advertising and other stuff. no, really.



Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Yea! New Starbucks logo!

















The mermaid formerly known as... Saw this on AdFreak and while Tim asks if people like it, I think in the current climate of fear that most brands find themselves, it doesn’t, and it won’t, matter. Social media gives them an out to change it back if the outcry is too much too handle. If you like it? Win! If you hate it though? Well, we were just *floating* the idea out there, so we’ll change it back. Another win! Which equals... win-win! I suspect the biggest gripe will be walking away from the use of the word Starbucks. Now, all the focus is on her, removing her possibly too much from the context people were familiar with. Will *brand advocates* care about that since they already live the brand? Probably not. (I was sad to see her belly button removed long ago.)

A rebrand can be as much about bringing new crew into the fold as anything though, and some may want to see some more brand ID in there. This simplified use of the symbol feels like they don’t care about that issue as much, preferring instead to count on the overall recognition the brand has to drive awareness here. The list of brands going without a name in the logo is fairly small though. Nike seems to get away with just a graphic. Pepsi tries in some of its usage but mostly has the word next to the logo. I guess things were that broke that they needed a rebrand.

1 comment:

Curator said...

The only thing that's 'broke' is their coffee!