Alaux, Hervé de Crécy and Ludovic Houplain, is a 16-minute movie and revolves around the adventures of two cops (Michelin Men) who are in pursuit of an armed criminal (Ronald McDonald ) through Los Angeles style city filled with famous logo designs. Never has a film depicted all characters and items through real-life famous logo designs featuring around 3000 corporate logo designs. Famous corporate logos like the Pringles, Sega, Dominos, Pizza Hut and McDonald’s logo designs are seen in the movie. The logo characters are articulated mainly by Bob Stephenson (as Bibendum Mike, Bibendum Sheriff and Ronald McDonald) and Aja Evans (as Esso Girl). Logorama beat other nominations in the category which included French Roast, Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty, The Lady and the Reaper, A Matter of Loaf and Death.>

 
logorama
 

6 years to make this 16 minutes!!

Nicolas Schmerkin, the film’s producer who went on stage to collect the prestigious Oscar Statue, said
Good evening. It doesn’t look like, but it’s a French film. Sorry about the accent. I’m the producer of the film, so I have to thank the 3,000 non-official sponsors that appear in the film. And I have to assure them that no logos were harmed in the making of the project. It took, like, six years to make this 16 minutes, so I hope to come back here with a long feature film, in about 36 years. Thank you very much. Bon soir.

 
Do you think this creative film is a clever way of promoting corporate logo designs?
 

Google Buzz Logo vs UNO Logo – Who should be blamed for plagiarism?

Categories: Logo Design Tips
Written By: Nora Reed
 

Google Buzz is undoubtedly the latest hype on the social media network. Ever since I saw the Buzz logo, I have constantly pondered on its mysterious logo design. It was one day while playing UNO that I finally figured why the Google Buzz logo design bewildered me so much. I discovered that the Google Buzz logo bears a startling resemblance to the UNO card game logo.

The four colors of the Google Buzz “conversation bubble” logo design are arranged in an almost similar manner to the UNO “Wild Draw-Four” cards. The circle on UNO logo is sliced into four equal triangles of red, green, blue, and yellow colors. Likewise, the Google Buzz conversation bubble logo design is also bifurcated into the same colors and proportions.

 

Setting the record straight:

Is it really a coincidence or is there something fishy? Let us review some facts about both the logo designs and their development….it might help us come to a conclusion.
 

 

Uno Logo

Google Buzz Logo

Introduced in

1971

2010

Developed by

Merle Robbins

Google Buzz Team

Owned by

Mattel Inc.

Google Inc.

Purpose

Card Game

Social Networking

 

Who to blame?

Merle Robbins died way before Google itself was formed. After having set the record straight, who do you propose to be blamed for logo design plagiarism? Is it a coincidence or is Google guilty of something?

 

10 Famous Logo Designers and their creations – A tribute!!

Categories: Famous Logo Designs, Logo Designers
Written By: Nora Reed
We witness countless famous brands and their captivating logo designs but do we ever wonder whose brainchild is it that created these magnificent logo designs? Short and simple, I say:

Behind every successful brand there is a logo designer”.

Today I have penned 10 of the most famous and prominent logo designers behind the finest corporate brands. Some of them are not among us today but their masterpieces are eternal, compelling us to salute these masterminds. So, let’s begin the tour.
 
 

1. Saul Bass

SAUL BASS (1920-1996) was a renowned graphic designer of the 20th century. He was well known for designing film titles. His corporate logo designing included very successful brand identities like Bell Telephone System Communications, United Airlines, AT&T, Minolta, and Warner.

 
 

2. Paul Rand

Paul Rand (1914–1996) was an eminent graphic designer of American origin. He was best recognized for his famous corporate logo designs. Some of his corporate identities include the logo designs for ABC, IBM and UPS.

 
 
 

3. Alan Fletcher

Alan Gerard Fletcher (1931- 2006) was a British graphic designer. The Daily Telegraph described him as "the most highly regarded graphic designer of his generation, and probably one of the most prolific". Some of his corporate work that is known to many is the logo for Reuters in 1965, comprising of 84 dots. His "V&A" logo for Victoria and Albert Museum, designed in 1989 his "IoD" logo for the Institute of Directors are still in use today.

 
 
 

4. Sagi Haviv

Sagi Haviv, who is a partner at Chermayeff & Geismar, is a 34 year old designer. Among his various corporate identity projects are the logo designs for the National Parks of New York Harbor, Radio Free Europe, Library of Congress, and the famous fashion brand Armani Exchange.

 
 
 

5. Walter Landor

Walter Landor (1913-1995) was a German graphic designer belonging to Munich. Landor was most popular for his creative Fedex logo design. The meticulous use of negative space ‘arrow’ was a brilliant masterpiece of Landor. His FedEx logo design is considered as one of the best logo designs in the world.

 
 
 

6. Herb Lubalin

Herbert F. Lubalin (1918 –1981) was a famous graphic designer of USA. Herb’s most prominent logo designs are the Marriage logo created in 1965 and the Families logo designed in 1980.

 
 
 

7. Chermayeff & Geismar:

Ivan Chermayeff and Tom Geismar were two students at Yale in the mid 1950s. Chermayeff & Geismar Inc are the creators of numerous famous trademarks and corporate identities. Some of the most prestigious of their works is for large corporations such as Mobil, Time Warner, Viacom, and Xerox.

 
 
 

8. Wally Olins

Wikipedia claims Wally Olins to be recognized as the world’s most experienced practitioner of corporate identity and branding. Wally was nominated for the Prince Philip Designers Prize in 1999 and received the Royal Society of Arts’ Bicentenary Medal for his tireless efforts in the design industry.

 
 
 

9. Gerard Huerta

Gerard Huerta is a designer with one of the most versatile design portfolio. Not many graphic designers get the opportunity to apply their design skills in such vast areas as Gerard Huerta has done. His famous corporate logo designs include Swiss Army Brands, Calvin Klein’s Eternity, MSG Network, CBS Records Masterworks logo, The Atlantic Monthly and PC Magazine.

 
 
 

10. Raymond Loewy

Raymond Loewy (1893 – 1986) is recognized as one of the best industrial designers of the 20th century. The 1971 Shell logo, which is still used today, was designed by Loewy. He also created old logos for British Petroleum (Shield logo) and Exxon.

 
 
 
Subscribe on RSS
Follow Me on twitter