Reactions to the new logo on Starbucks.com

I spent some time yesterday reading through comments on Starbucks’ blog post announcing the new logo. It seems like the feedback there is mostly negative, but many are clearly knee-jerk reactions from people whose thought process seems to be “it’s different, so I hate it!” Nonetheless, I thought it’d be interesting to see what words were showing up most in those 100+ posts, partly as an alternative way of quickly gauging group’s sentiment. Here’s the result (courtesy of Wordle):

Of course, “Starbucks” and “logo” were the clear winners, so I removed those, along with common English words and names of posters. Note that “like” shows up a lot, but it’s often in phrases such as “looks like…” or “don’t like.” Some of the more interesting words that show up are “sorry,” “Nike,” “Swoosh,” “iconic,” and “mistake.”

For a more interesting debate about the new mark, check out LogoDesignLove.

Li-Ning is one of 2010’s top brand stories in China

The fourth-quarter issue of Labbrand’s LABReport contains an article on the top five brand stories in China for 2010.  I’ll post them here individually over the next month or so, but if you’d like to read them all right away, including our point of view on the underlying trends involved, please follow the link above (and subscribe to receive LABReport for free, while you’re at it!). This article was written and researched with help from Kevin Gentle and the rest of the Labbrand team; thanks for your help, everyone!

I’d love to hear feedback on what stories we missed, where you agree or disagree, etc. Here’s the section on Li-Ning:

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Nitpick with Google’s Veterans Day logo

Google’s holiday logos, or Google Doodles, are great, and show off the company’s willingness to have a little fun at its own expense—something I think far too many big corporations are afraid to do. It’s an unfortunate fact that the brand consulting industry is partly to blame for this fear of “fun” and creative expression, as documents like visual identity guidelines (although very useful for many companies) can err on the side of restricting too much, preventing in-house creative talent or well-intentioned managers from effectively expressing the company’s personality. Guidelines and charters like these need to walk a fine line between preventing inconsistency and allowing a reasonable, useful amount of flexibility. They should, in fact, enhance the expression of a brand’s personality.

But all this is a topic for another post. All I really wanted to ask was whether anyone else was a bit freaked out by the pointy “horn” of the “e” sticking out from behind the US flag in this Veterans Day logo from Google a month ago:

I feel like Senator McCarthy saying this, but that red shape, peaking out from behind the American flag…it seems reminiscent of another symbol to me…

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Visualizing TV preferences by party affiliation

I’ve seen a few articles now about this Experian Simmons study showing the “highest scoring shows from Experian’s Republican Index and Democrat Index,” but I still haven’t been able to find any information about the methodology behind it.

Methodology aside, what immediately struck me as odd is that the presentation doesn’t make much sense. Why is Desperate Housewives a popular Republican show if it got the same score from both Democrats and Republicans? Why is Damages listed as the #10 most popular Democrat show if it scored lower than Community (#11) among democrats, and scored the same among Republicans? There doesn’t seem to be much rhyme or reason to the order or even the grouping.

Here’s alternative way to visualize the same data (again, I’m not sure how it was collected). I think it makes more sense than the list above. (Click for larger version.) Here, the shows are listed in order by the difference between their Republican and Democrat scores. Both scores are shown, making it easy to see the differences as well as the relative scores between shows. Here it becomes clear that many of the shows listed are actually “bipartisan,” in that the differences between their scores are negligible compared to the two extremes.

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Mind the Gap(’s new logo)

The picture above is not the new Gap logo. It’s a version that I created myself, in PowerPoint, in about 15 minutes. I just used the logo-design steps I outlined in one of my old, sarcastic posts titled “How to build your brand for free.” While it’s tough to objectively judge a logo, I do wonder whether the ability to quickly replicate it in a Microsoft Office program should be cause for concern.

It seems the new logo, announced earlier this week, has mostly experienced a negative reception from the general public. Time’s NewsFeed may be one exception (if they’re not kidding):

But “generic” and “looks alike” are not usually words you want to hear in reaction to a logo. And since the same words could be used to describe the vanishing uniqueness of Gap’s clothing, the brand may be squandering one of its few remaining strengths: a link to its own past. I’m not saying the logo has to stay the same, or that it should look like something from 1969, but if this dramatic change conveys “a streamlined, technologically dominant future,” can we expect a matching change in Gap’s overarching strategy (including products, of course)? If not, I have trouble seeing this as anything more than desperate attention seeking.

For contrast, check out something Levi’s has been up to lately. It’s not a logo redesign, but I love how this campaign at once romanticizes the company’s history and makes relevant connections to the present.

[Thanks to Shireen for pointing out the new Gap logo.]

Learning to trust again

About eight months ago I moved to Shanghai. It’s my first time living outside the United States as an adult, and as a consumer it sometimes feels like being reborn. Don’t get me wrong—Shanghai is a modern, diverse city, so it’s not so hard to find familiar Western brands here. But because of the ubiquity and lower cost of local brands (or at least less familiar ones), I’m constantly in the position of making decisions about brands with which I have no history—not the brands I grew up with and saw my parents using as a child—not the ones for which I remember a famous ad campaign from the 80s or can hum a jingle on cue.

(And as a side note, sometimes even the most familiar brands are somehow unfamiliar here.)

Of course it’s impossible to remove all the preconceived notions that influence a purchase decision, but in some ways I feel like a subject in an experiment: How do we form opinions and develop biases about things that are  new to us? And it’s not just that they’re unfamiliar…the written language barrier also blocks access to otherwise simply communicated messages. Since moving here I’ve twice bought yogurt thinking it was milk. (Hey, show an American a white-and-blue, one-quart cardboard carton at the supermarket, and it’s milk. Talk about a strong semiotic code. Now I do a shake-test just to be sure.) Sometimes I can’t even read the name of the salty packaged snack I’m buying, much less the ingredients list, nutritional information, or where it’s manufactured, not to mention any romance copy about how crunchy or flavorful it is.

If this was an experiment, what could we learn from it? It’s hard to say how applicable the results would be to any other situation. Most adult consumers are literate. They watch local TV and read local periodicals. The fact is, I’m not even in the target market for the majority of the products I’m buying. Regardless, I do feel I’m learning about my own consumption habits from a new perspective and therefore gaining some insights that could be generalized to other consumers. For example:

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