SKAGGS

There’s something about growing old gracefully that you’ve got to admire. In an age where Botox and surgery rule, it’s refreshing to see companies that embrace a woman’s natural beauty and produce products that aim to enhance and “beautify” your features…not change them dramatically. Enter Erno Laszo.

Dr Erno Laszlo was the pioneer of custom skin care. His work with movie stars, the social elite and members of the monarchy around the world is legendary and Erno Laszlo’s skin care products still have a huge and passionate following. In collaboration with KVDNYC, we took to modernizing his famed legacy and gave the Erno Laszlo marketing collateral a SKAGGS style facelift. This resulted in a rejuvenated marketing piece that retained its classic good looks, yet feels contemporary.
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Whilst on the subject of “not quite there” logos, I came across this little gem.
I really have to wonder who helped the CIA out with their new DCI Counterterrorist Center “Terrorist Buster” identity. Ladies and gents, I kid you not…this is 100% real.
Thoughts? Anyone?

Dear Smart Design
First of all I’d like to begin by saying my views are not representative of SKAGGS or any of its other employees. Secondly I’d like to say that I’ve bitten my tongue for long enough. The new NYC Taxi Logo is absolutely awful…AWFUL!!!

Not a day goes by where I don’t gnash and grind my teeth about it. The fact that I have to see this big black blocky logo every single day frustrates me immensely. I can’t ignore it and I’ve tried to get over it and accept that bad design still exists. However this has proved nearly impossible, as yellow cabs are everywhere.

Smart Design, you’ve ruined New York’s most ubiquitous symbol in fact you’ve pretty much murdered my love for the NYC cab aesthetic. I’m not a native New Yorker - but as a legal alien that lives, breathes, sleeps, eats, designs and works here I feel that I have every right to call you out on your despicable design.

“Let’s make it iconic and big,” he said. “Everybody knows what it is. You don’t need the words.” — Davin Stowell

Mr Stowell, I fully understand what you were trying to achieve, but many large brands have perfectly good logos that are iconic and big, without being ugly. Please see: Nike, Adidas, Fedex, Virgin, Apple, Coca Cola…even Home Depot!
I also read that Wolf Ollins, had a dastardly part in this, with their awful NYC Visit logo - didn’t they do enough damage with the London 2012 Olympic logo disaster?!?!!?!?!?

I could go on and on for days re: what’s wrong with the logo but I won’t. My blood pressure is high enough as it is, and I’m quite sure you’ve heard and read everything there is to read about how bad the logo is all over the blogosphere.

All in all, as a designer I have to commend you for your hard work, I’m just terribly disappointed. As a member of the public, I’d just like to say that I hope we never meet on a dark night*.

*I would never think of doing anything that involved actual bodily harm, ’tis a figure of speech.

Food Glorious Food! — The best way to anyone’s heart, especially if it’s gourmet and specially prepared for you…The seasons of over eating are almost upon us and what better way to kick off the culinary delights fest, than announcing the completion of our latest “scrumptious” project. In collaboration with the brand gurus at KVD NYC, we created a brand identity, marketing collateral and website for Samantha McCuen — chief “Gourmette” of Scrumptious — the New York City based company, whose services can only be described as personal, culinary luxury. We think the entire project’s results are pretty delicious, after the jump find out more on the project as well as pictures taken when Sam gave us a sneak preview of her cooking skills. Read the rest of this entry »

An interesting study came out earlier this week which found that children, some as young as 3, found food wrapped in McDonald’s packaging six times tastier than identical food in plain wrappers.

This study comes on the heels of other research linking skyrocketing childhood obesity rates to advertising and corporations backing away from marketing aimed at children under the age of twelve. Dr. Victor Strasburger, author of an American Academy of Pediatrics policy urging limits on the marketing to children, said the study shows not enough is being done.

“It’s an amazing study and it’s very sad,” Strasburger said. “Advertisers have tried to do exactly what this study is talking about - to brand younger and younger children, to instill in them an almost obsessional desire for a particular brand-name product,” he said.

I agree, I think it’s really sad. Read the story here at Time Magazing or at the The Daily Mail

In a follow-up, I came across this article on MSNBC which talks about how parents can battle the “McBranding”. On solution is for parents to begin to think like advertisers.

When Liesl Hyde’s daughter, Madi, was a toddler, McDonald’s was the “magic button.” The little girl would refuse to eat all day, but the sight of the familiar sign could spark her hunger.

Hyde, who works in advertising sales, didn’t ban the food, though. Instead, she made it a point to start observing what it was about the fast food that made it work. Part of the toddler appeal, she discovered, was that McDonald’s was recognizable and ubiquitous.

