We Don’t Do Logos

The silence is deafening. Just moments earlier there was excitement. The potential client understood that we were different. We’d confirmed what they’d heard, that we are a true branding firm. We’d taken them down the path of our branding process. We told them good branding only answers four questions: Who you are, what you do, who you do it for and, most important, what they have to say about you. We told them we’d doggedly return to these four questions, again and again, throughout the process.

This branding thing? They liked it. It was everything they’d heard and more.

That’s the problem, the more. A long silence, and then, “What do you mean, you don’t do logos?” I meant, and I still mean, exactly what I said. We don’t do logos. We don’t and we won’t ever intentionally do a client or potential client a disservice. A logo, just a logo, as a means to define one’s identity does a disservice.

A logo is only one element in the visual representation of a company’s brand. The logo must “go” someplace. The willingness on any so-called branding firm’s part to develop and release a logo as a stand-alone element should tell any prospective client one thing: They don’t care about you.

A logo is a shiny thing. We all want one. They’re cool. They scream status. We want to show our friends. Well, I want a plane. No, really. They’re shiny. If you know me, you know mine would be shinier than most. But, beyond being the shiny, cool new status thing that it is, what the hell good would a plane do me? Without proper instruction on when, where and how to use it, it can’t take me anywhere.

Without application, actually putting it on something, people will never see your shiny new logo.

At the very least, we do identity packages. We develop your logo with you as an extension of your brand voice and as an anchor of your brand identity. Then, we design a package of all the most likely elements that will hold your logo. The identity package is the hangar for the shiny new plane. It won’t take you any place. But, at the very least, people can safely come to it and hangout.

No, we don’t do logos. We design branded identity packages.

As exquisite as they are, they are a destination, a hangar. Even they don’t take you any place. The good news is that after nearly 15 years as a true branding firm, we know how this goes. Once a client trusts us to create the identity, it’s not long before they trust us in the cockpit. They quickly understand we are taking them someplace. We go together.