This got me wondering the other day, what do big companies actually want to represent through their logos?
Logos as we know are the face of a brand. It is not a random designing act, dabbling with images, words or one-liners.
It is a concerted effort, almost a geeky endeavor that involves technical skills and right amount of shrewdness to attract a customer merely by visual appeal.
Although the wise men say do not fall for such shallow beauty, but let's agree that visual presentation is an essential strategy in a business operations.
It's not show biz per say but a biz about what you want to show to the customers. Makes perfect sense!
Today we bring for you some mind blowing behind-the-scenes stories of brands and their logo designs. Get set for some happy findings, readers!
PICASSAA
Poopular photo-editing tool's logo is not only funky to look at but spells out a clever logo design attempt. It is obvious that the logo represents the traditional camera shutter mechanism. The central capture space is said to depict a house, in other words a personal environment and the two alphabets "Pi" stand for pixels. In short, Picassa for you is your personal pictures.
AMAZON.COM
AMAZON.COM
For most viewers the logo is just a typewritten name of the company. Well it ain't so simple. The brand actually has a philosophy behind its logo. The yellow arrow is percieved as a smile by most onlookers. However, the Amazon team conceived it as a represenation of their holistic customer satisfaction drive, i.e to offer clients anything from a to z.
FedEx
FedEx
This is what I call an intelligently geeky design tactic. The secret message in the logo is very hard to figure out unless you are a logo watcher per say. So here it is. Look closely at the last two words E and x, it forms a arrow in white. It is symbolic of speed and precision delivery of the company.
TOBLERONE
TOBLERONE
If you are a chocaholic like me, you will love this small snippet. Toblerone is a Swiss based chocolate manufacturer. The company's manufacturing unit is located in Bern, also known as the "City of Bears". True to its nativity, the choco giant incorporates the two important defining symbols of Switzerland- the Alps and the native Bear in their brand logo.
BASKIN ROBBINS
BASKIN ROBBINS
The giant is known for its delicious ice creams in all flavors and sizes. For the past generation who have been a BR loyalist would remember that the old logo had a No.31 with an arc above it. As a revamping measure, the logo was redesigned in funkier colors but 31 was still retained. Lookcarefully between the alphabets to catch the artistic 31 , that represents the 31 flavors of ice creams they offer.
Sony VAIO
Sony VAIO
A tech firm known for its specialty in laptops has a truly technical secret hidden in its logo. The first two letters in "Vaio" symbolize the basic analogue signal and the last two that resemble 1 and 0 represent the digital signal.
UNILEVER
UNILEVER
If there's a brand that symbolizes multi-tasking pictographically, it's got to be Unilever. A brand name known for a variety of assorted services in food, beverages, personal care products etc, their logo design when seen carefully represents each of their different products.
Le TOUR de FRANCE
It's as peppy as the the cycling sport is. The logo comes with a yellow dot and the tournament event written in a stylized manner. But looking beyond the surface, one can easily spot a person riding a bicycle actually in the logo, yellow being the front wheel of the cycle and r as the human body.
VOLVO
VOLVO
Taken from a Latin word, Volvo implies "I roll". To trace the company's antecedents, it was known for its high end ball bearing manufacturing in the past. The car making giant's logo with a Martian symbol is not to be misjudged as a sign of masculinity i.e men who drive these beasts fast and furious. In fact, it is the old scientific symbol for the metal iron since Swedish iron and steel was a major part of their car manufacturing industry.
DOMINOS
DOMINOS
This logo has an aura of old time charm. Designed originally in the 1960s with three red dots representing their outlets, the logo was refurbished eventually as the company grew. Since it was practically impossible to represent the food giant's global spread through so many dots, the company merely chose to tilt the original to the left slightly in 1987 so as to help a passerby catch it more easily. Since then the business has grown splendidly.
ADDIDAS
ADDIDAS
The footwear line's logo has undergone a 3 fold redesign since its first roll out. Their prototype design, famously known as the "3 Stripes" was designed by their founder Adi Dassler in 1949 to make a visual impact on the wearer. Coming to 1960 and 70s, when the brand was established and looking to expand sectorally, the 'Trefoil' or a geometric triple intersected design was chosen. It showcased the diversity of the brand. By 1990, designer Peter Moore was assigned the task to conceive a new look. Keeping the triad alive, a new corporate design with bar- like mountains was chosen highlighting the collective goals and challenges for the company to achieve.
REUTERS
REUTERS
The world acclaimed news reporting giant has a rather funny story behind its logo. For many the orange dots could represent the global reach of the company, such was my thought honestly. However, the far from the corporate symbolism that was desired to be represented. The logo is inspired from a flushing of a swirling toilet. Seen in the long shot, that's was Reuters does, collate all the crappy happenings from around the globe, filter it and hand out a meaningful journalistic story.
APPLE
APPLE
The half bitten apple in the tech firm's logo is not a Newtonian dedication nor a Christian truth derivative. It's more simple. A Byte in internet terminology is represented pictographically i.e 8 bits equal a Byte.
MERCEDES
MERCEDES
Daimler, the manufacturing giant has prudently chosen their symbolism. Unchanged over the decades, the 3-pointed star represents the car giant's zeal for 'universal motorization' - on land, water and air. In fact, this pre-War company actually produced aircrafts and marine engines before cars.
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Aah the best one would definitely be 'Sony VAIO' logo, it's clever and conveys a lot about their brand. I actually got very little but evident goose-bumps when i actually finished reading and noticed the logo.
Well said Parth. Its an extremely innovative and creative Brand logo that conveys the information it has to very subtly: that Sony has had an extremely successful hand in the analog field(with its earlier CRT based TV's, walkman etc), just to name a few and now in the digital age with its lineup of fantastic laptops and other digital devices. Thanks for cheering your thoughts with us Parth.
The Sony VAIO logo is pretty cool, although how many people really get that. The Picasa logo looks like a shutter and thats what I think most people see in it,.... Its pretty clever with the Pixel / Casa but since when has Pi been short for pixel? The adidas logo looks better now than before I think. Fortunately they havent managed to ruin the logo like some of these: http://print24.com/blog/2013/07/30-logo-redesigns-for-your-inspiration/ Couple of these are really shocking :O
As we shared in the past the Sony Vaio Brand logo is really very innovative though it may take some time to interpret it to what it actually conveys. That said we also feel that interpretation of logo brands is to some level a very personal experience and could be based on a person's nationality, social upbringing and his or her sensitization to the brand in question in their process of growing up. For example on the page link that you shared in your comment with us the "Sony Music" logo's color change from the garish red to mellow light blue would suggest to us the sophistication that sony has introduced via the spread of hands-free Bluetooth headsets with a light bluish led to show that the device is in operation. The main point that we are trying to make here is that is that everyone's interpretation at first could be unique until we tend to be taught by the medias and our immediate social circle what we are supposed to make of a certain brand's logo. If you tend to agree please lets discuss this in the comments below.