“At some point I started to use this idea with Madi and the foods I wanted her to eat. I decided I was going to keep exposing her to a variety of healthy foods, and even if she said she didn’t like them or wouldn’t eat them, I kept it up,” recalls Hyde of Orono, Minn.

Gradually, Madi started accepting a wide variety of fruits and vegetables.

I’ve always thought that large global corporations could often be ruthless and now there appears to be proof.

The red cross symbol is an icon of relief from disaster. For months, it has also been the subject of a festering disagreement between major American institutions: the health care company Johnson & Johnson and the American Red Cross. The dispute over rights to the symbol erupted to the surface yesterday in federal court in Manhattan, where J.& J. sued the American Red Cross. Johnson & Johnson, based in New Brunswick, N.J., asked in the lawsuit that all the goods be destroyed and that all profits from the goods, along with costs and punitive damages, be awarded to Johnson & Johnson.

[Source]

We all know that the world of fashion is extremely fickle and that exclusivity is pretty much key. I recently found an interesting article on HRH Posh Spice and her ability to kill a brand.

It brought me back to a long and heated discussion I once had regarding Burberry and their right to stop producing their infamous check because it was being “cheapened” by individuals they did not consider their target audience. My opposition on the matter felt that Burberry’s behavior was elitist, despicable and that if you could afford and want to buy Burberry, (in particluar the chequered items) you should. (BBC article on the matter)

I on the other hand felt that they had a right to do so, after all it was damaging their image. Unwanted individuals (Chavs) were buying the more affordable smaller items with the recognizable check and the wealthier consumers were buying pricier items (still with check).

Imagine Lady Muck with her “Burberried” handbag stepping out of her chauffer driven limousine to see Sharon and Pete head to toe in Burberry pushing a “Burberried” stroller on their way to the welfare office.

That doesn’t bode well for “luxury” or “exclusivity” at all, which I think is key to Burberry’s business. The Brand Killer article confirmed my thoughts on the matter. I know it’s snobby and in all fairness you should be able to wear what you want regardless of a brand’s disdain, but when it comes down to dollars, cents, pounds, euros and shareholders, I think a business has the right to protect it’s image…

Thoughts?

The 2012 London Olympics logo was unveiled to much mumbling, grumbling and criticism.

The four block-style jagged pieces combine to form the numbers 2012 in a variety of pink, blue, green and orange colours and is designed to appeal to young people. Stephen Bayley, London’s Design Museum founder and cultural commentator, described it as: “a puerile mess, an artistic flop and a commercial scandal.”

I’m myself am absolutely speechless…What happened!!??!?!
Your thoughts?

(Joe)
Just for some fun, here is what we will all look like in 2012.

I love FCUK’s lo-fi punk/zine aesthetic for their 2007 Collection, especially in print. Posters around town appear as if they’ve been duct-taped to the wall.

Jonina and I took a whole day last Tuesday for the PSFK Conference and I’ve been catching up ever since, hence my delay in posting. Wow, there’s a lot to say and quite honestly I don’t know where to begin. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was definitely an eye opener in terms of what other creatives are doing in the industry and what their thoughts for the future are.

There were some presentations and panel discussions that were inspirational and others that quite simply bored the hell out of me (the man sat next to me snored his way through one).

Rather than do a mega-post, I just wanted to touch on a those that inspired me the most:

I’m not much of a technology geek but Kevin Slavin of area/code had me on the edge of my seat: His presentation on taking game interactivity from the screen to the street back to the screen again and the technologies that were to come (I’m skimming it was way too detailed for me to post all at once) was brilliant.

Doug Jaeger of HappyCorpGlobal - amazing. He showed video of the LVHRD events and I have to say that Brand as Entertainment is a concept I’ve never even thought about or heard of until now.

George Parker - I loved his honesty, his bad language and his passion, please check out his blogs, they’re a great read.

Finally: Mike Byrne of Anomaly - he had the toughest job in terms of keeping everyone’s attention. He was the last speaker of the day and people were either bored or just plain tired, I have to admit my brain was hurting a little.

He was truly inspirational. He spoke about childhood and the care free attitudes we had then and how that is essentially what we need to bring this kind of thinking back to advertising and creativity in general. As he spoke the hair on the back of my neck stood up - because he’s absolutely right and I’ve never heard anybody speak so passionately about what they love. (apart from myself when I quit A Level English and Spanish told my parents I was going to study graphic design).

I think for a first conference it was great and I’ll definitely go to the next one, although maybe the 8am start time could do with a rethink.