"logos" news and stories

A new year, a new logo. The Wall Street Journal reports that the Starbucks mermaid is now going to fly solo, the company's 40th-anniversary logo shedding the Starbucks Coffee name in favor of a simple supersized trademark sea creature with the wild and wavy hair. Chief Executive Howard Schultz, at a webcast for baristas, said, "Even though we have been and always will be a coffee company and retailer, it's possible we'll have other products with our name on it and no coffee in it," the Journal reports.

Seattle's Best Coffee turns 40 this year, and is marking the occasion with something of a renaissance -- or midlife crisis. The brand, which has been owned by Starbucks for the past seven years, has long been number two (ironic, given its name) to the ubiquitous green label. Now the company is taking a totally different approach, pitting Seattle's Best against other players, namely the fast-food giants that got into the premium coffee game fairly recently, such as McDonald's and Dunkin' Donuts.

In order to effect this change, the newly positioned Seattle's Best has a stripped-down logo intended to "match [their] optimistic outlook and simplified approach" -- although some question whether the extreme simplicity moves into the realm of the generic. Tom Ehlers, a former Starbucks executive who is now vice president of retail for Seattle's Best, told The Wall Street Journal that Seattle's Best will be the Old Navy to Starbuck's Gap. Citing the jump in overall premium coffee sales (from 29 percent to 35 percent in three years, despite the recession), Ehlers points out that mass-market coffee is a sales gambit that has worked: "Regular people have found their way to great coffee."

I've always had an appreciation for the history of logos. One is created and recognized, then societal pressures or eager marketers come in and attempt to modernize things, sometimes succeeding, and sometimes failing. Considering my recent post on Tropicana, I thought I'd share a new post up at Neatorama -- they've gone through and shared how different logos have morphed over the years.

Above, you can check out the Morton Salt girl. I picked her for this post because it confused me the most. Here you have a little tyke in 1914, with an umbrella so large that it pretty much dwarfs her as she stands there in her to-the-knee frock. But then, she gets older and skinnier, with her hemline rising until it's so flipping high that if you saw the 1968 girl from a different angle, you'd know what her underwear would look like. Does someone say: "Hey, that dress is too long!"?

But Morton aside, you can check out everything from the morphing Aunt Jemima, to a company's notions on what a modern Betty Crocker would look like. Heck, you can even see what the Gerber baby grew into!

[via Serious Eats]