That Perfect Logo
By Mark Halliar
Take a look around you, right now... whatever you're doing, stop and look around you. Within five feet of where you are, how many logos do you see? Is there a logo on your coffee cup, pop can or even the pen you're holding? How about on the monitor you're reading this on? At one point in time, all of these logos were nothing but an idea. There were meetings, discussions, numerous revisions and maybe, even some hurt feelings, all about that one little logo printed on the back of your note pad. Imagine how many hours were spent just talking about that one little logo.
I've recently become friends with this guy Stew, who owns his own advertising agency. He recounted this story to me about a client he once had; they wanted a new look for their company, so Stew sat down and started coming up with new logo concepts. A week of sketching & refining ideas passes and he proudly takes them to his new client.
They look them over and don't like a single one. Back and forth they go for six months with revision after revision. Nearing a creative roadblock and pretty much out of desperation, Stew takes out the original logo concepts, and reintroduces them as new ideas. They're extatic... they rave about them... they even had the audacity to say, "Now, this is what we've been looking for! Why couldn't we do this in the beginning?"
I've found that when I am coming up with new logo concepts for a client, nine times out of ten, they'll love the one I hate the most...
So, keep in mind, when you are designing that perfect logo, you're not designing a logo that you think the client wants.. you're designing a logo that the client thinks, you think they want. Good luck with that... in the mean time, here's a fantastic link that really sums up being a graphic designer and designing that perfect logo.
