Melbourne’s $200,000 Logo
The city of Melbourne, Australia revealed their new brand identity yesterday. The logo was developed by Landor’s Aussie branch. Preliminary research for the logo came in at about $74,000 and the design itself cost $120,000. Those who have rebranded destinations know they should have paid twice that given the politics of the work.
The brand is already in use and looking pretty nifty.
(Spreads lifted from the City Council’s Plan.)
You can experience the new identity via video as well.
Melbourne’s website quotes CEO Dr Kathy Alexander in saying the City will benefit from the logo in the following ways:
- Consolidation of multiple logos into a single, strong, cutting-edge design
- Better identification of services City of Melbourne is delivering
- Greater brand impact and flexibility
- More cost and time-effective in-house design and brand management
Australia’s Herald Sun reports that Lord Doyle “said the council was spending about $90,000 a year on other logos that represented City of Melbourne groups, so Melburnians would save money in the long term.” Lord Doyle also said the old logo was “a bit daggy,” and made at a time when he was listening to MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice and that Melbourne needed a strong and innovative brand.
Cool dude.
Not everyone’s happy about the change. A few hours from Melbourne is the City of Monash. The City paid $5k for thier ‘M’ logo.
Beth LaPierre is a Brand + Creative Strategist. When Beth is not helping build brands she’s on her snowboard, spray painting something, or drinking copious amounts of espresso. Follow Beth on Twitter.
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I want to work for that agency, lol.
I find Landor’s work to be categorically exemplary. It’s always interesting to know the kind of research that goes into concepting, evaluating and finalizing such a mark. I’d say at first glimpse, the icon itself seems busy, but once you read more about what this rebranding effort symbolizes, you can start to piece things together.
The city of Melbourne is embracing a “renaissance” and wanted to put forth a cutting edge design to consolidate what is currently a scattered brand image. Further, they’ve mentioned the rebranding would be meaningless without changes to the city that back it up.
I think the use of the angular elements in print and the motion in the video are really cool. I would expect big things!
I agree Ryan. I’d love to see the research and the creative brief behind this one.
Putting aside the over the top waste of taxpayers money!…sorry had to have a dig
I really like how the design brings to light the different facets that go to make up the city of Melbourne. Fashion, Art and modern architecture are the mainstays of this cosmopolitan environment.
It sounds like an awful lot of money, but I would say it’s only wasteful if the city fails to make the changes it’s proposing — which is apparently part of the plan.
Consider this: $200,000 toward a revitalized brand that initiates tens of millions in new development, job creation, tourism and income to the city each year. Could be the greatest investment Melbourne ever made…of course, provided they follow through in making it meaningful!
I don’t really think this is too much to pay for a good logo nor do I think it’s a waste of tax payer money. Every city that capitalizes or wants to capitalize on tourism should be continually putting effort into their brand.
At first glance I also wasn’t sure what I though of it but the more I see it the more I like it and I think the accompanying collateral exploits the elements of the logo really well.
brilliant
I find this logo very engaging. It immediately communicates “water”, “sun”, “trees (particularly Palm trees)” and “sand”. I’ve never been to Melbourne, but I’m assuming that those things are among it’s positive qualities.
The geometry within the “M” icon also wonderfully conveys reflection, or the shimmer and play of light across water and perhaps glass. This provides the sense that Melbourne is both a metropolitan center of art and architecture as well as a resort destination for outdoor enthusiasts. What some above have described as the “shatter” look actually communicates to me “multifaceted”, which is a very powerful connotation for a city and it’s logo to convey.
I was particularly drawn to how the “M” appears both 2D and 3D at once. There is a distinct feeling of peering through a window, and that lends a powerful metaphorical depth to the mark. The abstract nature of the color and the “facets” give the impression that what you’re viewing through that window is a quick, dynamic glimpse of something vibrant.
Things fall apart a bit at the text. It feels “stuck on” and appears more as an afterthought. It’s like they spent all their time on the “M” and then somebody realized they needed the words, too. The all-caps formation is difficult to read and the proportion of the text to the icon is a little off balance to my eye. However, the font does feel contemporary and clean, which also are two good adjectives to have associated with your city.
I wonder how accurate the dollar figures quoted actually are. No doubt some of that money was spent on additional branding, such as the video above as well as web and printed collateral.
As others have noted above, I agree that the return on investment in this branding initiative will justify the up front expense.
All in all, I think this is an exceptional identity.
I happen to live in Australia – in Sydney, to be more precise. Which seems to always overshadow Melbourne when it comes to tourism (without a logo anyone can recall, mind). This is primarily because Sydney has a reputation for its night life and awesome beaches. And the Opera House, which is more effective than any logo in making the city visually memorable.
I can understand Melbourne’s need to acquire a visual symbol that would make it stand out; however, looking at the new City of Melbourne logo I get three initial reactions:
1. Love the logo
2. But is has nothing to do with Melbourne as Australians see it, and love it: a city very European in feel, with old-fashioned architecture, a rich cultural life and awesome restaurants and cafes.
3. OMG how much did they pay?!
Ignoring the first and third reaction, the second is to me the crux of this matter: that logo, albeit cool, doesn’t stand for anything that makes Melbourne popular from a touristic point of view. As such, I fail to see how is it going to succeed in driving more tourists by suggesting Melbourne is some sort of modernistic, angular, La Defense style place.
I really can’t make up my mind whether this logo will work or not; I suppose seeing the brief and the plan that backs up this logo would help. But I just think “disconnect” every time I look at that logo.
This was a great piece to read. How can a logo be a branding effort? It really can’t. I’d like to know the other steps the City has taken to create buy-in of the brand.
Recently, I was part of a team tasked with developing a brand for the City of Fresno (California). There were several branding efforts in the past that ended in a logo and tag line that was meant to capture the hearts and minds of the internal and external audience. They did not succeed.
Our approach was to NOT provide a logo or tag line. This was a difficult concept for the client to grasp. Instead the focus was on AuthentiCity (it starts with being an authentic city). We developed a brand platform that could be used to audit campaigns and creative initiatives. We also focused on multiple brand touch points: Marketing, Policy, Employee Relations.
The brand platform workbook is available for review and download: http://travissheridan.blogspot.com/2009/07/authenticity-secret-of-place-branding.html
I will say that the research on the front end and the community engagement has resulting in nearly 100% buy-in. The brand is authentic and highlights true strengths.
I look forward to following this discussion.
hello there, just wished to mention thanks for this article, it assisted me notice one thing I did not given much thought to it beforehand.
I reckon i’ll be the first person in the comments to actually have lived in Melbourne.
First of all: i left the city back in 2008 and as hard as i am trying to remember the previous city logo i can’t do it without the help of a google images search. This tells me that they did really needed a logo, as for an outsider (and a designer) to have gone and lived in the city and not remember the logo when i used to attend many of the city’s events, museums, stadiums and the like, well, it tells me that their logo was not that appealing and not working at all.
However, I do recall AFL’s Bulldogs team logo, which is one of the worst AFL teams out there, but hey, i got free tickets at uni to watch them so it’s ok.
But my point here is that I totally agree with Ema Hoffmann’s comment:: “But is has nothing to do with Melbourne as Australians see it, and love it: a city very European in feel, with old-fashioned architecture, a rich cultural life and awesome restaurants and cafes”.
That is Melbourne, it’s not modern, downtown is just skycrappers with old buildings next to it and trams go in between, that ain’t modern for me, in no way you can compare it to a japanese city. But i can assure you that: it has an awesome nightlife, it’s cultural, there is a lot of movement and people like to live there… This is why from my point of view this logo looks way too cold and modern to represent the city.
I would also love to read the brief and the research, but for me that logo doesn’t resemble at all for any of the experiences, history, people & sights that Melbourne has to offer
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I don’t think it’s good. Looks like it was designed for a building that utilizes similar geometries. If one of Melbourne’s landmark buildings looked like this, then I can see it working.
I find a lot of the work coming from Landor to be off-brand and believe they are able to post-rationalize bad work to their clients based on their reputation and client list.
I also think the application of the brand through the advertising is just awful. A total afterthought.
The emperor has no clothes my friends,
-dp